Update:Timber’s Arsenal move reveals changing role of full-back

There has been a tactical shift in the Premier League and it has happened quickly. It was not so long ago that the logical evolution of the full-back role was expected to be very different. The trend was towards attack-minded runners marauding up the flank.

Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher would joke on Sky Sports about how the defensive full-back as they knew it was finished. Trent Alexander-Arnold and Andy Robertson represented the future, with Liverpool's attack built around their threat from wide areas.With Jurrien Timber set to be used at right-back by Arsenal, is the profile of the modern full-back changing? With insight from Philipp Lahm and Gary Neville, we look at how the trend of moving a defender into midfield has changed the role of the 'other' full-back too...

Adam Bate

Friday 7 July 2023 09:49, UK

Netherlands international defender Jurrien Timber

Image: Netherlands international defender Jurrien Timber has been earmarked for a right-back role at Arsenal

Jurrien Timber looks a smart acquisition by Arsenal regardless of the positional plans for him. At 22, he has made over 200 appearances for Ajax, making more passes than any other player in the Eredivisie last season. This is a strong and composed defender.

Nevertheless, it has been striking that Arsenal have briefed the media of their plans to utilise him at right-back. Timber has operated in the centre for much of his career. His only start as a right-back last season came in a 4-0 international defeat to France.

But the move reflects a growing trendNow even the most celebrated full-back pairing in the land have had to make the adjustment. Alexander-Arnold's move into midfield mirrors that of Oleksandr Zinchenko at Arsenal. Manchester City have deployed various players in that hybrid role.

The man regarded as the pioneer of the inverted full-back has noted the change. "In the last 10 years the full-backs were very athletic, physical players," Philipp Lahm tells Sky Sports. "Now I think it has changed a little bit. There are more technical players."

But the impact of that full-back moving into midfield can be seen not just in the changing skill-set of the player asked to fulfil that remit but in the demands placed on the other nominal full-back in the team too. It has created the need for a Timber type.

At Liverpool, while Alexander-Arnold's positional change has been the more conspicuous, Robertson has found himself having to tuck inside and cover - a big change for him. "It has been a kind of back three. It is different, maybe a little bit more conservative."

Scotland's captain is good enough and experienced enough to adapt. But the cyclical nature of these changes mean that players like Neville, a full-back who could play centre-back, and Carragher, a centre-back who could play full-back, no longer seem so obsolete.