Sporting Life
Michael Duff

Gab Sutton EFL Insider: All eyes on the managers

By Gab Sutton
Football
Sat September 16, 2023 · 1y ago

In his first Sporting Life column, Sky Bet EFL expert Gab Sutton picks out five EFL focuses for the coming weekend, including two new managers and two under pressure.

  • @GabSutton is a football expert who specialises in the Sky Bet EFL

Duff desperate for derby win

Michael Duff was long overdue his shot at Championship management, having met – or in some cases, hugely exceeded – his targets in each of his first five seasons in management.

Duff made history at Cheltenham, leading them to their first EFL title and highest finish in successive seasons, and his work at Barnsley was equally impressive.

The Northern Irishman inherited a broken club after an embarrassing relegation from the Championship in 2021-22 and changed the culture, establishing a clear style of play, delivering a team that earned 86 points and a comfortable play-off berth.

But it has not started smoothly at Swansea.

Joël Piroe departure to Leeds was a serious blow to Swansea

Two points from their first five league games has seen the pressure mount already, though they have not yet faced anyone currently below 14th in the table.

Duff admitted his side were poor in defeat by Bristol City before the international break, honesty that will only go down well with fans if it is followed by improved performances and results – especially when facing your arch rivals next up.

Cardiff are monitoring the fitness of key man Aaron Ramsey, who was forced off in Wales’ 2-0 victory over Latvia on Tuesday.

Bluebirds boss Erol Bulut will need the 32-year-old at his best for what is both coaches’ first south Wales derby.

‘Streaky Lee’ to start fast at Fleetwood?

Fleetwood acted quickly to replace Scott Brown, who left the club with one point from six games and 23rd in League One, by appointing Lee Johnson a fortnight after the 42-year-old was himself sacked by Hibs.

Johnson has a reputation for taking teams on long winning and unbeaten streaks, when his flexibility can be a strength, but struggling to arrest slides when things go awry, sometimes through changing too much in terms of style, formation, and personnel.

The former midfielder has had a positive initial impact at all five of the clubs he’s managed: four wins in 10 at League One strugglers Oldham, five straight wins at Barnsley, three wins in four at Bristol City, two defeats in 23 at Sunderland and five wins in nine at Hibs.

He’ll need to harness all of that when Fleetwood host high-flying Oxford, who have won four their last five league games.

Harsh on Holden, Appleton a risk

After achieving top 10 form after Dean Holden took charge midway through last term, Charlton were hoping to challenge for the play-offs in 2023-24, but their early season form has been disappointing.

A four-game losing streak saw Holden lose his job, though in reality he was up against despite the eye-catching summer acquisition of Alfie May.

The 43-year-old was working with an imbalanced squad, hindered further by injuries to key players in Scott Fraser, Panutche Camara and Miles Leaburn, to the point he started four academy graduates in his final game in charge.

Holden was not backed to build a squad capable of a top-six push.

What he did have in his favour was that he is a largely open book, meaning he was able to quicky form a connection with supporters. The risk Charlton have taken by appointing Michael Appleton is that he doesn’t seem to care so much about that side of things.

Michael Appleton has helped develop plenty of young EFL talent including Brennan Johnson

Appleton prefers to focus on the technical side of the job and is excellent at that, a proven developer of such talents as Kemar Roofe, John Lundstram and Brennan Johnson.

However, he has done his best work at stable clubs under good owners – Oxford and Lincoln – where the overall project is rarely questioned, and he is given space to do what he does best.

At Charlton, connection with supporters is high on the priority list for fans given the decade or more of turmoil the club has been through off the field.

If Appleton brings everyone together, it will likely be entirely through results on the pitch.

Beginning his tenure at Steve Evans’ newly-promoted, top-of-the-table Stevenage is far from straightforward then.

Bradford blueprint or Harrogate to haunt Hughes?

Bradford were disjointed in Sky Bet League Two last season but the form of individuals, goalkeeper Harry Lewis and striker Andy Cook in particular, carried them into the play-offs.

The concern this term is they aren’t playing any better and those key men aren’t bailing them out.

Lewis has spoken openly about their play-off semi-final defeat by Carlisle taking a long time to get over and perhaps that has had a knock-on effect into the current campaign.

Cook – who scored 28 league goals last season – started this one sluggishly before getting injured.

And despite a succession of other injuries Mark Hughes has persisted with a formation that simply does not suit the personnel available.

It came to a head last weekend at home to Grimsby when they were booed off trailing 1-0 at half-time – but that may have proved to be the turning point.

Hughes switched to a back four at the break which sparked a huge improvement in performance, with academy graduate Bobby Pointon, on his full EFL debut, and the introductions of loanees Rayhaan Tulloch and Chisom Afoka all pivotal before the Alex Gilliead drilled in an equaliser on his return from injury.

That period laid out a possible template for Hughes to move forward with and enable Bradford to quickly climb from their current position of 17th.

But should he revert to type and they fail to win at home to struggling Harrogate, the former Manchester City boss could be in serious trouble.

Clash of the inverted right-backs

Relegated from the Premier League last season, Leicester and Southampton had made positive starts to their attempts at an instant return before losing their final games prior to the international break, with Southampton thrashed 5-0 at Sunderland in the shock result of the Sky Bet EFL weekend.

The similarities between the Foxes and Saints extend to a tactical quirk, one that is rare in the Championship: a full-back who becomes a midfielder during the game. That makes it almost impossible to pin either side down to a single formation.

Without the ball, Southampton and Leicester line up in a 4-3-3 with Kyle Walker-Peters and Ricardo Pereira as their respective right-backs.

With the ball, which is 71% and 65% of the time on average, both operate in midfield, with Leicester switching to more of a 3-3-4 and Leicester a 3-1-3-3.

There are subtle differences to how Russ Martin and Enzo Maresca make this work.

The most prominent area for Walker-Peters has been the space between the right of the centre circle and the touchline, and between halfway and the edge of the final third.

Southampton still rely on him to hold the width at times and combine on the flank with the outside midfielder and inside forward – Will Smallbone and Sékou Mara or Carlos Alcaraz and Sam Amo-Ameyaw – though no one player takes on that width permanently.

Walker-Peters is operating as a ‘volante’ for the Football Manager players (or Brazilian football lovers) out there, which is a cross between a wing-back and central midfielder.

He is the closest thing Southampton have to a wing-back positionally, but adopts the mentality of a midfielder, which will make for some interesting changes in output as the season progresses.

Ricardo Pereira played in a more attacking role for Leicester in 2018/19 to great effect

In Pereira’s case, he’s been inverted into an even more central role than Walker-Peters, which is not completely new to him having been used in a variety of positions since joining Leicester in 2019.

The Foxes’ opening weekend win over Coventry was the only time he has stayed primarily on the right and beyond the halfway line.

Wilfred Ndidi, a midfielder in the out of possession shape, overloads the flank while the right inside forward – Wanya Marçal-Madivadua, Yunus Akgün or Abdul Fatawu – acts like a kind of wing-back.

Like Southampton, Leicester play with a back three in build-up, yet don’t really have designated wing-backs: they simply balance responsibilities between the relevant midfielder wide of Harry Winks at the base and the inside forward, leaving Pereira free to control and create from midfield.

Pereira’s experience playing the inverted right-back role for Portugal, and Walker-Peters’ two-footedness and in-game intelligence, have been integral to making their respective remits work for Leicester and Southampton, and by extension the systems themselves.

Those roles are by far the most important to how Maresca and Martin’s teams play, and which player performs best on Friday night could have a big say in determining the outcome.

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