Wilfried Nancy’s Celtic spell hasn’t gone to plan in his first two games.
Nancy agreed to a daunting start, with three decisive games in three different competitions in his first week.
Given the immediate changes he has made to the team’s system from how they played under Martin O’Neill, this looks like a poor decision on reflection.
Yang Hyun-Jun and Sebastian Tounekti are playing out of position in Nancy’s 3-4-3, and it hasn’t yielded results so far.
And Jordi Cruyff’s words this week on changing to a new system under a new manager feel very relevant to Celtic at the minute.
Jordi Cruyff’s words send a message to Celtic and Wilfried Nancy
Celtic created chances in their 2-1 defeat to Hearts, ultimately being picked off despite some positive play.
But in the Europa League meeting with Roma, the team were completely outclassed and swept aside by half-time.
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It didn’t look like the system would be in full-flow any time soon – and for Cruyff, speaking on The Overlap, this is to be expected.
“Of course, when things don’t work out, it’s easy to give an opinion, and say things went wrong.
“But I love strategy. I’m always studying strategy. In November, I have a squad that’s built to play a certain way with a back four, and then you bring in November a coach who’s done a fantastic job in his other club, but he comes here, and he wants to change his way of playing…
“Sometimes, the squad and what he wants, it doesn’t go together. And in November, it’s not gonna work out. You need one or two transfer periods to change that a little bit.
“So to put him there, when the squad is not really made for his way of playing, it’s a risk.
“And then you have a bad season – in the summer, what are you gonna do?
“In Spain, you have a sport director who gives you information upstairs, but he also needs to know that this is the squad we’re gonna have, and we’re not going to change 50% of the players.
“Because wing backs, normally, they are specialised in going back and forth. If they’re in a back four, sometimes they’re not good enough to be a pure defender, and sometimes they’re not good enough to be a pure winger.
“So if you go that way, and things go wrong after one half-year, and you bring back a coach who is a back four, you have to make a lot of transfers again.
“So there is a lot of strategic things.”
Was Wilfried Nancy right to instantly implement his 3-4-3 at Celtic?
Celtic players in Wilfried Nancy’s new system
Much has been made of Nancy’s back three being made up entirely of left-footers, something you don’t see often.
Colby Donovan’s appearance as a right centre back in the later stages against Roma was a telling representation of how Nancy views his options at Celtic.
In attack, Daizen Maeda has cut a noticeably frustrated figure due to his lack of service. Arne Engels and Reo Hatate have both been used as wide number 10s, neither looking comfortable doing so.
Benjamin Nygren, who you’d expect to look more comfortable in that role, was hooked at half-time against Roma having noticeably struggled.
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