Date : 28/02/2016
Venue : Juventus Stadium
Competition : Serie A 2015/2016, Matchday 27
The starting line ups:
Roberto Mancini changed his team’s shape once again in this match, choosing a 5-3-2 formation. Samir Handanovic was under the goal posts behind a defense that consisted of Alex Telles, Danilo D’Ambrosio, Juan Jesus, Miranda and Murillo. Gary Medel was protecting the defense as a DM, with Felipe Melo and Kondogbia slightly in front of him. Rodrigo Palacio and Mauro Icardi were the two forwards.
Massimiliano Allegri on the other side, chose to field his team too in a 5-3-2/3-5-2 shape. Gianluigi Buffon was the GK, with Barzagli, Chiellini and Bonucci as the three CBs in front of him and Alex Sandro and Lichtsteiner on the wings. Ex-Inter midfielder, Hernanes started as the regista in front of the defense (replacing Marchisio) and had Pogba and Khedira playing in front of him as CMs. Paulo Dybala and Mandzukic were the two forwards.
Juventus
The bianconeri did not make any drastic tactical changes just for this particular match.
They tried to build up the game from the back with their three CBs, which had a 3vs2 man advantage against Inter’s two forwards, thus moving the ball more easy up front.
Lichtsteiner and Alex Sandro were the players that were higher up on the pitch(in line with the two forwards), stretching the opposition defense by providing width and also pinning back the two nerazzurri WBs, who had to create a five man defensive line and also start the transition from defense to offense from much lower on the pitch, thus decreasing their chances of a dangerous counterattack.
Up front, Dybala and Mandzukic were combining their movements in a very harmonious manner. Dybala was making fake runs, such as dropping deep to receive the ball, in order to drag an Inter defender out of his defensive line and enable Mandzukic to run in that space behind where his teammates were targeting him.
You can see on the above image, Juan Jesus being out of position after following Dybala, with Mandzukic running behind him, in the space he evacuated.
On defense there was no need to press with high intensity through long periods as it was very easy to take advantage of Inter’s usual poor build-up and force them into long balls immediately after the start of the pressing.
When Inter reached their half in an organized manner, through short build up play, Juventus were in a 5-3-2 shape, with the two forwards in front of the 3 midfielders cutting any passing lanes towards the centre of the field, hence forcing their opponents to play solely from the wings.
Mancini’s wrong approach
Mancini’s decision to use three CBs seemed obvious from the start. With a numerical advantage of 3vs2, against Juventu’s two forwards, one CB could always follow Dybala’s dropping movements, without a lot of hesitation as he still had a 2vs1 advantage for his team, behind him.
What proved to be a totally wrong decision, though, for Mancini, were his instructions to his three midfielders (Kondogbia, Melo and Medel) to be man oriented towards the tree Juventus midfielders, at the centre of the field and while their opponents were building up their game. That meant that their movements and their pressing runs were in relation of the runs and positions of their three opponents.
Even after the ball has moved to the wing you can see the Inter midfielders being in relation to Juventus’. You can also clearly see the two Juve wingbacks providing width.
(This seemed to be the biggest part of his defensive plan with Palacio and Icardi leaving the passing lanes to Heranes free in order to invite a pass there, where their teammates would press.(just as in the picture below))
This is where the problems started.
The first problem was the execution, with the three Inter midfielders arriving sometimes very late to press, thus giving enough time to their opponents to turn, see and find a pass.
After Medel failed to press on time, Khedira has received the ball between the lines from Hernanes and is ready to pass to Dybala.
The second problem was that with Medel leaving his DM position in order to press Hernanes and Melo and Kondogbia close to Khedira and Pogba, there was no one to cover behind the Chilean. This way a pressing mistake from him was becoming much more serious, as a pass in behind him, and Juve’s forwards were in front of the defense.
The third problem and most serious of the three, was that not letting Juventus’ midfielders touch the ball a lot and create was just part of what they were confronting, as the bianconeri have three CBs (with one of them being one of the best CBs in terms of creating and building up the game in the whole Italian peninsula, Leonardo Bonucci), that can play very accurate long balls or penetrate opponent’s lines with their passes.
Hence, the only thing Juventus had to do was to completely bypass the midfield line, have Dybala drag an Inter CB out of line in order to create a space for Mandzukic to run into and pass the ball to the Croatian.
Above we can see another good example, of Inter’s strategic inefficiencies. With a 3vs3 in the middle of the pitch and a 3vs2 advantage for Juventus’ defenders against Inter’s forwards, Chiellini becomes the free man and progresses the ball forwards.
When deep into their own half and in their own defensive third, Inter were positioned in a 5-3-1-1/5-3-2 shape.
On offense, once again there was lack of movement in order to create shots. However, that was something that Inter knew they would face during the match especially against an incredibly disciplined and compact defense. This way, counterattacking had become much more important.
With the wingbacks though starting from a very low position (due to the Juventus WBs pinning them back, as mentioned before), a long ball towards Icardi, for him to act as a target man seemed like a good solution. But only on paper, as the Argentinian was unable to compete aerially with any of the three black and white CBs. Moving Melo next to Icardi in cases when Inter wanted to avoid pressing or just play a long ball did not improve the situation either, as the Brasilian was not able to win a lot of aerial battles and was also, that way, out of position when transition phases started.
Second half changes
After the second half start, which was disastrous for the Milanese, as D’Ambrosio gave a present to Bonucci, letting him score, Mancini decided to make some tactical changes.
Ljajic came in on the 56th minute, replacing the injured Gary Medel.
The Serbian was now playing in front of Melo and Kondogbia, being close at all times to Hernanes, when on defense and cutting him as a passing option.
The Brazilian’s and Frenchman’s defensive attitude also changed, as they were much less oriented towards their opponents now, protecting the centre of the field and applying pressure only after Pogba or Khedira had touched the ball.
It was tactical move that stabilized Inter defensively in a certain (although minimum) way, until they decided to press high up the pitch and once again make mistakes that allowed Juve to easily break their pressing.
With Ljajic moving in very restricted central spaces on offense, Mancini decided to give more width higher up the pitch.
Perisic was in, replacing Telles and the nerazzurri moved into a 4-4-2 shape, with Perisic and Ljajicon the two wings, the Serbian being more free to move centrally.
It was a shape that also had its problems, as there was no one in a position to press or mark Hernanes, allowing this way Juventus to build their game from the back.
On offense there were huge distances between the CMs and the front four, making combination play either very predictable or simply impossible.
Did this formation work defensively though? Considering the two best chances were created by using it, yes, although at a time when everything had ended as Morata had already formed the final 2-0.
Conclusion
Juventus won yet another Derby d’Italia this year, against an Inter side, however, in a very bad state from every point of view (tactical, execution, etc.)
You can follow me on Twitter, @ThanosChelas.
Thanos Chelas should be our manager!
i think mancini need miracle if he want to qualify to the champions league.. i still think we need to give him time until the end of the season. but it’s fair to say we need to think a new coach for next season if mancini fail(and most likely will).
With the right formation we can win almost every match until the end. Roma and Napoli are the hardest teams we will have to play against + good teams like Lazio, Sassuolo and Bologna.
this is not about formation IMHO. it’s about mentality..
I have to agree with you on this. Even with the right formation, I wouldn’t have faith in Mancini. Seeing how he changes formation, avoids the medias and seems clueless to make a winning team, the players must have given up by now. Fresh blood, please.
Mancini be like: no problem, I’ll field a random 5-4-1 in the cup
Nice analysis thanos. I wonder why we still can’t press effectively and when we counter attack its so slow that we give the opponent the chance to close any open space which our players are never won. I also wonder what we can do to improve the buildup? Lijacic has to play because he is the only creative one we have and can go back deep because I noticed he is excellent at passing. and finally doesn’t the strikers control the tempo of pressing?
I always see icardi moving but the players at the midfield come to late to press like in medel’s case.
We should run more, aggressive passion believe.
Mancini wasn´t expecting that beautiful assist from d´Ambrosio which changed the game dramatically. Juve dropped back, played very compact and waited for inter to make a mistake. It is very hard to play against Juve when they are leading in scores. They are very good at slowing the pace down, and fall with slightest touch of an inter player to receive a penalty or freekick.
some sport analyst in a ESPN program mentioned that Mancio planed to hold on Juve until the 2nd half as they must be tired… but Mancio waited until 89 minute when we were losing 2-0, not sure but maybe we should’ve tried to attack constantly as they were a little tired, won’t be able to react and then park the bus– well anyway I’d like to see tomorrow’s experiment!
Thx Thanos-
It´s a shame that we have to ´´experiment´´ in a copa Italia semi final. I don´t expect inter to score 3. Inter threw the game away at Turin by losing 3-0. It is nearly impossible to come back. Juve will park the bus and counter and will most likely score.
imo, they dont need to park the bus. until now, Mancio didn’t know how to build attack. as soon our player get the ball, they will confuse and make the usual long ball to the front and start praying the wind will help them to score
It´s a shame that we cannot give them proper competition.