Revealed: How Arteta will teak his tactics and formation to fit Willian in

 By 1970's Gooner

A lot of journalists and of course fans have been wondering how Willian will fit in in an Arsenal side which, offensively wise, has finished the season pretty well, beating among others Manchester City in the semi and Chelsea in the FA Cup final.

In those games Pepe has shown improvement in both his attacking displays playing out on the right wing of a three pronged attack in a 3 4 3 formation and also attending to his defensive duties with diligence.

But if we assume that all of Arsenal's first and second choice attacking players are kept on the books for the coming season then Pepe would be the most likely choice to make way IF Arteta does decide that he will choose Willian as a first choice over Pepe. 

But in my opinion Arteta will tend to use Willian in a variety of ways.

Firstly, in a 3 4 3 system he will keep Aubameyang on the left side as he has shown how effective he can be from there coming in towards the middle. Lacazette will be dropping slightly back to receive the ball and distribute it forwards as he has done so well this season. So under such a system Willian will be in direct competition with Pepe and whoever is injured or lacking in form will be on the bench. In this way the one can be a substitute for the other late in the game.

But another way that Arteta can fit Willian in is by changing his formation to a 4 2 3 1 system where Aubameyang, Willian and Pepe will be the 3 and Lacazette up front. In this way Willian will play a more central attacking role adding his positive, forward dribbling and running game and feeding the other three the through balls required.

I can see this formation being used much more often in the coming season especially at home against opposition that may sit back and thus require us to use creativeness, imagination and direct dribbling to unlock them. 

Indeed Arteta can start a game with a 3 4 3 system and if he needs to push the team more forward to change the game in order to equalise or get the winner he can move to a more offensive 4 2 3 1. Alternatively if he starts with the 4 2 3 1 system he can revert to the 3 4 3 if he needs to hold a score and see the game out.

Thus Willian will offer Arteta something more than the much needed experience, guile and forward thrust.

Flexibility.