After sacking both Jack Ross and Shaun Maloney last season, Hibernian announced the appointment of Lee Johnson as their new manager last week.
Ross and Maloney both lost their jobs during a disappointing 21/22 campaign for the Edinburgh side, which saw them finish in the bottom six of the Scottish Premiership.
Johnson, who has managed Oldham, Barnsley, Bristol City, and most recently, Sunderland, is now the man tasked with turning things around at Easter Road.
With playing experience in the Scottish game, including with Hibs’ fierce rivals Hearts for a short spell, Johnson made over 450 appearances as a player before being appointed manager of Oldham at just 31.
He followed his first job at Oldham with a spell at Barnsley before consolidating Bristol City as an EFL Championship club over four seasons, as well as guiding them on a memorable run to the EFL Cup semi-finals in 2018 which saw them knock out Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United.
His latest spell in the dugout came at the Stadium of Light where he helped EFL League One Sunderland to their first piece of silverware in 14 years, winning the EFL Trophy at Wembley.
He also guided the Black Cats to a Play-Off position last season but departed Wearside earlier this year with the club just outside this season’s automatic promotion places.
This tactical analysis will look at some aspects of Johnson’s tactics from his previous jobs, particularly his recent spell at Sunderland, to see how Hibernian could line up next season, analysing his approach to the game in both attack and defence.
All data used throughout this analysis is taken from Wyscout.
Lee Johnson Formation
At Bristol City, Johnson favoured a traditional 4-4-2 system, a variation of which he used to great effect to orchestrate that famous win over Manchester United in the EFL Cup.
However, last season at Sunderland Johnson primarily used a 4-2-3-1 shape but also used several other formations, including a 4-3-1-2.
As he has mentioned in interviews, Johnson emphasises a balance of the individual qualities of his players against the strengths and weaknesses of his opponent, rather than being tied to one formation.
Although he is flexible in his formations, Johnson’s tactics, as we will see in this analysis, are attacking, but still with a focus on organisation.
Lee Johnson Tactics In Build-Up
Sunderland’s build-up under Johnson last season varied.
In the initial build-up, centre-backs would split wide when the goalkeeper was in possession. If they received from the goalkeeper, they would then have a couple of options to progress the ball.
Firstly, in the wide areas where they would play out to full-back to carry up the line and combine with the winger on their side, who would hold their width.
Or more centrally, again playing out to a full-back, wingers would stay wide and with the double pivot giving numbers in the middle, the ‘10’, often Alex Pritchard, would drop deep into the channels to combine with the full-backs.
This would create space in behind for midfield runners, and striker Ross Stewart to attack into.
In this example against Sheffield Wednesday, we can see just how wide the centre-backs are, with the right-back also taking a wide, and high, starting position.
In this build-up, one of the two holding midfielders drops into between the centre-backs with the other holding midfielders and the ‘10’ taking up positions on either side in the inside channels.
