No line from DDG, barely any line from our CBs, Ronaldo and Bruno being in the same position.
Its quite damning all in all.
Its quite damning all in all.
Our passing (The Athletic) and what it tells about this team.
- Thread starter Adisa
- Start date
Then, Ajax did not have a main CF. It was more of a false 9.
That City graph looking so symmetrical and beautiful! Hopefully in a year or two, United will be something similar as well.
Does anyone have something like this for LvG’s season, or even for Jose? Would be interesting.
Does anyone have something like this for LvG’s season, or even for Jose? Would be interesting.
I'd argue our fullbacks don't go wide enough
It shows that regardless of spend, he is clearly an extremely intelligent and brilliant tactical manager. We have spent over 1b on transfer fees, yet we are an absolute tactical mess! Pep / City spend 1b are as close to perfection as you can get!
So yeah its absolutely fair to say the difference is the manager / coaching ability at one club vs the other.
Agree on Chelsea, just missing that CF piece it seems... what a disaster Rom has been in the PL again!
It confirms how controlling Pep is with this City team. He certainly has a plan, as do the City owners, neither of which is true for us.
I think Brighton's map is of very little statistical value compared to most of the others.
Potter has tweaked systems so much that the data for their pass map only includes the 9 games in which they started in a 532 before switching to something else - 577 minutes total apparently!
I agree that symmetry and green everywhere isn't the only way to go though. Take West Ham as an example. It's good for them that the RM isn't passing loads or progressively when he does, because that RM is Jarrod Bowen, and he should be getting on the end of chances.
Made a hell of a lot worse as a result of the one player who was good at it the previous season (Shaw) having been either in awful form, and rightly dropped, or injured.
With that level of symmetry I'm guessing he looks at these graphs every single game and doesn't stop going on about them. He probably gets out the spray in training to explain the area players are allowed to move within. Basically subbuteo!
Its unbelievably perfect. A proper system right there, but also says a lot about the quality of the players. No need to be covering each other, they each hold their own.
It's a passing graph so covering isn't really a thing.
People said that last year about Chelsea. They aren’t anywhere near.
Yes but there’s a decent gap between having dross managers who play direct counter football and having a good one who specialises in possession football (as the map clearly backs up). It would be interesting to see if they have one of these for LVGs seasons - whilst it wouldn’t be as neat as City’s it would be interesting to see how much better we were on the ball back then with a much inferior team.
When a player covers they'll be passing from a different position changing their average pass position. Players won't just gravitate back to their assigned positions before passing.It's a passing graph so covering isn't really a thing.
I would expect a pretty similar player heat map for positions over a match.
I do think the league fecked then over in that period where they made them play (but we’re letting teams like Villa cancel with no notice) and their CMs were all dead/injured - that Dec/Jan period was disastrous (Played 11, W4, D5, L2) AND they signed Lukaku - despite the caf’s warning
Let’s see if Marina goes and then Tuchel might control transfers a bit more (which might not be good but assuming they’d avoid another Lukaku).
I think even looking at that passing map it’s clear that Chelsea are using a 5 man system to achieve the same level of control/dominance that Liverpool and City achieve. All that really means is they are sacrificing an attacking player and I’d say more often than not Chelsea just look very impotent and that’s not just on one striker. That’s before you start breaking down the individuals who in my opinion are miles off the pace. Not a single even close world class attacker, arguably not even a single world class player.I do think the league fecked then over in that period where they made them play (but we’re letting teams like Villa cancel with no notice) and their CMs were all dead/injured - that Dec/Jan period was disastrous (Played 11, W4, D5, L2) AND they signed Lukaku - despite the caf’s warning
Let’s see if Marina goes and then Tuchel might control transfers a bit more (which might not be good but assuming they’d avoid another Lukaku).
Not really. This graph will show you how teams are set when they are in a possession phase not how they are set in transition or defensive shape. In fact it's not difficult to explain how they get that shape, City are masters at recycling the ball from the back which is shown in that graph with the frequency of passes from their back four, the three teams with the cleanest shape happens to be the three teams that are above 60% of possession, these teams spend significantly more time in their attacking/possession shape than others.
At no point does the graph tells you anything about defensive coverage/shape.
Kante had an iffy season and Rudiger leaving is a big blow but I rate Kovacic, Jorginho (particularly for their system) as elite players and James has developed into a world class player in my opinion (which for me means basically top 5 in the world). They have a lot of dependable guys albeit players like Azpi are getting on. I agree their attack is the issue but disagree it’s at the expense of a man given their system - they use the third CB offensively and they don’t really have an issue with getting into good areas and pinning most teams around their box. Just a lack of real quality - maybe Lewa will be tempted…
I'm not on about just the green passing lines, its as much their positions. It's absolutely perfect.
To play that much football and to be that on point is remarkable.
I can see that bald bastard bringing golden ratio and Fibonacci numbers into his tactical analysis.
It looks super satisfying that's for sure
Very much shows 3 of our major issues, one the complete lack of the GK being involved, and 2 many passes going round the houses and not enough though the 2 6's in the middle and that happened even less under rangnick than Ole, and not actually having a proper CF, Ronaldo being in brunos posistion rather than pushing forward to make space for other players was a theme of the season.
Oh well onto next season hopefully ten hag can get us closer to the perfect example from city, full credit to Pep they are drilled to an absolute tee.
Oh well onto next season hopefully ten hag can get us closer to the perfect example from city, full credit to Pep they are drilled to an absolute tee.
Shows McTominay's cowardice perfectly.
And to be fair, so had Ole in the 2 seasons prior (for the most part).
Ooh The Athletic 
. @noodlehair has been on about this for years.
. @noodlehair has been on about this for years.This reads like you're absolving the players of any blame, which is pretty silly.
Was it similar last season under ole ?
In some small defence of Ralf, his main strategy is winning the ball high to create chances. That is nothing to do with pass maps. He didn't do what he set out to do, so no surprise his possession strategy was nonsense
In some small defence of Ralf, his main strategy is winning the ball high to create chances. That is nothing to do with pass maps. He didn't do what he set out to do, so no surprise his possession strategy was nonsense
The City graphic is beautifully balanced
Look at Burnley's
You don't need a fancy chart to tell you that McTominay and Fred can't manage a 20 yard pass.
Those two can barely keep the ball under pressure, let alone pass the ball accurately.
Those two can barely keep the ball under pressure, let alone pass the ball accurately.
You can end up reading too much into these graphics I think and over analysing what is actually quite obvious, namely:
- we play with 2 midfielders which leaves us outnumbered in midfield in nearly every game, which means we can't build attacks from the back as our centre backs almost never have a forward passing option, other than to the wing or over the top.
- because we can't build attacks our forwards are also not involved in the game and have limited movement, because unless Bruno already has the ball there is no point making a run.
- because of this our play is extremely slow and static, which is not helped by us also having an abundance of slow players
- We also only have two midfielders which means we can't even play a third. Matic is too slow and pogba is too not a midfielder, and as an added bonus they also now both don't play for us.
- the two midfielders we do have are both the type of midfielder that would be the third or stand in midfielder at any other top level team.
And possibly most relevantly:
- most of our players were really shite last season to the point they basically got two managers sacked
- we play with 2 midfielders which leaves us outnumbered in midfield in nearly every game, which means we can't build attacks from the back as our centre backs almost never have a forward passing option, other than to the wing or over the top.
- because we can't build attacks our forwards are also not involved in the game and have limited movement, because unless Bruno already has the ball there is no point making a run.
- because of this our play is extremely slow and static, which is not helped by us also having an abundance of slow players
- We also only have two midfielders which means we can't even play a third. Matic is too slow and pogba is too not a midfielder, and as an added bonus they also now both don't play for us.
- the two midfielders we do have are both the type of midfielder that would be the third or stand in midfielder at any other top level team.
And possibly most relevantly:
- most of our players were really shite last season to the point they basically got two managers sacked
It's been forever now that we completely bypass our own midfield in the buildup. we just love going back and forth along our back line to the wide players.
McTominay causes so many issues for this team. You only need eyes to see that.
He's not alone, but in that position you can't have that many deficiencies.
He's not alone, but in that position you can't have that many deficiencies.
It's almost unreal. That's some next level coaching.
It’s a pretty good representation of the usual ‘centre half to full back ball, followed by a mental pass into the centre of midfield that leads to an opposition counter attack’ routine that we usually see.
I’m not a big fan of heat maps, but I do like this one. Just look at the passes into the sitting midfielder on the Liverpool and City heat maps. They’re playing a different game to us.
I’m not a big fan of heat maps, but I do like this one. Just look at the passes into the sitting midfielder on the Liverpool and City heat maps. They’re playing a different game to us.
Pretty cool graphics. They seem to tally with my overall perception of our buildup, which is not always the case with statistics. I would guess that is because it is over such a big sample size and takes into account trends that become readily apparent when you watch a team for a whole season. It's pretty hard to miss those things. But this also means it really hasn't unearthed anything that anybody with a few braincells doesn't know. It's just a pretty nifty way of expressing it.
How is ‘possession value’ being defined here?
City the feckers!
That Man City chart is an OCD person's heaven. Pep must be one.
How does the graphic for Madrid look for the last 6,7,8 years?
The Athletic is dominated now by people that see football as a stat game imo and with little to no concept of adaptability. The more mechanical things are the more impressed these guys and girls are. Unfortunately for them, results in Europe show that while patterns of play have an importance, it's small in comparison to adapting and molding to different situations.
The last 7,8 years coincided with the height of set patterns of play in PL football with City and Pool, but also with unprecedented Madrid Champions League wins. You can blame injustice for one year, but not close to a decade.
The Athletic is dominated now by people that see football as a stat game imo and with little to no concept of adaptability. The more mechanical things are the more impressed these guys and girls are. Unfortunately for them, results in Europe show that while patterns of play have an importance, it's small in comparison to adapting and molding to different situations.
The last 7,8 years coincided with the height of set patterns of play in PL football with City and Pool, but also with unprecedented Madrid Champions League wins. You can blame injustice for one year, but not close to a decade.
Slightly more annoying is many of them were players we could easily of afforded but given our managerial situations, recruitment and so on probably wouldn’t have performed to that sort of level. The team from a few years back, be intresting to see its passing map dont Even think his best Barca team passed like that one either.