After Luis Enrique’s departure in the summer, Barcelona appointed another former player of theirs, Ernesto Valverde. Under his managerial time so far Barca has shown that the club is still among the very bests in Europe and Real Madrid shouldn’t be too confident in themselves. In the following article I will try to break down how they manage to be still this good with the probably worst squad in their last ten years.

Until this moment the Catalans have ranked up a nine points lead against Atlético de Madrid, they have scored the most and conceded the least goals in La Liga, while staying unbeaten in the domestic league and in the Champions League too. Valverde has shown that he can get the most out of the team with his usually logical and pragmatic approach to the game.

Squad and formations

The beginning wasn’t an easy one for the new coach, as after two months full of gossips, unconsciousness and famous Instagram posts, Neymar Jr. announced his transfer to Paris Saint-Germain. Loosing such a talent hurt Barcelona badly, as the young Brazilian was a key figure in the match plans for the Blaugranes, and replacing him with one player is probably impossible, so they had to consider other ways to fill in the gap. The board and the coach decided to spend the tremendous amount of money they got from selling Neymar, and invested in four new players, namely Gerard Deulofeu, who was an academist there years ago, Nélson Semedo, who left Benfica for the Catalans, the formerly misjudged Paulinho, and Ousmane Dembélé from Borussia Dortmund. After completing all these signings, Valverde’s job was, and is still to fit every element to their places.

However, the player quality in the squad is still questionable, as if we take a closer look at them, we find the likes of Arda Turan or Aleix Vidal there, who can be very useful tools in many teams, but in Barcelona their work-ethic, or technical abilities aren’t on the required level, which makes effective rotation almost impossible. Furthermore, the average age is just above 27 years, mainly due to the younger players on the bench, but the core of the team is rather around 30.

New formations

After Neymar’s departure it was pretty evident that the former 4-3-3 is unsustainable in the future, at least in its previous way. In his first competitive matches as a Barcelona trainer Valverde tried some formations, but not all of them worked out well, his 3-5-2 against Zidane’s Real Madrid looked like a nightmare, as the players didn’t exactly know their tasks in this new environment, so the defensive line of three was easy to stretch, and the space behind the full-backs was easy to exploit with Madrid’s double wing occupation.

The 4-3-3 with a Lionel Messi on the right wing was neither a Hollywood success story, as he couldn’t influence the game in the way he usually does, he was quite isolated, just like Deulofeu on the left, who usually occupied Alba’s favourite position and totally ruined the dynamics on that side. These El Clásico defeats were good lessons to Ernesto Valverde, who later decided to build the team around Messi and give him the freedom he wants.

Currently Barcelona play in a formation, which looks mostly like a 4-4-2 diamond, but the roles aren’t the typical ones. A very important component of this set-up is Messi, who is allowed to go everywhere on the pitch, and the full-backs, who usually have to act like wingers in the offensive third, while being able to give a stable defensive cover in defensive phases.

Barcelona’s usual starting eleven

They sometimes use a 4-3-3 too, but that isn’t so common, as due to Messi’s role the team would be really asymmetrical, and although it isn’t a big problem in most cases, but without Dembélé it wasn’t a risk that would be worth it week by week, the focus was on building a stable midfield-based system. But in the future, after Dembélé’s return, it would be possible to introduce it again.

First phase of attacking

FC Barcelona have always been famous of the fact that they prefer to start their attacks through the defenders, aiming to create some sort of stability during this process. They are known as a team that usually prefers to have large amount of possession, which is understandable given the player archetypes they have. Since Johan Cruyff’s era Barcelona tend to put a great emphasis on playing out of the back in a deliberate way on the ground. However, in the past few years they needed to make some modifications, so they have options for a build-up, which abandones the defensive line.

Building up against zonal marking

To properly understand the process, we have to take a quick look at the specific features of a zonal defensive system. This way of defending consists of having the space as a primed reference point, which means that the system is mainly a proactive one, as its working depends only on constant factors, thus giving the opportunity to the defending team to guide the attackers’ movements to an extent. If you are interested about more in-depth informations about defensive system, have a look at this piece.

In Spain most teams prefer to defend this way, as it lets them to create a solid structure in which every player knows their place, and with the often changing squad composition it’s useful to have a fix task for each role, so adding new guys to the team is easier this way.

Against Barcelona, the procedure looks like the following: the two strikers’ task is to stay close to Sergio Busquets and prevent passes to him, preferably doing all this at the central area, thus blocking other central passing options as well. The midfield line shifts softly towards the ball carrier, while trying to minimalize the space around the Barcelona players in their zone, and also closing down the full-back on the ball’s side. Meanwhile this, the defensive line covers the space behind, shifting less than the midfielders, and keeping Suárez offside.

4-4-2 against Barcelona

A frequent problem of Barcelona against such defensive scheme was the lack of connection between the team units. Busquets has functioned as a lone pivot for a long time before too, but in recent seasons his role became even harder, as the midfield partners granted him less support than before, so when the strikers closed down the space around him, the connection between defense and the other parts of the team was really weak. To solve this issue, Valverde had to reinterpret Sergio’s role in the team during this phase.

As mentioned above, Busquets was usually positioned in the traditional pivot place, which kept him away from action, so the coach decided to bring him out of the defensive block, where he could contribute more to the game on the ball, and help the team exploit the weakest spot of most 4-4-2 defensive formations. This means that he frequently drops between the two central defenders, thus allowing them to split more, and cover more of the pitch horizontally. This results in significantly shorter distances at the back, which offers better connection, therefore more stability in the build-up process.

The other great advantage of using Busquets as a dropping midfielder is the huge space which opens up in front of the two defenders when they are on the ball. As I touched on above, this helps the team attack the most poorly spaced part of the 4-4-2, which are the half-spaces, mainly between the first and second line of pressure.

The half-spaces are exploitable in a 4-4-2.

As Busquets drops to the deepest line of the team, he gives not just a posititional support to the defenders, he also offers them the option of progressing with the ball. The Spaniard secures the numerical superiority at the back, and stabilizes the structure if Umtiti or Piqué decides to dribble forward.

Scene against Athletic Club.

However, Sergio’s movement has a huge disadvantage as well: the defensive midfielder’s position is crucial in Barcelona, as the player there is responsible for keeping the opposing strikers narrow, and he is also has to offer himself as a pass option if the ball is played to the wing. So as a consequence of this, to really gain advantage of Busquets’ movement, Valverde decided to move the strong-sided central midfielder of his to the lone pivot position, thus reducing the risk of frequently occuring spatial issues during the build-up. And to keep the proper horizontal staggering, the winger on the ball side moves inside to take up the vacant position of the midfielder.

Through these movements Barca are able to create, and then maintain a numerical and positional superiority in the ball’s zone, therefore the progression to the next stage of attack is easier.

Positional rotations to maintain proper spacing.

Now that we had a look at the way Barcelona deal with zonal-oriented defending, we can observe them against systems that add mix man-marking with the zonal one.

Building up against mixed defending

This is a less common way of first phase defending against Barcelona, but the Blaugranes had to face it on some occasions through the first half of the season. This style of defending was used on those occasions mainly where the defensive team wanted to press Barcelona more aggressively, trying to force out errors by leaving the players less time and space for controlling the ball. Barca was seen pretty vulnerable in such situations last season, they let the opponents turnovers deep in their own half, and made dozens of errors when trying to bring the ball out on the ground.

These teams put high emphasis on trying to minimalize Barcelona’s options on the ball, mainly in the centrum, so they move up on the pitch and try to man-mark Barcelona’s central players. However, Valverde’s team has implemented a solution for this situation (to be fair, Luis Enrique has already started it), which is using the goalkeeper as an eleventh outfield player in this phase. Luckily Ter Stegen possesses such on the ball qualities, that allow him to take part in the game with his feet quite often.

Ter Stegen offers an extra man at the back during circulation, which allows the attacking unit and full-backs to spread out more on the pitch, as the deepest players are supported by an extra man, and are able to get the ball out of the pressure without further help. The German keeper has a great technique for short, and middle range passes, and is even top category at long passes, so he can offer any type of contribution.

When the opponent moves up the pitch, Barcelona would like to take advantage of the spaces left vacant by them, as in these cases they have to try to cover half of the pitch, which makes holes in the formation unavoidable. The decision is there for the pressing team, where would they like to leave the gaps?

Well, Barcelona tries to make this decision easier to them, and they position their midfield three quite deep , which means that a pass to them is possibly affordable on the ground, so the opponent has to move further up on the pitch to put pressure on them. But while they move higher, they leave the two fullbacks open, and here comes the point when Ter Stegen’s long range passes become important. The pressing midfielders usually try to create a situation, where they can mark the full-backs to an extent too, but the German’s quality on the ball means that the passes are well-aimed and reach the full-backs perfectly behind the second line of pressure. The defenders although would have the opportunity to pressurize them, but this is often found too risky by them, as it would leave a 3v3 situation at the back, and this isn’t a thing that many teams can afford against Messi and Suárez.

Using Ter Stegen’s skills.

And there is one more way of pressing Barcelona, which I decided to mention in this topic despite the fact that it isn’t so strongly related to it, which is man-marking. It was hardly used by teams through the season, only Girona decided to stick to it through a whole game, and Real Madrid in some periods of El Clásico.

Girona was an one of the most interesting games of Barcelona, to see how the Catalans react to strict man-marking, and dealing with such kind of pressure was also a nice thing to examine. They approached every Barcelona kick-off with sticking to all of their outfield players, so Ter Stegen didn’t really have real passing options, so Barca had to look for possible ways of dismarking.

Barcelona tried to do this on a group-tactical level, which means that for losing the markers they worked as a collective, and tried to gain advantage of the possible dynamical superiority they could create, and of the fact that by dismarking one player, the whole defensive system is deeply hurt. So the team started to look for lay-offs for a third man after well-hit long passes towards Suárez. This was the point where the runs from Alba, Vidal and Messi could be made, running to the unoccupied spaces around Girona’s last line.

Barcelona’s dismarking in own half.

Now that we know how the Catalans get the ball to the second phase of attack, we can start looking at what they do when they finally reach the opposing half.

Playing through the middle third

This is the second phase of Barcelona’s attacking play, which they are famous for. This season they they made some tactical changes here too, but they are still able to look one of the most nicely playing clubs in Europe. They are still possession-focused, which can be seen as a similarity with the past seasons, but they have a different approach to getting the ball to the last third.

Positional structure in attack

It is important to state that Barcelona still play a position-oriented kind of football, although with more positional rotations and mobility. In this football all the players have their positional roles and tasks, which we should examine before moving on to the next paragraph.

The central defenders have a similar role as in the previous seasons, as they are the ones who have to give stability to the team when in possession. But this year their objectives on the ball are different, with less line breaking passes, as the progression is more dependant on shorter passes. They are positioned more widely, and with Busquets’ frequent dropping movements they are given the opporunity to dribble forward in the wider channels, where they mostly combine with the full-backs.

Last year, in Luis Enrique’s Barca the full-backs used to have smaller roles in the team, in the second part of the season they were even used less after the introduction of the 3-1-3-3. This season it has changed almost dramatically, as they are given a big attacking role in the team, as after Neymar’s departure and Messi’s new position they are the ones that have to give with to the team’s structure, endlessly running up and down by the sideline.

The defensive midfielder position is taken up by Sergio Busquets most of the time, who is back in his best form these days. He is responsible for connecting the team parts at this stage of the play, so he can be found sometimes between the central defenders, sometimes among the attacking unit. Valverde trusts his instincts of positioning, his football intelligence, and this positional freedom allows him to give his best, stabilizing the whole team.

The two central midfielders are usually Iniesta and Rakitic, but they are given different objectives when in possession. They both function in the half-spaces usually, but while the Croatian has the task of giving central stability a bit deeper, or when the flank is vacant, he takes a position up there. Meanwhile, Iniesta is responsible for creativity on the left, often playing outside of the block, to gain advantage of his dribbling when he has momentum, and only moving between the lines, when he has to combine with the progressing Alba. In such situations, he uses his great sense for close control in tight spaces, so he can attract the pressure while Alba makes his run.

A new role compared to the past years is Paulinho’s, who is a kind of a jolly-joker in this phase. He has bigger positional freedom, as he is in the team because of his good sense for well-timed movements and his already good partnership with Messi. He isn’t so talented dribbling-wise, so he has to make runs to the box when the ball is on the flanks, and he is used for breaking the lines when Barca keep it at the back. He is often found between the lines, where he can be played wall passes, that he lays off to Messi.

The most important part of the team -as always- is Lionel Andrés Messi. The Argentinian is given more freedom than ever, and he is living up to the expectations in this new role too. He is responsible for dictating the play, combining in the middle, giving key passes and scoring goals at the same time, and he does well. He can be found mostly on the right side of the central region, from where he drifts inside, but he also drops deep on numerous occasions to gain speed, and threaten through quick combinations with the midfielders. He is more important than ever.

And last but not least, Luis Suárez. The Uruguayan started off the season in a terrible form, but since Valverde moved him back to his favourite position, he’s been performing well. He usually plays on the side of the opposing right central defender. From this place, he can drift to the left to help Alba out, but he often moves to the middle too and looks for balls behind. He has the most simplified role, but he is probably satisfied with that.

But now let’s progress to the next topic.

Team dynamics

As I’ve mentioned previously, Barcelona have improved in their deep midfield dynamics, just like in wing dynamics. This part will focus on these two, to help us properly understand what makes the team still exceptionally good, and how did they achive this level of coherence in their offensive play.

First of all, we again have to think of how the defensive systems in the Primera División work. The teams usually focus on zonal coverage in their mid-block too, where they would like to have a clear defensive formation too, without overloading one side too much. The focus is more on maintaining this solid defensive system, than on risking leaving space behind by collectively pressing the team in possession.

This, and the above mentioned positional roles preview us the way in Barca play, a combinative, but still stability-focused style. To break zonal blocks, you need to move the ball a lot, use it as a bait to open spaces between defensive players, and this is exactly what Barcelona do. They are aiming to focus the opponent’s attention to the ball, while finding options for the consecutive pass. They do all this with more positional rotations and with generally more movement than in the previous seasons, which often ends up in nice quick combinations.

A key figure of these situations is Busquets, who has shown much more activity this season when it comes to moving into spaces. The Spanish midfielder usually positions himself just above the central defenders to show himself as a secure, free passing option, which is quite natural for him. He controls the game from that spot, and seems like he won’t ever move, but he is just waiting for the good opportunity to occur. When the ball is on the flank, and he senses some space higher up on the pitch, he slowly starts moving, and after the closest defender has checked above his shoulders, he starts the run to the space left by the defensive team.

These blindside movements let him surprise the opponent, and offer a progressing opportunity to the team. However, to achieve these situations, there is a need for a great tactical understanding from the teammates, but luckily his partners are also able to recognize the situations, and the midfield members often make vertical runs in the opposite direction as Busi, thus dragging away the closest defender.

Busquets finding space.

The other important player when it comes to dynamics is the star player, Lionel Messi. His sense to this game is incredible, and Valverde’s side tries to profit from him as much as possible. A common manner in which Barca take advantage of Messi’s quick passing is when he comes out of the defensive block to collect the ball, and starts fast short passing with a midfielder nearby. This has a great effect for the team, as it focuses the opponent’s attention on Messi, who has the technical abilities to deal with the pressure put on him, and he just starts dribbling forward exceptionally quickly, using the players ahead of him like passing walls, and he escapes the pressure quickly. Via this he can avoid the opposing midfield and can take the ball on the rather passive last line, which is probably the most dangerous threat in the world’s football.

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After examining the dynamic positioning of the most important players, we have to take a look at a group-tactical element of Barcelona’s playing style too. Playing through the wing has never been the main focus of the Catalans, but the team can profit a lot from developing the structure by the sidelines, and it’s also a place of possible progression after getting the ball out of the crowded center.

Valverde’s side has emerged into a side that is great at wing dynamics, mainly because of the relationship between the central midfielders and full-backs. As previously described and illustrated, the two central midfielders like to drift wide when they have the ball on their side, as in the absence of wingers in the line-up usually they are the ones that have to co-operate with the progressing full-backs.

The situation is usually the following: Barcelona establish their stable midfield structure with Busquets in the core of it, and he is supported by one of the central midfielders, while the other one drifts towards the sidelines and takes his place up close to the full-back. In these moments Valverde’s side focuses on taking advantage from over- and underlapping runs by the two players close to each other, as a method for gaining space on the wing, probably behind the defence. The dynamical superiority, which is possessed by the player running in from depth allows them to beat the quite rigid defensive players, or if they choose to take up the runner and mark him, it gives space and time to the player on the ball. Most of the time it’s rather Iniesta and Alba who make these positional rotations on the flank, but Rakitic also helps Roberto or Semedo out when they discover a situation where it might be useful.

However, team dynamic is a thing that has been having some serious problems through the first half of the season. The most problematic place is the middle of the pitch further up on the playing ground, as in contrast to the deep midfield dynamics mentioned above, the team can become too static up there. The players move up to the edge of the attacking third, but don’t move enough between the lines, which leads to impotent attacks and harmless circulation at the back with no real progress. The lack of runs into depth from the middle can be a serious problem, as this way they are offering less progressive options to the ball carrier. In such situations it’s usually Messi who gets the control to himself and tries to produce something valuable with the ball, but this needs to be repaired as soon as possible. (I’ve already seen some improvements in the past months.)

Frequent combinations

As a way of progressing up the field, Barcelona quite often put high emphasis on taking advantage of the spaces opened up on the wing. This is a consequence of the quality Barcelona own in the central areas, with the likes of Busquets or Messi. So teams often focus on closing down the dribbling routes and passing lanes in front of them. However, they usually find a way to bypass the defence, like dribbling to different parts of the pitch and taking the ball on a less organized part of the defense, or just by passing it to the weakly defended areas, like the far side.

But how does it exactly look like? Barcelona try to break the covering scheme by exploiting the spaces behind by hitting exrtremely accurate diagonals towards Jordi Alba. Most of the time they are played by Messi, because when he has the ball, the opponent usually focuses only on him, so the other players have more opportunities to move into spaces, and this is exactly what Alba does. The focus on Messi and the Argentinian’s ability to put the ball right into the right place in the right moment means that the Spanish left-backs has both time and space to make his run down the pitch, bypassing the standing defenders with his outstanding pace. This kind of combination was a key in Alba achieving six assists by this time of the season, while playing as a defender.

A key part of these passes’ success however is the nature of Alba’s situation. As the defenders are positioned between the ball and the Spaniard, they have to orientate themselves towards the ball, which leaves Jordi Alba out of their field of vision, so they can’t exactly close down the passing routes towards him, or the pass can even be lobbed. Furthermore, the turning movement takes so much time from the defenders, that the positional superiority of Alba is almost inevitable. Furthermore, this kind of passes have a huge Packing value, for example Messi’s assist to Alba against Celta Vigo had a Packing value of 9.

Another frequent combination type is the Busquets-Messi duo’s, who are currently the best Barcelona players by far. A friend of mine mentioned it once in a group chat, that we should take a look at how Messi moves more when Sergio has the ball, compared to the other players. And if we think of it a bit, it’s quite logical. When a player with Busi’s quality has the ball, you are sure that he will deliver it to you, even if it’s a more difficult passing situa tion, therefore Messi often tries to move higher on the pitch when Sergio is on the ball, and this makes Barcelona more direct.



Busquets usually stays outside of the defensive block these times, just like he does most of the time, but Messi is further up on the pitch than in most situations, he is basically playing between the lines these times, or moves there, and through his diagonal body orientation he is able to progress instantly after receiving. This gives him the opportunity to face the defenders directly, and dribble to his preferred shooting locations around the edge of the box in the left half-space. This is a movement type which wasn’t so common in the past few seasons, but since Valverde’s arrival it seems to be a part of Barcelona’s plans again.

Getting into the box and finishing

If we look a bit deeply into the various types of Barcelona have scored this season, we will see long range efforts, set-piece goals, but most importantly goals that were put back to the second wave of arriving players to finish them. This isn’t so surprising if we think of the attacking types the Blaugranes lead, but it’s surely worth a deeper examination.

As I have already detailed it above, Messi’s well-aimed diagonal balls play a huge role in Ernesto Valverde’s system, and what comes after is the most important part of the whole process. As Barcelona only have Paulinho who is really good at headers (Suárez rarely beats his man in the air, he is better at arriving for headers), putting the ball into the crowded box through the air wouldn’t be so logical. But as all Messi, Suárez and Paulinho are really good at arriving in the second wave, and even Rakitic is capable of this, it’s a better solution to do.

When talking about these low crosses we need to make a difference on the types of them, mainly based on the side from where the cross is coming. On the left side of the pitch, Alba usually makes a run to the end of the pitch, and then rolls it back towards the penalty spot, where Messi attacks it from depth, or when he isn’t there, Paulinho arrives to the cross and tries to put it away.

On the other side it’s usually Sergi Roberto who makes the cross, and he chooses different options on the ball most of the time. His main preference when crossing isn’t the short side, although he completes that type of pass frequently too, he rather looks for Suárez, and the passing channel is opened by a runner to the close post from a teammate, and after that he can put it to Suárez.

And last but not least: why so focused on the second wave? Because this is a passing type that can result in a positional advantage inside the box. As the defense is rushing back to close the route towards the goal and the cross in front of the goal, they can’t take up the arriving players who are not just in a better position, but are also in momentum, so trying to stop them can easily result in a penalty.

Pressing

An important part of Barcelona’s success this season has been their improved defensive display, and their pressing specially too. To understand the changes made by Valverde, we have to take a quick look at how they approached this phase in the last seasons.

With Luis Enrique Barcelona tried to achieve a dominant role in all games, almost at any moment. This required a high-intensity pressing game from the Catalonian side, because to gain control over the match as a possession-focused side, the most practical decision is trying to get the ball as soon as possible.

However, the implementation of the attacking third pressing was sometimes questionable, even though they had some nice ideas. To start with, the nature of their pressing was sometimes disorganized, lacking compactness on the front, and also reactive. This resulted in many wrong-timed pressing movements, and the absence of conscious body orientation and precise curves of the runs. As a compensation, the deeper parts of the team who didn’t rush towards the ball often stabilized this phase of their game, and the incredible intensity of the pressing also helped them to force out turnovers.

On the other hand, there was an interesting element of their high-tempo pressing, which was the role of Luis Suárez. The Uruguayan likes to approach the ball-carrier with great pace, but he is prone to making mistakes in his orientation and positioning. To solve this problem, Lucho decided to apply him as a backwards presser, which means he attacked the defenders from the direction of their goalkeeper, thus reducing the options of the carrier, and also the time and space he had on the ball. Through this modification in their pressing game Barca were able to push the opponent into aimlessly kicked long balls that could be collected by the deeper midfield.

This season Valverde decided to modify the set-up detailed above, and his new approach has been successful through the season. This has happened mainly due to the clarified and detailed pressing structure he has implemented, which has lead Barcelona back to the top.

To begin with, the pressing Barcelona try to do week by week is a compact, zonal-oriented one, with clear tasks given to each player. Suárez and Messi are the ones who lead the pressing in the attacking third, and especially Suárez is active, as he is the one who tries to press the carrier from first intention and force out a long ball. Messi prefers to save energy and only starts his pressing run when an escaping pass has already been played to the other defender, which gives the pressing some reactive marks, but in overall it’s logical from the number 10 to spare with his energy, as Suárez is often enough to force the long ball.

This initiative way of pressing by the South-American duo helps the team to prepare themselves for the next actions, as the behaviour shown by the team in possession against the two strikers will help them specify their movements. If they go for a long ball, the midfield will drop a bit in order to get more access to second balls through outnumbering the opponent in that area.

When the defender doesn’t panic and find an escape route from his situation and plays the ball to his partner, the team reacts in a different way. In such situations the main goal of the team is to prevent further progression from the opponent, therefore they try to establish a local compactness around the ball, where they aim to close down passing routes out of the crowded area, or at least to reduce the options of the player on the ball. To achieve this, the strong-sided midfielder steps out of the midfield chain and joins the attackers. The remaining unit of the midfield softly shifts towards the gap left by the teammate stepping out, and compress the game into an even smaller space, where they can win the ball through either tackles or interceptions.

This gives them a quite asymmetrical formation, which can be really useful for defending the whole pitch. The ball’s side is pushed higher in order to close the short passing options, but the other side’s deeper positioning has its own advantages too. If the team would be too narrow, or the other side would be pushed up high too, it would be exploitable through long crosses to the other side, where the opponent would have space to progress. But as Barca remain a bit deeper, it means that the ball can’t be crossed behind their defensive line, and can be transferred to the other side only through back line, or through the air but not above Barca’s midfield. This gives Barcelona time to shift towards the ball again.

A good example of this was their game against Real Madrid, where they looked to neutralize Kroos’ threat during the build-up through creating an overload in the right channel, and tried to force the defending Champions League winners to safe circulation instead of deadly through balls towards the strikers drifting wide. Even though this left Sergi Roberto alone with Marcelo and Ronaldo oftentimes, it worked well generally.

Another interesting part of their pressing to mention is the consciousness they are having when it comes to approaching opposing players in wide areas, where they are trying to guide them. The core idea is to set pressing traps for them on the flank, which means that the defensive side leaves a passing option free at first, using it as a bait, in order to close the receiver down later.

The way Ernesto Valverde’s side does it is based on using the sideline as an additional defensive player, thus reducing the possible passing angle to 180°. Through the above mentioned methods they guide the opponent to their wing players, and via the usage of their local compactness they attempt to close them down. This is the moment when the strong-sided full-back is given the right to move even higher by the sideline and help the two midfielders in the action.

These movements are sometimes tried to be encountered with a striker moving into the gap left between the full-back and the central defender, but as the last line shifts properly and they rarely have to deal with one more striker in the middle, the defender can push towards the half-space and reduce the space for a possible long ball to the wide striker. However, this is a potential weakness of Barcelona, as if the defender is dragged away and an attacking midfielder advances to the open space, the defense could be outnumbered quite close to their own box, behind the midfield cover. So far Barcelona avoided this situation in most games, but for example Real Sociedad often looked to play the ball into these situations.

Moving into defensive block

An important part of Barca’s success has been the stability shown in their own half when defending, which can be connected to Valverde too. His previous sides, like Athletic Club or Espanyol also showed great defensive displays in their own half, so the fact that he could transfer this into his Barcelona too isn’t a big surprise.

Player roles

In the defensive shape the two forwards, Messi and Suárez are responsible for covering the direct access towards the central midfield for the opponent with their generally centrum-focused positioning against the ball. This task suits the duo well as they can save energy with the lack of intensive running and complicated movements. When the ball is passed to the flank and the attack has passed them, they don’t even have to drop deeper in order to help the team out.

Behind them the two wide midfielders have to close the diagonal passing lanes towards the wingers, and even the vertical ones towards opposing players in their half-space. To be more exact, they have to force the opponent into deep circulation and prevent their progress towards the middle. When the opponent uses a double wing occupation, they might drift a bit wider in some cases too, but this isn’t too common, as they prefer to keep the superiority in interior zones instead of the flanks.

The two central midfielders, usually Rakitic and Busquets are positioned quite deeply in their midfield, and their role is to deprive the opponent from their access to the attacking unit, where the great positioning talent of Busquets can often be utilized. They only step out of this position, when the team is beaten on the wing and the opponent progresses towards the middle. In such cases they try to put the player under pressure from different angles, reducing his options and not leaving reasonable passing lanes for him. Beside these situations, they might move out for loose balls, thus trying to control the chatotic phase and regain possession through their defensive sense in these moments.

The full-backs have a different role from the usual approach to their position, as they are given more positional freedom during deep defending, meaning that they are allowed to move further up on the pitch for interceptions, usually in the deep half-space, or sometimes they can even track the opposing wingers, but this isn’t so common, as it leaves the deep wide areas vacant.

As for the central backs, they have a quite ordinary role in deep defending, with the task of guarding the striker(s) of the opponent. However, they might move a bit more during this, as if the full-backs move out of their positions for a longer time and the ball is played to the vacant positions, they are the ones who have to go into the duel on the wing.

Detailed set-up

The Catalans usually line up in a solid 4-4-2 block when it comes to own half defending. Just like during pressing, Messi and Suárez stay up front, while the four midfielders line up in a chain behind them, covering the centre mainly. What is notable about the positioning of the midfield is that they stay quite narrow, which results a great defensive relationship between wide midfielders and full-backs. As most teams try to break Barcelona on the wings, a winger is usually positioned wide on the pitch, meaning that if they aren’t pressured immediately after receiving, they might have the opportunity to create an inequal starting situation for an isolated one-on-one duel, as the player on the ball will be able to gain pace, which would be too harmful. To avoid this situation, Valverde’s side usually sends the strong-sided full-back wide, and tries to cover the channel between full-back and centre-back through the positioning of the wide midfielder in the half-space.

This doesn’t only offer Barcelona an immediate access to the opposing wing players, but also lets them to gain bigger advantage in the central zones of the pitch. The compactness of the front six, plus the well-defended wing let Barcelona to put a big amount of pressure on the ball carrier from every direction if they couldn’t stop them at the flank.

The other interesting part of Barca’s defending in depth is the way they manage to fill in the gaps that their teammates leave. As I’ve mentioned above, the full-backs have some freedom while defending, which means that they are allowed to track the winger further up on the pitch, but as a consequence, their position, the side of the defence will be abandoned, and the opponents are keen on exploiting this. But the defensive roles are well-discussed between the Catalans, so when this happens they don’t start panicing, but find a solution instead. This solution is the closest central defender moving to the vacant position, so if the opponent can bring the ball there, they will still face a defender. Meanwhile, the full-back drops back to the central back’s position in the half-space and prevents the success of underlapping runs to depth from the opponent. Sometimes, when this man-marking happens in higher zones, it is the wide midfielder’s role to move back to the side of the defensive line, so the back line doesn’t have to rotate, which eases the defending against through balls.

However, Valverde’s team still has some flaws in their defensive game that are usually compensated by individual talent, but on some occasions they lead to big chances or even goals, so analyzing them is important. Due to their ball-orientated zonal defending in their half, they can sometimes become too focused on the ball, which leads to being ‘too compact’. This means that they get very narrow around the ball, and if the opponent finds a route to escape from the pressure, they can find themselves with huge spaces ahead of them undefended. These are the situations that are often solved by the defenders stepping out of their positions towards the midfield, but this leaves exploitable spaces behind them. A recent example of this was Juanmi’s goal in their away match against Real Sociedad, where the Spanish attacker could move into the gap behind Piqué well and after a deflection on Sergi Roberto put the ball in Ter Stegen’s net.

Transitions

In the past few years, especially after the success of Klopp’s Borussia Dortmund, the international attention turned towards the counter-pressing, as through that a team is able to regain possession when the opponent is in their most disorganized defensive situation. As statistics have shown it, most goals come after chaotic situations, and managers have realized that to be able to score even more goals the key is to control these originally uncontrolled situations.

Defending the counters

Since Pep Guardiola’s reign in the capital of Catalonia, counter-pressing has been an important part of Barcelona’s identity. They train their players in their youth system to be able to adapt in the first team’s strictly organized counter-pressing strategy, and also try to sign players with a sense for this part of the game.

Although the possession usually gives them a huge level of protection against oppositional attacks, Barca needed to establish a stable counter-pressing method, where they can maintain their dominance even after losing the ball. What has been really important for the Catalans is the proper midfield structure during their attacks. As mentioned earlier, Rakitic often stays a bit deeper during the attacks, and even Iniesta moves more outside of the block than previously, which already gives them a line of two to cover for the attacking unit depending on which side is the attack going on. In addition to that, Paulinho is also a talented counter-presser, which with the support of the full-backs predicts a strong core for the action.

When they lose the ball during their attacks, the Blaugranes move into a horizontally compact formation, with the far-sided midfielder coming closer to the ball’s side, and the strong-sided one with Busquets pushing towards the carrier. The defensive discipline of Busquets -who in addition has a great sense for positioning in such situations as he closes the forward options well with his body posture most of the time- and the help of the other midfielder is usually enough to stop vertical progression, as they focus on reducing the space in front of the player first, and then try to tackle him after trapping him. Meanwhile Paulinho usually applies backwards pressing on the carrier, thus leading him into the trap set up by Busquets&co. They are helped by the full-back too if they don’t seem to be enough in the given situation.

The nature of counter-pressing and Sergio’s deep positioning already suggests it, but I find it important to highlight that the team profits a lot from attacking the receiver on his blindside, which helps them to regain possession when the opponent doesn’t have a real sight of the situation.

The role of the far-sided midfielder is also important most of the time as he is responsible for covering the escaping option towards the centre of the pitch, usually attacking the ball with his face towards the opponent’s goal, which already gives him a sight of the pitch and a deeper understanding of the situation.

But what happens when the counter-pressing is outplayed?

In such situations where the team in possession is able to rescue the pressure, they usually have an almost empty half in front of them, which suggests that the defending side has to cover a huge space in a very short time, so they have to focus on cutting the most direct routes towards the goal. Barcelona uses the same, as they divide their defensive line in order to avoid conceding. The closest defender to the runner for a longer pass is man-marking and tries to defend the attacker in a one-on-one situation, and if he isn’t capable of doing it within the rules, he is allowed to comit a tactical foul. The rest of the defence is responsible for covering the middle, usually rushing back fast, so the opponent will have to pass it to the flanks. However, if the attackers in the middle make some horizontal rotation, it can confuse them, and they will be vulnerable against balls played into depth, as the offside trap isn’t adjusted accordingly. Luckily, they have Ter Stegen in the goal, so he can intercept longer passes that reach the box, and he is world-class in 1v1 shot stopping, which means that Barcelona rarely concede from turnovers.

Counter-attacking

Barcelona have scored many goals from counter-attacking this season, which is logical if we think of the likes of Messi, Suárez or Alba, and the harm they can cause to the opponent when they have loads of space ahead of them.

The style in which they defend on their half has a huge effect on how the team will start their counters, and also suggest who will be the ones that participate in it actively. In Barcelona’s system the counters usually start with the deeper players aiming the ball at Messi, who has the close control and shielding ability needed to launch a successful counter even under pressure from the opponent.

This usually focuses the attention of the defenders on Messi, so Suárez, Alba, a midfielder plus the right full-back Roberto or Semedo can move into space, well-spread on the pitch horizontally. Through their horizontally wide positioning they try to stretch the defensive line in order to make space for central key passes, or if it’s not possible, offer a wide option too in case of emergency.

If the opponent leaves gaps in their rest defence, Messi is able to recognize them and dribbles or passes through them, owing to his incredibly fast perceptional skills and the needed technical ability. If they don’t, Messi puts the ball wide for a cross behind the defensive line, or to get it back as an arriving second wave player.

Whatever Messi chooses in such situation, the defenders are in trouble, and these are exactly those situations that can highlight the biggest principle of attacking: create such circumstances for the defenders in any situations, where they can do anything, they are outplayed.

Conclusion

When Valverde was appointed as a Barcelona coach in the early phase of summer, many fans welcomed him with fear in their hearts, if the new trainer would be skilled enough for Barca, and mostly if he would lead the team back to the days when the beautiful style was followed by results. These people started to spread hatred when the team lost 5-1 on aggregate against Real Madrid in the Copa, and also criticized his style without considering the circumstances and the positive sides.

These people have been proved wrong luckily, as the team is leading the league by a great margin and progressed from their Champions League group in the first place after beating the last year’s finalist Juventus 3-0 in the Camp Nou. Valverde has shown to the haters that he is surely amongst the best coaches in the world, and that in the current situation he was the perfect choice for Barcelona to bring calmness, tradition-respecting football style and as many trophies as possible.