When the Italy team-sheets were out Monday night, there was a flutter on the social media. What formation was this? It was indeed a far cry from the Italian line-up two years ago in the World Cup. Buffon had in front of him a three-man defence. Matteo Darmian — usually down at right back or sitting on the bench for Manchester United — was playing way up the wing, high enough to smell the sweat on forward Eder's back. Emanuele Giaccherini, who struggled out wide for Sunderland, occupied a central slot. It all looked rather strange. Would it work against the star-studded Belgian team?
Ninety minutes later, Antonio Conte was being hailed as a tactical genius.
Belgium lined up more or less as expected with Marc Wilmots scattering all the gunpowder he had on the pitch. One imagines his pre-match team talk involved telling the likes of Eden Hazard, Romelu Lukaku, Kevin de Bruyne and Marouane Fellaini to 'go do their thing.' Conte, however, had strategically placed his mines in specific areas of the pitch and the Belgians unerringly trod on all of them.
The 3-5-2 is no tactical innovation. Louis van Gaal famously powered the Netherlands to the final of the 2014 World Cup with his version of the formation. But the one that Italy employed on Monday was so fluid, so mobile that it was not 3-5-2 most of the time at all! When the Azzurri had the ball, Darmian and Antonio Candreva pushed up, while Giaccherini and Marco Parolo made piercing runs from midfield, dragging the Italian defence out of shape. When the ball was lost, Darmian dropped back and Giaccherini pushed wide, and the 3-5-2 morphed into a regular 4-4-2. This effectively pegged back the two Belgian full-backs, meaning that Radja Naingollan & co had to drift out of position, looking for width. That left holes, ones that Eden Hazard & co had to track back to fill. Consequently, Lukaku looked as lonely as as shipwrecked sailor up front. Italy took around 15 minutes to oil their machinery and then rolled over Belgium.
Talk before the game had been all about how 'the worst Italian team in years' would take on a Belgian team brimming with some of the most sought-after attacking talent in the world. In the end, it proved to be a mismatch between the archaic Wilmots and the meticulous, tactically astute Conte. And victory, in a rather brutal fashion, belonged to the incoming Chelsea manager.
Fans at Stamford Bridge though would do well to not hyperventilate over their new manager's genius. A couple of years ago in Brazil, another manager, spoken for by a major English club, wowed the world with his bizarre yet effective tactics (including subbing a goalkeeper just for a penalty shootout). We all know how Louis van Gaal’s move to Manchester United worked out.