Breaking the Horseshoe: Why Liverpool struggle against low blocks, and how things turned around against Spurs.
It's been strange at times to watch this Liverpool side, in games where the opposition come to win, they invariably lose, usually embarrassingly. However in games where teams come to claim a solitary point, grinding out a 0-0 draw, they almost invariably go home with all three. So why in this modern age of football, where dictating possession is considered king, and the old ways of physical numbers nines are considered out-dated, why does the team that plays to control the game seem to end up losing?
Now this isn't a Liverpool only issue, Barcelona have faced it, famously against Mourinho, and perhaps even more famously lost to Celtic despite having 89% possession, Dortmund faced it under Klopp at times, and plenty of other top sides who play possession football have faced it, so why is it so effective and so hard to counter? How can a team have 11% of the ball, cede 65% of the territory and still end up winning?
Well at the most basic level, if you don't concede you don't lose, right? It certainly doesn't mean you'll win, but scoring 1 goal is far easier than scoring 3, and 90 minutes is a long time to do it in. So the system that has become so popular over the last few years only really has one idea in mind, don't ever concede.
So how do you ensure you don't concede?
According to shot data, that green zone accounts for the majority of goals scored, (It should include the six yard box, I cba to re-draw it) probably accounting for around 75% of all goals scored, and the creative zones; the flanks, central area 18-36 yards, combined with the scoring zone account for almost all the assist locations. So if you never allow your opponent to establish (ball under control, head up, can see the play, not under significant pressure) in those zones, chances are they are unlikely to ever score. In fact, shots outside of the box or from tight angles have an approximate 2-3% conversion rate. We've seen plenty of times this season, how when we are limited to shots outside the box, we can have 30+ shots and never score, and importantly, we were never
likely too.
So how do teams go about achieving this?Simply put, they sit deep, pack the central zones with players, and use their wide players to deny access to the wings.
My second crude diagram (over 9000 hours in MSPaint 1.0) shows the structure that these teams have used to achieve this, essentially a 6-3-1 in defence, the key red central area contains 7 of their players, essentially 4 centre halves within the width of the penalty box, 3 defensive midfielders, their wide player marks the full back, denying any chance of a 2 vs 1 overlap, and there is so little space between the back line and the goalie that balls in behind, in particular in central areas, have to be incredibly accurate to be successful. It actually brings to mind the Roman Testudo, the box of shields absorbing and deflecting incoming arrow fire, protecting the squishy bits inside of it.
Just looking at the pitch, where is all the space? There is practically none in their half, but in our half? Of course this is always the case, when the opposition get the ball you drop off to fill that space, but that diagram makes it very easy to see how one tackle, one missed pass, and suddenly their wide players can explode into that space, suddenly it's a 3 vs 2 in our half. Now this may not happen often, but you don't need very many of those situations to score, as we've learned to our peril. In fact Wolves second goal was almost the textbook example of what the defending team want to achieve.
The Horseshoe
As a kid I was taught never to hang a horseshoe upside down, as it would bring bad luck to the house, and when I look at the passing structure we follow when teams play this system, I can't help but see that upturned horseshoe ruining our January.
We've all seen this a million times, working the ball side to side, struggling to get into the center, with our only wide outlets being the fullbacks. Now having the ball in these areas isn't a problem, the problem is that it's very hard to deviate from it. Once that testudo formation has formed, pulling players out of it is extremely difficult, and the only option that remains is the safe pass.
In fact I'd say it's so hard to create offensive opportunities out of this structure, that we should avoid voluntarily entering this structure when we are genuinely trying to score. There are too many players trying to operate in too little space, it's too slow, it's so
predictable and it's nearly impossible to get a player established in those key areas from the first diagram.
Why were we so much better vs Spurs?Well...they didn't really force us into this structure...
However there were signs that Klopp has learned and was trying to make changes.
This diagram quite aptly shows the difference between the two games, you can see in the Hull match how we never got into those key central areas, Firmino was crowded out, and all the passing links to central areas are weak, the ball spent the whole match with our defence and deep midfielders.
Then the Spurs match is like looking at a whole different 11, we never even attempted to establish a Horseshoe pattern, we got our attackers on the ball in those key central areas, and as a result had better shots in better areas, and gave ourselves a much better chance of winning the game.
But how do we counter the Low Block?Teams are going to keep playing the 6-4-1 against us, so we are going to need a way to face it , on the first diagram I highlighted how I think we can increase our chances, I highlighted the FB vs Winger situation and the fact that our central players are likely to get time on the ball, in my opinion our best bet in this structure is for the central players to
quickly hit balls to the wing backs, either to isolate them 1 vs 1 for a take on, or get them in behind directly. Our problem is that while Barca had Xavi, Dani Alves and Jordi Alba for this, we have Henderson, Milner and Clyne.
Overall we need to be more direct, utilise the channels more, move the ball quicker, and generally take more risks in an attacking sense, rather than sitting in the holding pattern, waiting for a landing clearance that likely will never come, before running out of fuel and plummeting to an actually not fiery but just as deadly death.
We need to prevent opposition teams forming their testudo, and when they have we need to have a better sense as a team as to when to collectively increase the tempo.
Ultimately, most goals are scored withing 3-5 passes for a reason, now I don't believe that this means we should hit long balls every chance we get, but I think as a team when we have the ball, we need to understand that a slow 30 pass move is unlikely to result in a goal, and when in possession we should look to spring 3-5 pass attacks, dynamically increasing the tempo as a team.
