You do have formations.
What you do is you set your fleet up, and then only issue commands to your flagship. All of the ships escorting the flagship will move in formation, and react intelligently (most the time) to commands you give to the Flagship.
Ie: You tell the flagship to attack an enemy fleet, specifically say, it's flagship. In this case YOUR flagship which received the order will move forward and engage. It's escort ships will decide whether or not to join in, based on what type of ship you are fighting. Ships will typically engage the ship they are designed to counter if in range, or the ship the flagship is attacking if their weapons are suitable enough to take it.
What makes people think there are no formations... is the engagement envelope. If it is set to anything other than hold position, the escort ships will break formation and attack within their engagement envelope. You can pretty much read "Hold Position" as "Hold Formation". Also, if you give an order directly to a ship or group of ships, it will override it's fleet commands and break to fulfill your order.
-Itharus
