Milos Milojević: Analysing what went wrong for the bright coach at Malmö – tactical analysis

Managerial sackings are one of the most devastating aspects of football. They don’t necessarily tell the full story and certainly don’t mean that a coach is poor, despite the negative stain it may leave on their career.

Some of the greatest managers of all time have been sacked by clubs in the past, often multiple times. The likes of Jose Mourinho, Louis van Gaal, and even Carlo Ancelotti have all stared down the barrel of the gun at one point before the trigger was pulled. It’s part of the merry-go-round that football management has become, for good or for bad.

This past week, it was announced by Swedish giants Malmö that Miloš Milojević was relieved of his duties after the club suffered a devastating and premature exit from the UEFA Champions League.

Di blåe were put to the sword by Lithuanian side FK Žalgiris in a 3-0 defeat on aggregate, losing 2-0 in the second leg at home, to hammer the final nail in the coffin of Milojević’s time at the Eleda Stadium in the Swedish South-West.

Milojević is a very astute and attack-minded coach as he had shown from his time with Víkingur, Breiðablik and Mjällby, but things, unfortunately, went wrong at Malmö.

As ever, Total Football Analysis is here to put things into perspective in the only way we know how – tactical analysis. This tactics piece will be an analysis of Milojević at Malmö, looking at what were the main issues suffered by the Swedish champions that led to the 39-year-old’s dismissal.

Preferred formation choice

While some coaches are less stubborn and more tactically flexible than others, ultimately, they all have a favourite formation. Milojević’s has been the 4-3-3 at Malmö, although the Serbian complemented this nicely by using the 4-2-3-1 as a backup plan.

However, during his stint with Mjällby, where Milojević guided the team to back-to-back promotions from the Ettan to the Superettan, all the way to the Allsvenskan, the manager used a more conventional 4-4-2.

But in the 2019 campaign, Milojević employed the 4-4-2 in just 30 percent of Mjällby’s games in all competitions, seeing great success to reach the footballing promised land in Sweden. The 4-4-2 was still his go-to but the young coach was beginning to be slightly more flexible.

The 4-3-3, including its more defensive cousin the 4-1-4-1, was utilised in 11 percent of their matches.

After leaving Mjällby, Milojević moved back home to Serbia to become Internazionale legend Dejan Stanković’s assistant manager at Red Star Belgrade until 2021. Upon return to Sweden with Hammarby, the coach displayed even more flexibility, often sifting through a vast array of different formations like the 4-3-3, 4-2-3-1, 3-4-1-2, 3-5-2, the 3-4-3 and also the 4-4-2.