Manchester United and Strategy Strangeness Jose Mourinho

Manchester United defeated three goals without reply from Tottenham Hotspur in the third week of the Premier League, at Old Trafford Stadium, Manchester, Monday (08/27/2018) local time. In that match, manager Jose Mourinho used an unusual strategy.

Mourinho tries to play the three-defender scheme in a 3-5-2 formation. Although this scheme was used in the past season, Mourinho is a manager who usually likes to use a four-defender parallel formation.

Even more surprising, Mourinho forced Ander Herrera to become one of three equal defenders in Manchester United. Herrera plays in the right center-back position, accompanying Chris Smalling as center-back and Phil Jones as left center-back.

This is quite surprising. Because, so far Herrera is known as a central midfielder. Reported by Transfermarkt, Herrera is the first time playing as a central defender from a total of 376 matches with his clubs in Real Zaragoza, Athletic Bilbao and Manchester United.

The decision proved wrong, at least looking at Tottenham Hotspur's second goal scored by Lucas Moura in the 52nd minute. The goal began with Herrera's unpreparedness to carry out the offside strategy commanded by Smalling.

Herrera was late in carrying out this strategy which made Christian Eriksen escape the offside trap. Eriksen freely crossed to Lucas Moura who then fired a shot to break David de Gea's goal.

After the goal, Herrera was replaced by Alexis Sanchez to increase the team's power and change the scheme back into four equal defenders, namely Antonio Valencia, Smalling, Jones, and Luke Shaw.

Mourinho's decision to make Herrera as a central defender is indeed confusing. Ironically, Mourinho saved Victor Lindelof, a pure central defender on the bench and only played to replace injured Jones in the second half.