For the second week in a row, Swansea City came back from behind to claim a 1-1 draw and a point against Everton, here’s a look at the average positions map from the game.
With van der Hoorn suffering a shoulder injury at West Brom last week and only making the bench, Carlos Carvalhal opted to switch to a back four, something the fans were in favour of before the game, rather than replacing the Dutch defender with Kyle Bartley, who didn’t do near enough at the Hawthorns to stake his claim for a starting birth this weekend.
The average positions of both Swansea and Everton are shown below, with the Swans in red on the left, attacking left to right.
Average Positions Map
The Swans played with a lot more attacking freedom compared to their recent displays away from home. Carvalhal allows his team to play that way on home soil but prefers to revert back to a more conservative approach on their travels. As you can see, compared to last week (see average positions vs West Brom here), we played further forward, with only 3 outfield players averaging a position in their own half.
System Imbalance
Our imbalance that you can see above makes it tricky to understand exactly what the formation was, as Olsson lacked wide attacking support in front of him, while Narsingh played wide in front of right back Naughton. Was Carroll meant to be playing wide left, with Narsingh wide right in a 4-4-2? Or was it a 4-3-3 with Narsingh playing deeper than he should have been, and Carroll the opposite, as he left Ki and King behind him in central midfield?
I’d assume the latter, with Carroll being the third central midfielder in a 4-3-3 with the license to roam forward, while Narsingh – who was supposed to play as a wide right attacker in a front 3 with the Ayew’s, forced to play deeper to provide defensive support in front of Naughton.
Despite the imbalance and what formation it was, it kept the opposition guessing and it worked, it was a performance where we created enough chances to win the game. Olsson’s lack of cover in front of him didn’t affect us too much because, as many teams seem to do now, Everton were far busier down our right side (45%).
On the left side, Tom Carroll played more centrally and close to the Ayew brothers.
Andre Ayew, as he’s always done, played wide right at times, but was always coming inside to get into better goalscoring positions.
Everton’s 4-1-4-1
In contrast, Everton’s shape was better balanced, in a 4-1-4-1 shape, with Schneiderlin playing just in front of the back four. Bolasie and Walcott offered the width, with Gueye and Rooney playing through the middle behind striker Tosun.
But despite having the likes of Bolasie and Walcott in the side, Everton were severely lacking in an attacking sense. They were solid enough defensively, but there was no real style and pattern to their play. It was clear to see why their fans are getting more and more frustrated with manager Sam Allardyce, and his lack of ambition.
