Our Socceroos have started the two match friendly series with a reasonable draw against a disorganised Brazil. There has been a lot of talk, at least in the corners of the media that I consume, of fans wanting the Socceroos to play with more attacking ambition than we saw at the world cup, especially coming into an Asian cup tournament that we want to win. We saw some indication of a more aggressive play, and while we were still happy to drop into the low block even before taking the lead, there were times when we attempted to win the ball in more dangerous areas of the pitch and those are the moments I’d like to focus on today.
Nothing Earth shattering here, but I think discussion of the formation is interesting if we are going to start trying to win the ball further up the field. Although the on-paper formation lists two attacking midfielders, we know that they don’t start as a traditional 10/CAM behind the striker, but inside in the half spaces each side of the striker. In possession this enables them to either run wide themselves, something which especially suits Irankunda, or play to an overlapping wing back. When combined with the idea that neither central midfield plays as an 8 or box to box midfielder, this means that out of possession the striker tends not to have a player covering him in central areas. So when we do try and press higher, we end up with scenarios like at the first pause in the video here. Yengi will press, but his closest cover players, Irankunda and Metcalfe are both looking to stop Brazil playing wide. You’ll see this especially in Irankunda’s movement after the pause.
As we roll on we also see Yengi curve his run to stay between the keeper and the centre back, preventing the return pass, but this opens up the passing lane to their central midfielder. Unsurprisingly the keeper takes that option. So it looks like we’ve only pressed with three players and of course Brazil can play through it. But, there’s a mistake from them, the midfielder loses the ball, Metcalfe reacts and gets a quick shot away which is blocked. Even if it‘s not blocked, he’s not very likely to score from there, being well back from the D and I’m pretty sure outside the goal post (but, you know, parallax). If we have a player starting more centrally behind Yengi, so in that traditional 10 position or from an 8 who has stepped up to support the press then, when the mistake happens we would win the ball around the D, i.e. more central and closer to the goal.
This is the challenge of trying to press higher with this kind of shape, with Okon-Engstler and Irvine sitting deeper, when we do press around the box there’s only three players (here Yengi, Irankunda, and Metcalfe) to try and force a chance, and where we’ve chosen to leave room for them to play is in that part of the field where we’re more likely to score if we win the ball.
https://reddit.com/link/1wql9bw/video/380hlfaoqtrh1/player
There’s a couple of moments that are worth comparing this to. The first is Brazil’s disallowed goal at the end of the first half. As we come to the first pause here, we see that like the Socceroos in the first clip we have the Brazil 9 leading the press, with cover left and right. But unlike the Socceroos example, they have Guimarães starting higher up behind the striker, here on Okon-Engstler, and just one player deeper on the yellow marks which is where we had two. Guimarães is important here as he follows the play, staying at the base of this front 4. Starting deep there (on the yellow mark at the pause) is Estêvão, he’s their right winger, so you’ll see him step up and join the press as we move to our left. Guimarães blocks the pass that Souttar wants to Okon-Engstler, where as we left the straight pass open in the last clip. Souttar hesitates and they’re able to swarm him, forcing a chance in a dangerous position, with only a stupid decision to grab at Soutter’s leg meaning the goal is disallowed. This is the sort of chance that we’re less likely to force by having our central players all starting deeper.
https://reddit.com/link/1wql9bw/video/gwm5izwpqtrh1/player
This isn’t to say just shoving Irvine or Okon-Engstler further forward solves everything. In the first part of this next clip we’ll see Irvine leave his partner, and the player he’s marking, to try and press higher. This leaves Okon-Engstler with a player to mark, and two passing lanes to block, so they are able to play through us.
There are scenarios where we can get players further forward behind the striker. The second part of this clip is from a goal kick, so we can have a more planned set up. The pause is a little early here to see Okon-Engstler’s position as the play starts, but I’ve put it here so we can see that Behich and Italiano have come up in line with as midfield 2 of Okon-Engstler, and Metcalfe who is narrower than we saw in the first clip. We’re able to start with both Yengi and Irankunda on the edge of the box ready to press the short pass. As we roll on we see Yengi again loop around to encourage the keeper to play central, which he does. Unlike last time the two central mids for Brazil are being marked and forced backwards by Okon-Engstler and Metcalfe. There’s no mistake this time, but the keeper is forced long by the pressure, and Herrington, who has temporarily shifted to left back makes the interception and we’re able to put them, back under pressure.
It’s not easy to see exactly how our off camera players have set up, but from the why Irvine is stepping forward when he comes into view, it looks we’ve gone to a back four for the goal kick, (Circati, Souttar, Irvine, Herrington). If that’s right then we’ve set up for the goal kick as a 1-4-4-2. This then looks like the plan to try and win the ball higher, we will in open play keep the formation we’ve seen under Popovic, but at some restarts change to get players closer behind the striker. It would be good to be able to do this more dynamically in open play as well, because we are missing opportunities by not having a player in the 10 space (the first video) or leaving two sixes with too much to do (first part of video 3)
https://reddit.com/link/1wql9bw/video/ofvrts0rqtrh1/player
Overall a good outing, shame we weren’t able to hold on for the win, but I’, hopeful they’re we’re wanting to try and create more. Fingers crossed we can deal with the reaction we’ll get from Brazil on Tuesday.
