Hans-Dieter Flick

I'm not sure he will learn. To learn you need to respect the opponent far more, and even question the possibility that he is better than you, or more clever than you. This is what triggers the learning phase and gives it a great possibility of progression.

To learn he will need to adapt his style. He will never be able to get away with having this wild pressing vs teams of the caliber of PSG. Either it goes and gets transformed into something different, still pressing, but more selective and clever, or we lose.

If he studied the opponent better, he'd know Hakimi is not pressable in the way he tried. He can be contained strategically, but not athletically dominated by somebody like Balde coming after an injury lol. Not from that far back at least. You want to press him, you need to be super close to him. Or else don't bother and keep position.

serghei said:

The best in defense was Kounde

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stopped reading after this, Kounde couldnt even win the 1vs1 battles, best was ERIC and after Martin was out left side was completely free

Yeah serghei. He can learn Olmo and Yamal to be pressing beasts and Martin and Kounde to have technique of Dani Alves and Alba. Maybe learn to keep Inigo too.

Eric said it, we tried to adapt in 2nd half. Olmo had a match winner but in the end we lost in last minutes. PSG were pressing beasts and could replace their missing players better while we missed our best pressing beasts (Gavi, Fermin, Raphinha) and have weak bench.

Fati_Future_BallonDor said:

stopped reading after this, Kounde couldnt even win the 1vs1 battles, best was ERIC and after Martin was out left side was completely free

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Fine with Eric over Kounde, but you're just wrong. Barcola didn't even try 1 vs 1 attempts until he switched the side and faced Martin instead of Kounde. With Kounde in 1vs 1 he recycled possession constantly in the 1st half. Not saying Kounde had a strong game, but PSG clearly saw Martin (especially him) and Cubarsi as our weak players.

Kounde had one situation where he tripped himself, fell over, and lost the opponent, but even then he recovered and helped Garcia I think contain him.

When faced with Martin, Barcola was clearly instructed to force 1 vs 1. When faced with Kounde, played it differently. You can see this clearly by watching Barcola in the game, since he was the PSG player with most 1 vs 1 ability in the absence of Dembele and partly Doue.

serghei said:

Fine with Eric over Kounde, but you're just wrong. Barcola didn't even try 1 vs 1 attempts until he switched the side and faced Martin instead of Kounde. With Kounde in 1vs 1 he recycled possession constantly in the 1st half. Not saying Kounde had a strong game, but PSG clearly saw Martin (especially him) and Cubarsi as our weak players.

Kounde had one situation where he tripped himself, fell over, and lost the opponent, but even then he recovered and helped Garcia I think contain him.

When faced with Martin, Barcola was clearly instructed to force 1 vs 1. When faced with Kounde, played it differently.

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Kounde was completely embarrassing and this comment is too

TacticsTim said:

Kounde was completely embarrassing and this comment is too

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When. Post minute where he lost 1 vs 1 with PSG wingers in his zone. Except that one moment talked about already. First download the game as I did, then we can discuss.

The way to beat this PSG system is with variations against their press. Easier said than done.

-Quick long balls to the wide spaces and up to the CF (Xavi done this one well with Lewy at PdP, but then he was on Berardi who was a paper bag).
Also Joan Garcia would have helped immensely with this.

-Condensing the midfield with the AMC and fullbacks so PSG don't have a numerical advantage and then again, hitting them with medium over the top exits to the front line who can also come centrally. This is what LE has mastered effectively with PSG's first choice front 3/4.

But mainly, after thinking the game back, we lost because of personnel and fitness. Personnel because the backline and fitness because Lamine and Olmo couldn't sustain intensity for one reason or another.

Thing is, there were a couple of times where Kounde broke through on the right, and Gerard broke through on the left. And the few times that this happened where they didn't slow the ball down and cut back, they didn't have the pace to sustain and even put a cross in. Nuno and Hakimi both got back to stop it.

And in Hakimi case moreso, he has pace but is not a particularly smart nor good defensively. So if you had Balde fully fit then you would expect we could keep him much more honest or both ends.

About Kounde being embarassing in 1 vs 1.

Here are the two moments where he was isolated against PSG wingers. First with Barcola, who played on the left before min. 30 or so, until he wasn't getting in the game enough vs Kounde, and he switched sides to deal with Martin instead.

Both were handled by Kounde, and PSG players didn't even attempt the duel. They just declined the duel and passed to a teammate instead.

Here barcola has him face on goal, no back-up in sight, doesn't try to get past him. Nothing happens.



Here same thing, Mbaye has him in 1 vs 1, doesn't go for it.



Why do you think players don't often opt to engage in 1 vs 1s vs Kounde, but nearly always do with Martin when presented with the chance to do so?

Porque said:

And in Hakimi case moreso, he has pace but is not a particularly smart nor good defensively. So if you had Balde fully fit then you would expect we could keep him much more honest or both ends.

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True, but we're not talking about his defensive nous or ability when you press him. He has excellent ball control and athletic traits. It's one thing to attack him, and another thing to press him and dispossess him while he has the ball. You go against his strongest skills when you do what we did. Balde fitter doesn't make much difference here.

Hakimi will always punish you when you give him so much space.

The way to defend him imo is deny him space to run into. He has excellent ball controll, but he's not exactly marvelous at dribbling from standing position or in close range encounters. He needs to get going and build pace to get past you. Same for Mendes. Deny them that space to run into by positioning. Once you go and press and leave gaps for him to trigger his run, he won't stop until he gets near your goal. It's containment vs chasing. Chasing them is stupid. They will run rings around him. Both their FBs have top notch athletic ability. On smaller, more congested spaces, not nearly as effective.

A lot has to do with distances between comparments. They were big. If you plan to have 40-50m between first line and last line, compress spaces between compartments to deny space to run into, it means you can't press that high. You need to let them 20-30m of free access on the ball, to reinforce the 40-50m between their box, and your box.

Flick got caught badly. First he was hesitant to have a super high line at times, but at the same time, instead of dropping the press line by 30-40m, he stretched the team causing glaring holes between compartments which runners like Hakimi and Mendes love to feast on.

serghei said:

True, but we're not talking about defensive when you press him. He has excellent ball control and athletic ability. It's one thing to attack him, and another thing to press him and dispossess him. You go against his strongest skills when you do what we did. Balde fitter doesn't make much difference here.

Hakimi will always punish you when you give him so much space.

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To face fullbacks like Nuno and Hakimi you need good acceleration and then speed. Our whole backline immensely lacked acceleration and speed.

Martin has the highest top speed but very slow acceleration while Eric has the best acceleration but a low top speed.

It's also why guys like Marc Casado and Gavi can hustle more, but lack the speed to close the press quick enough.

Balde has that acceleration and a solid top speed. Sustainability over 90 is questionable though. But I don't doubt that if he were in PSG, that he would have the stamina of Hakimi and Nuno (you get what I am saying).

Basically if Hakimi and Nuno were that good at attacking then they wouldn't be playing as fullbacks. So for guys like then you absolutely need to be able to match their short burst and then keep up with them on the sprint.

Balde LB, perhaps Araujo RB if you really want to go full containment.

serghei said:

A lot has to do with distances between comparments. They were big. If you plan to have 40-50m between first line and last line, compress spaces between compartments to deny space to run into, it means you can't press that high. You need to let them 20-30m of free access on the ball, to reinforce the 40-50m between their box, and your box.

Flick got caught badly. First he was hesitant to have a super high line at times, but at the same time, instead of dropping the press line by 30-40m, he stretched the team causing glaring holes between compartments which runners like Hakimi and Mendes love to feast on.

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Was gonna touch on that. This is the other big point. As good as we are, we have an obvious kryptonite with the space behind our high line. Which against top class opponents you can get away with to the extent of how fast your defenders are and how great their anticipation is.

Compare Flick's line to Lucho's. Lucho's was high too initially and it was a midfield battle where we were winning.

Then Lucho amended it and their centres held deeper, and their fullbacks wide as a mid 5 keeping our fullbacks wider. So there was still space but it was between the defence and the midfield. So for example we could exploit it with Olmo and Lamine, but their attacks were slowed down by facing 2 centrebacks rather than empty space, and this gave the time for Nuno/Hakimi to recover.

Now if Lamine was fully fit and Olmo on his A game then we would have exploited this setup. Hell we almost did, Lamine earned a red card on Nuno through one of these situations and Olmo missed an easy goalscoring opportunity through another.

Dont have time to read all these posts. While I appreciate @serghei 's methodical analysis, it's not manager's responsibility to micro-manage every play on the pitch. The players are expected to demonstrate a certain degree of spatial awareness, positional intelligence and understanding of the game. To pin the blame on the manager for everything that goes wrong on the pitch is unreasonable. That said, Flick didn't have a great night and I'm sure he knows that.

zanela said:

Dont have time to read all these posts. While I appreciate @serghei 's methodical analysis, it's not manager's responsibility to micro-manage every play on the pitch. The players are expected to demonstrate a certain degree of spatial awareness, positional intelligence and understanding of the game. To pin the blame on the manager for everything that goes wrong on the pitch is unreasonable. That said, Flick didn't have a great night and I'm sure he knows that.

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He knows he did not have a great night.
We also know he won't have a great night if we face PSG again.
Cause he wont change shittttttt