Tactical analysis: Montella’s Catania – a chaotic high tempo
Vincenzo Montella experienced his first taste of Serie A management last season when he took charge of Roma after the downfall of Claudio Ranieri, things didn’t quite go to plan though. His record at the club was just about positive, but not enough to convince the new ownership of the former youth coach’s credentials and he was left looking for a new flame in June.
u Liotru: the symbol of Catania
Montella turned up at Catania with positive ideas and, despite his experience being called into question before he’d had a chance to do anything, he has had a relatively positive start to the season so far. However, at one point it looked like the side may have had the carpet swept from beneath their feet before they could even start the season. A disagreement between president Nino Pulvirenti and sporting director Pietro Lo Monaco saw the talent finder, Lo Monaco, attempt to resign before being persuaded to return.
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Tactical observations – Udinese’s shattered dreams
It is normal for dreams to be brought to an end at sunrise following a good nights sleep, but in Udine last Wednesday evening the dreams of Francesco Guidolin, his faithful squad and their 17,000 fans in attendance were shattered in the final 20 minutes of the second half against Arsenal. Having taken a 1-0 deficit home following the first leg in London, there had still been hope of overturning this debt and creating their own legend.
Giampaolo Pinzi speaking before the first leg said: “we have prepared well, intensely, and meticulously” but it was all in vain. They lost the tie, but there was certainly positives to be garnered from the 180 minutes against top opposition. Across the two legs there were a few notes worth pointing out on various tactics, mainly with regard to Udinese.
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Shakhtar Donetsk: How far have they come?
Just over a year ago the Ukranian side Shakhtar Donetsk were lifting the final edition of the UEFA Cup. The ‘miners’ also competed in the 2009/10 edition of the Europa league but were dumped out of the competition by beaten finalists Fulham FC. For all of Shakhtar’s wonderful, short, accurate passing they failed to penetrate the South West Londoner’s organised defence.
Throughout the two legs the Ukrainians failed to use any width to attack Fulham, choosing to cut inside and shoot into a crowded penalty area on almost every occasion. On the few occasions they did contrive to use width and were in behind the defence they scored, if only they had learnt to do this a little more often.
A season on and they have made it to the Champions League group stage, the draw has handed them as good a hand as was possible. They have been drawn against Arsenal, SC Braga and FK Partizan. The group is one they will fancy their chances of getting out of, especially after having taking 6 points from their first 2 games. It has been an intriguing journey, personally, to witness from afar the change in attitude and tactics that they have undergone since I saw them lose at Craven Cottage.
Their performances so far in the Champions League this season suggest that they have transplanted some of their lateral passing for more incisive movement at the attacking end of the pitch. Without winger Ilsinho who has moved back to Brazil and Fernandinho, carrying a long term knee injury, there have been outings for younger Brazilians in the squad such as Douglas Costa, Alex Teixera and Willian. Despite having come a long way since their over intricate passing style that appeared to ultimately result in no gains there are still a number of areas in which they will need to improve if they want to progress further than the 2nd round of the tournament.
Starting from the front, one of the signings made by Lucescu last January was the young Brazilian prodigy Douglas Costa. Costa had been linked with a number of clubs before having a poor season full of off the pitch troubles and then signing for Shakhtar. The young starlet has reined in his tendencies to cut in and shoot, but not enough to give him the real unpredictability required to open up the very best defences. Usually deployed on the right hand side of an attacking three as an inside-out winger, he has been given plenty of license to cut inside but he needs to change his approach at the top level.
Douglas Costa - stays wide without the ball
Above we can see, marked in yellow, Costa when he does not have the ball at his feet has the tactical sense to stay close to the touch line and on the full back’s shoulder offering the threat of picking up balls in behind the full back’s inside shoulder. This is very good play for the winger and will cause full backs lots of problems if his team mates can play balls in between centre back and full back for him to run onto.
Douglas Costa in possession, cuts inside
However when he does get the ball to feet, we see the same pattern emerging where by he will charge in-field and very often shoot from upwards of 25-30 yards because there is rarely enough space to continue a run or find an accurate pass. In fairness to the lad, on this occasion he feigns to shoot and lays off a nice pass for Luiz Adriano to score with. Willian, who regularly plays as the left winger (also inside-out), has a similar tendency to cut inside too often but usually finds a pass to Jadson or Gai in the centre. Willian’s pass completion rate in the game against Partizan was 91% to Douglas’ meagre 54%.
The central play of both wingers means that Shakhtar were often a very narrow team last season, to get by without the wingers width a lot of attacking play is required from both full backs. Darijo Srna (Right) and Razvan Rat (Left) tend to play very high up the pitch, particularly in games where Shakhtar are dominating possession.
Average positions for Shakhtar players (subs ringed in yellow)
There are a number of observations to be made from the pitch map above. First of all, as discussed earlier, the very narrow positions of both wingers (10 & 20) as well as the high positions of the full backs. While Tomas Hubschman (3) plays a very capable role as defensive midfielder he tends to get sucked into the middle of the pitch looking to block off play and intercept passes which leaves tons of space in the channels to be exploited on the counter attack.
Up front Luiz Adriano has shown that he has what it takes to bag goals and has steadily been upping his haul year on year since moving to the Ukraine. He is a versatile player who can play as a traditional number 9 on the shoulder of the last man as well as dropping deep to interchange and link up with Jadson in the hole. He’s not bad with his head either. He has been joined this summer by former Arsenal striker Eduardo, who appears to be rebuilding the career that was on the ropes after that Martin Taylor reducer. The Striker has 4 goals in 7 games so far this season, hopefully he can rediscover the ice cold finish that brought him to the Premier League in 2007.
To round off with a pointlessly interesting statistic, Oleksiy Gai the Shakhtar central midfielder passed to every one of his team mates 2 or more times when they faced SC Braga except to his central midfield partner Tomas Hubschman. I’ve not heard of any John Terry style antics from the pair so we’ll have to assume that this is a sign of their new found commitment to onward rushing attacking play?
The true test of just how far Shakhtar have come will be against a side who play a very similar brand of short passing football next week. They will play Arsenal on consecutive game weeks, first home then away. If they can maintain the kind of passing football I have seen from them over the last 18 months I would like to think that they will win over a few fans from these fine shores. These are the two games I have been most looking forward to in the whole group stage since the draw was made.
Blast from the past: 1999 Cup Winners Cup Final – Lazio v Mallorca
In 1999 Villa Park hosted the 39th Cup Winners Cup final, it was to be the final edition of the European knockout tournament before it was consumed into the UEFA cup. The final final was contested by Lazio and R.C.D. Mallorca, the two sides had battled their way through four rounds of two legged ties before reaching the final. Lazio beating Lausanne (3-3 away goals), FK Partizan (3-2 agg), Panionios (7-0) and Lokomotiv Moscow (1-1 away goals). Mallorca stopped Chelsea reaching the final, beating the blues 0-1 at Stamford Bridge.
Formations - both sides playing 4-4-2. Mallorca using a diamond in midfield
Lazio won the game 2-1 and took the trophy but anyone who saw the game would have been forgiven for thinking that Mallorca had been mugged. Lazio’s style of play was very stereotypical of their manager. Sven-Goran Eriksson favoured a very rigid 4-4-2, the emphasis was on maintaining shape defensively looking to break as quickly as possible to catch teams on the counter attack. The first goal was indicative of this tactic, the ball was simply played long toward Vieri and Salas who were stationed some 40-50 yards up the pitch from the central midfielders. Christian Vieri used all of his strength to rise above Siviero and put a looping header in at the far post.
The constant distance between the strikers and midfielders remained 40-50 yards whenever Lazio had the ball, this was indicative of how the game was panning out in the first half and how Lazio were setting their stall out. The vast majority of their link up play was left to the central midfield pairing to produce. Roberto Mancini and Hugo Almeyda spent their time on the pitch with a 10 yard piece of elastic between them. They shuffled up and down the pitch as a unit to attempt to get to the strikers, Almeyda was a shade more defensive than Mancini. Link up play with the wingers was very rare, it was all about straight line play.
Mallorca on the other hand were the complete anti-thesis of straight line play, they were holding possession and playing triangles around the Lazio players. This was facilitated by the midfield diamond deployed by coach, Hector Cuper. Engonga sat at the base of the diamond and swept up any second balls that came from the Lazio counter attacks. Whilst Lauren and Stankovic went from inside to out and provided plenty of width, constantly finding themselves in plenty of space to run at the Lazio full backs or link up with Ibagaza in the hole or the strikers, Dani and Biagini. Mallorca were playing better football for the first hour of the match but were struggling to break through Nesta and Mihajlovic at the heart of the Lazio defence.
The game changed when Eriksson brought on right winger Sergio Conceicao for Stankovic. Within 10 minutes of being on the pitch the Lazio players had finally worked out how to get the ball out to their wingers who were finding space to cut inside as well as go to the by line and deliver crosses across the box. The winning goal came in the 81st minute when Vieri and Siviero went up for a 50-50 header and the ball dropped to the young Pavel Nedved, the Czech winger had cut inside and found himself at the right place at the right time to deliver a roundhouse kick that would see the ball nestling into the bottom corner of the net.
Whilst Mallorca started the game as the stronger of the two sides, dominating for the greater portion of the playing time, their inability to find a breakthrough and their lack of concentration in the final 15 minutes cost them. There is also the question of whether the Spaniards had run out of steam and the Romans superior fitness had carried them through to win the trophy.
For Lazio this was in many ways the beginning of the end, they would go on to win the 1999-00 Scudetto but they soon were on the brink of being wound up after running up over €100m of debt under Eriksson, many of the players bought for huge sums, such as Hernan Crespo, were released for peanuts just a few years later.
Mexico defeated, but did they expect too much?
On Sunday evening my favourite side at this edition of the World Cup were eliminated. Mexico had shown in pre-tournament friendlies against England and Italy that they were a young side full of players who were all very comfortable on the ball. Javier Aguirre took over from Sven Goran Eriksson last April after the swede’s terribly inconsistent run of form left the Mexican FA in a tiff over their qualification to the tournament. Incidentally, this was the second time that Aguirre had been rushed in to rescue a faltering qualification campaign. He was also installed in 2001 to try and steer them toward the finals in Japan and South Korea.
Italy's W-W (2-3-2-3)
Mexico set out their stall to play a very fluid style of football, there would be no thought of shutting down games after getting a goal or two. This was evident given their ability to keep a clean sheet in only 1 of their last 8 fixtures, their second group game win against France. The most interesting feature of Mexico’s play was that they were setup in a formation which was similar to the W-W used by Vittorio Pozzo’s Italy, winners in 1934 and 1938.
Pozzo in the 1930s felt that he didn’t have the adequate players to play the standard 2-3-5, Pozzo lacked a centre half who had the physical and technical abilities to get around the pitch. He modified the formation by pulling back the inside-forwards and at played Ricardo Monti, one of the many Oriundi in Italy’s history. Jonathan Wilson in ‘Inverting the Pyramid’ says of Monti:
“[Pozzo] used him as a centro mediano, a halfway house. He would drop when the other team had possesssion and mark the opposing centre forward, but would advance and become an attacking fulcrum when his side had the ball“
Italy’s wing-halves had support from the retreated centre forwards, making the W-W.
The similarity with Mexico’s shape in 2010 is quite uncanny but the styles differ dramatically, Italy were a brutally pragmatic side noted for their inability to play the ball well on the floor. Mexico have played some of the most attractive at this World Cup able to keep the ball well and pass and move with terrifying speed and accuracy.
In the modern game full backs have become some of the most important players on the field, they are usually the players who have the most space to operate in. Their full backs were outstanding throughout the competition, flying up and down the flanks and offering options to pass and cross as well as shoot on goal themselves. Salcido’s efforts against Argentina epitomised this hunger to get forward and produce.
Mexico's formation looks quite similar to the W-W
The two advanced midfielders, Torrado and one of Juarez or Guardado, acted is Carilleros (shuttlers) moving up and down the pitch as a unit to provide options inside for the advancing wing backs, playing balls through to the strikers and putting lots of pressure on the opposition’s midfielders as soon as they had the ball.
Barcelona centre back, Rafael Marquez undertook a very important role in the side as a sweeper sitting in front of the defence. This type of sweeper is becoming more prevalent in the modern game, it gives ample cover against 2 man attacks, playmakers between the lines as well as indirectly making the side much more attacking at the other end of the field. Marquez has been one of the few sweepers at this World Cup, is he the blueprint for the next few seasons of football tactics? His assist for the Javier Hernandez goal against France summed up his ability to influence the attack despite lying exceptionally deep.
Expectations
Mexico’s exit was marred by Argentina’s first goal which was offside, it was a terrible decision but the misery was componded by hitting the self destruct button. Javier Aguirre stepped down a few days after their elimination, he was expected to go further in this competition. He initially promised a quarter final berth so many will say that to step down is the respectable thing to do.
But Mexico have performed to their level at this World Cup, they have been eliminated at the 2nd round consistently for 5 World Cups in successions and they are currently ranked 17th in the world according to FIFA. I have to ask the question why do so many countries think they deserve better in these tournaments? It is simple mathematical fact, only 8 countries can make the quarter finals. Obviously I don’t want to stunt any kind of fan ambition, some is always healthy, but I really thought the Mexican FA would give Aguirre to really have a go at a competition such as the 2011 Copa America.
I’ll be keeping an eye on Mexico to see if they maintain this wonderful style of play…
Schoolboy mistakes from Italian managers
The 2nd round of group games have been concluded now in the World Cup and the two games which I saw the most of this weekend featured two Italian managers, Capello and Lippi. Both of whom carry a great deal of experience on their shoulders and yet they both made a shocking tactical faux pas against their respective oppositions, while it was not the only reason that they failed to take the points it was certainly a major contributing factor.
Taking a look at England first, they took on an Algeria side noted for being one of the few sides at the World Cup who would be playing a 3-5-2 formation. England had prepared for this prospect, or so we thought, by playing a friendly against Egypt in March. On Friday night however, it appeared that Fabio Capello had been struck down by a severe bout of amnesia. The lessons that were learnt in the first half against Egypt were jettisoned by the England management and put out the side that had taken them through qualification, he had decided to play 2 out and out strikers in Heskey and Rooney against a 3 man defence.
Marcello Lippi also decided to start with a 4-4-2, he had announced this the day before his game against New Zealand. Lippi had some reason to pursue this route with the players ending the game very much on the front foot against Paraguay using this formation. They appeared to be a far more comfortable side but going into the game I felt that too much importance was being placed on individual battles being won, particularly in the midfield where the players would be matched man for man.
A problem of numbers
The problem with playing 2 out and out strikers against a 3 man defence is that the strikers are constantly out numbered. The defenders are able to man mark each striker while keeping a man free to sweep up and knock ons and second balls, if any of the strikers is able to lose their marker they would be faced with another defender to get past. A good explanation of 3 man defences can be found here at Zonal Marking. It is fine to play 2 strikers if they provide plenty of movement and are able to pull the defence out of shape by dropping deep and making runs into the channels.
England fans may be thinking that this was fine because Wayne Rooney has always been the type of striker who likes to drop deep and link up with the midfield but with the English midfield not wanting to play in this way Rooney was left short of options. England resorted to sending long passes up towards Heskey and trying to get Rooney and Gerrard to try and pick up any knock ons.
Italy’s two strikers were Vincenzo Iaquinta and Alberto Gilardino, neither of which are noted for their link up play nor are they particularly good in the air which meant that any balls that were delivered to the 2 front men were swept up with ease by Ryan Nelsen who put in a man of the match performance. Italy have been stereotyped as the tacticians of the modern game, however on Sunday afternoon they were thoroughly out thought.
Conclusion
While it is important to try and play your players in the positions you think will suit them best, there has to be some consideration for the shape and style of play that the opposition will bring. The deployment of these formations smacks in some sense of pure arrogance from managers who should’ve had enough experience to think through this decision. Hopefully both sides can learn from this experience and take more care in preparing a side that will be able to maximise it’s strengths against other opposition.
I must point out that I realise there were many many other points that could be made about both games, I just found it very surprising that both managers had made this very basic mistake at the pinnacle of International football.
Italy leave spaces between their lines (Italy v Mexico 03-06-2010)
It’s difficult to pay any kind of lip service to pre-tournament friendlies; France lost 1-0 against China on Friday, Serbia lost 1-0 to New Zealand last week and England achieved uninspiring and undeserved victories against Mexico and Japan. Except for ensuring that plenty of big name stars will not be appearing at this Summers tournament and giving journalists a look at the new rounder, better, faster, stronger Adidas ball so that they can publish their concerns and condemnations. What have we learnt from these friendlies?
First half: 4-3-3
Italy boss Marcelo Lippi sent out his side for their first International friendly on Thursday evening, they had played some practice games against local Serie D sides near their training base in Sestriere, Turin. Italy are one of the only sides to have waiting until after the June 1 squad deadline before unveiling any sort of team. Italy lined up in a 4-3-3 formation similar to the one which had taken them through the early rounds of qualification. Di Natale and Iaquinta were to provide with as well as support with Andrea Pirlo playing from deep to try and create.
This plan to wait for any kind of competition appeared to have backfired though, with Italy starting very slowly and conceding a poor goal in the 11th minute to Arsenal’s young striker, Carlos Vela (he didn’t try and chip it this time). The goal came from a communication error between the two Italian centre backs, Bonucci and Cannavaro, Cannavaro was looking to step up to play the Mexican runners offside but Bonucci follows his man into the box after having already lost him.
Italy were unable to keep up with the Mexican full backs, I really hope Mexico continue to play like this when the World Cup starts. Whenever Mexico had won the ball back the full backs bombed up the flanks, Salcido on the left and Aguilar on the right. Marquez sat in front of the two centre backs as a sweeper, yet another attempt to resurrect the role of sweeper.
Second half: 4-2-3-1 / 4-3-2-1
To try and counter this Italy were defending very deep as soon as they lost the ball. Forcing Iaquinta and Di Natale to try and pursue the fullbacks, a task that Iaquinta was openly refusing to do stating “He [Lippi] asked me to follow the full back. But if I did this I didn’t have the energy to join the attacks.” Asking his wide men to track back meant that Alberto Gilardino was isolated against 2, or at times 3, centre backs high up the pitch. It was difficult for Italy to maintain possession in any attacking areas and they struggled to put any kind of threatening passing moves together.
In the second half Lippi changed the system around to what looked more like a 4-2-3-1, bringing on Simone Pepe to play on the right wing, moved Iaquinta further infield towards his favoured left hand side and Maggio came on at right back for Zambrotta. Marchisio was playing from a bit deeper than the other two players attacking players. This change did have the desired effect in the attacking third of the field, Pepe and Iaquinta were able to provide better support for the lone Gilardino. But Mexico dealth with the Italian attacks very well.
The midfield and attack were pushing forward together and pressing well when Mexico had the ball in their own half, but the back four were still rooted to the Italian 18 yard line. There was acres of space between the lines for the Mexican midfielders to pass and move into and they were able to hold onto the ball with few objections from the Italians.
Arrigo Sacchi sums up the need for the team to move as a unit with the following quote: -
“I used to tell my players that, if we played with twenty-five metres from the last defender to the centre-forward, given our ability, nobody could beat us. And thus, the team had to move as a unit up and down the pitch, and also from left to right.”
If the defence are close to the attack then it is difficult to put passes together as easily as Mexico did on Thursday evening. My only thought would be that Italy were worried about the attacking speed and guile of the Mexican players, they have 3 very quick talented young strikers in Vela, Hernandez and Dos Santos. The second goal was setup by Cuauhtémoc Blanco, the oldest player going to the World Cup, he was able to drop off 10-15 yards, turn and put a ball in for Medina to rifle into the net. Bonucci was unsure whether to follow his man into the space or remain in the back four and once the ball had been played Cannavaro was caught ball watching and failed to track Medina back into the box.
Italy will certainly need to work on their passing as well as defensive movement before their first game against Paraguay on June 14. After the game they received a further piece of bad news with Andrea Pirlo likely to miss at least the first two games because of a calf injury, Ricardo Montolivo is the most similar replacement otherwise Lippi will need to redesign his Italy side.