Manchester United interim manager Ralf Rangnick adjusted the team’s setup in Sunday’s 1-0 win over Crystal Palace at Old Trafford, despite having just one training session with his new troops
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Rangnick reflects on first win as Man Utd manager
Fred’s late 78th-minute strike handed new manager Ralf Rangnick the perfect start to his tenure at Old Trafford.
Although the 1-0 win against Crystal Palace lacked the drama of Wednesday night’s 3-2 thriller with Arsenal, the result paired with a promising performance left many United fans pleased with what they’d seen.
Perhaps most satisfying was how the team not only adapted but thrived playing within the 4-2-2-2 formation Rangnick deployed for the encounter.
“For me, it was logical not to change too many positions or too many things after the win against Arsenal,” the German explained. “Everyone was fully fit, nobody was injured, fully recovered, I started to play the same starting XI.
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“For me, the question was how do we get pressure on the ball, how do we get control? So I decided to play 4-2-2-2 with two strikers, not Cristiano alone up front, together with Marcus, using pace for vertical balls.”
Although Rangnick had only days in which to get across his philosophy to the squad, it was surprising how United players looked more than understanding of their roles.
Central midfielders, namely Scott McTominay and Fred, remained slightly deeper behind wider midfielders who often drifted into central locations to create a box shape in behind the two forward players.
To compensate for wide players drifting centrally, the wing-backs were heavily relied upon to provide width and support in attacks. We can capture how the same panned out in game by looking at the below ‘average positions’ map.
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Image:
Sofascore)
As alluded to by Rangnick, this system is beneficial for a couple of reasons. It firstly allows attacking players to occupy areas in between the lines, which aids direct and progressive passes forward and also often provides them with a numerical advantage through the middle.
Notably in this game, United completed more progressive passes than in any of their previous seven league matches (40).
They also completed their second-highest number of passes into the box this season (13), and their third-highest number of long passes (96).
Interestingly with regards to the latter, the success rate in terms of finding a United player from these long passes was fairly low (61.5%), yet expect this to be a regular occurrence throughout the season.
Rangnick will encourage his side to fire balls towards the opposition’s goal, even if not always accurate, hoping to create opportunities in which they can press with their opponents and potentially force valuable turnovers in dangerous areas.
The close proximity of players within the 4-2-2-2 formation allowed United to press in packs and in a more coordinated manner on Sunday. It’s also a big reason why we saw United’s defensive line much higher up the pitch, condensing the gaps in between the lines.
Coincidently against Palace, United made more successful pressures than in any other Premier League game this season (55).
Whilst Rangnick will of course be eager to fine-tune the setup in these coming weeks and months, the early signs are good.
United players responded well to playing in this new system highlighted by the performance and above underlying numbers, and now fans will be eager to see if the side can build on this solid start under Rangnick when they take on Young Boys in the Champions League on Wednesday.
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