Newcastle United 2 Forest 0: Tactical analysis

Forest were welcomed back to The Premier League on Saturday by a dominant Newcastle side. The Reds defended bravely but were undone by classy goals from Fabian Schar and Callum Wilson, losing the game 2-0.

Steve Cooper began the season using his favoured 3-4-1-2 system. Jesse Lingard, Harry Toffolo, Dean Henderson, Lewis O’Brien, Moussa Niakhate and Nico Williams all made their first competitive starts in the garibaldi. Along with substitutes Taiwo Awoniyi and Orel Mangala, this meant 8 players made their debuts in an unfamiliar looking side.

Eddie Howe deployed a 4-3-3. With only goalkeeper Nick Pope making his debut this was a settled team looking to continue last season’s good progress.

Variants of the 3-4-3 have become popular over the last few seasons, however it seems to me that the very best managers are finding a way to use the 4-3-3 and Newcastle demonstrated exactly how it should be used in modern football.

As the game kicked off Forest looked bright, even breaking their opponents’ lines with the beginnings of a nice move through the middle – however this was stamped out immediately.

Newcastle set about pressing hard and intelligently in order to eliminate Forest’s passing game. The 4-3-3 formation is ideal for the press if you have physical enough players who know their jobs, in a settled team – The Magpies tick all of these boxes.

Cooper likes his central defenders to interact with the keeper and trigger attacks, however Newcastle’s front three would not allow this – the exertions of these players, in particular Allan Saint-Maximin and Miguel Almiron was impressive, probably demonstrating that the step up Forest will have to deal with is not just in skill, but in physicality too.

Although harried Forest often broke this line, however the midfield trio was where the Newcastle press bit; O’Brien and his midfield partner Jack Colback were outmuscled and outnumbered in this area.

Bruno Guimaraes anchored Newcastle's midfield, assisted by Joelinton and Joe Willock. The two Brazilians are fantastic all-round midfielders; supported by the defenders they were stopping Forest bring the ball through this part of the pitch, pressing hard here but appearing to deliberately allow Forest to play the ball out wide to their wing-backs.

This was a cute tactical move – it made the wing-backs come closer in order to have an easier pass, which allowed Newcastle’s own full-backs to creep forward, but mainly once the ball was over to one side of the pitch, Forest had less options. Newcastle’s press cut off the switch in play and had dictated the area Forest could safely play the ball into – they were ready to pounce on the likes of Lingard showing for the ball in this part of the pitch.

The reds stuck with their plan to an extent – they tried to swash-buckle their way through but Guimaraes and Joelinton in particular were too strong.

They were having to play more and more long balls, however these were almost always won by Newcastle.

Forest were trapped.

They did manage to break forward on a couple of occasions, however as the game went on and Newcastle pushed forward, the starting position of Forest’s wing-backs and midfielders became too deep for them to to get forward quickly enough to help.

Having won the midfield battle, Newcastle’s stifling and overbearing presence was camped firmly in Forest’s half reminiscent of an attack v defence session.

For a team new to this level, penned into their own third of the pitch by a team seeing a large amount of the ball, Forest defended well. Supported by the wing-backs, they were able to narrow their back three and concentrate on defending the penalty area. At times the central midfielders had to drop into the defence too, especially when defending deep or pulled around by Newcastle players.

It could be argued that Forest were unambitious in playing this way – why cede the pitch and concentrate on defending your penalty area?

Cooper did actually try to leave players up the pitch to form a threat, but sometimes in football you have to accept that you can’t have tactical superiority, and have to just make life difficult for your opponents. Who knows - the situation may change, you might be able to steal a goal, or hold out for a point.

On this occasion, Newcastle were too good. In possession they had the fluidity of a well coached team used to each other’s runs off the ball, and their front six players moved around the pitch to cause overloads and uncertainty in the Forest defence.

This was most problematic just after losing the ball. The Reds seemed half a second behind Newcastle in their thinking and would do brilliantly to scamper back into position to defend one threat, however Newcastle were already creating another problem, patiently working their way into an even better position.

We see a good example of this below, as Newcastle pull Forest around the pitch by creating an overload on Forest's left, and using it to gain a shooting opportunity at close range.

Forest coped reasonably well defensively, however they were unable to combine this with being in a position to hurt Newcastle on the turnover, so the waves of attack came again and again. Johnson, Lingard and at times Surridge were told not to get too involved in closing down in Forest’s half in order to be available when The Reds won the ball, but this still did not create enough threat.

Disaster was almost inevitable and ironically, for all of Newcastle’s brilliant movement and intuitive build up, the breakthrough came from a central defender’s long range shot in the kind of area Forest appeared happy to let their opponents have the ball.

Fabian Schar’s thunderbolt put the home side ahead after almost an hour of pressure, and Wilson added to this, getting the better of Niakhate to skilfully flick past Henderson.

Cooper will need to find a way to maintain defensive solidity but still have players high enough up the pitch to hurt the opposition. Forest spent the first half of last season struggling to do this in variants of Cooper’s favourite the 3-4-3 formations, forcing him to switch to his plan B system, a 4-2-3-1.

However, he was determined to make the 3-4-1-2 work and there is nothing to suggest it will be abandoned, even against more difficult opposition.

Cooper needed a lot of hours on the training field to instil the fluidity required to balance his system – with almost a new team this may be the case all over again. Over 50% of the minutes played last season have left the club or are unavailable. Forest have needed to spend big and brought in a lot of players.

Newcastle are an excellent team – and crucially they've had a long time to develop an understanding. Their strategy of steady improvement is clever and makes life easy for Howe. They all knew what to do while Forest, while defending well, looked like a team that had not played together much.

And for context it is no disgrace losing at St James’ Park – Newcastle won 7 of their last 8 there last season with only Liverpool managing a slim 1-0 victory. Their smothering, physical strategy will thwart more established teams than Forest in the weeks to come.

Forest have a lot of work to do, however they have the right man in charge, if given time. The transition may be smoother once they have Ryan Yates and Steve Cook available – both players were key to making Cooper’s 3-4-1-2 system work last season.

If The Reds can find a striker able to get hold of the ball in the opposition half, either one already in their ranks or a new signing, they should be able to make things work. Hopefully they will not regret not signing Keinan Davis, who I think is ready for this level.

Newcastle are sure to have a good season - I see no reason why they cannot challenge for the top 6 if Wilson stays fit. Forest will improve however we may see a change of system in the near future to enable them to spring forward quicker. Hopefully we'll see that against West Ham this week.