Manchester City – Atletico Madrid – Match Analysis – A different approach

Introduction

Manchester City worked hard to earn a 1-0 win in their Champions League quarter-final first leg against Atletico Madrid. Pep Guardiola’s team, beat Sporting in the previous knock out round to book a meeting with Atletico, who knocked out Manchester Unit. After 70 minutes Atletico Madrid was still keeping the attacking-minded Citizens away. At that point a clever movement by De Bruyne and a brilliant assist by Phil Foden solved the challenge. Against the very compact low defensive block of the Spanish they he managed to put an amazing vertical, penetrating pass to Foden.

To start with, we have to admit that Pep Guardiola is one of the best even managers in football history. Not just for the trophies, he has won, but mostly for the kind of football he suggests and supports. The citizens had a clear plan on how to attack and Atletico’s behavior help them to also defend, or to saying better recover the ball immediately, in higher positions on the pitch.

Both Guardiola and Simeone are considered among the top managers in the world at the current moment, each one for their own reasons. Pep with his positional play philosophy has managed to offer to the fans an orchestrated football beautiful to anyone’s eye. In addition he managed to influenced coaches from all over the world. On the other hand, Diego has managed to convince high-paid quality players to be sacrificed for their teams and play tough, disciplined football. With this mindset he managed to brought to Atletico 2 La Liga titles, one Copa Del Rey, two UEFA Europa League titles and two appearances in Champions League finals. He was also named La Liga coach 4 times and once the European Coach of the year.

Do not misunderstand!!

This article is not to raise Diego Simeone in the eyes of the football fans or coaches but to analyze the match from a different perspective. The aim is to present numbers and tactical facts that Atletico had in mind to do on the pitch. The overall objective for Simeone was to help the team to pass to the next round. Over the years, Simeone showed clearly his intention in such kinds of matches. He does not want to play beautifully or dominate the opponent through continuous attacks or high percentages of possession. He wants to go to the war to win it at all costs. Diego Simeone uses a very compact Low Block in defense with the intention to avoid getting chances and try to score in the counter attack.

In the article “How to defend in a Low Block – The “Diego Simeone Way” we present basic guidelines how a team can defend and be successful when defending in a Low Block.

FORMATIONS

Manchester City

• Ederson (31)
• Stones (5)
• Laporte (14)
• Cancelo (27)
• Ake (6)
• Rodri (16)
• Gundogan (8)
• De Bruyne (17)
• Sterling (7)
• Mahrez (26)
• Bernardro Silva (20)

Atletico de Madrid

• Oblak (13)
• Reinildo (23)
• Monteoro (18)
• Savic (15)
• Renan Lodi (12)
• Koke (6)
• Vrsaljko (24)
• Kondogbia (4)
• Llorente moreno (14)
• Joao Felix (7)
• Griezmann (8)

Manchester City

Manchester City’s formation is not something new. They lined up with a 4 – 3 – 3 which during the game was converted to a formation with 3 at the back. The use of Nathan Ake as a left-back intended to convert the backline of four to a backline of three without the need for Rodri to drop at the back. The intention was to create overloads in different parts of the pitch. One of the main ways that City used to break Atletico’s low block was to create numerical superiority on one side of the pitch by passing short and then to witch the play to the other side on the wide-open winger to take advantage of 1 v 1 situations.

The position of Cancelo in the midfield especially when the switch of play happened, created positional superiority for City. Atletico’s backline was forced to tag inside and leave the winger (Mahrez) free on the right flack. The center backs had much free space to push up with the ball or to offer support to the on-ball players. The density of players on Atletico Madrid’s half helped City to recover many calls high up the pitch.

Due to the way that City build their game, the players with the most number of passes were Ake (100 – 92% accuracy), Laporte (97 – 100% accuracy), Stones (108 – 95%) and Rodri (109 – 89% accuracy)

Atletico de Madrid

Atletico used a 3 – 5 – 2 formation on papers but on the pitch, the structure was more of a 5 – 3 – 2. In many many occasions Atletico Madrid converted the formation to a 5 – 5 during the Organized Defense in a very low block. The intention was to keep City away from crucial areas of the pitch even if they will have the ball less.

In the eyes of the fans, Simeone’s approach was of a weaker team. All the players behind the ball, tight spaces to avoid central penetration and shooting from dangerous areas. Atletico is comfortable dealing with crosses so leaving spaces to the flanks is something that they can do with minimal risk. This is mainly because of their defender’s ability to win the majority of the aerial duels even in risky areas inside the penalty box.

Data Analysis

Ball Possession

The simple data speaks of a pure dominance of Manchester City side over Atletico with 71% Ball Possession and 743 passes with 89% accuracy. On the opposite side Atletico manages to complete 324 passes with 78% accuracy. Before jumping to any assumptions about Simeone’s philosophy, we have to admit that to lose ball possession by Citizens, especially in Etihad is normal. So, their opponents to achieve a positive result have to design a different strategy. The result on the 2nd leg will show if Atletico’s approach in the 1st leg was correct or not. The 1 – 0 gave Simeone exactly what he was looking for. A result that will give him the chance to chase the qualification to the next round.

Shots and Chances

Manchester City had in total 12 shots and the 3 of them ended on target (25%). One was converted to a goal. The expected goals of the Citizens was 1.06 meaning that they have scored what they were deserved to score. The expected goals per shot were below 0.1 (0.09) meaning that every shot of City had less than 10% to be converted to a goal. For that number only we can understand the work that Atletico put in to forbid the quality players of City and a high attacking minded team to create high-quality chances. From that perspective, we can say that even though City was the majority of the time in the opponent’s half, Atletico was managing to control the game without facing too many risks.

City created 6 chances with 1 successful. The number does not reveal the huge domination of City. Of course, this was a result of the players that Atletico had behind the ball with small distances that left no room for City to progress the ball vertically. That factor forced them to attack mostly from the flanks and to bring the ball into the box with crosses from half-spaces. The alternative was to overload one side to attack the other after a switch of play with 1 v 1 situations. For that reason, in the 2nd half, Pep brought Grealish and Foden as wingers. Both of them are very capable on 1 v 1 situations in tight spaces.

Crossing

City completed 16 crosses with 13% accuracy. The Citizens divided their attacks to 21 from the left, 20 centrally and 35 form the right all of them with less than 10% conversion to a shot. If Atletico’s defenders didn’t lose their focus and picked up De Bruyne’s movement on their back, now we would speak of a major strategic win by Simeone.

Atletico Madrid Behavior in Low Block

The very compact block from Atletico left no room for the attaching midfielders and forwards of City to operate between the lines or in the half-spaces (Guardiola’s favorite area – see relevant article on Positional Play). For that reason, defenders had the space to push up until the attacking third and to make shots. Of the total 12 shots of City’s, 4 of them were done by Laporte, Stones and Rodri. As we can understand, shots from long distances have very few possibilities to be converted into a goal, especially against a top goalkeeper like Oblak.

See below the goal-scoring opportunities of City to understand that in reality, Atletico was in control of the game even if they were forced or choose to defend the majority of the game.

Conclusion

Normally every situation has two sides of a coin. In the specific match, indeed Manchester City was the favorite and the result and the numbers proved it. But, it all comes to the result. The round of 16 has 2 legs to play. Simeone is a mastermind in qualifying especially against stronger opponents. He did it in the past with much success. A more detailed analysis of the numbers shows that Atletico manage to get from the game the best outcome they could to fight for the qualification in Madrid.