Historically the biggest match in English football, the latest edition of this great rivalry served up the drama, controversy but overall the quality this fixture has become famous for. Whereas previously this match has decided titles, this game was key in the race for fourth with Manchester United only two points ahead of Liverpool before the first whistle was blown.

Van Persie and Evans were unavailable for United, likewise with Ibe and Lucas for Liverpool. The biggest line-up shocker was Rodger’s decision to start Steven Gerrard on the bench, in what was to be his last match (or should I say last 40 seconds) in the North-West Derby.

The starting line-ups. LVG’s favoured 4-3-3 for United, while Rodgers continued with a 3-4-2-1. Both line-ups remained the same until Liverpool switched to a 4-3-1-1 after Gerrard’s sending off.

Man United in possession and Liverpool’s difficulties off the ball.

Brendan Rodgers’ Liverpool have become known as probably the best pressing side in the Premier League. Van Gaal was all too aware of this and use his experienced tactical nous to make this work to his team’s advantage. United would invite Liverpool’s pressing on one side of the field, and then beat it using quick combinations, allowing them to switch to the other side of the field where they had more space. Said combinations were often made easy as a result of United’s passing triangles all over the field, something which Van Gaal mentioned in his pre-match interview as being important to him. He said how the 4-3-3 is the formation that best creates these triangles.

Manchester United’s passing triangles in their 4-3-3 formation. The numbers show the passes exchanged between the two players along that line (i.e. Valencia to Mata 35 passes, Mata to Valencia 23 passes.). We can see United’s two key passing triangles.

Liverpool getting sucked in during pressing, thus allowing United space, contributed to Man United’s opener. Allen and Henderson moved over to the right hand side of the pitch (tertiary press) while a pass from Jones to Fellaini beats Liverpool’s first (Sturridge on Jones) and second (Sterling and Lallana tight marking on near options) pressing waves. The rest is explained in the caption below.

As Fellaini receives the ball, Herrera is in the open space left by Liverpool’s shift due to their press. Liverpool tended to play a pendulating back four when either Moreno or Sterling (usually Sterling) were very advanced. We can see this as Can has moved across into a RB position. Moreno, however is still in wingback mode, and is in a strange position, caught between pressing Valencia and marking Mata. This leaves a large space between him and Sakho. Herrera passes it into Mata who finishes well. 0-1 to the away side.

Juan Mata was brilliant–man of the match by a long way. He was given more of a free role, often playing deeper and more narrow, meaning Sakho and Moreno were often left marking nobody. The Spaniard had the most touches, the best pass accuracy, and the joint 2nd most dribbles of any player on the pitch.  He scored one of the goals of the season, an exquisite bicycle kick from Di Maria’s chipped through ball.

Di Maria had quite a good match after coming on in the 55th minute, acting as a more effective box-to-box player than Young as Liverpool inevitably would leave space behind as they looked to get back into the game. He replaced Young at LW but his movement and passing was much more dangerous than Young’s. For United’s second goal, he contributed to a United 3vs2 overload with Fellaini and Rooney on Can and Skrtel. This meant he would not be followed when dropping to pick up the ball and assist Mata. Moreno yet again was indecisive and failed to either press anybody, or mark Mata.

These 3v2 overloads were commonplace, with Fellaini often moving onto the last line to facilitate them. Liverpool played with a naturally very narrow formation, with four in central midfield area. United would often completely vacate central areas of the pitch during their build-up, focusing on building through wide areas.

United building up through wide areas with emphasis on the aforementioned wide triangles.

This tactic didn’t always work well for United however. In one incident, Liverpool pressed and won the ball wide, which allowed Coutinho to run with the ball into open central space, with nobody close enough to put him under pressure when tracking back. He had the time to pick out a pass to Sturridge who pulled a goal back for Liverpool, making it 1-2.

Liverpool’s pressing did work on occasion, mostly when Carrick dropped between United’s CBs in their first build-up phase so they could press 3v3. This forced United to play long however they always aimed their long balls at Fellaini, who won a massive 11 aerial duels during the match (2nd highest was Skrtel with 5). Fellaini was very good in the match, continuing to answer his critics after his impressive performance vs Tottenham last weekend. He was a good physical presence in midfield, nullifying Henderson, probably Liverpool’s most physical player after Skrtel.

Liverpool’s attacking frailties

Liverpool were poor when building up in the first and middle third. United’s good pressing, coupled with Liverpool’s sloppy, slow passing caused them to be dispossessed 21 times during the match (United were only dispossessed 6 times).

United’s 4-1-4-1/4-5-1 shape when Liverpool were in build-up worked well as it blocked passing lanes effectively, while also meaning that dropping Liverpool players could be followed tight as it would not leave much space open.

As I have mentioned, Liverpool played in more of a pendulating back four, meaning Moreno and Sterling were hardly ever both high up the field at the same time. This is seen as one of the main attacking benefits of playing with wingbacks as it stretches the opposition defence and creates numerical superiority in all thirds but wasn’t utilised effectively by Liverpool.

Sterling couldn’t really effect the game from his right wingback position and briefly moved into a no. 10 role in Liverpool’s post-Gerrard-sending-off 4-3-1-1 before being moved deeper after Balotelli came on.

One of the only attacking nuances that worked for Liverpool was Sturridge’s wide movement in attacking transition. On one occasion, it helped open up central space for Lallana to receive the ball from Sturridge, only to skew his shot wide. It also gave Sturridge space to receive an assist from Coutinho for Liverpool’s only goal.

Conclusion

It wouldn’t be exaggerating to say that Louis Van Gaal gave us a tactical masterclass in not only avoiding Liverpool’s pressing, but using it to his advantage too. United are now five points clear of Liverpool, but will also have their eyes on their other rivals, Manchester City, who they are still just two points behind.

Liverpool weren’t quite as bad as I’ve probably made them out to be but may need a little re-think in tactics when they play top sides they looked very easy to defend against. Champions League qualification is now looking unlikely and Rodgers will probably leave at the end of the season if they don’t make the top four.

Chelsea maintain their lead at the top of the Premier League. The Tigers didn’t go down without a fight, however. Positional changes in the first half, from Hull, caused Chelsea problems after taking an early 2-0 lead.  Second half changes by Mourinho allowed Chelsea to regain control of the game to take 3 points away from the KC stadium.

Initial problems in Hulls pressing

Hull began the game playing against the ball, looking to press the Chelsea build up around the halfway line, then using the depth runs of Hernandez to attack the space behind the Chelsea centre backs and Ivanovic, in transition. In possession of the the ball they would play direct and long from the goalkeeper, N’doye being the target to play flick ons, and the emphasis being still on attacking the same spaces as in transitions. They would have good, deep, support from the wing backs in longer phases in possession of the ball, as well as the central midfielders joining attacks in central and wide areas.

The team was set up in a 532 against the ball, 352 in possession of the ball: Alex Bruce as the middle centre back; Dawson and McShane as the wide centre backs; Elmohamady and Robertson as wing backs; Meyler, Livermore and Ramirez as the middle 3; Hernandez and N’Doye as the strikers. Here is where the initial positioning of their players caused them problems in their pressing. As they would keep the back 5 deep zonal players, with man orientated aspects, Chelsea were able to overload them in the Chelsea half when the Blues were in possession of the ball. This would lead to the midfield line moving up to press, but without proper access to the ball. As a result, the midfield and defensive line would split and become disconnected and opening space for Chelsea to use. Giving players that are the quality of Hazard, Willian and Costa in these situations is going to lead to problems for any team, and they didn’t disappoint. Hull found themselves 2-0 down in under 10 minutes.

Hull in their initial 532

Chelsea finding spaces in front and behind the Hull defence

Chelsea used the spaces between the lines of the Hull midfield and defenders after building short form Courtois, overload on the left, and disconnect the Hull centre backs. In their usual 4231 formation,  Matic and Ramires were the pivots, Cesc as the 10. In their short build up from the back, the central midfielders dropped to receive the ball from the centre backs – creating numerical superiority. These overloads (7v5 outfielders) were not only formed due to the movements of the Chelsea players, however, as Elmohamady and Robertson were deep, behind the midfield line – man to man with Hazard and Willian. Upon creating stability in their build up, they would then look to progress into creation areas – passes to Costa, Willian and Hazard. Costa would make two movements in order to draw defenders out of position to open spaces to receive the ball: he would either drop deep followed by a Hull central defender man marking him – his layoff to Hazard before the first goal, for example – or he would move wide to the left. By moving to the left he achieved three things: drawing Dawson out wide to disconnect him from Bruce; leave central zones free for Hazard and Willian to receive the ball coming inside from the wing; and to play 1v1 against Dawson in counterattacks. His second goal come from the latter situation, for example.

Hull reaction and changes

The switch to a 4231 in the 15th minute allowed Hull to have access to the ball in their pressing, which would allow them to disturb the Chelsea buildup and take control of the rhythm of the game. McShane was moved over to right back, Elmohamady moved up to the right, N’Doye switched to the left and Hernandez moved forward to the 10 position. Now it was 6v5 outfielders, where they could use cover shadows or the option to the free ball-far player was blocked. The reduction of stability in the Chelsea buildup would increase the use of Courtois in possession in some situations – not the best characteristics of his game – and increasing the amount of transitions in the game: pressing traps in central areas, by Hull, to win the ball, bad play under pressure and more long balls over the top from Courtois.

Hull change in formation leads to improvement in their pressing

As a consequence of the game becoming more transitional, Hull could use some of their more dominant players, such as Robertson supporting play on the left, more frequently. They, also, created some effective dynamics to attack the spaces behind the Chelsea defence, especially on the left. The new role of N’Doye on the left caused Chelsea problems, as he would receive the ball deep in the left half-space with various options: Robertson would overlap on the left flank, Meyler would move to the left to combine, Hernandez would make diagonal runs outside of Cahill to the space behind Ivanovic and Ramirez would be in the 10 position to receive or to be used as a 3rd man. In turn, both of the Hull goals came in this moment and potentially due to the changes – along with individual errors.

Chelsea second half changes

In the second half Chelseas formation become asymmetric, with their attack now orientated in central areas – overloads, rotations, combinations. Hazard was now in a new role in the middle and Luis would be involved more in offensive actions, higher up on the left. Cesc and Ramires were used more as 8’s, Willian was also more free in his offensive movements, and Costa would remain central more often – not moving wide to the left as much as in the first half. In building they could play a much higher rhythm, as Ramires and Cesc would start deeper. They regained stability in their buildup, as well as being able to find earlier passes to Hazard and Willian – they would move closer to the ball in ball-near areas or deep in their new roles – to overload the middle of the field. Hull had difficulties pressing this, as it was a similar situation to the first half where they would have a lot of defenders deep,not involved, and were overloaded in midfield. As a consequence they become passive and dropped off as a team, mostly defending only in their own 3rd of the field. Chelsea now would play with longer phases of possession, as well as getting all their dominant and creative players involved in the game which would allow them to, eventually, to winning goal.

Conclusion

A game where the changes made the difference for both teams. Chelsea were well prepared to take on Hull in their 352/532, but the change in formation and pressing surprised them. Mourinho, after the game, also talked about this and the positional changes in the second half which lead to them winning the game. All in all a game of a few slight changes from both teams which made the difference in favour of Chelsea.

This match was one of the most impressive performances put on by Arsenal in a very long time. The pressing movements of the Gunners were set up perfectly for Liverpool’s system in the first half. Couple the pressing with a more efficient positional structure for combinations – and you get a halftime scoreline of Arsenal – Liverpool 3:0!

Arsenal Pressing

The starting lineups.

Arsenal dominated the rhythm of the match in the first half, and it was through a quality you see missing in a lot of EPL teams – efficient pressing. To be fair, their pressing was only successful during the first half when Liverpool played with a back 3 – Arsenal wasn’t able to adjust correctly when Liverpool switched to a 4-1-4-1 formation when Daniel Sturridge came on.

Arsenal’s pressing out of their defensive shape was compact in all directions (for the most part – this is the EPL after all!), and well coordinated in order to shut down nearly all of Liverpool’s options when on the ball. This lead to multiple losses of the ball by Toure and Sakho in the defense, while Can is more talented on the ball and dealt with the pressure slightly better.

Efficiently layered pressing!

It was Coquelin, Monreal, Koscielny, and Mertesacker who took on the role of covering the defensive movements of the team high up the field. The image above highlights how Arsenal pressed Liverpool in the match. The yellow arrows show the ball-oriented covering movements of Arsenal’s defenders when the team was pressing high. Notice that Sterling, Coutinho, and Markovic were all quite high and disconnected from the ball – this is due to Liverpool’s usual approach to their offense.

Liverpool like to use their back 3 for stability in buildup play as they outnumber most forward lines – meaning they always have 1 extra defender than the opponent is pressing with. The ‘free man’ from defense advances with the ball while the central midfielders of Liverpool look for supportive movements, but their main focus is to open passing lanes directly into their talented front 3 of dribblers. In the EPL there is a lot of man-marking (especially in midfield), so what Allen or Lucas do in possession is make evasive movements from the passing lanes between the half-backs and the forwards.

So Liverpool’s wide forwards focus mainly on occupying the halfspaces as they are moving inside from the flank while the central striker makes evasive runs from the center and also helps in combination play once the ball is received between the opponent lines. Liverpool’s focus on long, low, vertical passes from defense and into the forwards is what caused them trouble here.

As you can tell from the image, Arsenal wasnt fully man-marking. They were making ball-oriented shifts in the defense and congested the area near the ball. Notice in the orange zone that Ozil doesnt mark his player, but he makes sure to block the passing lane into the player with his cover shadow before shifting closer towards the ball. Along with that, Cazorla and Bellerin (two talented and dynamic players) step up immediately to cover any possible short combinations. Meaning as long as there is pressure on the ball-player so he cant pass freely, the Liverpool central midfielders cannot expose the lack of a direct marker with small movements – because they will just be in another players zone.

This also meant that the usual long passes out of defense didnt have a clear passing lane to move through – which mostly results in inaccurate long balls won by Arsenal’s covering defenders or losses of the ball right infront of goal.

In the yellow zone you will see Giroud doing what he did for nearly the entire first half – covering Toure before pressing the half-back. This means Sakho cannot play backwards and that his options for a pass are cut down significantly. On top of that, Ramsey is blocking the passing lane into Moreno so Sakho has no real option while Ramsey sprints towards him to double-team him with Giroud. The most probable controlled escape in the situation could have been to bounce the ball off of Allen into Toure, but Cazorla and Ozil were in the area ready to press him immediately – and Ramsey’s pressing run was slightly looped in order to make the vertical passing lane more difficult to play through.

Lastly, the green zone. The green area was used for balancing as Monreal and Sanchez blocked any possible long passes towards the far-side. This was usually their role in defense because Arsenal forced the ball into Sakho more often than Can (and with good reason). These movements from Arsenal were particularly impressive as its rarely seen that teams are competent enough in their pressing to remain diagonally compact. Notice how Sakho is the closest player to his own corner flag? That is nearly the longest possible amount of space a pressing team would have to cover while remaining compact. Arsenal were able to structure their movement in such a way that they pressed the ball in a diagonal fashion – how much of it was actually planned? Who knows.

So what happened here? Sakho lost the ball when Ramsey tackled him, the ball went straight into Giroud with Ozil and Sanchez making runs into the box unmarked – but Giroud was offside when he received the ball! Nearly a perfect pressing scene.

Arsenal Positional Structure

You get my point.

A large part of what lead to Arsenal’s dominance of the game’s rhythm was their positioning while in possession. Monreal and Bellerin were both high up the field – while Bellerin was much more involved in combinations and dribbling scenes. Cazrola moved up the field next to Ozil while Coquelin played in front of the defense. Cazorla and Ozil had supportive roles in the creation of combination play while Sanchez (who made more penetrating runs) and Giroud positioned themselves between the lines – and Ramsey was positioned in between the lines much more often than he dropped deep.

Liverpool defended in what was a 5-4-1/5-2-3 shape and Arsenal had an easy time controlling the center during possession. Coquelin would play safer passes (with the rare penetrating through pass sprinkled in) from deeper areas while Cazorla and Ozil joined him very frequently – having no problems against Lucas and Allen. Arsenals players found many opportunities for vertical passes into Sanchez, Giroud, or Ramsey for combination play. Bellerin made diagonal inside runs quite frequently and added a more direct rhythm to the creation phases.

The adventurous positional structure lead to good counterpressing. When the ball was lost Arsenal was able to immediately pressure the ball with many players and win the ball back. Coquelin had an impressive showing in regards to his pressing ability during transition in the game. Bellerin, Monreal, Cazorla, Giroud, Sanchez, Ramsey, and Coquelin are very good players to have pressing for you high up the field – and this is why Wenger’s men were able to dominate the rhythm so well in the first half.

The first goal came when the ball was switched out to Ramsey and Liverpool weren’t compact enough to support the situation correctly (as I’m sure you’re used to by now) and Bellerin made a very quick diagonal run into the box while receiving a lay-off from Ramsey. Bellerin feinted his movement to beat Moreno and then took a touch inside before curling it into the left corner. The second goal came from an Ozil free-kick which was created by Ozil receiving a quick, low, diagonal pass in between the lines. The third goal came in transition from a great vertical pass between Liverpool’s lines into Ramsey – who played a ball across the front of the box to Sanchez before Sanchez cut inside and scored from range. These were all a result of an impressive Arsenal strategy.

Sturridge Comes On

In the second half Liverpool were much more stable in possession. This is because Daniel Sturridge came on and Liverpool switched to a 4-1-4-1 with Sterling and Coutinho as wingers, and Lucas, Henderson, and Allen as central midfielders. Resulting in Arsenal having a tougher time in possession because of a much improved defensive structure from Liverpool that had a higher central midfield presence and 2 players on each flank at the same time.

Arsenal’s pressing wasn’t as successful either because of the change in positional structure of Liverpool’s wide build-up play. When Liverpool attempted the build-up through the wide/halfspace areas the fullbacks would be wide and high, the winger would drop into the halfspace for a vertical option, the near-side central midfielder supported the ball from inside, as well as Sturridge moving much more ball-oriented in possession and offering yet another pass option. This was a much more stable approach and demanded a different pressing scheme from Arsenal – which they didn’t seem to have ready.

The Gunners eventually substituted Flamini on for Ramsey and Welbeck on for Ozil, and began defending in a deep 4-4-2 shape – with all the usual problems we have mentioned before from EPL defenses. Liverpool didn’t take full advantage of Arsenal’s unstable deep defense in the second half, scoring only 1 time from a penalty. Arsenal managed to score in transition at the very end of the game, resulting in a 1-1 second half scoreline.

Conclusion

A great first half and a lackluster second half from Arsenal. The game’s scoreline could’ve been even crazier if Arsenal were able to adapt their pressing scheme to Liverpool’s second half structure, but it didn’t seem Wenger wanted to be as active or look for a solution in the pressing with a 3:0 lead in the second half. Arsenal now take 2nd place and look like the “title contenders” Mourinho described them as, though it seems the season is too close to being finished for any real threat to Chelsea’s title run.

The term ‘compactness’ has been somewhat of a buzzword in football tactics over the past few seasons, particular in the last campaign where Simeone’s Atletico Madrid side won the league with a system so heavily oriented on the aspect. In this article, I will be looking to explore the benefits of this tactical attribute with some scenarios from past games, whilst showing the contrast between European forces and that of English teams.

“What is defending? … Defending is a matter of – ‘How much space should I defend?’ … Everything is about meters, that’s all”.

– Johan Cruyff

Defining and Measuring Compactness

The standard definition of compactness is to maintain a short distance between the furthest players both horizontally and vertically, however such a basic response lacks in it’s application – to start with, what is the optimal level of compaction? For this reason I believe there must be other definitions which could provide a less simplistic answer, proving more applicable in practice?

Basic definitions of compactness, the Red team have large distances on both a vertical and a horizontal axis, making them uncompact.

Alternatively, it could be broken down to an individual level. Possibly to the point at which the players are close enough together to be connected, ensuring a compactness within the shape – obviously a prime aspect. It could be reasoned that it is at this point where the benefits of compactness come into effect, making it a suitable definition and measurement of the term. However, all 10 players could be stood within a 5 yard perimeter, and they would be connected yet the defensive capabilities would be non-existent – so what is the optimal level? This can be somewhat dependent on the opposition, however a good starting point may be the instance that the individual players are as far away from each other as possible whilst maintaining the connections. Through this, they can control more space whilst retaining the benefits of a compact block.

Another argument is that compactness needs to be relative to the positioning of the opposition. It is not only a matter of how compact a team is within itself but also that the distances between themselves and the opposition are short. Through this a key principle of compactness is achieved, the playing area of the opposition is minimized  which wouldn’t be the case had only the initial definition been taken into account.

The Defensive Advantages of Compactness

Defensive Connections

One of the plethora of defensive advantages gained from a high compactness is the increased number of connections between the individual defenders. A connection could be classified as when a player is within distance to be able to support a teammate, such as through a secondary press. Through this, a defensive block can be much more stable against the opposition’s attempts to penetrate as multiple (an optimal number is highly dependent on the specific scene) players can attack the same space simultaneously.

The shorter distances between individual players makes penetrative passes more difficult as the passing lanes are minimized, whilst multiple players can challenge the same through ball if needed.

Defensive connections in an uncompact defence

In an uncompact shape such as here, only two players are in distance to support should the CM be challenged in some form by the ball-carrier, whilst the 3 other players are too far away to move and act in time. What is worse that in this case, where the players are slightly oriented to man-marking, two of the disconnected player are required to protect the centre from opening up. Given that they’re both disconnected from the yellow-highlighted player, the midfield’s structure is very weak and could quite simply be opened up.

The improved connections in a compact defence can be crucial.

In contrast, the player when accompanied by a team organisation of good compactness has 5 connections with other teammates; 3 of whom are from a central position, ensuring greater defensive stability in a key area of the pitch. Aside from this, the team also benefits from having two other players near the opposition ball-carrier, who can then support in the pressing.

Improved Defensive Access

A compact defensive block can make use of a better defensive access to the ball. By this, I mean that the defending team have a better ability to effectively and correctly press the ball to challenge it in some form.

A scene from a match involving AO’s UNG team (defending) against Georgia State University. Originally his team have poor access to the ball in their press.

In the above diagram, the defending team possess a poor access to the ball (in that they cannot press it correctly) due to a number of reasons; the majority of which originate from the lack of compaction. The right forward is covering a practically redundant area of the pitch (as neither team will find benefit in using it from the ball position) whilst the man-marking of the right-midfielder makes the team very uncompact horizontally. This then results in overloads in two key areas for the opposition;

1. The first overload in the ball-near space is created from the right centre-back pushing up as he is completely free, forming a 4v3 superiority down the flank (marked blue). This is primarily resulting from the lack of shifting by the team (especially in the two strikers), resulting in poor horizontal compactness.

2. Secondly, a 3v2 overload is created in the most crucial space – the centre of the midfield. With the right-midfielder marking the wing-back, the defending team are suffering the consequences of lacking horizontal compactness. The positioning of the right striker is also an issue as previously stated, whilst the lack of staggering makes the overload even more easily-exploitable for the attacking team.

With a greater compactness, his team benefit from improved access to the ball.

On a basic level, the simple factors of things such as having a strong ball-near compaction translates to a better access to the ball as more players will be in a position to press. Aspects such as a good ball-orientation and the preparation for pressing is also important to ensure than an effective pressure will be made on the ball. The impact of more players around the ball allows for the space around the ball, limiting options and restrict in the opportunity of evasion through dribbling.

With bad access to the ball, mainly as a result of a poor compactness, the ball-carrier can create a 4v3 overload whilst has the time and space to penetrate the opposition – possibly through attacking the underloaded side through a switch.

On the other hand, with a compact organisation the defending team profit from having good ball access, forcing the ball into a strategically weak area which can be pressed further with ease.

When utilising a compact shape (especially when focused on horizontal compaction specifically), there is a necessity to maintain ball access at all times. Without ball pressure, the opposition will be able to exploit the underloaded side of the pitch by switching the play due to having lots of time without a challenge disrupting their ability to progress ball possession. In the above diagram, had there not been the very good ball access which is shown then the defence would be very unstable as the opposition could make a switch to exploit the underloaded opposite flank with a 2v0.

Exploiting an Absence of Needle Players

A needle player is one who possesses an excellent close control and dribbling ability, which can be used to allow his team to maintain ball possession in a high position on the field, where it would be subject to above-average pressure from defenders. Because of this reason, they are especially effective against compact defences to the point of being considered on of the main ways to counteract a defence in this situation.

Considering this, a compact defence can be used situationally to exploit a team who lack such players; an example being Real Madrid, when playing their capital rivals Atletico. Over the past season, there has been a distinct contrast in the performances of Real Madrid and Barcelona against Simeone’s team. A key reason for this is the particular qualities of the players which Ancelotti and Enrique have available.

Barcelona are renowned for their technical excellence, with every player in the attack being able to maintain possession under considerable pressure. This helps them massively when they come to play teams such as Atletico, as they have multiple needle players who are tailored well to breaking down a compact defence.

An image from the German domain, notice how Barcelona still position many players inside the Atletico defensive block, as they can still be effective in such tight space.

On the other hand, players such as Ronaldo and Bale need space to be effective. If they aren’t provided with space to move into by the opposition, then they struggle massively which has shown as these players have failed to influence the game in recent fixtures. It’s not that Real Madrid don’t have the players necessary to be effective against Atletico, because they do – the likes of Modric and Isco could be vital in penetrating Simeone’s 4-4-2-0; however Ancelotti has misused such players at times and not used them to their full potential.

A scene from the 4-0, players such as Bale are given no space to utilise by the 4-4-2-0. Real Madrid’s structure is much more wing-oriented when compared to the above image of Barcelona.

In addition to this, Ronaldo’s inactivity in the development of possession in midfield forces Ancelotti to use Benzema in a role of dropping deep to support the likes of Modric and Kroos. This can disrupt the balance because Ronaldo creates little effectual presence as a lone striker (as he is a player of individuality) whilst means that the often underrated Benzema cannot be used to his fullest potential higher up the pitch.

Benzema (red) is required to vacate his natural position in order to facilitate the passive Ronaldo (black)

Spatial Control

By having shorter distances between the furthest players both horizontally and vertically, a team will technically be covering less space, but they will be controlling much more. By having a compact shape, a team can enforce a much higher degree of control on an area of the pitch whereas if they were more spread out, then their spatial control will be far worse.

Spatial control can be achieved through the numerical superiority within said space, which stops the opposition team from obtaining access and utilising the zone for any strategic benefit. The overload improves the cover of passing lanes, restricts any usable space and minimises the possibilities from inside the block itself in order to force the opposition into circulating possession into an alternative and usually less strategically valuable space.

The management of spatial control is a key factor in a team properly utilising compactness against the ball. In most cases of defending, there are spaces on the pitch which are not necessary to cover for the opposition cannot utilise it to provide benefit, for what could be a number of reasons from lack of access to penetration from said area. Therefore the defending team can ‘cut the corners’ of the shape to ensure that the management is at its most effective, emphasising the key areas which need controlling whilst sacrificing the spaces less valuable to the opposition. A simple and common case of this, which rarely varies depending on the opposition, is the narrow positioning of the outside midfielders in Atletico’s 4-4-2-0. Instead of covering the wide spaces, they come inside to cover the half-spaces which are much more valuable to occupy.

The defensive block is covering a large space with little control over it.

Whereas here, they’re covering less space but exerting a large degree of control over it.

Expanding on this, through maintaining a compact defensive block a team can focus on a specific space on the pitch. In most situations the optimal area to control is the centre as it holds greater strategical value for a number of reasons, such as a greater range of potential movements whilst it offers the best platform to access alternative spaces. Similarly to the sport of chess, the centre is largely considered as the most important part of the playing area.

Karpov – Kasparov: World Championship Match 1985, Game 16

In the above scene from a Karpov – Kasparov match, Kasparov (black) develops central control which is crucial to his eventual victory. This is achieved through intelligent use of his anchored D3 knight (A.K.A the octopus, referencing its excellent control of key squares) and advances his B4 pawn, forcing the A4 knight for Karpov, he forces the opposition knights into passive squares from which they can enforce no control. Where Karpov only has a bishop and queen (though advancing the queen so early is very dangerous) which can influence the centre of the board, whereas Kasparov has both knights and both bishops in strong positions.

The general shapes from Gladbach’s 2-0 win over Bayern

Furthermore, this principle can then be adapted to specific opposition. In many cases, teams will have at least somewhat of an emphasis on a particular area of the pitch in attack – to counteract this, the defending team can maintain an especially compact defence in this area, negating the impact of their strategy whilst potentially forcing a redirection of the attack.

An example of this is commonly done by Real Madrid in their Clasico matches against Messi. Defending in their 4-3-3-turned-4-4-2, they often have a greater compaction on Barcelona’s right side where Messi is positioned. From this they obviously look to minimise his influence and dribbling ability inside.

Madrid defending on Messi’s flank.

Forcing Inefficient Attacking Strategies

Through control of the centre of the pitch, a compact defence can force the opposition into one of the most inefficient attacking strategies – crossing. An analysis by Michael Caley (MC_of_A on twitter) found that headed shots and shots assisted from crosses have a conversion rate much lower than normal shots from the same position (you can find the relevant analysis here). It is a common sight than when the central passing lanes are covered with little usable space within the defensive block, the attacking team will resort to passing to the only free advanced player – the full-back. In a lot of these situations the full-back will then cross from a deep position – the most inefficient position to cross from.

This has been the case in a few matches recently, perhaps most notably in Gladbach’s 2-0 victory over Bayern, and Juventus defeat of Dortmund in the Champions League. In both games the teams utilised a defensive block with emphasis on central control, which forced the opposition into attacking the wings which often resulted in tame crosses into the box.

Following Juventus’ win, Stefan Lichtsteiner stated in the post-match interview that they simply looked to defend the centre, with BVB’s crosses causing little threat.

This strategy was particularly useful against Dortmund because Aubameyang offers little aerial ability whilst he possesses much more threat on cut-backs and central attacks. In addition, the somewhat of a surprise selection of Sokratis at right-back meant that the possession game down the right of the pitch was lacking in several aspects as he rarely got into advanced positions and didn’t support Mkhitaryan in the development of possession with potential combinations.

The issue with crossing is the almost-necessity for a first-time shot, topped with the difficult angle and pace at which the ball is being delivered into the player. Aside from that, the ExpG (expected goals) of headers are much lower than standard shots, as are cross-assisted shots in comparison to a normal one.

Reducing the Influence of Individual Weaknesses

“With Barcelona we won the European Cup and 4 Ligas with Guardiola and Koeman, now if there are two examples of individuals who cannot defend, then it’s those two. But they played in the heart of defence.” – Johan Cruyff

Through a compact organisation, a team can reduce the impact of individual weaknesses.This is due to a number of the above factors, namely the increased defensive connections. Simply given the increased support from teammates, a player who would be a defensive liability and weakness in a standard organisation is covered better, reducing the possibility of him being exposed.

Another factor in this is the distribution of space between players. When a team lacks compaction, and the shape spans quite a large area of the pitch, each player individually has to cover a large amount of space also, which is obviously difficult unless your name happens to be Sergio Busquets. From this, the weakest players can be exposed and isolated more easily by attacking the big space which they’re responsible of defending.

Expanding on this, since a stretched defensive block is more difficult to organise and maintain stability in, the distribution of space is often less even as some players end up covering more or less than others. By intelligent circulation of the ball, the attacking team could hypothetically manipulate this into creating an imbalance to their benefit, by forcing the weaker players to cover a larger amount of space.

Two diagrams from an analysis of mine which will shortly be published by New York Red Bulls, displaying the spatial distribution in an uncompact shape.

In contrast, an individual in a compact defence is required to cover a lesser amount of space, since the shape stretches across a lesser amount overall, making his defensive role significantly easier. As well as that, the distribution of space-coverage across the team can be maintained more evenly, making it more difficult for the opposition to exploit an individual weakness.

Whilst in this diagram, it shows NYRB’s usual compact shape under Marsch this season, with a better distribution of space, which is less for the individual also.

Reducing the Threat of Counterpressing

A compact defence can also have benefits during the start of attacking transition, once possession has been regained. The increased numbers around the ball provides vital insurance against counterpressing, which could potentially be used by the opposition to immediately initiate another attack. A key aspect of the effectiveness of counterpressing is the premise that there are large numbers of players still forward following the attack, who can all begin to press after losing possession.

Therefore, if the defensive team also has a large number of players around the ball during these moments then it works against one of the key features of counterpressing. Aside from this, the defender who regains possession instantly has a large number of passing options due to the amount of players nearby so he can quickly move the ball onwards away from the space where the opposition are closing in.

Pressing Benefits

The best and most extreme pressing teams in the world are all founded upon a well-organized and compact defensive block.

With an increase in supporting teammates, the main pressing movements can be accompanied by auxiliary pressing from deeper players, creating a better-structured press which can attack the space more effectively. The addition of supporting movements is key to the stability of a pressing which otherwise could be easily countered into the space left exposed.

A prime example of bad pressing was from an early Premier League (obviously) match between Chelsea and Everton. The diagram below shows how Everton’s very uncompact and uncoordinated press was easily exposed by Chelsea in the build-up to their second goal.

Everton have particularly awful vertical compactness in the build-up, meaning Chelsea could easily exploit the spaces between the lines in the centre.

There is often less of a requirement for an individual player to make long runs during pressing also. A common sight in the Premier League, is to see a lone striker run continuously for upwards of 5 seconds in an individual press, and is then easily beaten through simple passing. Not only can the player not maintain pace as he runs too far, but the simple fact that the ball can be moved quicker than a player can run over such a distance means that the pressing can very easily be bypassed.

Uncompact pressing has greater demands on and individual and is rarely effective.

On the other hand, when an individual is accompanied by other teammates, he doesn’t have to run as far as the space he needs to cover is less, and an alternative player will press once the ball nears his area. With multiple players pressing (or at least supporting) in the first line, the defending team can also adjust to a frequent changing of the ball’s position.

Whilst a compact defence can press with greater numbers, reducing the demands in both distance and intensity of the individual.

Pressing is less easily exploited when the block has a high level of compaction. During many cases of pressing with no regard to maintain vertical compaction, lines often open up between the lines, especially should the pressing be poorly-coordinated initially.

A compact defensive block also minimizes the accessibility of passing lanes, which can be vital in the effectiveness of a team’s pressing. Without the possibility of utilising a vertical pass to bypass the initial lines of pressure, a player may resort to a lateral or pass backwards which would likely invite more pressure.

The preparation in anticipation of pressing the opposition is also aided by a compact organisation beforehand. Within this, a team will make more fine movements in order to prepare the organisation to be in an optimal position to press from, ensuring that it is of high stability and co-ordination. This is supported by the compact shape as previously stated, the narrow block can be organised better and within a shorter time period as it is naturally stable due to the control and defensive connections.

Translating to Attack

It is possible to translate some of the above principles into increasing the effectiveness of attacking. In some aspects, this is not as literal as in defence given that width can often be vital in supporting central possession, as shown by the positional play of Guardiola’s Barcelona and Bayern.

Just like in the defensive aspects, an increased number of connections can benefit an attacking team. This facilitates the use of combination plays with more teammates in a distance from which they can support the ball-carrier. A prime example being Guardiola’s 3-3-4 seen through his final year at Barcelona. Such combinations can be used for many reasons from ball retention to creating a situation for penetrating the defensive block.

A scene from Barcelona’s 8-0 demolition of Osasuna. The central movements of the players allowed for a combination to destabilize the opposition.

With a greater density of players in a small area, overloads happen naturally as a result. These are vital in numerous ways, as they can allow the team to expose the opposite space on the field as the opposition try to match the numerical superiority whilst the simple number of players within a short space can cause great problems.

Through the overloads, a team will always have a free player (trusting that the positioning isn’t so bad) which can be pivotal in the breaking down of a defence. In the situations of numerical superiority (a 3v2 for example), the attacking team must utilise the free player as there is no available defensive player to cover him. An example of this can be found in Roger Schmidt’s Red Bull Salzburg in their 3-0 defeat of Bayern Munich back in January 2014.

The 5v3 overload for Sadio Mané’s opener.

Inside movements from both Mané and Kampl help form a 5v3 overload alongside the less common higher positioning from Ilsanker, which came from the previous phase.

The counterpressing following loss of possession is made much easier when the team are attacking with a more compact shape. This is quite simply a result of having a large number of players around the ball at the time of losing it, all of whom will be able to press instantly upon losing the ball.

From a defensive perspective, counterpressing can be pivotal in the nullification of potential counter-attacks from the opposition. With the instant press of the attackers, the initiating pass can be cut off, stopping the break from happening at it’s beginning.

It can even be extended to be an attacking strategy, and has been used by Schmidt for both Salzburg and Leverkusen. In early possession, they will often make a vertical pass towards an area of high density upfield. The pass doesn’t have to be aimed at a teammate, but just in the general area, so that if it gets intercepted the ball carrier will be faced with 3-4 players counterpressing immediately. From these situations then, the attackers can generate good momentum and combinations breaking out following the compact counterpress.

Working Against Compactness

In their 7-1 demolition of Rome in the Stadio Olimpico, Pep Guardiola demonstrated an excellent method of counteracting a compact defence. On paper, his fielding of Arjen Robben as right wing-back in a 3-4-2-1 understandably came to some shock for a number of fans, as is his nature, but the Dutch winger produced a magnificent performance and was pivotal in their emphatic victory.

Starting formations from Bayern’s UCL game versus Roma.

Through Robben’s very wide positioning, Bayern exploited Roma’s shape brilliantly which caused them great issues as they looked to maintain a good horizontal compactness. Simply through the wide positioning, Robben caused a massive threat whenever Roma were organised narrowly as through switching the play they could create 1v1 situations against Ashley Cole. This is emphasised in the fact that this was often through Xabi Alonso who is very effective in this area of his game.

In argument of this strategy, one could state that such long diagonal passes are largely ineffective. Colm McMullan’s OPTA presentation on the matter, titled ‘Please stop applauding diagonal cross-field passes’, proves that this type of pass in particular is a very ineffective means of ball circulation in attack.

From his study, McMullan found that for a start, this type of pass had only a 40% success rate across the top 5 European leagues. Expanding on this through analysing the events following a completed pass, he calculated the probability of a positive outcome (shot, final third pass and successful take-on are examples of these) of an attempted cross-field diagonal was a meager 17%.

Furthermore, McMullan then used an alternate method of measuring the outcome by tracking the phases of play following the long diagonal (for example, 1 pass equals a phase, as does a shot, aerial duel or other events). This then found figures even more incriminating of the pass, showing that by the end of the possession phase, the outcome was positive only 15% of the time. Such findings carried significant proof of his initial hypothesis, which stated “Diagonal cross-field passes often have excellent aesthetic qualities, but my intuition is that they rarely directly lead to an effective attack”.

On a side note, the study was particularly damning of English ‘hero’ Steven Gerrard who, although McMullan used the findings in favour of the Liverpool midfielder, made a significantly greater number of passes than any other midfielder and thus had a greater negative impact on his team – highlighting his lack of intelligence in passing.

Going back to early-winter Rome, Xabi Alonso can be considered somewhat of an exception to the rule. Unlike his former Liverpool teammate, Alonso’s diagonal switches of play are often made with great pace and low to the ground which negates two of the key issues with such passes. Usually when a player will make this type of pass, there is often a lack of pace and it travels high in the air. In relation to the issue of the speed of the pass, when it is made with low intensity the opposition have much more time to adjust, prepare well for the situation and often challenge the ball upon the attacker receiving it. As for the trajectory, the fact that it travels high not only makes it difficult to control (especially when he is being challenged) due to the angle at which the ball is received, but it is almost impossible for the first touch to continue the attack – it often momentarily slows the play.

With Alonso’s faster and flatter passing however, the team can rarely shift in time to be organised at the point of the attacker receiving the ball, whilst the flat passes don’t slow the play down since the first touch can often be forward, maintaining the pace of the attack. This equates into frequent 1v1 situations being made and given the quality of players which Bayern possess in this aspect, their attacking ability is far better than most – certainly not least in this situation as Robben made one of his best performances this season.

A scene just following the 1st goal – where Robben had cut inside, beaten Ashley Cole and made an excellent curling shot into the far corner.

As you can see above, Roma are quite significantly horizontally compact whilst the diagonal compactness is also strong with the midfield covering the necessary zones. Their compaction and horizontal ball-orientation in this case is a result of having to deal with the left-sided overload which Bayern are forming through Gotze, Bernat, Muller and Alonso – a certain quote comes to mind:

“You have the ball on one side, to finish on the other.” – Josep Guardiola

The quartet do well to move the ball deeper to Alonso, who is in a position where Roma cannot press him instantly due to poor access. Then, as a result of the aforementioned characteristics of Alonso’s passing, he is able to find Robben with a brilliant switching pass which creates a 1v1 situation against Ashley Cole whom he beats before setting up Lahm for a cross towards the penalty spot.

This factor alone was the source of a significant issue which Rudi Garcia was faced with. If he organised his team with an emphasis on horizontal compaction, then they would get exposed by Robben in the switching of play as demonstrated above. It only becomes a significant issue for Roma however, if you consider the consequences of not maintaining a compact defence against Bayern. Had Garcia allowed his team to become stretched then the attacking talents of Gotze, Lewandowski and co. would’ve exploited the centre instantly, making it somewhat of a lose-lose situation for the Giallorossi.

In hindsight, if Roma had made an emphasis on maintaining access to Alonso as frequently as possible, they may have found fewer issues as Bayern’s ability to switch would’ve been limited – something which teams have been doing more and more frequently in the Rückrunde. Admittedly, it is rather easy to suggest ways in which the defense could’ve been better organised following the original strategy resulting in a 7-1 dismantling.

Another way of exploiting compactness is through a previously-mentioned aspect; ball access. During moments where the defending team is unable to press effectively, they become immediately susceptible in areas weakened by their compactness – usually the flanks or behind the defensive line. When against such a team, it is therefore imperative to exploit these situations when they arise – which is inevitable as very few teams can go a full 90 minutes with constant ball access in defence.

Andre Villas-Boas’ teams are notorious for having this issue, as his Chelsea and Spurs sides both had issues with playing a high block without pressure on the ball, and he has brought the problem to Russia too. This is typified in a scene from Zenit’s 2-2 draw with Sevilla in the Europa League which sent the Russians out as Emery’s side edged the first leg 2:1.

In their Europa League game against Sevilla, Zenit press with poor organisation and lack ball access as a result.

In this case, Vitolo has managed to find lots of time and space on the ball as a result of Zenit having no access. You can contribute this to a number of different reasons, namely that the defending team had a very poor spatial compactness as demonstrated by the yellow highlight. The diagonal compactness, or spatial distribution is also quite poor particularly in the pair of Witsel and Shatov who show poor co-ordination and communication which ultimately leaves Vitolo free.

England’s Issues

Because it wouldn’t be an article about compactness if we didn’t have a laugh at the Premier League’s ‘attempts’.

Whether it be a result of a poor-quality of coaching and management, or simply a factor of teams following suit after one-another in a mess of midfield-passivity and high blocks without ball access, the Premier League is notoriously bad in this tactical aspect.

The best way to observe the stark contrast is when an English team takes to the European stage in search of Champions League glory (ha).

A scene from Manchester City’s 1:0 defeat in Barcelona.

In the above situation, Pellegrini’s side display a poor organisation in terms of compactness, which translates into an uncoordinated press. The vertical and horizontal compactness isn’t exactly good, but it’s not bad either – the issue is their spatial compactness. This is the level of compactness within the block and as shown by the red space here, they lack it severely in midfield. Once Rakitic breaks (can you break something which was never correct?) the line of Milner and Silva, he has a great area to drive into.

The poor organisation overall in this scene can be contributed at least somewhat down to the lack of preparation. In the seconds before the diagram there was no effort to prepare the team to press by any player – the most severe case is perhaps amongst the deeper midfield 3 who have made no attempt to close out the space highlighted in red which would’ve made the press at least partially stable.

These factors result in absolutely zero defensive access as Rakitic cannot be put under any decent pressure for a long period of time, at which point he could have already caused damage to the English defence. This, accompanied by spaces in the defensive block through poor spatial compaction, equates to a very threatening situation for City to deal with – one which results in an unmarked Neymar hitting the post from inside the box.

Other aspects such as the incorrect situational man-marking highlight the poor intelligence which is common in English football, most likely a result of the coaching standard and culture.

You can contrast this easily with teams such as Atletico Madrid, Bayern Munich and Juventus however instead of looking at the champions in their respective leagues (just like Man City), we’ll go to Monaco – a team Arsenal expected to walk over.

In contrast, Monaco held great compactness in their victory in London, stopping any chance of central access for Arsenal.

In stark contrast to City, Monaco defend with a brilliantly organised compact shape. From this, they have benefits which City didn’t possess – such as strong defensive access to the ball (as they’re in a strong position to press with Berbatov suported by Mouthino and Dirar), whilst they control the centre and force the likes of Sanchez drop away from a dangerous area, as shown above. It is noteworthy that second before this diagram, the midfield and forwards made slight adjustments before pressing again, showing a preparation to increase effectiveness.

Eddie Howe has just received the LMA manager of the year award after an excellent season in Bournemouth which saw them promoted to the top flight whilst playing the most progressive football in the country. In this article, I will look into some of the key aspects of Howe’s system, in particular their positional play.

Formation

The formation of Bournemouth for 14/15

Eddie Howe has had the luxury of being able to field a consistent first XI throughout the season, with key players such as Matt Ritchie, Callum Wilson and Harry Arter all featuring in the large majority of fixtures.

A 4-2-3-1 formation has been used in nearly every game this year, with a consistent selection throughout, with some occasional variations to more of a 4-4-2.

Artur Boruc has been virtually ever-present as goalkeeper behind a common defence of Charlie Daniels, Steve Cook, Tommy Elphick and Simon Francis. The two full-backs, Francis in particular, are amongst the best in the league albeit more considered for the attacking qualities which they bring. A key feature of the two is their partnership with their respective wingers, something which I will come onto later in the analysis.

In the centre of the pitch, Bournemouth possess two of the best central midfielders in the Championship in a double pivot which is vital to most of their play. In possession, Arter and Surman are obviously vital for bringing the ball out of defence as they can both situationally drop both centrally and into the half-space. In more advanced positions however, they rarely move ahead of the ball and instead stay behind to support circulation and penetrate the midfield line when the situation allows.

On the flanks, Matt Ritchie and Marc Pugh are considered as two of the best wingers in the league; the former regarded as the best overall in the competition. The roles of the two wide players have slight differences, as Ritchie is more of an inside forward where Pugh has a variable role where he can come inside as an extra midfielder, or take up a wide position to stretch the opposition whilst Daniels moves inside.

Signed from Coventry, Callum Wilson has occupied the role of striker for virtually the whole season. The young forward doesn’t have a great influence in the build-up but is a strong finisher, scoring 20 goals in the season – 2nd in the league behind Daryl Murphy. His pace is his biggest attribute and with the passing ability behind him, he possesses the capacity to find space in behind the defensive line.

Perhaps the only variable in Howe’s selection has been just behind Wilson. This role has been shared relatively equally between Yann Kermorgant and Pittman. Kermorgant plays just off of their leading scorer in a supportive role whilst in the presence of Pittman, the shape becomes more of a 4-4-2.

Pressing

The covering of space in Bournemouth’s pressing. The colours serve no purpose but to differentiate between the players.

As the diagram to the right displays, the key player in Bournemouth’s pressing is Kermorgant as the Frenchman has a role in the pressure of virtually every space. This is simply a result of his positioning in the formation and relation to his teammates in what is a rather orthodox pressing shape.

The movements of the two central midfielders are very much standard as they’re vertically-oriented, rarely deviating to press more lateral space and instead just staying fixated on their respective opposition midfielders. As a result, the space in the centre is rarely left open – although it can become susceptible to overloads when Kermorgant moves higher whilst stability in the half-space could also be stronger.

Significant issues arise on the occasion when Surman or Arter deviate from this space as should the press be bypassed, the centre is crucially unstable.

Such a situation occurred in their second match against Brighton from early November, in which they emerged victorious at 3-2.

As Arter pushes high and into the right half-space in order to cover Stephens, he makes Bournemouth’s defensive shape lack spatial compaction, particularly in the centre of midfield. With little positional support, Surman is overloaded 3v1 and even though the pass from Dunk caused a 50/50 duel, the second ball was received by a Brighton player who could start a break through the midfield.

The wide pressing in an optimal situation is orthodox of a 4-2-3-1 shape, as Wilson presses, cover shadowing the near-side centre-back whilst Kermorgant closes in diagonally, covering inside options. Ritchie or Pugh (or Fraser) will then be the main presser, coming in vertically and covering any passes down the flank. For the standard of the league, the full-backs are both quite free in their marking and will move high up if the winger they’re covering drops.

Wide pressing in a preferable situation for Bournemouth.

However obviously optimal moments for pressing don’t occur very often and situationally a 4-4-2 press in wide areas is utilised. This is common following a switch from the ball-far centre-back to the full-back, or a quick shift across the back line.

Good enough for the Premier League? Eh, probably.

Centrally a standard approach is also taken. The most common shape is that of a 4-4-2 with Kermorgant alongside Wilson. As with most teams, the two forwards block any passes centrally whilst the midfield mark their respective opposition midfielders. The two central midfielders will move into advanced positions through their marking which creates moments of instability but is otherwise secure.

Due to the strategic standards of the Championship, such as positional structure, support for the ball and generally direct orientation, Bournemouth’s pressing game can nullify teams such as Rotherham and Brighton (who play the definition of tiki-taka) without being at a very high level.

Possession Game

Eddie Howe’s side have been acclaimed the most this year by their possession game which has received massive praise in a country where such a style is rarely seen effective.

Pivotal to their play in possession is the double 6 of Andrew Surman and Harry Arter – who have established themselves as two of the best midfielders in the league. This feature could be considered quite unusual for an English possession-based team, who largely aim to completely replicate the common aspects such as La Salida Lavolpiana. However in neglecting such an aspect, Howe demonstrates his understanding of the influence of such features, whilst also making Bournemouth’s shape slightly more vertically-oriented than the standard positional structure of a possession team – which is much more based on a slower, more horizontal game (the archetypal and true ‘tiki-taka’).

In deep possession, both midfielders drop to some extent yet don’t often drop in between the centre-backs. Surman in particular drops to the left half-space to receive possession. From this area of the pitch, he is rarely pressed effectively by the opposition whose wide players are both oriented on the Bournemouth wide players. Meanwhile as teams are reluctant to press, it is uncommon that a midfielder will push out of position to press Surman and as a result he creates time and space as a result of a lack of access from the opposition.

One weakness in Bournemouth’s deep possession lies within their two centre-backs – Cook and Elphick. Both are technically competent but weak against pressing and when paired with the lack of dropping support from the two central midfielders, it becomes an issue which could be potentially exploited. Through an intelligent use of cover shadows, a rather simple pressing shape could be used to disconnect the next line of players from the two centre-backs to attempt to force a 1v1 in the favour of the defending team.

Such a shape may be effective in restricting Bournemouth’s deep possession game. The first wave perform a simple role of covering Surman and Arter in their cover shadows, whilst the 3 central midfielders allow the defending team to maintain numerical superiority both centrally whilst shifting to maintain stability in the flanks also. Because of Kermorgant, a defensive midfielder is important as the Frenchman can allow a direct game to be played which can work to counter a pressing system.

In the Championship, Howe’s team had some freedom in the fact that they rarely come up against neither pressing nor counter-attacking ability which is at the level of their possession game. Because of this, their positional structure was at times slightly unstable in a potential transition following losing the ball. Considering this, he may need to make adaptions to this for the 15/16 season which would create a more stable structure which would set the foundation for their possession game. This would include features such as having better positional support around the ball (especially in early possession) both in the positioning itself as well as the support in numbers. Through doing this, he would guard against the improved pressing in the Premier League which could otherwise cause issues, especially in the increase in quality of opposition also.

¿Juego de Posicion?

Following their promotion, Simon Francis revealed an interesting tactical aspect of their game in an interview with football site ‘The Set Pieces’. He stated:

“We work a lot on training on the stuff that Guardiola does, what he did at Barcelona and does at Bayern. Obviously we’re nowhere near what they are doing, but Eddie likes to look at them and how they are playing positionally”

Now initially I doubted that the right-back was making a direct reference to that Bournemouth practice Juego de Posicion and that instead they emulated Bayern’s positioning. As a result of this, their positional game holds similar characteristics to that of a team utilising Juego de Posicion but such a statement was impossible to ignore. It does seem apparent, however, that Bournemouth could well utilise a grid similar to that of Guardiola.

Bournemouth possess a rather vertically-oriented axis, which suggests that he follows the pitch of Bayern over Barcelona whilst the pure differences in formation result in a slightly altered grid in the middle.

Howe’s Juego de Posicion?

Now we can’t be certain as to whether Howe actually utilises a grid, or his team simply seem to do so from their replication of Bayern’s positioning. However if they do, then it is possible to look similar to the above image.

The only variations from Bayern’s grid are the two horizontal lines in the opposition half and are overall a result of the differences in shape.

Firstly, the deeper line represents the functions of Arter and Surman who work on this line frequently whether the ball is central or wide to allow the team to circulate the ball horizontally effectively. In contrast, the single pivot of Bayern means that this line doesn’t exist on Pep’s pitch.

The narrower line higher up field is for the supporting striker Kermorgant, who is often situated there to support in penetrating the midfield and for combination plays. Alternatively, the Frenchman can move onto the wider vertical lines to support in the wide combinations.

These two added lines, or more the lack of central horizontal lines of Bayern’s pitch, is because the Bayern players don’t particularly require such guidelines as their vertical positioning is already good. In addition, the central positioning of the Bayern players is much less flexible than Bournemouth who take a more rigid approach in this area.

Another difference from the Bavarian Juego de Posicion is that the inside vertical lines are slightly less used, however again I feel that is a result of the overall formation, as Kermorgant is obviously much more a supporting striker than the likes of Gotze and Thiago.

To support my claim, I’ll be using some examples from matches of last season in which features of Juego de Posicion can be found.

Wide Shape

An example of Bournemouth seemingly utilising a grid against Charlton.

One particular example was in the opening goal of their 3-0 victory over Charlton in the last game of the season. A few things can be taken from this but primarily, the wing orientations are key.

On the left, a triangle is formed as Pugh moves inside onto the first vertical line due to Daniels taking up the touchline, Surman also shifts with a ball-oriented movement to support also. This allows Daniels to play a simple pass through the free man in Pugh (as a result of the numerical superiority) who can drive diagonally through the half-space without a challenger.

Then, on the right –  a similar feature can be seen as Ritchie occupies the inside line as Francis sits on the touchline. Pugh plays a horizontal pass through which Kermorgant leaves for the winger who makes an excellent, unstoppable finish into the opposite bottom corner.

Central Shape

An example of Bournemouth’s positional play during central possession.

When the ball is central, Bournemouth look to gain dominance in the middle through the inside movements of Pugh and Ritchie as the full-backs take up very advanced positions.

In the first diamond of Bournemouth’s shape, you can see their emphasis on bringing the ball out securely – as they generate a 4v1 overload. From this, Surman has the freedom to drive forward into space, or perhaps circulate the ball right where Derby are lacking balance and spatial compactness.

“Positional Play consists of generating superiorities out of the defensive line against those who are pressing you. Everything is much easier when the first progression of the ball is clean.”

– Juan Manuel Lillo

Kermorgant is adopting the higher horizontal line, to which a vertical pass could be made starting a potential combination with Pugh and Ritchie are on the inside vertical lines. Both full-backs take up the touchlines which forces Derby into a back 5 leaving the midfield control weakened.

Quantitative Superiority

Howe’s team also look to generate numerical superiority over the pitch through their positional play.

Centrally, this is accomplished primarily through the inside movements of Pugh and Ritchie in the half-spaces whilst the movements of the full-backs can: a) force a winger into the defensive line to weaken the opposition central control or b) underlap themselves to add to the central overload.

During wide possession, it is created through the ball-oriented shifting of Surman and Arter who often move across into at least the half-space to support the ball. Wilson also moves toward the flank, often moving behind the defensive line which serves to keep the defensive line back whilst Kermorgant tilts slightly though doesn’t make long movements.

Qualitative Superiority

In a team where the majority are amongst the best for their position in terms of technical ability, it is of no surprise that Howe looked to take advantage of that in their possession game.

The simple wide movement of Ritchie can be used to exemplify this action. One of the winger’s greatest attributes is his direct running inside and to emphasise the effectiveness of this, he often initially makes movement to the touchline before receiving the pass.

Through doing this he creates a 1v1 situation as the defender has to move out from the defensive block, who he can isolate with relative ease. This action removes many variables from the situation such as the defensive support and makes it as pure a 1v1 battle as possible on a football pitch. In this Ritchie can demonstrate his superiority over virtually every full-back in the league.

Issues in Implementation

With this being said, it must be noted that Bournemouth have in no way perfected the system, as it is often rather uncoordinated. Commonly there can be issues in the coordination of positioning especially in the two central midfielders who were poorly balanced at times.

Particularly when the ball was wide, Surman and Arter could be very close to each other which would disrupt the overall structure and cause a few issues when bringing the ball back inside. Similarly, similar issues would occur as a result of them being on the same horizontal line, where the lack of staggering is easily pressed against.

In the overall perspective, such issues didn’t have a telling impact as only a handful of Championship teams possessed the capacity to exploit these rather rare situations. Considering this, the same can be said for the Premier League where it is unlikely that the pressing standard of West Brom and Newcastle will be any better than Middlesbrough or Brentford.

A Low Block

Despite a strong pressing game and their superiority over many teams in the league, there were a number of cases last season in which Howe chose to utilise a low defensive block. One particular example of this was against then-league leaders Derby in a game which ended 2-2.

Their defensive low block is always paired with at least situational pressing, usually when the opposition’s possession isn’t fully secured as well as other common cues such as a poor body position.

Like most teams the wingers man mark, however not to the same extent in relation to strictness, and they can often move to occupy a different player instead of the respective full-back. It should not be confused with a zonal marking system with man-orientation as they will often follow the player outside of their zone. An example of this was in the above Derby game, where Pugh often moved onto Hughes who frequently makes dropping movements into the left half-space.

Pugh oriented on Hughes who made movements from a central position to the right half-space constantly.

Due to this man-orientation, there is potential to destabilize them in wide areas through standard features such as rotation of positions and combination play. A key issue with man-marking is that the defenders are at an immediate disadvantage, as they do not possess a vital piece of knowledge which the attacker does – what he will do next (unless they’re up against Danny Rose who doesn’t seem to have much of an idea as to what he himself will do either). They can anticipate to some extent, but for the most part they will always be slightly behind the attackers in this factor. On the other hand, when defending with a zonal system there is less of a disadvantage from this as the defenders’ actions are less dependent on the actions of the attacking players.

A better solution would be to have zonal marking roles, from which they could support the midfield without lacking security in wide areas through occupying the half-spaces. Within this, a man-orientation could be used yet similar issues would occur out wide where the shape can be destabilised and stretched. A different alternative would be to have an option-oriented zonal strategy, yet giving both Ritchie and Pugh a more situational responsibility could potentially be risky.

A zonal marking system with man-orientations could be effective provided that Howe installs it efficiently whilst it isn’t too strict to defend effectively in a wide situation without the shape becoming too disorganised. Similarly a space-oriented man-marking role for the wide players could potentially be successful as long as the space designated to the individual isn’t so big that it drags them out of position.

Wing Orientation

Like most teams in the Championship, Bournemouth have quite a notable focus on attacking down the flanks. However, their process of this is so distinctly contrasting from nearly all other teams which allows them to actually be effective in doing so.

Considering their squad, their attacking focus in wide areas comes of no surprise as they possess two of the best wingers and full-backs in the league, with Matt Ritchie in particular considered as one of the best players overall. This factor allows them to dominate through qualitative superiority, as well as at times quantitative depending on the situational movements of the central midfielders and Kermorgant.

In deep possession, they take some preparation to make the positional structure virtually pressing resistant against the oft-uncoordinated pressing which they face. One of the key mechanisms, is a simple switch to the ball-far centre-back.

This works against the large majority of teams as they use their wingers in linear roles against the ball, being instructed to man-mark the opposition full-backs without variation whatsoever. Considering that Bournemouth possess arguably the two best full-backs in the league, this is then emphasised as the opposition are very reluctant to give them freedom from marking.  Combine this with the fact that whilst many teams defend with somewhat of a focus on the ball-near centre-back yet disregard the far-sided one, and it is very rare that the opposite centre-back is covered in any form.

One team who looked to disrupt this however, was Huddersfield Town. In their trip down South in mid-February, they seemingly took note of this feature and restricted Bournemouth from utilising the pass by having the ball-far centre-back marked during such situations. Alternatively, the player would be instantly pressed by the nearest midfielder who maintained a coverage of his respective Bournemouth midfielder in his cover shadow.

Through doing this among other defensive aspects, they earned a point from what was obviously expected to be a difficult game whilst reducing Bournemouth’s possession game quite considerably.

During their wide attacks, the roles of Arter and Surman are relatively simple. Although situationally they can make ball-oriented movements to support in the overloads, they generally stay deeper than the ball. Through doing so, the central midfielders stop Bournemouth from becoming isolated in a wide position and offer a stable means of which to circulate the ball back inside.

Another key feature is the positional relationship between the winger and the full-back. Throughout the Championship, teams are full of both wingers and full-backs who take on the same attacking role in that they look to provide crosses into the box. As a result, they are often on the same vertical line and therefore the connection can easily broken by a simple and linear pressing movement.

From the defenders’ perspective, it is much easier to press both individually and collectively against a team where the full-back and winger are on the same vertical line  in comparison to where they’re differing (thus the connection is diagonal instead of vertical).

Build-up is easily pressed against with the full-back and winger on the same line.

Here, the half-space is unused and the winger is easily cut off by the defending winger’s cover shadowing. Centrally, the players are man-marked and providing little support to the right-back.

Now with the winger on the inside vertical line.

Now with the winger making the movement inside, the opposition pressing is counteracted. The lack of pressing ability in the winger is crucial in this but it is a characteristic shared by 95% of the wingers in the Championship which allowed this to work to great effect. They rarely use cover shadowing to a good effect and as a result, such a movement from the winger in possession could make the press redundant and ineffective.

With this overload centrally, the defending team are faced with a dilemma. If the full-back comes out, then the striker (Wilson does this frequently) will make the movement to utilise the space behind. Meanwhile, should the deepest midfielder push up then he vacates space between the lines which the CAM could exploit.

In contrast, Bournemouth and a very small number of other teams aren’t as focused on crossing, whilst they benefit from a greater effectiveness in wide areas as a result of their positional differences. Unlike the large majority of teams, Bournemouth’s wide players always take up positioning on differing vertical lines.

By this, I mean that if the full-back occupies a position next to the touchline, then the winger will come slightly inside close to moving into the half-space.

This rather small detail is something which few opposition teams seem to notice, as their pressing against Bournemouth becomes much less effective. In addition, the alternate positioning better facilitates combination plays whilst the differing roles translates to a more polyvalent wide-attack from Bournemouth which teams struggle to contain.

With this relationship, both full-backs have great freedom and come inside frequently. From here they can create overloads as the opposition midfield is already man-marking the runs forward which despite its simplicity causes dangerous situations in every game. When Bournemouth lined up against some of the weaker teams, such a situation was very much resembling of the matches between England and the great Hungarian side of the 1950s, where the opposition players looked rather dumbfounded at the long-range movements.

The orientation of the wide players themselves are also somewhat different. On the right, Matt Ritchie is very much an orthodox inside forward, albeit with situational movements to his touchline (often to allow a switch or exploit the rare horizontal compactness they may encounter) and also in midfield. In contrast, Pugh holds a more supportive role – he still moves inside but lacks the direct movement of Ritchie and instead looks to perform actions such as combining with Daniels.

Adaptions and Alternatives

A 4-3-3

A 4-3-3 from the standard XI from the 14/15 season.

As I have discussed in the article, one of the albeit minor issues is Bournemouth’s midfield shape. With 2 midfielders and Kermorgant infront of them, the relationship in positioning allows them to be easily pressed at times (luckily, they aren’t getting promoted into the Bundesliga) as not only are they often reducing the space for eachother, but Kermorgant is much more of an attacking role than he supports in the possession game during the 2nd phase.

Hypothetically, this issue could potentially by avoided through a switch to a single pivot in a 4-3-3 system. With the current squad, this may be slightly unconventional as Bournemouth lack an extra midfielder who has enough quality for the step up.

This issue could likely be bypassed through utilising Pugh in a role somewhat similar to his current one. Through acting in the half-space with an orientation inside to support the possession game, he would restore and maintain balance which would otherwise be somewhat lacking.

He already performs a similar role, though to a lesser extent, where he comes inside slightly as Daniels pushes up. However this is often in a high position during the 3rd phase (chance creation) and he doesn’t impact the development of possession much.

Meanwhile, Yann Kermorgant performs a similar role in supporting the attack behind Wilson as well as an alternative through a more direct route. Should Ryan Fraser develop more however, he could well takeover to make it more of a orthodox system though Kermorgant still offers valuable aspects to Bournemouth’s game both in and out of possession.

Accommodating Trippier

A 3-5-1-1?

One of the main transfer rumours surrounding AFC Bournemouth in the off season is the possible addition of right-back Kieran Tripper from the relegated Burnley. However, Howe already possesses an excellent right-back in the form of Simon Francis, meaning that he may look to create a system to facilitate the two.

Perhaps the best aspect of Francis’ overall game is his support in possession, his variable movement and good positioning was very effective last season as Bournemouth held a strong wing-orientation with little disadvantage.

Considering this, there may be a role for Francis as a potential half-back whilst Trippier takes to the right-wing as he did to some success with Burnley last season.

Although he is important in a number of aspects in Bournemouth’s play, the prime candidate to drop out for Trippier in this instance would be Yann Kermorgant as Ritchie comes inside from his right position.

Similarly to the hypothetical 4-3-3, Pugh comes inside and can act in the left half-space with variable movements in a role which sees him support in most spaces during Bournemouth’s possession.

Conclusion

In the 14/15 season, Bournemouth took the Championship by storm with the most progressive football seen on English soil for years. They now face the Premier League but are primed well for survival at the least with one of the better tactical managers. Last season, Bournemouth were rarely challenged to adapt and could play with generally similar strategies across the campaign; taking this into account it may be interesting to see some of the adaptions Howe will make. It may be this particular facet from which we will able to judge Howe’s intelligence overall but until then, the hype will continue.

Half-time adjustments from Martinez allow Everton to get a point against newly promoted Watford, after difficulties in creation during the first half.

Basic formations during the first half.

Everton stable in build-up, with initial problems creating

Everton began the match with their attack oriented towards targeting the right of the field in the final 3rd. Their build up was stable with both centre backs and one of the central midfielders (Barry and McCarthy) situationally dropping either side of the centre backs to create a back 3 – with the fullbacks moving up to the midfield line. Coleman was very influential on the right, with Barkley moving across to the right halfspace in the final 3rd in order to try to connect with Coleman and Mirallas. However, they found problems when trying to create dynamic situations – due to the numerical advantage of Watford, making combinations difficult and man-marking local passing options.

Watford collective against the ball & balanced during counter attacks

Watford were passive and let Everton have the ball, without pressure, in the Everton half – with pressure being applied on the halfway line. Their key defensive strategies were: to play with a deep defensive line, keep the back 4 closely connected and to defend small spaces, keep high numerical superiority in their own box, keep high numbers behind the ball, and to use wide pressing traps.

Against the ball they would use variants of 4411, 4420 and 631. Their pressing traps would use the front two in central positions to try to block Everton from playing through the middle and encourage them to move the ball to the flanks. where one of the front two (usually Jurado) will allow the pass from the centre back to the fullback (high and wide in the Watford half) and will then move to block off the return passing lane. This is to force the Everton player to have the ball against the touchline (limited options) and have to find an option against the numerical superiority of the Watford block. The ball-near winger will apply pressure on the ball, the two central midfielders move horizontally towards the ball (and will look to man-mark), the ball-near fullback will remain in the halfspace (closely connected with the ball-near centre back), and the ball-far winger is man-orientated towards the opposition fullback. When they are defending in their own 3rd in these situations, their formation can become a 631 – keeping high numerical superiority and closely connected defenders in the box.

Offensively they would mostly attack through counter attacks – with hardly any organised offensive play. Upon winning the ball their attack was focused around creating crossing situations, where the ball-far winger would join the box and both their fullbacks central midfielders would act in supporting roles behind the ball. If the ball was lost, they would drop – with the occasional individual player trying to counter press (not effectively).

Switch of wings allows diagonal dribbling

Towards the end of the the first-half, the switch of positions between Mirallas and Cleverely allowed Everton to use Mirallas to dribble diagonally into the left halfspace from the flank, after overloading the left and then using the opened space in the middle. This was more effective than whenCleverely was on the left and Mirallas on the right, as the player roles were different. On the right, Mirallas would be used to try and create combinations. On the left,Cleverely would be used to draw out Nyom and look to rotate positions with Barry and Galloway – trying to open the halfspace for Barkley to exploit with depth runs. This was easily controlled, as the Watford defenders can remain in their zones and simply switchover who each of them is marking. In short, and similar to a well known quote from Pep Guardiola, Everton were simply moving themselves, not the opposition.

With the lack of central combination options, they didn’t have a way to get inside the block of Watford, nor did they manage to get a player on the ball, facing play, between the Watford midfield and defensive lines. With Mirallas now on the left and dribbling inside, opportunities to get inside the block of Watford were created. This caused problems for Watford and their space marking, due to the changeovers in the man-marking in each zone.

Mirallas dribbling diagonally inside to exploit the opened space and play a through-ball for Cleverely.

Basic formations after changes in the second half.

Second half changes – Everton become more direct

In the second half, Everton changed their strategy to play more long and direct balls to Lukaku and look to play on the second ball. This was another method they used to create more central attacks, due to the earlier long ball to Lukaku from the centre backs going over the Watford midfield and pushing the defensive line back – creating space between the two lines. The wide players would also come inside and position themselves between the lines in order to either run behind for a flick on or to compete for the second ball from Lukaku. Due to the players now being closer together and able to find each other, the dynamic of their attacks improved. With the Watford back 4 narrowing to try to control the direct balls to Lukaku, the flanks were left open for Coleman, especially, to receive the ball and either cross first-time from a deep position, or progress forward with the ball and cross from the edge of the box.

Impact of Kone and increased influence of Lukaku

The introduction of Kone for Galloway (Barry to left back, Barkley drops deeper and Kone as a striker) allowed them to apply more pressure on the Watford centre backs and be more dangerous with their central attacks.  He added some valuable back-to-goal associative play, to allow him to receive the ball and find teammates with layoffs – which Lukaku struggled with earlier in the match. He also made some good combinations with Lukaku, playing on the second ball. Both goals were created from these situations, where they had struggled in the first half – Barkley being used while facing play with the ball and to overload wide areas, whereas Kone would remain central. The changed role of Barkley moving forward to arrive from deeper positions also caused more problems.

Conclusion

In the first half Everton weren’t dynamic, nor could they create good chances. A good change of strategy from Martinez at half-time allowed Lukaku to become more influential in the game, as well as the introduction of Kone bringing more passing options centrally. A good away point for Watford on their return to the Premier League, and it will be interesting to see how they play in their next match.

One of the most-anticipated matches of the opening day of the Premier League season turned out to be a relatively low-quality affair as United ran out winners with a Kyle Walker own goal. This article focuses on the pressing games of both sides.

The game’s starting lineups.

Van Gaal started one of numerous big signings Memphis Depay in a central role as Manchester United lined up in a clear 4-2-3-1 formation. De Gea was controversially left out of the squad all together for the game as Sergio Romero started behind a back four of Shaw, Blind, Smalling and ex-Torino Darmian at right-back. Schneiderlin was another new signing to debut in the starting 11 as he sat in the left side of defensive midfield alongside Michael Carrick. In the attack, Ashley Young and Juan Mata were positioned on the left and right wings respectively flanking the promising Dutch forward behind captain Wayne Rooney.

Spurs came to Old Trafford also in a 4-2-3-1 formation with some slight differences in the orientation of the players. Michel Vorm was the away team’s goalkeeper behind a back four consisting of Ben Davies, Vertonghen, new signing Alderweireld and Kyle Walker at right-back. Eric Dier had a somewhat of a surprise inclusion in the centre of midfield alongside the slightly more advanced Nabil Bentaleb at the left 6. Ahead of them sat Eriksen in the centre of a trio featuring both Dembele and Chadli whilst Kane was the lone striker at the top of the system.

The game generally lacked quality throughout as neither team managed to get an expected goal score of over 1 as there were some issues in the possession games of both teams. In particular the positional structure of United suffered from the pairing of Mata and Depay. The Dutchman played in the role of a second striker behind Rooney and rarely moved out wide apart from some movements to the left half-space whilst Mata more familiarly looked to support United’s possession game coming in from a right-wing position. However during many scenes where the Spaniard came inside there was an issue in the spacing with very little distance between the two, making it easier for Spurs’ to defend against the two players who were in the same space far too often.

From Michael Caley’s excellent expected goals analysis.

Poor Spurs’ Pressing

Throughout the game, Pochettino’s side pressed ineffectively and caused them numerous issues which would’ve been capitalised on but for some poor play in transition by United’s forwards. Especially when pressing high into Manchester United’s own third they lacked co-ordination and rarely was a press effectively organised without issue. For the most part it was a case of a poor spatial compaction between the waves of pressing which United could easily use to quickly progress the ball up field with safety.

One of numerous cases where Spurs lacked coordination in their press which ultimately failed as a result.

Spurs pressed particularly poorly in the half-spaces where they consistently failed to develop any defensive access which was at times exploited well by the opposition. This was particularly evident on Manchester’s right flank where Mata came inside to support the possession game. The main cause for this defensive issue were typical of English football.

The primary issue for Spurs’ ineffective pressing attempts was that they lacked any horizontal compactness throughout the game, resulting in horizontal connection issues and big open areas in the half-spaces – particularly as the wingers were stretched. This issue alone was down to the man-marking orientation of the wingers as, like the majority of English teams, were oriented to the full-back with absolutely no variation in between. Although neither team exploited this to its greatest potential, there were a few moments throughout the game where the defending team lacked stability in the centre because of this. Another, slightly less significant factor was a poor level of ball-orientation collectively. This emphasised the compactness problems with little support close to the ball, resulting in a below-average consistency and level of defensive access meaning that the original uncompact shape could be more easily exploited.

This wide orientation was a feature of both sides and was a defensive issue which occurred on numerous occasions throughout the match. By moving into a situational 6-man defensive line, a team will usually relinquish central control without the support of the wide players in the midfield which is the cause of a significant lack of security. In the case below, United lose defensive access to press Eriksen who unlocks the defense in an excellent diagonal pass, nearly resulting in a goal.

Defending in a 6-2-1-1, United easily lost defensive access which resulted in a chance following a diagonal by Eriksen.

United Defensive Strategy

In contrast, Manchester United were much more promising in their defensive strategy as they used a mix of direct pressing and partial pressing to direct Spurs’ possession into weak areas, where the home side enforced simple yet effective traps. Using a flexible man-marking scheme which saw the two United 6s move quite high up the pitch in pursuit of their Spurs counterparts and they coordinated the press relatively well, considerably better than their London opposition.

It seems like they chose this strategy in order to attempt to exploit the players on Tottenham’s right as Eric Dier in particular struggled under pressure in midfield. By isolating such players, Van Gaal’s team made the progression of the ball difficult for Tottenham as they were restricted from moving the ball down their favoured left flank and instead were left with

One of many examples of United’s intelligent movement to force the ball towards Spurs’ left flank.

This was quite a typical scene from United’s pressing in the opposition’s build-up phase of possession. The positioning of Mata and Rooney forces Vertonghen to take an alternative route than down the left through Davies whilst Carrick ensures that Spurs must find an option other than the technically-superior Bentaleb in the middle of the pitch. Within their man-marking scheme there was a particular focus on the Algerian and the likes of Carrick and Schneiderlin were more aggressive in their pressing of the number 6, coming further out of their original position than in comparison to the press on Dier.

From this position, United forced Spurs to the left through Alderweireld who reluctantly drove the ball towards the touchline. Instead of pressing him directly, Memphis arcs his movement to block off the return passes to both Vorm and Vertonghen and later inside passes into Dier and Bentaleb who are both being marked also by Carrick and Rooney respectively.

The final stage of the pressing trap.

Once Depay isolated Alderweireld from bringing the ball inside and instead forcing him even further towards the touchline, United start the press with relatively good (this is still a Premier League match guys) preparation which allows for the necessary stability. In the above scene in particular, Carrick is intentionally slightly withdrawn from Dier to create another trap as he regains possession following a pass from Alderweireld and United find themselves in a threatening position to transition from.

The pressing shape with both Carrick and Schneiderlin oriented to pushing high up the pitch situationally was somewhat unstable in the lines between the midfield and defence yet the opposition were more often than not unable to access these spaces where Eriksen was positioned. Considering that Memphis had the role of initiating and completing the trap alongside Rooney in the first line of pressure, it would’ve been interesting to see the effect which Eriksen could’ve had in the first phase of Tottenham’s possession. The Danish 10 would’ve been hypothetically able to create overloads amongst the first midfield line which, even if Memphis was forced to drop to restablish the balance in the midfield, would’ve prevented United from enforcing the above wide traps.

From the aggressive shape on the right of the pitch, United were quite good in their ball-oriented shifts in order to maintain compactness and not become disorganised by the horizontal movement of the ball by the opposition. The shift of the midfield pairing were particularly effective as they were key in United maintaining defensive access throughout the organisation of the trap and crucially once Alderweireld had taken the ball towards the touchline.

In reply to this strategy from United, Spurs looked to use long diagonal passes to the opposite flank. As I discussed in a recent analysis, one of the key aspects of diagonal passing is that it generally not only moves the ball from a well-defended area to an under-covered one but when the pass originates from the wing, moves it into a more strategically-valuable space. In this case however the strategy was largely ineffective due to a poor technique in the passing.

When Alderweireld was making these passes, they were far too lofted and slow through the air meaning that United not only found it easier to intercept them but if they did reach their target then the defence will have had enough time to redevelop defensive access and perform an effective press on the new ball location. One of the only times this worked was late on in the 84th minute as a long diagonal from Spurs’ right resulted in a dangerous shot by Eriksen. The difference here was the pass was much flatter and faster to reach its target so United didn’t have time to react and shift accordingly.

Premier League on a Friday. No more injuries, or reasons for not reaching latter stages, for English teams in the Champions League! (Well, maybe.)  

Basic formations and movements.

Poor central connections for United

United began with one change in personnel (Januzaj for Young) and one role change from their first game (Memphis moves to the left, Januzaj takes over as the attacking midfielder). When United had the ball, they were mostly stable in building – bar some situations were Westwood and Gueye would block passing options to the United central midfielders, and pressure was applied by the Villa front two. The orientated their attacks mostly in the left halfspace and left flank – where they had the best connections. However, when looking to progress centrally or on the right they had poor connections. This was a result of various factors: positioning Memphis and Mata on the flanks early on leaves only Rooney and Januzaj the only forward options in central areas; some poor positioning and decision making of Schneiderlin, where he would either not be connected to the two forward players, or would make a line-breaking run off the ball which was poorly timed and isolated the players on the ball. 

Exposing the left

One area United were successful and well connected was on the left, where Blind would occasionally join midfield from the back, Shaw would support play well (along with runs with the ball), and Memphis was positioned well to support Januzaj. The closer connections of the attacking players allowed a much greater dynamic for United, and allowed them to expose some weaknesses that Villa have. One of these is the poor connection between Richards and Bacuna, where they open the channel between them and no midfield player moving to cover the opened space. This hints at a rather instinctive and individual way of looking at defending. A problem of not looking at defending as a chain? Or a lack of value for halfspaces, in general, in English football? Or both?

Januzaj exposing the open channel between Richards and Bacuna. This area was exposed on a few occasions – due to the poor connection between the two defenders – and similar movements later resulted in the United goal.

This poor connection wasn’t just a one off, either. On various occasions United exploited this space. One resulted in the only goal of the game, and another in the second half – after a fantastic diagonal pass from Mata – created a clear chance for Memphis.

The role of Mata

Due to the positional structure of the United players with the ball, it was difficult for Mata to be influential on the right of the pitch, and was limited to occasionally dropping deep for the ball to help with building play, and rare opportunities to play depth diagonals, over the top, to Memphis. When he did move from the right to the middle and the left to overload, he became much more influential. Although he didn’t get the chance to move and overload other zones often, he managed to provide the pass which resulted in the goal – and would be far more influential, and useful, for United if he had a role with more freedom to move when the team are in possession of the ball.

Villa with asymmetry in their 442 with the ball

With the ball, Villa had a stable – yet non-progressive – buildup. Ayew acts as the second striker to Agbonlahor, with Sinclair on the left flank and Veretout moving central to connect and rotate with the Westwood and Gueye. Bacuna is high on the right flank in the vacated space, with Amavi in a supporting role – waiting to overlap – on the left. Villa not only had problems when looking to progress and move the ball into higher areas, but they also had poor connections and positional structure when the did manage to find players between lines. For example, when looking to progress up the left, Sinclair would move into the halfspace and look to come deep to receive. He was met with pressure by Darmian from behind and without any other passing options than to bounce the ball back to the player who had just passed him the ball. While this happened, Amavi would move higher on the left flank and then look to receive (Mata becoming ball-orientated upon the first pass, loses his man) but was isolated. However, he managed to show some good dribbling ability on some occasions, where he would move forward with the ball and go down the outside and cross.

When looking to progress centrally, Villa didn’t have options to play forward due to the positioning of the United midfielders (blocking passing lanes) and the distances between the front two and the player on the ball. Long balls over the top showed some promise, with space in-front of the dropping defensive line of United – with the midfield high to block vertical balls along the floor – but a combination of the inability to win the first ball, along with the lack of support near the long-ball target in order to compete for the second ball, prevented this being a solution for them.

Finally, on the right Villa didn’t have any options high early on, but did manage to find some combinations between the advancing Richards (forced, due to the United pressing in-between positions, to move forward with central passing options blocked), central midfielders and the progressive Bacuna on the right. In these situations they actually caused some co-ordination problems in United’s defensive structure, with Memphis leaving Bacuna free on the right – forcing Shaw to press him high up the pitch. At times it wasn’t possible for Shaw to cover for Memphis in these situations, as he would be pressing Veretout in midfield. Luckily for United, the excellent Daley Bilnd covered Shaw when he was exposed, and dealt with any danger successfully.

Introduction of Herrera and Schweinsteiger

Herrera and Schweinsteiger changed the dynamic of United in possession. Herrera was far more active that Januzaj in coming deeper for the ball (Januzaj would look to use good body position to resist pressure and then either pass the ball or draw a foul, but wasn’t efficient in this match) and looking for quick and intelligent combinations. Mata also become more prominent centrally upon the change. 

Schweinsteiger came on in a much more direct possession role than Carrick. This, however, could be to do with the increase in forward passing options when he was on the pitch, compared to the situations Carrick was in with the ball in the first half. Overall, they had a much greater dynamic in their ball possession after the two changes.  

Great efficiency in counter attacks allow Everton to take 3 points away from Southampton. However, better use of open space by Saints could have resulted in a different story.

Basic formations in the first half.

Everton with the ball

With the ball Everton played with it in-front of the Southampton midfield, circulating the ball horizontally. This was often after winning the ball from deep positions, initially looking to counter attack, before delaying the attack to keep the ball.

Lukaku and Kone would rotate positions, along with the 442 graduations of the team to be a front two when the team had the ball. Kone initially started on the right, with inside movements off the ball, before moving towards the ball (back to goal, centrally) to receive the ball. He would continue his good possession play when switch to striker – similar to his performance last week. Lukaku was different when he was on the right. He would stay wide and wait to receive the ball, facing goal, before looking to either run direct at the Southampton defence with the ball, or to hold the ball and look to use an overlap of one of his teammates. As a striker, Lukaku was far more effective and efficient in counter attacks – with space to attack – than his associative play in organised possession. During counter attacks he showed his immense physical attributes to run past players with the ball, make depth movements. His finishing was also clinical during counter attacks.

Southampton with the ball

Low amounts of central presences from the Saints due to the roles of the front 4 offering poor or inefficient possession and connections. Long started on the left, acting as a wide forward. He wouldn’t get involved in much creation, instead making runs into the box to support Pelle and compete for the second ball. Tadic was on the right, but his inability to resist pressure was his only contribution to the game. Mane was central, where his movements were mostly in the box or behind the fullbacks. This role limited his influence in creation, which would change later on in the game. Pelle was the target man striker, who would target Stones in the Everton backline and waited for deep diagonal crosses, from the full backs, into the box. These crosses were a main theme through the game, but particularly in the first half they were the only real situations where Southampton created chances.

In the second half, Southampton forced Everton back to a deeper block with more box pressure and central presence. This made things difficult for Everton to get out of their own half, with Lukaku only option forward and poor connections to receive the ball from him – due to the distances being too far apart, as well as Lukaku not being able to hold the ball for long enough until support arrived. He was able to make good use of the space behind the Southampton centre backs when the would play immediately over the top, however they played very few balls into depth for him. This, to an extent, solved the problem of controlling the central areas, during counter attacks, that Southampton had in the first half. Barkley was deeper positioned and couldn’t run off Romeu – unlike Davis in the first half – and Wanyama was positioned deeper to support (unlike the first half, where he would often move higher to counterpress).

Open spaces not used

There was possibilities for Southampton to use the open space in-front of the Everton back 4 (either side of Barry) in both halves. The ways of which they tried to expose this was indifferent. In the first half, they would try to use Tadic to come deep in the right halfspace and receive the ball. However, when any of the Saints offensive players would make such movement towards the ball, an Everton defender would follow them and pressure them tightly from behind. Galloway dominated these situations with Tadic static upon receiving and subsequently losing the ball. In the second half, Long was more efficient in retaining the ball in these situations (when moved to the right) but the ball would immediately go back to one of the central midfielders and the space wouldn’t be used. The same situations occurred on the left of the pitch in the second half, with Mane and Coleman. Mane was the most efficient of the three due to his great pressure resistance and dribbling ability to then move out of the pressure.  

Second half changes from Southampton.

Changed role of Mane 

In the second half, Southampton brought Romeu on for Tadic. Davis moved to play as the attacking midfielder, Romeu came on into the double pivot, Mane was moved to the left flank, and Long moved over to the right flank. This new wide role – and flexibility to rotate wings with Long – allowed Mane the possibility of becoming more influential in the game. There were some situations where he would receive the ball on the left flank, and then dribble diagonally inside to the open halfspace (this space was especially open due to Lukaku and Kone not sufficiently covering this wing). Kone and Cleverley later swapped wings to try and prevent this, but Mane would switch wings with Long at the same time to create different situations on the right – such as one instance where Pelle moved out wide, Mane gave him the ball and run into the open channel between Gallows and Jagielka before receiving the return ball in the box.

This kind of diagonal movement was also much more profitable due to the way the Everton block is setup. The back 4 will follow players and man-mark them tightly if their starting position is in a central position and they are receiving the ball with back to goal, but if the ball is played to a wide player facing goal, the defenders will hold off – allowing the space for inside diagonal dribbling. Unfortunately for Southampton, the movements of Davis from a central attacking midfield position – into the left half space – cut off the possibility for Mane to receive the ball and dribble diagonally in-front of the Everton defence more frequently, as Barry would follow Davis into the space.

Manchester City’s forwards shared the star roles in the Premier League’s first Holywood fixture of the 2015/16 season while Chelsea’s defence were poorer than they Eva have been before.

Both coaches had pretty much a full compliment of players to choose from and they both played variants of a 4-2-3-1 formation.

The starting line-ups.

Matic is the Key…

…and when they key doesn’t work, you can’t lock the door. The Chelsea double pivot of Matic and Fabregas, although especially Matic as he is the more defensive influence of the two, were given two vital roles. Firstly, to fill in the channels between fullback and centre-back when Chelsea’s fullbacks were inevitably pulled wide due to Manchester City’s expansive attacking system that uses most of the width of the pitch. And secondly, to look out for and track the Magician of Manchester, David Silva.

Despite the poor performances of all of the five defenders Chelsea fielded (Zouma replaced Terry at half-time) over the course of the match (especially Cahill and Ivanovic), it was Matic and Fabregas’ play that gave Manchester City so many chances. The problem wasn’t that the pair didn’t follow said instructions, however it was the instructions themselves were that the problem, a problem that caused Matic to give up his main responsibility of protecting the space in front of Chelsea’s centre-backs.

Below we have have an example of Matic’s role of tracking David Silva causing Chelsea problems. Matic is initially covering a very good space on the edge of his own penalty area as Kolarov has the ball on City’s left wing. Fabregas is in the halfspace covering the channel between Ivanovic and Cahill, as was organised. A clever Silva decoy run between the Chelsea centre-backs pulls Matic away with him and leaves a large area for Sergio Aguero to drop off Cahill, collect the cross from Kolarov, turn and register a shot on target.

Silva pulls Matic out of position

This time, City are counter attacking and instead of running into the space in front of Chelsea’s centre-backs, Matic stays in the halfspace, looking to cover the channel between Azpilicueta and Terry while also keeping an eye on Silva. This allows Aguero to, again, shake off Cahill and get into key space central space in front of Chelsea’s centre-backs and get another shot on target.

Another Aguero chance.

Below we have another example. Here, Matic is unnecessarily in the small channel between Azpilicueta and Navas, while Fabregas has been pulled away by a Silva run. Navas simply pulls it back to Aguero who has a crazy amount of space to set a shot which just misses Begovic’s left post.

Aguero shoots wide this time.

It was this non-coverage of the important space in front of Chelsea’s centre backs which was at least in part to blame for Manchester City’s opening goal. Terry is caught having to press Silva while Matic sensibly drops in to cover him. However, for some reason Fabregas moves into the channel meaning both of Chelsea’s makeshift double pivot (Terry+Fabregas) are in the same halfspace, leaving a big space in the centre. Toure drops off Matic who this time can only blame himself (rather than anything systematic) for losing concentration. Toure and Aguero combine and the Argentine to slides a finish past Chelsea’s back-up ‘keeper and into the net.

1-0 to City. Also, notice the nice 2v2 situation city have created with Toure and Aguero, Navas’ width which stretches the Chelsea defence, Sterlings infield position which opens up potential space for Kolarov on City’s left-hand side and finally the fantastic positioning of Sagna, Fernandinho and Kolarov to enable City to regain possession if Chelsea clear as well as blocking potential Chelsea counter-attacks.

I’m being careful not to fall into the stereotype of the typical British pundit who blames individual defensive errors instead of a flawed system for a loss however I would say that individual mistakes and lack of common sense combined with poor instructions from Mourinho lead to Man City enjoying so many chances, especially in the first half.

City’s left side orientation

Just twenty seconds into the match, David Silva played a wonderful through ball down City’s left halfspace to Aguero who disappointingly shot straight at Asmir Begovic. It was a sign of things to come both in the sense of City’s domination but also the fact they had used the left side of the field to exploit Chelsea’s trio of Ivanovic, Cahill and Fabregas. These three are defensively inferior to Terry, Matic and Azpilicueta on Chelsea’s left half of their defensive block. Also, it gave City a chance to show off their new £49m signing who had a Sterling performance, embarrassing Ivanovic on a few occasions, and allowing them to use David Silva on his favoured left side of the pitch.

City’s overall heatmap.

Raheem Sterling and David Slva’s combined heatmap.

Below is City’s left side overload of the field which they would use in three ways: firstly, to give the ball to Kolarov or Sterling who would have time to cross or dribble in behind Ivanovic. Secondly, Play in Aguero, Sterling or Silva in the channel between Cahill and Ivanovic. Or thirdly, as we have seen they use it to attract Chelsea’s double pivot away from the centre of the pitch, before playing the ball into Aguero in this area.

Note that normally Ramires, or later on Cuadrado would move back and position themselves to the right of Ivanovic as well as Silva obviously normally being further infield than Sterling rather than the other way around. However, if you take the former of those two factors into account, City would still have a 4v3 overload in the area I have outlines.

Manchester City left side overload. Matic is in a good position! Aguero pinning Ivanovic in the halfspace–stopping him going towards the ball/closing down Kolarov.

Another reason for attacking down this side of the pitch, is that it makes it more difficult for Chelsea to counter attack through their main threat, Eden Hazard, should they win the ball.

City also set out to exploit this side of the field in the defensive phase too. Neither side, as is the nature of the Premier League, did much front line pressing in the match although City did, at times, look to isolate and expose Chelsea’s less able passers down this side–Ramires and Ivanovic. Below is an example.

City isolate Ramires on the touchline in the 61st minute.

Chelsea’s issues going forward

Chelsea played with an interchanging attacking midfield three of Hazard, Willian and Ramires. Hazard had long spells playing in the centre of the pitch while Willian dropped deeper or played to the left. The two ‘wingers’ generally spent most of the match in the halfspaces with the aim of Hazard or Willian finding the fairly large space behind Toure and Fernandinho but they didn’t manage to do this often enough.

The full-backs rarely pushed up enough to give Chelsea any considerable width. Mourinho was obviously concerned about defensive transitions and not leaving Chelsea to open to counter attack, citing this as his reason to replace Terry with Zouma at half-time (a decision which paid off to a small extent as Aguero didn’t get a shot on target all second half and City not being too devastating on the counter attack.

Despite this, the decision not to play Hazard very wide on the left, somewhere he could have given Bacary Sagna nightmares for months, was strange. The Belgian only managed two successful take-ons in the game. It looked as if Juan Cuadrado would give Chelsea some width when he came on in the sixty-fourth minute however he infuriatingly was given some sort of pseudo-left wingback role and spent a lot of his spell on the pitch in a back five helping Branislav Ivanovic deal with Sterling and Kolarov.

In general, Chelsea were just horribly static off-the ball when they had possession in City’s half and didn’t offer much threat other than a couple of promising moments when Hazard and Costa combined.

Conclusion

A dreadful start to the season for Jose Mourinho. The decorated coach now has to be very careful not to turn his charisma into egotistical madness as arguably the main reason for his success as a coach is the his players adore him and will happily live and die by him. John Terry didn’t looked best pleased to be substituted at half-time and Jose could start to lose the dressing room, not just the treatment room. I think signing a forward as well as a full-back would be ideal for Chelsea.

On the other hand, Pellegrini will be pretty delighted with his Man City side who now have an added element of danger, especially on the counter attack, in Raheem Sterling. One area which they may wish to improve is their intensity in central midfield as Silva doesn’t offer much defensively and Toure + Fernandinho don’t offer much pressing coverage (Fabregas had the most touches of anyone on the field, 100, and Matic had the most dribbles, 8).

United’s 3-1 win over their rivals stemmed from a rather typical performance from Van Gaal’s team as their possession game first held a great focus on stability which later developed into a more aggressive performance following half-time.

The starting formations from the two teams.

After what has been a disappointing start to the season from Rooney, the recent England record-breaker was out of the squad entirely as Fellaini took on his role as United’s striker from the start.

Unsurprisingly, the home team showed in their 4-2-3-1 shape with David De Gea making his return as their first goalkeeper.Chris Smalling and Daley Blind featured again as the two centre-backs in what is becoming a strong partnership in the heart of the United defence whilst they were, as usual, flanked by Luke Shaw and Matteo Darmian. Schweinsteiger put in another impressive performance alongside Michael Carrick who together formed the foundation of a midfield which had Herrera, Mata and Memphis Depay in the ‘3’ behind Fellaini as striker.

Although Rodgers’ team selection hinted that we may have seen the 4-1-2-1-2 formation which been used in past seasons, the Northern Irish manager opted for a 4-5-1 shape.

There was little change to the back 5 as again Mignolet featured behind a 4-chain of Nathaniel Clyne, Martin Skrtel, Dejan Lovren and Joe Gomez. Lucas Leiva was the deepest in the midfield triangle with Milner and Can both as 8s, though the new English signing situationally created a double 6 in defence. On the two flanks, both Firmino and Ings were out of position and struggled to support Benteke who was isolated for long periods of the game.

Liverpool Without the Ball

Without possession, Rodgers’ team were organised in an interesting shape which situationally varied between a 4-1-4-1 and a 4-4-1-1 dependent on the orientation of the 3 midfielders in the centre. The defensive strategy was reminiscent of their 0-0 draw against Arsenal earlier in the season as they attempted to be compact and stable in a low block with pressure generally only being enforced quite deep in their own half.

Both Milner and Can had the freedom to move up and support Benteke as well as pressing the United 6s, albeit not always effectively. Deeper in their own half, Milner would quite often drop in line with Leiva, presumably to increase the stability in the centre of their block which was being tested by the likes of Herrera and Mata moving in. Aside from this, it may also have been to cope with United’s new threat in Fellaini by supporting the defence in winning the 2nd ball from the Belgian target man.

There was a distinct lack of pressure in United’s half, especially through the first 45 which was played at a low intensity. Rodgers’ side would rarely look to challenge the likes of Blind in their construction game and would only increase the pressure if the ball was moved to the touchline. This allowed for easy playmaking with Carrick and Schweinsteiger whilst raising no attempt to disrupt United’s possession game which was very focused on maintaining stability and being very selective in their attempts to penetrate the block.

When they did press however, it was often quite poor and possessed some key issues.

First and foremost, they struggled to develop defensive access as well as maintain it once they had established a means of pressing the ball effectively. This was generally through a lack of ball-orientation as Liverpool were generally passive so that even when they wanted to press higher up the pitch, their lack of preparation meant that they couldn’t effectively challenge the security of United’s possession.

The pressing was also weakened by the poor support from teammates across the system. When they attempted to challenge United higher up, the pressing itself was often quite individual with a lack of co-ordination across the ball-near defenders which meant for little effective pressure as United could quite easily pass through it.

This was quite common in wide areas, where Liverpool would react to the trigger by the ball-near midfielder moving wide to press the ball. However the other near Liverpool players rarely made an attempt to close up the space surrounding the main presser, giving United the ability to pass around the pressure through their superior positional play.

Upon regaining the ball, Liverpool also struggled greatly to develop any threatening counter-attacks. The movements from the regain often lacked co-ordination with most of the players simply running straight forward which reduced their ability to form connections to progress the ball as a collective. Through this, the breaks were often orientation around individual actions and many were stopped by United in 1v1 challenges with the ball still in Liverpool’s half. Alternatively, they would play a straight long ball to Benteke who was immediately isolated by the deep Ings and Firmino whilst the target man struggled against Smalling who contained Liverpool’s £30m signing well.

United’s Possession Game

In possession, Manchester United made a very typical performance with a low-intensity first half in which they looked to maintain stability in control over the possession and then progressed later on into a more expansive and aggressive game. At times it could be argued the issue of many english clubs as involving possession as a philosophy rather than utilising it as a tool was prevalent, yet the stability which Van Gaal created was an important foundation as they grew into the game later on. Deep circulation, orchestrated by the double 6 was also an effective tool throughout the 90 minutes as they opened up spaces quite well (though this was also through the asymmetry of Carrick and Schweinsteiger) albeit struggling to develop on that.

With both Schweinsteiger and Carrick deep, United were comfortable and secure on the ball with a quite ball-oriented positional structure through the midfield. This did have its downsides, as they lacked penetration in the centre of the pitch and were often content to make non-threatening ball circulation in a ‘u’ shape around the Liverpool block despite the away side’s issues in access. Their intentions to maintain stability in possession was helped well by their opposition whose passivity and then their ineffectiveness when they did press made little challenge against LVG’s possession game.

The two United pivots were amongst the top performers and worked well together as they were central to the performance of United with the ball. A key feature of the partnership was the slight degree of asymmetry from the two movements. As one would move vertically, usually to create a greater presence higher up the pitch as well as the basic benefits of vertical staggering, the other would shift side-to-side to offer themselves for the connections. Through this, the midfielders opened up spaces for each other which enhanced their ability to dictate the play with less pressure from the opposition.

As they progressed through the second half, their possession game became more vertically-oriented as they were more direct in circulation and adversely the stability lessened though this caused little issues. At times they looked to force the penetration into the centre but lacked the necessary positional structure to do so effectively and with sustainability. In turn Liverpool improved but far too late to have a meaningful impact, the additions of Ibe, Origi and Moreno helped as they became more aggressive in search of a way back into the game

After a week of preparation, although some players did their duties for the national teams, Jürgen Klopp began his Premier League career with a point at Tottenham. Liverpool showed only rudiments of Klopp’s preferred style of football, trying to emulate the high energy gegenpressing which was synonymous with the Klopp era at Borussia Dortmund.

Formations

With the likes of Daniel Sturridge and Christian Benteke being injured, Klopp decided to field Divick Origi up-front, while Emre Can and Lucas Leiva played in the middle of the park. Intriguingly, James Milner spent quite some time on the right side, but fluidly changed positions throughout the game. Using the usual telephone numbers, the Reds played a 4-2-3-1/4-3-2-1 hybrid, as both Philippe Coutinho and Adam Lallana are not genuine wingers, but rather linking players in the half-spaces. Therefore, Milner and also Can moved to the outside and supported the respective full-back.

Meanwhile, Mauricio Pochettino decided to stick with the customary 4-2-3-1 shape, with Mousa Dembélé and the 19-year-old Dele Alli as number 6s.

Early storm…

First of all, Liverpool’s pressing structure came straight out of Klopp’s playbook. The Reds usually used a 4-3-3, when Tottenham were building up. Coutinho or Lallana moved situationally towards the opposing full-back, while the ball-far winger/number 10 blocked the central zones to stop both Tottenham centre midfielders from receiving a pass. Alternatively, the ball-far winger/number 10 moved back to the second line, while the former midfield line of three pushed towards the ball.

Overall, Klopp was able to implement a rather compact, intense, and ball-orientated pressing. During the first phase of the game, Tottenham struggled to play through middle, as Dortmund…um…Liverpool led them to the wings and blocked passing lanes afterwards, so that there were no open men in the half-space near the ball.

Moreover, Liverpool’s gegenpressing structure worked quite well. The shown intensity after turnovers and desire to win the ball back coerced Tottenham into playing passes quickly without having the chance to build up attacking plays in a seemly way. Hence Liverpool were able to avoid opposing counter attacks, while keeping the ball in higher zones.

…weathered by Tottenham

However, despite showing promising glimpses in the early stages, Liverpool only created goal-scoring opportunities after set-pieces. For instance, Origi flicked Can’s header onto the woodwork with Hugo Lloris beaten in the ninth minute. Pochettino’s side weathered the storm and had chances to go ahead after 25 minutes, when Simon Mignolet denied Harry Kane and Clinton N’Jie, who had been sent on for the injured Nacer Chadli, in tremendous fashion.

Liverpool’s attacks

When building up, Liverpool primarily used the deeper half-spaces to expedite the attacks. Normally, the centre-backs tried to play the ball to Lucas, when the Brazilian stood behind Kane and Christian Eriksen. Moreover, Milner and Can supported Lucas as well as the full-backs, when the ball moved to the outside. Consequently, Liverpool provided connections, because the midfielders permanently moved diagonally and vertically, so that the Reds usually had three men at each wing.

Later, both centre-backs stood wider and had problems to find open lanes, while at times Kane and Eriksen moved as a wedge in between Mamadou Sakho and Martin Škrtel.

Yet, Tottenham initially struggled to figure the appropriate pressing patterns out. They simply did not know the required zones and opponents to cover. Thus Liverpool could play quick passes through wings and half-spaces without being under pressure. Particularly Milner, who displayed his football IQ by moving intelligently off the ball, not only provided the width situationally, but also played decent passes into the number ten’s space, where Lallana and Coutinho overloaded the zone.

As expected, both full-backs were also asked to get involved in attacking plays, being aggressive, advancing runs in the first half. Plus, the ball-far winger/number 10 usually behaved quite intelligently, looking for gapes between the opposing defenders to support Origi. Especially after losing the ball, the Reds therefore generated compactness around the ball up-front.

Speaking of Origi, the young Belgian experienced a nightmare. Apart from a few decent lay-off passes, he just was not able to physically keep up with the opposing centre-backs. Most of the balls he received were eventually lost balls. Only Liverpool’s intense gegenpressing could mask the non-existent of a reliable centre-forward. Immediately after turnovers, Liverpool mostly had four players near the ball to attack the carrier.

As already mentioned, Liverpool, however, were not able to maintain the level of intensity after half an hour. As a consequence, the vertical compactness got lost after 30 minutes. Plus, some players had constant problems to cover the necessary zones or to maintain the chain mechanism in midfield.

On the other side, Alli and Dembélé, all in all a comfortable pairing in the middle of the park, looked more and more resistant against Liverpool’s gegenpressing, while both full-backs also stayed deeper during build-up play to bring Milner or Can out of their midfield line. Furthermore, in some situations, Kane had the chance to get into one-on-ones with Škrtel, who looked unsurprisingly stiff.

Despite seeing more of the ball during phases of the game, Liverpool easily allowed Tottenham a couple of shots. After the interval, the match looked even-steven, though, with neither coach having a dazzling idea.

Conclusion

The Jürgen Klopp era got off to a fairly good start. The 48-year-old said, that there “were many full-throttle moments in the game.” He is “completely satisfied for the moment. This was a good first step; I can work with this.”

If the peak of his spell at Borussia Dortmund is a blueprint, the German manager could have the tools to improve the defensive and offensive mechanism of his team. His pressing and gegenpressing approach could suit Liverpool’s players and could become a problem for many Premier League side. On the downside, the Reds showed a lack of stamina to play high-energy football for the full 90 minutes.

Since joining the club he played for between 1987 and 1991, Alan Pardew has designed an attacking-minded Crystal Palace side who have performed largely above expectations and sit 7th in the Premier League. This is even more telling when you consider the strength of the teams they have already faced, with Arsenal, Manchester City, Chelsea and Tottenham all featuring in their first 8.

Palace in the matches I viewed over the break.

He has generally lined up in a 4-4-2/4-2-3-1 shape so far with an emphasis on attacking support from midfield. Alex McCarthy has been the number 1 goalkeeper, protected by a centre-back pairing of Scott Dann alongside one of Brede Hangeland or Damien Delaney. On the left side of the defensive line, Pape Souaré has been a constant feature whilst the opposite full-back slot has been occupied by either Joel Ward or Martin Kelly.

New big signing Yohan Cabaye has featured in every match so far in the centre of the midfield, largely accompanied by James McArthur too making a very consistent pairing which is key to everything Palace do. On the wings, Palace have seen a combination of Bakary Sako, Wilfried Zaha, Yannick Bolasie and at times Jason Puncheon perform well in largely individual roles. The latter has been found more centrally when the situation allows and from this position, he has a tendency to drift and support collectively. Unlike the other 3 wingers, Puncheon is more oriented towards collective actions such as combinations which allows him to be an influence in central attacks where the others would be less capable.

The position at the top of the shape has not yet had a fixed occupier, with Dwight Gayle, Connor Wickham and Glenn Murray (before his move to Bournemouth) all featuring equally.

Individuality and Wing-Focus in Attack

With players such as Wilfried Zaha and Yannick Bolasie, it came as no surprise to see the distinct individuality of Crystal Palace’s possession game in the final third. Combinations are limited to very small scenes, often between a winger, full-back and a drifting forward and even then the intention is to create an isolation for the dribblers to take on. With this, the attacks are quite commonly isolated in small spaces and through more basic mechanisms. This is less so in central areas where, as I stated in the under the previous sub-heading, the attacks aren’t often focused anyway. The input of Jason Puncheon has a telling influence on this as the winger-turned-attacking midfielder works well to bring others into a move with supportive movement and in combinations through the middle.

However it must be noted that in possession prior to reaching the penetration phase, Palace are relatively quite strong in their collective possession game. Through Cabaye and McArthur in the centre, they are able to circulate the ball quite effectively through valuable spaces to create a good foundation to build from. It is only once they reach a more advanced position when their orientation shifts significantly.

Regain possession – Zaha runs away for isolation whilst Gayle makes diagonal movement for through ball with no intentions of supporting the development of potentially a more effective route to goal.

A key problem with a game model so based on individuals is it’s linearity and one-dimensional nature. If a team attacks through individuals and at most, very small groups, they limit themselves in their attacking variability. An attack through one or two players generally contains a limited degree of variation due to the small number of players, integration of space and simple skill-sets amongst other things. When Palace attack through Zaha or Bolasie down the wings, there are only a few options which they can take to break through the defence.

On the other hand, with a more collectively-oriented approach, the attacking variability increases significantly. In relation to the limits of individual-based football, an attack which incorporates 5-6 players offers much more potential, as long as it is orchestrated well of course. As long as their is good spacing, the spatial occupation and integration will benefit as the team can circulate the ball together to attack various different spaces. It also allows for a greater combination of different skillsets which also aids the variability.

Looking at it on a basic level, an attack involving Zaha and Ward will not be able to effectively solve as many attacking situations as one which also integrates the likes of Puncheon and Cabaye because of the unique (to Zaha and Ward) talents which these two possess.

Cabaye on the ball with little support nearby. He is forced to play a long ball which cannot be counterpressed effectively due to lack of connections/pure numbers in the targeted area.

One issue in the individuality of Crystal Palace’s possession game is it’s negative influence on collective features. With the aforementioned linearity of individual-focused football, a more collective orientation has a greater impact on various different tactical principles where individuality is less far-reaching. A prime example is positional structure; a collective-oriented tactical concept. As often seen in teams practising Juego de Posicion, a team who has a strong positional structure in possession can defend the transition more effectively as their good structure – something which they play with great emphasis on – facilitates it.

When a team such as Palace is so focused on attacking through individuals, they neglect collective features which then has a maladaptive influence on numerous attacking and defensive principles.

The wing-orientation of Crystal Palace’s possession game in the final third contributes to the lack of variability in some ways. In attack, the ball spends the majority of the time in spaces close to the touchline with a lack or recognition for areas more centrally. Occasionally the ball-near half-space will be used to provide a degree of support but it is never seen as an important component by the midfield.

With all being said, the attacking strategy which Pardew has developed certainly makes the most of his team. In Bolasie and Zaha they have two strong dribblers so it only makes sense for their attacking model to be largely oriented around creating isolation situations for them. It is just a shame that through doing so, Palace are carrying some more wide-reaching tactical deficiencies in their system.

Superior Space Valuation in Defence

In defence, Crystal Palace defend in a relatively compact 4-4-2 block which works well to force the opposition to attack from weak areas. The two forwards have the role of blocking passing lanes into the centre and at times, specially man-marking a key midfielder to take them out of the game as they (and many other teams) did against Chelsea.

On the flanks, the wingers are more inside than the usual PL wide midfielder and instead look to support their CM more whilst using their cover shadow well in support of their full-back. They didn’t usually directly challenge their opposing full-back and instead look to show them into a wider position through simple positioning and shadowing of inside players on a diagonal axis. With the recognition of spatial value not being one of many PL team’s strong points, this can easily work against many full-backs who are content to travel with the ball into a weak position before they effectively trap themselves against the touchline.

Notably, it differs from a large quantity of PL defences in the final third as the wingers are more oriented to supporting the midfield instead of shifting to a 6-man defensive line as the likes of WBA prefer. This creates for generally a more balanced defensive block where other teams are much more unstable in the centre.

An example of Palace’s man-marking causing issues for themselves.

Within the man-oriented marking scheme some common defensive weaknesses reside as Pardew’s side commonly become disorganised through the reactivity of the tactic. Fortunately for them, it hasn’t been fully taken advantage of on a very frequent basis though a number of dangerous situations have risen.

When defending in wide areas, it isn’t unusual to see the ball-far winger remove themselves from defensive responsibility and be primed to attack the open space on the counter. Because of this, the area vacated by the CMs when they move to the ball for marking duties can be left dangerously open.

This is what happened on the right, as both Cabaye and McArthur (highlighted) moved towards the ball to maintain their marking. The space isn’t recovered by Zaha who is looking to exploit Ivanovic for obvious reasons leading to Chelsea making a dangerous combination through the right half-space and centre.

Once protecting a lead, it seemed a common reaction for a central attacker to drop into a CM position to create more of an adaptable 4-1-4-1 where the ball-near CM can situationally push back up if needed. With this, the side become slightly more passive and focused on protecting the space between the lines. With their increased passivity, they actually end up sacrificing more space than before and thus in some areas, the block becomes slightly less stable.

A Statistical Perspective from Tom Worville

A good way to check for whether a team is under (or over) performing is to look at their save and shooting percentages. These are relatively simple to calculate; the save percentage is the number of shots on target that are prevented from becoming goals and the shooting percentage is the number of shots on target that become goals. If a team is under (or over) performing these measures, they are likely to return to the league average at some point in the near future.

Taking a look at Crystal Palaces save percentage, we can see that they are currently slightly over-performing, preventing 77.8% of the shots on target against them (data from http://objective-football.blogspot.com.es/2015/08/201516-pdo.html). The league average save percentage sits at 69.2% – so this over-performance of 8.6% is likely to cool off at some point in the future. In turn this means that Palace are likely to concede a few more goals, so may have been fortunate with a couple of their wins so far this season being down to a boosted save percentage.

On the other hand, if you look at their scoring percentage, they are mildly underperforming at 29.3% vs the league average of 30.8%. Having said that this is pretty close to league average, and the margin is so small here between Palace’s level and the league average that we can realistically say this is at the league average level. This is a good level to be at – but as with all teams they could face either a boost or a drop in this as the season continues, as it’s highly unlikely they stay at the league average level for the next 28 games.

Paul Riley’s xG table

Another way to check whether Crystal Palace are over-performing is to look at the quality of shots that they are taking and conceding. To quantify the quality of a shot we can use an “Expected Goal” figure, that uses historical data to plot whether a shot taken from a certain place on the pitch and the probability that a shot from that position results in a goal or not. There are a number of public models available, but this post is using data from Paul Riley’s Expected Goals table – click on the image to be taken to the source.

Crystal Palace’s Expected Goals for is 14.84, the sixth highest in the Premier League. Their actual goals total sits at 12 goals for the season, with three of these coming from the penalty spot. This shows a slight level of under-performance in front of goal – which they may get a boost from in the future. For Palace though this level of shot quality is positive, as they are performing similarly to Tottenham (14.94 Expected Goals) and Southampton (15.08 Expected Goals) – two sides likely to be in the top six in May.

(Note: Riley’s model buckets shots together in different zones and is not as specific as models like for example. Michael Caley’s. For that reason, it does not take into account that some of Palace’s shots come from fast attacks and counter attacks – where the level of goal expectancy may be even higher).

Looking at the quality of shots conceded, Palace sit ninth in the Premier League with a figure of 12.16 Expected Goals against. Compared to their actual goals conceded being 10 (I’m assuming Riley’s model hasn’t taken into account the Leicester game yet) that shows mild over-performance, but nothing too drastic. In the long run their goals conceded will likely align with their Expected Goals Conceded – which will likely come with the drop in their save percentage to the league average level.

Taken together, we can get the Expected Goal Difference for Crystal Palace. This is exactly the same as your traditional goal difference, just taken with the Expected Goal figures instead of the actual goal figures. Palace currently sit 5th in the table for Expected Goal Difference, with +2.68. Of course we are only a few games into the season, but this looks good for Palace. Over the course of the season they are likely to score more than they concede – and considering that from Riley’s Expected Goals data only nine teams have a positive Expected Goal Difference, Palace have solid underlying numbers.

To conclude, Crystal Palace are the real deal this season. They are conceding slightly less than they should be doing with their above-average save percentage, but they are also conceding shots that are of a lower quality. Going forward they are creating a lot of good chances (despite the three penalties) and potentially they may benefit from a boost in their shooting percentage at some point to keep them in the top eight.

Tom is a statistical analyst who co-runs the analytics podcast: Analytics FC.

Twitter – @Worville

Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool just fell short of their first win as Sadio Mané equalised following a Benteke header. The game was fairly balanced throughout with a particularly interesting approach from Klopp which featured a number of changes in shape.

The formations at the beginning of the match.

The German started off with a 4-3-2-1 shape which he has used in his matches so far in England. Simon Mignolet was the goalkeeper behind an unchanged back four of Moreno, Sakho, Skrtel and Clyne. Lucas was the nominated central pivot whilst James Milner and Emre Can were either side of him in more ‘8’ roles. The flexible front ‘3’ consisted of Lallana and Coutinho playing behind Origi, though the trio rotated on a frequent basis.

Ronald Koeman brought his side to Anfield with a fairly 4-2-3-1 formation. Maarten Stekelenburg started with Jose Fonte, Virgil van Dijk, Cedric Soares and Ryan Bertrand making up the defensive line. Victor Wanyama and Jordi Clasie made up the double pivot with the Dutchman moving forward more than his African partner. Mané was the central player in the ‘3’ yet made many movements to wide positions where he could combine with one of Steven Davis or Dusan Tadic. Graziano Pelle was the lone striker ahead of the ex-Salzburg forward.

Klopp’s Pressing Approach

Something which will be payed close attention to in his start at Anfield will be the pressing of Liverpool. The German manager is obviously famous for it from his time at Borussia Dortmund and it is clear that he will look to carry this on in Liverpool.

Through their narrow 4-3-2-1 shape, Liverpool were shaped quite well to press diagonally and force Southampton away from the valuable central spaces. This was roughly the approach which they took against Tottenham as the Spurs initially struggled to develop possession through the middle. However in a quite unusual approach this was not always the case.

Coutinho arcing his run to attack Cedric vertically.

As the ball looked to be moving from the centre-back to his near full-back, the ball-near ’10’ would often arch his run to press the full-back vertically as opposed to being on a diagonal line. Meanwhile, the ball-far ’10’ would shift over slightly to semi-cover the space left. The effect this had was that the press was more focused to blocking developments down the wing as opposed to a more-threatening half-space build-up. In addition to this, the movements were understandably not fully harmonic and windows of opportunity opened for diagonal passes between the movements of Lallana and Coutinho. A particularly interesting aspect of this was that it happened much more frequently down Liverpool’s left, suggesting an adaptation to accommodate something spotted in Southampton’s right-sided build-up on the wing.

Liverpool’s asymmetrical structure when defending the left.

The resulting positional structure which followed these movements was another point as it formed an asymmetrical shape during Southampton’s possession in midfield. Coutinho drops towards a left-midfield position whilst Can becomes the left central-midfielder in a bank of four.

Through general inactivity, Lallana stays higher than his attacking-midfield partner to form a lopsided 4-4-2 shape as Origi blocks the return pass to the ball-near centre-back.

The structure was relatively stable as Southampton struggled at times to bring the ball back into the centre despite Liverpool’s greater focus on their wing play.With Coutinho and Origi blocking forwards and backwards passes whilst Lallana and Can occupied central spaces there was the potential for traps against the touchline, which were made occasionally.

When they pressed centrally with a more standard 4-3-2-1 shape, there were some apparent issues which are inevitable as Klopp develops a weak team. As MR pointed out on Twitter, Klopp has a job on his hands as he has to change a team from being reactive under Rodgers, to one which is proactive in defence; something which will definitely take time.

Milner moving away leaves the centre vulnerable.

An example of this issue came in the 30th minute. The double ’10’ was beaten and Southampton started moving towards the three midfielders behind them. As the play developed, James Milner made a (likely instinctual) reactionary movement towards Bertrand as if to man-mark him and space between him and Lucas opened up for Saints to use.

This situation would’ve been much more stable had Milner taken a proactive approach. An example of this would’ve been to orient him zonally and cover the half-space and inadvertently cover Bertrand with his shadow. This would’ve applied positional pressure on van Dijk and likely forced a pass to a weaker wide position.

Another variation would’ve been to drop deeper yet still cover the half-space. This would’ve produced a similar result with potentially more defensive security though without the possibility of intercepting the pass.

Attention can also be paid to Can, whose positioning is down to the ball being previously down Southampton’s right, yet he could definitely shift back quicker to provide cover in the open 10 space.

Central-Focus in Possession

With a narrow 4-3-2-1 shape, Liverpool are orientated around the centre and half-spaces in possession – promising. During their build-up of possession, Southampton controlled the central passing lanes quite well which forced Liverpool into wider build-ups however following the initial press, they looked to access the centre and ball-near half-space through diagonal passes.

Klopp’s side were quite stable during these wide developments due to the movements of the ball-near midfielders. The closer ‘8’ would often drop into the half-space and offer a pass inside, whilst the near ’10’ could make similar movements depending on his teammate. In some of their worse situations, Lallana or Coutinho (usually the former) would make a run down the line and through insufficient connections, the possession game would break down. Through shifting towards the ball, they generally created a structure which allowed enough connections to move the ball upfield. Although not always fantastic, it was good enough for the Premier League.

Once they moved the ball into the half-space during the second phase of possession, they encountered some issues against Southampton’s man-orientated defense and the body position the midfielders received in. With the ball-near 10 often dropping in to receive a pass, they most commonly got the ball with their back to goal. With the immediate pressure of a man-marker, they lacked the ability to turn towards goal which limited their options significantly and usually they resorted to a pass back to their teammate.

In the moments where they could turn, usually due to a slow reaction from the man-marker or the ’10’ dropping slightly further deep, Liverpool looked quite threatening and the combinations between the front ‘3’ carried some potential.

Rotation between Lallana and Origi to allow the Belgian to receive between the man-marking Wanyama and Clasie.

Although the Origi – Lallana – Coutinho attack lasted for only the first 45 minutes, it demonstrated some potential for success with effective rotational movements. Origi quite frequently dropped off of the defensive line whilst a ’10’ would move higher up so that the Belgian could move free in a deeper position. Through doing so, they worked well against Southampton’s man-marking scheme which generally was too strict to deal with local rotations.

As you can see in the diagram on the right, Wanyama and Clasie have become disconnected due to their man-marking as they follow the aggressive movements of Can and Lallana respectively. By stretching the two central midfielders whilst putting pressure on both centre-backs, Liverpool opened space for Origi to drop in without a marker.

Klopp Shifts at the Interval

At half-time, Klopp replaced Origi with Cristian Benteke as Liverpool moved to a more aggressive possession game. James Milner took on a more advanced role whilst Can formed more of a standard double ‘6’ with Lucas. The result was a shape closer to a 4-2-3-1 though slight asymmetry was evident across the midfield through both the positions and orientations.

Initially, the build-up suffered to some degree as it missed the supporting movements of the ball-near CM, especially down the right as Can was still able to offer through the left. Klopp quickly made an adaptation however as he allowed Lucas to start dropping between the centre-backs which created a situational back 3.

Klopp’s changes through the second half.

With three attacking midfielders behind the striker now, Liverpool benefited from a slightly more aggressive structure with similar degrees of variability in the movements. The previous orientations were still relevant as Milner was more supportive yet the English midfield now had the freedom to make runs forwards and could be seen on the same line as Benteke at times.

And then Moves to a Variable Diamond

After introducing Roberto Firmino for Lallana, Liverpool changed shape again and reverted to one closer to the original 4-3-2-1. The midfield was very flexible as they looked to find the opening goal of what was a tightly contested match.

Many variable movements could be seen between Can, Milner, Lallana and Coutinho whilst Lucas took on a more static role as he had throughout the match so far.

To the Brazilian’s left, Can made vertical movements upfield much more frequently as opposed to his role in the 4-2-3-1 whilst Lucas made deeper balancing movements to support the structure. On the opposite side, Milner was more oriented to a wider role and exclusively acted in the right half-space and flank, positioning himself as the situation demanded. This was often in accordance with the movements of Clyne and can be seen in the scene where he crossed for Benteke’s goal from a deep half-space position.

It was interesting to see a supportive role for Firmino as the attacking midfielder. The new-signing made constant dropping movements during Liverpool’s build-up stage and he received passes in deep positions on a common basis. He was quite important in accelerating the development of their possession which was important given the stage of the game.

Later Developments

After Benteke put the home side ahead in the 77th minute, Klopp quickly reverted back to a 4-3-2-1 in an attempt to find more stability to protect the lead. The above 4-1-2-1-2 was based around aggressive movements from the midfield (bar Lucas) and would’ve been a risky shape to protect a 1-0 lead because of that.

The only other adaption in shape was when Ibe came on for Lallana in the 83rd. Firmino moved into right central-midfield, Milner to right-midfield and Ibe slotted in on the left to create a basic 4-5-1 formation. After Mané equalised, Firmino started to take a more aggressive positioning between an 8 and a 10 with the expected forward movements of the wide players and Can to some extent.

Conclusion

Klopp is still looking for his first win as Liverpool manager but will be able to take multiple positives out of the match. Liverpool adapted their shape on a number of occasions throughout the second half yet there wasn’t many negative consequences in features such as their synergy across different formations. The introduction of Benteke was important despite Origi putting in a competent performance whilst their pressing was improved.

On the other hand, there are still some underlying issues. A major one being the orientation of the players being very much reactive to the opposition’s actions. It will be a big task for Klopp, Buvac and co. to develop a more proactive process in the decision making of both the individuals and the collective as a whole.

Jurgen Klopp’s first three games as Liverpool manager gave us just as much gegenpressing, high work-rate, and press conference comedy as we expected. The only real surprise from these three matches was that he still hadn’t earned his first win. This was rectified on Wednesday night as Liverpool beat an ever impressive Bournemouth side 1-0.

Eddie Howe, who may be secretly pleased that his Bournemouth side can now give greater focus to their man goal of avoiding relegation, continued to have his hand forced by his list of serious injuries. Gradel, Mings and Wilson all have bad knee injuries and will be lucky to be back before the end of the season. Elphick, meanwhile, is suffering from an ankle injury and is expected to be back in action in mid-December. Despite these injuries to four of his very best players, Howe’s side held their own at Anfield for the second time this season.

The starting line-ups. Liverpool were somewhere in between a 4-2-3-1 and a 4-3-3, moving into a 4-3-2-1 at times during the second half.. Bournemouth used a 4-3-3 formation.

Liverpool’s pressing

The main tactical talking point in the mainstream media over the last two weeks has been pressing and gegenpressing, something Klopp’s Dortmund and Mainz sides were revered for. The British media are so obsessed with this because most senior football journalists and pundits only watch the Premier League therefore they have never seen pressing before. Klopp’s pressing is high intensity by Premier League standards however isn’t as energetic or chaotic as sides such as Schmidt’s Leverkusen or Sampaoli’s Chile.

Liverpool defended in a compact 4-1-4-1 with Allen usually being the man in the no. 6 role although sometimes Brannagan took up this position in the defensive phase. It is the intelligence of Liverpool’s pressing rather than its intensity that is the reason as to why it was so successful. The team stayed in their 4-1-4-1 block and let Bournemouth’s centre-backs and Macdonald, who dropped back as part of Bournemouth’s La salida lavolpiana, lots of space to pass the ball. They only pressed in accordance to a set of pressing triggers; if an isolated player received the ball, if a player in a wide position received the ball, if a player received the ball facing his own goal, or if a player received a pass that was too slow or at an awkward height. When one of said triggers happened, they would press as a collective unit; when one goes, they all go. They used a mixture of man-orientated pressing (pressing he man on the ball/near the ball), but more importantly space orientated pressing, restricting the ball-players time, space and options. Below is a gif Illustrating this:

1. Ball is played wide to Smith, he is pressed by Teixeira. 2. Smith recycles it back to Francis who isn’t pressed. 3. Francis plays it to Macdonald, who has his back to goal-he is pressed by Firmino. 4. As the ball is played back to Macdonald, Firmino sees the chance to press Francis while cover-shadowing Macdonald. 4. Teixeira stays tight to Smith and Origi blocks passes to Distin Macdonald simultaneously. Firmino presses Francis and forces a pass to Smith who can only find a dodgy chipped ball back to his goalkeeper who clears. Bournemouth’s build-up is stifled.

Liverpool were just as enthusiastic when gegenpressing however it lacked a bit of structure. Their spatially oriented gegenpressing system, similar to that of Klopp’s Dortmund worked well on several occasions although sometimes it wasn’t carried out by every player surrounding the ball and looked like players running around to win back the ball without any direction. Also, their possessional structure, which has to be perfect in order to make gegenpressing effective should they lose the ball will be worked on by Klopp in coming weeks. Below is an example of Liverpool’s spatially orientated gegenpressing in the second half of the match.

Liverpool’s gegenpressing. Restricting the space around the ball-carrier as he receives a ball at chest-height. After a Liverpool through ball is cleared by a Bournemouth defender.

Liverpool more exciting in the final third

The main criticism of Klopp’s short reign so far is the absence of free-scoring, exciting, attacking play he is associated with. Having said this, Liverpool were much improved in the final third than they were against Southampton or Tottenham.

In early build-up, their centre-backs stay quite narrow and their fullbacks push high up, sometimes leaving the halfspaces completely empty. Teixeira, Allen, Brannagan or even Firmino took turns to drop into the space in front of the centre-backs and play short passes while looking for spaces in Bournemouth’s compact midfield five to thread a ball through. Using La salida lavolpiana as Rodgers often did would have helped occupy the halfspaces as well as given them more time to look for a long diagonal ball forward however this isn’t Klopp’s style, and besides, Liverpool didn’t have a player who can play these long high balls accurately.

Liverpool placed their winger and full-back on the opposite side of the pitch to where the ball was on the touchline to stretch Bournemouth. This wasn’t too effective as Bournemouth were pretty disciplined defensively however did help open up spaces inside on a few occasions, especially in what some may call ‘zone 14’. This space in front of the opposition’s centre-backs is one of the most important on a football pitch, and Klopp’s selection of Firmino in a free central role meant that the most technically gifted player on the pitch was in said area. Firmino was a deserved man of the match, pressing brilliantly and causing havoc in between Bournemouth’s defensive and midfield lines. Teixeira also put in a notably good performance.

Allen and Brannagan, who was replaced by Lucas in the second half, did a good job of containing Bournemouth in their own third. Bournemouth played with two deep defensive blocks when the ball was in the final third. Said Liverpool players held positions around 35-yards from goal where they could collect any clearances, stop counter-attacks, and pass the ball in space from side to side into pockets.

Bournemouth-not your average English side.

You would be forgiven for thinking a small club with an English manager that is promoted into the Premier League would play defensive, direct 4-4-2 football. However Bournemouth have continued to stick to their reputation of playing progressive football and are a true breath of fresh air in the Premier League. Tom Payne’s brilliant analysis of them illustrates this in detail.

They were equally expansive as Liverpool were in possession. They played with lots of width, especially Pugh who hugged the left touchline for most of the match. Ritchie played more in the right halfspace while Smith provided attacking width from right-back. Klopp started with Clyne at left-back to cope with the threat that Ritchie poses while giving academy prospect Randall his debut at right-back. Pugh gave the youngster a tough night and most of Bournemouth’s threat came from giving Pugh the ball one-on-one with Randall. Liverpool maintained their horizontal compactness despite Bournemouth’s width although this did leave large spaces on either side of the field when the ball was being switched. This could have been exploited if Bournemouth had a player who can pick out long diagonal balls into these areas.

Liverpool’s 4-1-4-1 defensive block worked well at restricting Bournemouth during their own-half build up however Howe’s side did use some clever techniques to penetrate Liverpool’s defensive lines. Below is an example of this:

Arter knows if he drops he will be followed by Firmino. Arter and Smith drop back towards the ball and open up a large space for Ritchie to move into and collect the ball. Ritchie was important in the halfspace throughout the match.

In Tom’s analysis I linked earlier, he spoke of Eddie Howe implementing Juego de Posicion elements in his Bournemouth side. A few of these (La salida lavolpiana as you can see above; staggering; playing in between lines) were apparent in Wednesday’s match. Below is an example directly following the passage of play shown above.

Stanislas, Pugh and Daniels move into the space between the lines. They have also overloaded the inexperienced Randall 2v1 should they receive the ball and are able to turn.

Bournemouth were equally impressive in defence, restricting Liverpool’s creative talents to only a handful of chances. They used a 4-5-1 defensive shape against Liverpool’s early build up and didn’t press Liverpool’s back line, instead blocking passing lanes in their compact defensive shape. Their spatial control was fantastic. Kermorgant showed good energy pressing Liverpool’s centre-backs who aren’t very comfortable on the ball.

Conclusion

This won’t be the most memorable win of Klopp’s Liverpool career but it has wet the appetite of Liverpool fans as well as those of us who are fans of forward-thinking tactical approaches and above all, exciting football. Early days indeed, but Jurgen Klopp could (and in my opinion will) revolutionise thinking within English football. I look forward to following his progress closely over coming months.

Eddie Howe has had his work cut out with injuries to his most capable players but I believe Bournemouth will stay up and hope for English football’s sake that they do. Eddie Howe is eleven years younger than Klopp and despite having a few seasons as a coach under his belt already, is at the beginning of his managerial career. Despite this, I would not be surprised if in eleven years time Eddie Howe has achieved what Klopp has to date.

Jurgen Klopp achieved his first win in the Premier League to the ever-extending misery of Jose Mourinho as Liverpool won at Stamford Bridge following a brace from Phillipe Coutinho and one from Christian Benteke.

Klopp Decides on a 4-2-3-1 whilst Oscar is Reintroduced on the Wing

The two starting formations.

For his first few games as the boss at Anfield, Jurgen Klopp has opted for a 4-3-2-1 formation with Lallana and Coutinho operating in a narrow midfield behind a lone striker. Despite a relatively similar line-up, Klopp decided to set his team in a 4-2-3-1 shape, more reminiscent of his tenure at Borussia Dortmund.

Roberto Firmino was the striker and made frequent dropping movements as expected whilst Adam Lallana was directly behind him in the 10 position. Coutinho took on the left half-space whilst Milner was more variable, fluctuating between a position in the right half-space and the touchline.

A key feature of Liverpool’s attacks was the partnership between Lallana and Firmino, particularly the Brazilian’s variable movements. During many movements in the first half you could suggest Liverpool were playing without a striker and often looked like a 4-2-4 with Firmino coming into the midfield. In other moments however, the two central attackers rotated positions to some success.

Although the movements between Can and Lucas were rather typical of a double 6 partnership, it was interesting to see more expansive runs from Lucas. In matches so far, the Brazilian has played a restricted role and commonly dropped deeper however against Chelsea, he could be seen moving ahead of the ball quite a bit. This is particularly intriguing being away from home in a potentially tricky game, yet is perhaps an indicator to how Chelsea are viewed currently as well as Klopp’s positive attitude. Another possible reasoning could be Hazard’s central role as the Belgian is not known for his defensive efforts, yet this still leaves a counter-attacking threat.

Mourinho stuck with his 4-2-3-1 formation yet made some changes to the selection. An under-performing Fabregas only made the bench as he was beaten by a double 6 of Mikel and Ramires. Although the Brazilian gave his side the lead early on, there was a distinct lack of playmaking ability from the midfield as Chelsea struggled to create throughout the match.

Oscar was brought back into the squad but was interestingly elected to play in a position on the left of the ‘3’. He frequently moved back towards the centre whilst Hazard made movements to the left flank in particular, whilst he permanently returned to a central role once his Belgian teammate was replaced by Kenedy in the 60th minute.

Chelsea’s Passivity and Weak Counter-Attacking

Mournho’s side caused themselves some issues by playing a passive defensive game. During Liverpool’s build-up game, they would only press with intensity once the ball reached around the half-way line – up until that point, no pressure was made on the centre-backs. This was potentially influenced by the early goal for Mourinho’s team as they reverted back to old ways and sat without enough pressure.

It was particularly an issue in the half-space, as they lacked a defensively-strong 10 with Hazard there.

Chelsea’s passivity caused issues for themselves.

Without much pressure against them, the Liverpool centre-backs (particularly Sakho), had more freedom to play penetrative passes towards the centre. Spaces were commonly opened through the flexible movements across the trio of Coutinho, Lallana and Firmino which was strong against the man-marking of Chelsea’s midfield. Although the orientation of Liverpool’s possession game was maladaptive, they created some decent situations during these moments but simply didn’t capitalise on it through a weak wing-focus.

It should be noted that this may have been more successful against a less-aggressive Liverpool under Rodgers, however the increased verticality which Klopp has introduced was a strong counter to Chelsea’s organisation. His attacking structure occupied more (and better!) passing lanes which not only improved Liverpool’s access when moving the ball into higher positions, but benefited the counterpressing following the turnover.

Upon regaining possession of the ball, Chelsea looked to add to their lead through counter-attacks. Hazard offered potential centrally whilst Costa would shift the ball-near half-space which was presumably to exploit Liverpool’s highly-positioned full-backs whilst he dragged a centre-back out with him in the process.

However, counter-attacks in such positions lacked threat for the most part due to the spaces used. The wings offered little variabilty and often counters struggled to even start as Chelsea struggled to find Costa initially whilst the striker had issues in bringing in other attackers due to his position near the touchline.

Liverpool Pressing

The development of Liverpool’s pressing game will be under much scrutiny following Klopp’s appointment and the side put in a reasonable performance in an aggressive showing. They showed key signs of improvement since the managerial change looked strong as they will soon (if not already) become the best in the league for this defensive aspect. It may be unlikely that Klopp will ever have Liverpool reach the pressing ability of his Dortmund though it will not take long for them to be comfortably ahead of any other Premier League competition.

Liverpool pressed well in wide areas.

Again they were strong at forcing the ball into wide areas during Chelsea’s build-up to trap them, with their shift in intensity particularly impressive. This was more commonly done down Liverpool’s right, perhaps to make more of Milner’s defensive ability as opposed to a weaker Coutinho. Similar features remained from their 4-3-2-1, such as the actions of the ball-near winger in pressing the ball-carrier as they press vertically.

Like in the match against Southampton, this may have been a precaution against wider developments – both Hazard and Costa shifted towards the touchline during wider developments which gave them slightly more potential (yet still rather weak). Despite this, the pressing was still nicely stable and effective (more-so than against Southampton) pressing down the wings which disrupted the build-up of Chelsea well.

With the ball-near winger, Lallana and Firmino/Benteke, Liverpool were able to form a competent press across the 3 major angles. In co-ordination with the man-marking by the full-back and nearer midfielders, they could isolate the ball well.

Wing-Orientation Issue for Liverpool’s Possession Game

One downside of Liverpool’s performance was their focus on wing-play in possession. Despite making decent openings in the centre of the pitch, they moved the ball towards the touchline not only far too frequently, but also too early in the play.

A moment from the 32nd minute, Firmino unnecessarily passes to Moreno instead of a centrally-focused attack,

As I mentioned when talking of Chelsea’s passivity, Liverpool were able to break through the first line of pressure quite commonly in a central position, yet for some reason they quickly wanted to shift the ball over to wider spaces.

This resulted in limited options and variability in the final third as the access of space weakened amongst other strategical issues associated with wider positions. When they looked to bring the ball back inside, it was usually too late in the attack and could easily be restricted by Chelsea. It was not helped by relatively weak structures – particularly down the right where Milner and Clyne would often be positioned in a straight vertical line.

In comparison, Chelsea were more focused on breaking through the centre yet struggled to do so against a Liverpool defense which controlled space well. They were more patient and would circulate the ball horizontally in attempt to open up a lane inside yet these opportunities were quite rare and not always taken advantage of.

I expect that this will be something which Klopp will want to address thoroughly in training as it seemingly stems from the orientation on an individual-level which Rodgers developed. Because of this it may be a while for clear improvements to be seen though the impact will be significant. Meanwhile, alternative issues such as poor structures and attacking strategies are typically-English and likely to improve as Klopp takes over what Rodgers left behind at Melwood.

Later Developments

Probably encouraged by their equalizer late into added time of the first half, Liverpool came out following the interval with increased aggression. They attacked with greater impetus which was probably most evident in their pressing, both during developed Chelsea possession and transitions which benefited from a greater intensity. This helped to sway the momentum further and Klopp’s side developed a better control of the match as the latter 45 minutes progressed. The German manager emphasised this in his first substitution which at 1-1 he replaced Milner with Benteke. Through doing this, he created a more attacking-minded ‘3-1’ whilst Firmino dropped into a central position which in-turn shifted Lallana out to the right whilst Coutinho maintained his half-left role.

Once they took the lead and then more-so after the third, Liverpool’s possession game became more stability-oriented as they saw out the rest of the match with composure. During their build-up they brought more players closer to the ball for increased-resistance against the Chelsea press, whilst were more patient and less vertical in their passing.

Conclusion

We saw yet another weak performance from Chelsea where the usual issues were their downfall. Again key players failed to deliver even competent performances whilst their typical lack of adequate pressure brings weakness in their defensive game. On the flipside, Klopp will undoubtedly be delighted to register his first Premier League win at Stamford Bridge. His side were not great – just superior as there are still clear problems to amend, albeit amongst some positives.

Minus that loss at the Allianz Arena, Arsenal had been playing well for a few weeks and were facing high expectations coming into this North London derby.They disappointed and were outclassed by their local rivals in the first half both defensively and in attack. They controlled possession well in the second half however were predictable in the final third.

Pochettino’s Spurs have quietly been having a pretty good season, playing some dynamic football with one of the youngest squads in Europe. They haven’t lost a Premier League match since their first day of the season away loss to Manchester United.

Both managers named predictable starting XIs in 4-2-3-1 formations.

The starting line ups

Arsenal Poor in the Final Third

After having only one shot in the whole of the first half, Arsenal managed to get the ball in the final third frequently during the second half. Despite this, they only scored once and it wasn’t just Olivier Giroud’s atrocious finishing that was to blame for this.

In the first half, Arsenal’s weak possessional structure was to blame for their lack of fluency with the ball in Spurs’ half. Their attacking midfield trio of Sanchez, Ozil and Campbell had more-or-less roaming roles, especially Campbell who often dropped back to link up play and stayed quite narrow. It was strange to see Campbell playing an almost identical role to Ramsay’s usual role considering they are very different players. These roaming roles contributed to Arsenal’s lack of structure. Also, Arsenal’s players were too static off the ball and they missed Walcott’s forward runs that stretch the opposition. Nobody was trying to penetrate space in behind Spurs’ back four.

Arsenal’s structure have allowed Spurs to box in Cazorla and restrict Arsenal with simply a nicely compact defence. Arsenal will struggle to score without anyone in the central column of the field.

Spurs’ very compact two banks of four in the defensive phase forced Arsenal’s possession into the wide areas. In the second half, Arsenal gave up trying to break down Tottenham’s defence with the quick combination passing they are famous for and decided to play in cross after cross instead. Arsenal played 11 crosses in the last 15 minutes of the match. It’s important to note that Arsenal did score from a cross and did create a few good chances from these crosses however this strategy is not only boring and predictable but also a waste of the immensely talented creative players they have.

Pochettino’s Game-Changing Switch

The main problem with Spurs’ play in the first half-an-hour of the match was their lack of width on the left hand side. This was due to Eriksen being started as a left-winger although he has natural tendencies to drift inwards. This was also combined with the fact that despite having two very attack-minded fullbacks, Pochettino wasn’t very keen on his fullbacks holding positions in the final third, only moving into this area with late overlapping runs forward. Below are a couple of examples of Eriksen’s centrality making Spurs easy to defend against.

Eriksen holding a position in the halfspace, nobody out wide. Arsenal can defend in a nice compact block and not worry about pressurising the ball.

This time, Eriksen moves central with the ball at feet, allowing Arsenal to comfortably control central space.

After around thirty minutes Pochettino rectified this by moving Eriksen to central attacking midfield and putting Lamela on the left while Alli switched to right midfield and Dembele dropped into a deeper role. This gave Spurs much more width and this change directly resulted in a goal just a few minutes after this change.

In the GIF below, Lamela is taking up his new position on the left while Eriksen is in the left halfspace he thrives in. Spurs actually find themselves in a good Juego de Posicion-like structure. This was purely situational however stresses the effectiveness of this sort of structure in terms of making a team difficult to cover space effectively against. Immediately we can see that Arsenal’s defensive block is much less horizontally and vertically compact. As the ball makes its way to Rose, Lamela moves wide and deeper, pulling Debuchy over giving space for Eriksen to run towards. Eriksen moves into this space which opens up the space between the centre-backs for Rose to play a ball through and Kane to finish clinically. Note how Spurs have two clear units here, six defensive players and four attacking. Having Dembele this deep means Rose is much harder to press, giving him time to find the long vertical pass to Kane. In general, Arsenal had no pressing intensity whatsoever and Spurs’ defenders had loads of time to find these long passes behind Arsenal’s medium defensive line.

 Also, with this new-found width on the left, Spurs targeted Debuchy as a potential weakness in Arsenal’s defence, often overloading the left side.

Tottenham’s Effective Man-Orientated Pressing

Another reason Arsenal struggles in possession was Spurs’ fantastic tight man-orientated marking/pressing in all areas of the field. One man would go towards the ball while others stay very tight to the ball-players’ options. Other players would be slightly less tight holding shape and space.

Tight man-orientation in Arsenal’s half.

…and in their own half too. One man towards the ball, the rest tight to the options.

Conclusion

This analysis briefly touched upon the three most tactically interesting pointers from this game, none of which reflected positively upon Arsenal. I felt Arsenal had lost their spark which was probably due to the hangover of their crippling defeat in Munich earlier that week. Arsenal did control possession well in stages however and good individual performances from Koscielny and Coquelin should be noted. Arsenal have only won 50% of their matches at home this season, which is possibly due to the fact opponents are happy to sit back and defend at The Emirates. Arsenal do struggle to break down a compact defence. This, combined with their unwillingness/inability to press is the reason I believe they are not tactically well rounded enough to sustain a thirty-eight match campaign that would deliver the league title.

Tottenham, on the other hand, will be very happy with their performance. They created their fair share of chances and attacked Arsenal’s weak points effectively, especially making use of Arsenal’s lack of pressing. Spurs also defended very well however do lack pace on the counter attack, causing them to sometimes struggle in attacking transition. If they continue to play in this manner, a top-four place is an ambitious but realistic target for them this season.

Jurgen Klopp continued his excellent start at Liverpool with a 6-1 win over Southampton last night which saw the return of Daniel Sturridge in quite a rotated squad. Although their performance was perhaps not as good as the scoreline suggested, they still showed clear signs of improvement as they continue to impress following the German’s appointment.

The two starting formations.

With a few changes in selection, Liverpool lined up in somewhat of a 4-1-2-1-2 formation. Young Randall was given a start in a back-line consisting of Skrtel, a returning Lovren and Alberto Moreno. Lucas Leiva formed the deepest point of the midfield with Can and Allen moving forward ahead of him. The duo looked to support Adam Lallana who occupied the 10 position behind goalscorers Sturridge and Origi.

There was less change across Southampton’s squad with Koeman opting not to rest his key players. Stekelenberg was goalkeeper behind a back four of Bertrand, Van Dijk, Caulker and Soares. A pairing of Wanyama and Clasie made a double 6 at the base of midfield, with Wanyama deeper than his Dutch partner whilst Davis supported the attack in front of them. Sadio Mane was a threat from the right wing with Dusan Tadic operating on the opposite touchline whilst Graziano Pelle led the line centrally.

Weak Liverpool Start

With Mane putting the home side ahead within the first minutes, Liverpool got off to a slow start and took a bit longer to get into the game than their opponents.

Southampton’s pressing did well to disrupt Liverpool’s building game and through an energetic front four they caused a few issues early on. This was not aided by a Liverpool shape which didn’t offer much support for the defensive line during deep possession and the block was commonly disconnected. Despite starting Sturridge and Origi in attack, they played many long balls due to the threat of Southampton’s front four without possession.

When going forward, Southampton quickly showed their focus on attacking the wing of young full-back Randall. Not only did this lead to the first goal as an accurate cross from Liverpool’s right was met with a strong header from Mane, but the ex-Salzburg forward had the opportunity to double his side’s lead with another cross from Randall’s side.

Half-Space Orientation

As the game progressed, Liverpool improved and their possession game became more effective. Albeit aided by a surprisingly weak Southampton, Lallana and co. created well behind Sturridge and Origi with Can particularly impressive from a right-sided central midfield position.

Through the lateral movement of Lallana and the forward runs of both Can and Allen, it was clear to see that Liverpool’s attacks were oriented around the half-spaces. When met with the dropping movements of both Sturridge and Origi, they positioned themselves quite well around the two half-spaces and looked to break through in midfield.

After the early attacks of Southampton, Liverpool managed to form a few threatening situations of their own from the half-space with Allen in particular moving high up the pitch down the left. Clop’s side equalised soon in the 25th minute and by the 28th they were in the lead – the second coming from an exquisite assist by Can – in the right half-space.

The goal was a good example of the diagonality of the half-space as the ex-Bayern midfielder was able to play a diagonal through-ball into Sturridge after moving inside towards the centre.

With quite a flexible midfield 4, Liverpool again looked improved with the ball as they positioned themselves well. Ere Can in particular made many ball-oriented movements as he could be commonly seen moving towards the left flank. The same can be said about Joe Allen though this was slightly later on in the match. Lallana’s movements were also important as he shifted horizontally between the half-spaces offering himself for passes beyond the Southampton midfield. The flexibility of the midfield movements created a versatile system which facilitated attacks in wider areas too, especially when the ball-near striker would shift towards the touchline too.

Liverpool’s attacks benefited from the central focus and with most of the forays forward happening between the two half-spaces. Not only did the centre provide a better platform to carve out chances for the Liverpool forwards but the structural focus gave potential to create overloads against Southampton’s 4-4-2. This was particularly the case when one of Mane or Tadic would push up into the first line of pressure, leaving uncovered spaces across the midfield.

Although their spacing didn’t really allow them to establish such overloads as often as they’d have liked, it did provide some success. At times the front 3 were too disconnected from the deeper midfield, whilst in build-up at times there weren’t enough connections around the ball. On quite a few occasions two midfielders would occupy the same space meaning that they struggled to generate the passing options necessary to progress the ball upfield. The more threatening occasions coming when Southampton were vertically uncompact which itself was common enough for Liverpool to profit in the final third.

This central-focus immediately put them at an advantage over Southampton who were more wing-oriented when going forward. After the opening 10 minutes of the game, the Saints’ wide attacks offered little threat as their crosses amounted to little whilst Liverpool’s central attacks created better.

Liverpool Pressing

Something which has been payed close attention to after Klopp’s appointment is Liverpool’s pressing game and how it has developed. The German coach’s former club Dortmund were famous for their ability to press and there has no doubt been attention payed towards the same aspects of Liverpool’s defensive setup.

Immediately some of the more macro-level facets have seen changes, with their pressing become more compact and with better connections. Whilst there are still some amendments necessary on a micro-level, their pressing is already superior to the vast majority of the league.

Against Southampton, Klopp’s team generally pressed in a 4-3-1-2 shape with Lallana just behind the two strikers. For the most part they were nicely compact with the front 3 in particular narrow as they looked to block passes towards the centre of the pitch.

Situationally we could see the English attacking midfielder push up between Sturridge and Origi to increase the pressure on Southampton’s defensive line. Generally though Lallana would man-mark the ball-near Southampton 6 and often follow him if he dropped between his centre-backs – this was Wanyama more-so than Clasie

At times however, Lallana’s presence wasn’t necessary as the pairing in attack co-ordinated themselves well to force the ball to one side of the situational back-three thus negating the ball-far centre-back. Such moments show the improvements made since Rodgers’ sacking with Liverpool’s play in general showing a greater intelligence which is rarely seen in the Premier League.

Conclusion

Although the 6-1 scoreline maybe slightly flattering on Klopp’s men, they still thoroughly deserved their win against a sub-par Southampton side. Sturridge’s performance was definitely an encouragement whilst the more tactically-based aspects again showed the continuous improvement since Klopp (and Buvac!) arrived at Anfield.

Arsenal beat Manchester City in this potentially title-deciding battle at the Emirates. Wenger’s side were creative and fluid in attack and surprisingly resolute in defence and although they had less possession and fewer shots, were the better side on the night.

The most significant line-up news was surrounding two South American forwards. Sergio Aguero was returning from injury Manchester City and put in a typical Aguero-coming-back-from-injury performance (cautious and harmless). Meanwhile, to Raymond Verheijen’s delight I would imagine, Alexis Sanchez wasn’t risked despite being expected to return from a hamstring injury.

The starting XIs. Arsenal would be described as a 4-2-3-1 with possession however a 4-1-4-1 or 4-5-1 when defending in their own half. Manchester City played in a 4-4-1-1 formation with Delph playing narrower and deeper than De Bruyne and Silva roaming.

Arsenal’s Defending-Better In Their Own Half Than In The Opposition’s.

Pressing in the final third

As Arsene Wenger suggested in his pre-game press conference, Arsenal did apply pressure to the ball and have a high block when City were building up in the first third. Özil often moved up next to Giroud to press the centre-backs and Ramsey and Flamini stuck tight to Toure and Fernandinho. The pressing worked with mixed success with Giroud’s pressure on Managala causing him to misplace a pass to Fernandinho, allowing Arsenal to recover possession and score. However, it sometimes was too uncoordinated and structurally flawed as shown below.

Arsenal’s flawed press.

Otamendi has already had time to take a touch and is being pressed by Giroud. Ramsey, Flamini, Monreal and Walcott are fairly static. They aren’t pressing anybody, closing important space nor deliberately cover shadowing. Aguero drops to receive the ball and isn’t followed tightly enough by Koscielny. Aguero can flick the ball to De Bruyne who is in acres of space and is being played onside by Mertesacker who is the deepest Arsenal player by about 15 yards when Aguero plays his pass. This is far too deep for a cover player in a pressing system and it would also make more sense to have the faster centre-back as the cover defender. De Bruyne can run through on goal and narrowly miss a shot from 12 yards.

In the middle third

When defending in the middle third, Arsenal dropped back to a 4-1-4-1 shape with Giroud applying pressure to the ball carrier.

Middle third defensive phase.

Flamini dropping back to hold the space in between the lines means that the midfield four can hold space higher up the pitch without the defensive line having to be very high to accommodate this. Flamini’s presence also means it is harder for Arsenal’s centre-backs to be pulled apart as they do not have to move out of the defensive line to track players moving in between the lines. Bellerin is positioned ready to use his pace to apply pressure to Delph should the ball be played out wide. Arsenal’s horizontally compact midfield four block passes behind them as well as diagonal floor passes, to Delph or De Bruyne. If Fernandinho wishes to play a lofted pass to Delph or De Bruyne, Monreal or Bellerin will be there by the time the ball is under control.

In their own third

When defending deep, Arsenal would move to two very compact lines in a 4-5-1 shape. Again, Giroud would apply pressure to the ball and aim to prevent City switching play diagonally while the rest of the team controlled important space.

Compact 4-5-1 in defence.

The aim of the above shape was to force City wide as they could not penetrate central areas. The spatial compactness of Arsenal’s midfield four means there is no room for a pass through them. Arsenal could keep this horizontally compact shape as Manchester City’s fullbacks don’t move up onto the last line until the ball is secured in the final quarter of the pitch.  Delph plays it wide to Kolarov.

The ball is played wide.

Campbell presses Kolarov and Flamini moves deeper. Arsenal block all potential angles for Man City. Giroud makes sure Kolarov cannot switch the play across to Delph or Fernandinho. Brilliant spatial control from Arsenal.

However, Manchester City did cause Arsenal problems when they managed to get it into wide areas very high up the pitch. As shown below, the Arsenal defence often became too deep when the ball was near their byline and therefore left a lot of space on the edge of the area. On a few occasions, this allowed City players to have time to shoot from 18-20 yards from goal, most significantly Yaya Toure who scored late on in the game.

Arsenal drop too deep, Sagna plays it to Silva who has time to set himself and take a shot at goal.

Arsenal’s Verticality in Possession Causing Problems for City

Arsenal’s attacking strategy was to play short passes in the middle third, with Flamini and Ramsey dropping either side of the centre-backs and then play longer vertical balls into overloaded areas. These passes often picked out Özil who drifted horizontally between the lines looking to receive one of these medium-range low passes. He did this brilliantly for Arsenal’s opening goal.

Walcott goal part 1

Walcott goal part 2

Arsenal play it back to Koscielny, suck the ill-defensively-disciplined Toure out of position and then play the ball through to Özil who is in an overloaded area. He turns and plays it to Walcott who scores. This sort of verticality worked well throughout the night and allows Arsenal and Özil to put to use their strength of quick combination play on the edge of the penalty area, being able to penetrate the opposition before they have been able to put two banks of four behind the ball.

Arsenal were also dangerous on the counter attack in the second half when the game began to open up. An increased amount of turnovers meant that the pace of Campbell and Walcott were higher up the field in attacking transition. City’s defence looked very vulnerable in most phases but especially when moving towards their own goal.

City’s Weaknesses

Poor spatial compactness in defence

When defending in their own half, City tended to have a lot of space between each players, in part due to the fact Arsenal played with a good degree of width. This meant that each defender could be isolated and they were easy to play one-twos around as well as being more easily beaten 1v1. Arsenal moved the ball quickly and moved well, playing around City with ease.

Toure’s poor defensive discipline

As we can see in the image above and to the left (Walcott goal part 1) Toure has a tendency to follow the ball and ignore his defensive duties. He is out of position, meaning that Fernandinho is alone in central midfield and is unable to block the pass from Koscielny to Özil. He moves up and presses but nobody moves up around him, meaning it is easy to play the ball around him and take him out of the game.

City too slow in possession

Arsenal sat back and complexed vexed City. City moved the ball too slowly and showed little off-the-ball movement. Silva only made 42 passes in the match (the 8th most of any City player) and struggled to affect the match as the no. 10 space he normally thrives in was completely cut off. City resembled their cross-city rivals at times.

Conclusion

Arsenal were brilliant, putting in a performance worthy of the title. A lot of their strengths came from the fact that City had most of the ball and didn’t revert to two deep defensive lines when Arsenal had the ball. Arsenal normally struggle against teams that put 11 men behind the ball.

Manchester City weren’t particularly poor however failed to break down Arsenal’s compact defence. They could struggle to maintain focus from now until the rest of the season with rumours that Guardiola is bound for the Etihad at the end of the season intensifying.

2^nd place meets 4^th place in this top of the table clash. Leicester is coming off of a loss to Klopp’s Liverpool while Manchester City won handedly on Boxing Day 4-1 in their last match. Despite Leicester’s impressive run in this underdog story everyone is loving, Manchester City was still considered the heavy favorites. LCFCs deep block and counterattacking strategy stifled MCFC and didn’t yield any results for themselves – resulting in the 0:0 scoreline.

Leicester’s 4-1-4-1

The starting lineups

Surprisingly the Foxes started Inler as an extra midfielder rather than playing in their usual system with 2 strikers in a 4-4-2. Inler simply sat in front of the defense while the 4 in front of him shifted towards the ball. This inevitably left Vardy isolated up top and Manchester’s central defenders didn’t have a difficult time bypassing the forward pressing line.

Both Kante and Drinkwater played as 8s intelligently in this system and would flexibly join Vardy in the front pressing line when he wouldn’t be able to pressure the other central defender in a high pressing sequence. This would form the 4-4-2 which we are more accustomed to in this squad and forced City into inaccurate long balls which were pressed well by Leicester.

In regards to their offensive strategy – Leicester didn’t have much of the ball and looked to break mainly through the isolated Vardy (who made quick evasive movements towards the flanks so he can attack the goal diagonally) up front. They’d play simple combinations like a vertical pass into one of the central midfielders before laying off to one of the fullbacks like Fuchs to try and escape pressure and face forward – from this position they looked for long passes behind the defense for Vardy to run onto (instead of playing into his feet and letting him resist pressure to bring the rest of the team up the field).

This was more easily intercepted by the City defenders as they could read the ball for a longer period of time due to the length of the pass and as Vardy was isolated they didn’t have a difficult time covering the space and attacking the pass (this changed in the second half though).

LCFC’s main approach to buildup was to play long passes into the forwards (especially off of goalkicks). This is when Drinkwater or Kante would move forward and Mahrez would move very narrow – though this resulted in some dangerous counterattacks down the far side when City was able to escape this pressure. They did this to obviously press the long balls but also use their ability in tight combinations and dribbling (mainly Mahrez) to resist pressure and break through or play the ball onto the wing for a long diagonal. In the first half LCFC had 1 particularly nice moment where Fuchs was able to shield the ball from KDB and dribble towards the wing and play a long diagonal towards the far post where Vardy, Albrighton, and a central midfielder were attacking and nearly resulted in a goal.

Manchester City’s Possession Game

City played in their usual manner – with the two “wingers” vacating their positions and moving into the center and halfspaces as creators while the two fullbacks push high up the pitch (Kolarov even joined the forward line in most situations – where he consistently played long diagonals into the box without success). Silva was the one who most often dropped into midfield to help Toure and Fernandinho maintain possession and play into the forwards. Raheem Sterling began the match on the left flank but played as the right striker next to Aguero for most of the match.

City had some problems due to the fullbacks pushing too high up too soon which isolated Fernandinho and Toure in the center without anywhere to play longer passes to escape pressure (when Silva wouldn’t drop). LCFC pressed quite well out of their midfield in their 4-1-4-1 and was able to win the ball off of the City central midfielders a few times due to this isolation.

Though through this City structure they were able to connect in a few combinations which resulted in dangerous chances on goal. In one situation Sagna played a wall-pass into KDB in the halfspace and received the return pass once he had broken through the flank. This drew out a central defender and Sterling was able to attack the space in behind and nearly scored on a volley. City’s main threat in offense has always been their combinations on the flank to penetrate the box.

When Kolarov moved to the left wing and Sagna occupied the right City were able to play with 4 players in central midfield. Aguero and Sterling remained as strikers while Silva and KDB moved into the halfspaces. Toure had some intelligent movement in moved into a #10 position here while Fernandinho remained as a six to form a diamond. In one situation this resulted in a vertical pass from Fernadinho into Silva who laid off to Toure. Toure immediately played the ball through the defense from this creative position to Kolarov.

In one other situation KDB received a vertical pass in the halfspace and he flicked the ball to Sterling in the center as a lay-off pass who then played Sagna (who was already making a run during the vertical pass into KDB) and this resulted in another breakthrough of the defense. This type of speed, changing of structure, and anticipation is incredibly difficult to defend properly.

Second Half

In the second half there were a few minor changes that didn’t really impact the course of the game. Around the 61^st minute Leicester subbed off Inler (who was struggling to keep the ball under pressure) and added another striker to move to a 4-4-2 (and 4-4-1-1 defensively). City subbed on Bony for Aguero and Navas for Silva (and they struggled in combinations a bit more due to this).

The biggest and most valuable improvement in the second half for LCFC was that Vardy became much more involved in the combination play in transition to move his team towards the goal rather than simply making runs in behind and hoping the long balls broke through properly. The difference was immediately obvious as wingers now had an option for short diagonal passes into Vardy who would lay the ball off into Kante or Drinkwater moving up the field and now LCFC were able to attack City with a good field of vision and many runners ahead of the ball.

LCFC had one of their best moments in the second half. Mahrez received the ball on the right flank and was being marked by Kolarov. When Drinkwater played him the pass he underlapped Mahrez, dragging his marker with him. Mahrez used that momentum and dribbled inside of the pitch into the cleared space (with the ball shielded far away from Kolarov). While this was happening Albrighton vacated the left flank and ran into the center and then made a diagonal run towards the front post from the center of the field. Because Mahrez had the proper position and field of vision he was able to play Albrighton through for a shot on goal.

*I planned on making a graphic of the above movement from LCFC but I can’t make my bending arrows look as sexy as MR’s do…

Conclusion

The final result of the game was fair given how both teams played. Neither team dominated but each had their dangerous chances on goal. They finish earning a point a piece as Leicester City move into 2^nd place on goal difference behind Arsenal and City move into 3^rd place (3 points behind the leaders and 1 point ahead of 4^th). Leicester continue their underdog story and from my point of view as an analyst, they play consistently stable football which should result in them finishing out the season in a similar place on the table that they’ve achieved in the last game before the New Year. One things for sure, the Premier League title race looks like it will be exciting.