Mysterious Case Of Missing Right Midfielder - Tactics of Seattle at Dallas
by Dave Clark on Aug 21, 2011 12:45 PM PDT
in Sounders: MLS Regular Season
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When Mauro Rosales scored the goal that would be the winner against FC Dallas Saturday night, he was certainly to the right of Fredy Montero and the rest of the offense. But watch the highlight again, and you may notice that he's in a central space. But that wasn't his only time centrally. Yesterday saw a different Rosales.
In the past he's hugged the right touchline and centered in crosses - either low or high. This has been true in a vast majority of his matches, except for the small sample where he's been a forward or center mid by design. But with the attacking four being Lamar Neagle on the left with Montero and Mike Fucito up top, the inclination for all was that Rosales would be the right sided player.
This seemed to be even more likely when we learned of the Zach Scott for James Riley tactical switch. This would mean that Riley's crossing ability (maybe 2nd on the team) and flank speed wouldn't be available. While defensively this meant that Seattle was more sound against counters through Brek Shea, there was an absence offensively.
That empty space was not filled.
That's from the first half chalkboard with only the band of three of Lamar, Fredy and Mauro listed, but including more players doesn't actually fill the empty hole. Adding in Fucito and the two centermid of Erik Friberg and Osvaldo Alonso still leaves the empty space.
Now, this is only for the Opta trackable actions, but if you spend some time hovering over the player names and look at heatmaps you'll notice that the far right channel is basically unoccupied, with only Montero and Neagle (late in second half) taking that space at times.
If you felt that Dallas was able to flood Seattle's right defensive side, that's because they did.
Jair Benitez was more of a left attacking player than a left back. With Seattle not putting a man into that space, Dallas did. They were able to cheat forward. If we are looking for a reason why Seattle was unable to create as many chances as usual the tactical shift from Riley to Scott and the shift of Rosales to being a third central attacking player is probably why.
The Sounders chose to give up certain spaces. One to focus on the defense, and the other to flood the opposing centerbacks with three players rather than a typical two. It worked in a one-off game, but probably is not the solution long term.
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I guess you wonder...
…against a team you’ve played once and will play at least once more, do you go with an unexpected look? If you’re FCD, you had success on the counter in Seattle and you have plenty of film of watching Soudners crosses come from right side this year.
As you point out, the flip of this is the defensive focus… Shea had one shot from the left and at the perimeter of the box, I think. Not bad.
I agree this is not a sustainable setup, but as the sun sets on the season, I’m all for giving the opposition unexpected sets. As long as, you know, they work for us. :-)
Love me some chalkboard
The chalkboard tools just make the whole analysis come together. Great post Dave – would love to see this type of thing more often.
strategy
So I take it from your last couple sentences you think this way of describing the Sounders play indicates an intentional strategy to create the odd result rather than a tactical failure?
Can you elaborate on your briefly mentioned conclusion near the end on what the goal was in doing this? This stuff is interesting.
Cool.
I think that it was by design yes
because the only time it changed is when personel changed.
Scott for Riley was clearly intended as a way to limit Shea’s effectiveness. Up top folding Rosales inside meant that there would be two ball-controllers there to work tight spaces and possibly free up either of them (Rosales/Montero) or Fucito on a flick-on or throughball. When a space like that is flooded it often limits passing options, but it also means that if the players have good ball-at-feet skills there’s a stronger chance that they can free themselves or push the ball through small spaces.
The lack of height meant more need for intricate play and this was one way to make it happen.
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Rosales likes tight triangles
Excellent analysis. Without Riley Rosales had no support along the line. Several times he played balls into spaces Riley normally fills and Scott was nowhere to be found. Was Rosales moving more central a pre-determined strategy or his in-game adjustment to find the close passing support he prefers?
Tactical decisions
Great article and supporting documentation.
Watching the game Saturday I was struck by how much the game felt like so many frustrating matches that Seattle has lost but from the other side of the result.
Sigi made a tactical decision to leverage the team’s depth and the unique game time conditions into an unlikely lineup. 3 things to remember about this game.
1. Shea has become the key to the FCD attack. Stopping him, choked the FCD offense. It didn’t shut it down, but it did stifle it. Zach Scott had one job Saturday night, neutralize Shea. He accomplished this feat.
2. The FCD central defense was in shambles. George John was out with a red card suspension. The team has a new defender who hasn’t had time to acclimate since his trade and a green rookie providing much of their depth. Then one of their other CDs goes down early in the game. FCD will never be as susceptible to a counter attack as they were on Saturday night.
3. The temperature at game time was 100 degrees F.
Sigi made a decision to roll the dice and the leverage the Sounder’s depth against the unique circumstances of a particular game. He brought in Zach Scott to neutralize Shea and strengthened the team’s defensive stature by starting Hurtado and Parke along with Scott. Then he selectively rested his offensive players. Neagle cannot play on Tuesday so he got the start. Then Sigi judiciously used his bench to rest other offensive players.
Take a look at where Seattle sits in terms of personnel going into Tuesday’s match.
Riley and Wahl didn’t play at all.
Fucito, Montero, Flaco, Evans and Friberg all got some rest and didn’t play a full 90 in 100 degree heat.
And Seattle got the win. It wasn’t pretty and at times it was exasperating to watch. But it was effective and an example of why Sigi has 151 wins and indicative of how a team wins titles.
As for the situation with Rosales, I think that was an onfield adjustment to the reality of Zach Scott being totally focused on Shea. Early in the game, Rosales played balls into the right hand space for Scott to run on and the attack didn’t materialize. (Thankfully, because Scott has shown repeatedly that he has difficulty recovering defensively when he ventures down the wings.) So Rosales shifted to where he was effective.
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