Arsenal are among one of the most creative and dangerous teams in the world while in possession, but without it, Arsène Wenger’s side have suffered from well documented defensive mistakes. Not always explainable with the lack of quality at the back, Wenger has spent much of the summer plotting a plan to make the sure up his back-line.
Barcelona are widely regarded as the best team in the world, and their masterclass at the Emirates last season showed their perfect balance of creative and fluid attacking, plus a firm defensive plan. The key? well Barça employ fierce pressing tactics. Whenever they lose the ball, they all bunch up and press high up the pitch to win back possession as quickly as possible. Arsenal’s first-team have began the season with the same plan, and it’s being passed through the ranks.
To show you the plus points and to highlight the issues without the pressing plan, we’ve gathered these screen shots. We start off with the Under 18’s who didn’t play a pressing game and were thrashed by Manchester City. Arsenal weren’t ruthless enough with the ball, but their defending put the score beyond their reach before they began taking their chances.
Highlighted here. Callum Webb gave away the ball in midfield and City worked it back to their centre back. Philip Roberts drops off and allows the defender to pick a ball out from the back which needed last ditch defending from Martin Angha. If Roberts presses and gets tight, he cuts out the ball forward.
The Reserves did press, and in a similar position, the ball forward is stopped because Afobe presses the Bolton defence and forces them back. He gives away a free kick, but it stops pressure on the defence.
That’s an example of forwards tracking back. Yet real defending comes down to the mentality and performance of the centre backs. Here’s a Bolton chance below. Danny Shittu bursts out from the back with the ball after Eastmond gives it away, but Miquel presses up. The ball is shifted out wide, but this time Nordtveit is the one who presses and the danger is snuffed out.
The Under 18’s didn’t press from the back, and were punished. The City midfielder runs at Elton Montiero, he doesn’t push up and allows the ball to slipped inside. Instead of another centre half coming across and pressing, like Nordtveit did, Angha backs off and Harry Bunn smashes home number three.
All we’re simple defensive scenarios, but dealt with in different ways and with different results.
Pressing isn’t always an easy option for every team, but one with the work rate and energy that Arsenal have, it is a simple and realistic tactic to close up those defensive mistakes.
great analyses!! Any highlights or vids from last reserve games? Also want to see new footage of our “star in the making” Wellington. Pls help me if you can. cheers
i really wished i understood..
oh well, its been long i played FIFA
Of the entire year, this is the most encouraging article yet.
Sure people want new players; new CBs a Keeper (please wenger, a keeper), but our biggest issue has always been our defensive play without the ball, our ability to press and retrieve.
I was concerned that wenger hadn’t rectified this and thus the same defensive woes would happen again, no matter which defenders were playing.
But this (along with a new keeper) will, IMO, make us very dangerous. We pressed very well last season till we lost persie, then fab pushed up, then our midfield could be easily overrun.
Great analysis keep up the good work JS
If we apply this effectively, and get a new GK, then I’m pretty sure that we’ll win SOMETHING this year, most probably the PL.
I’m happy to hear that Wenger has learnt from the first half versus Barcelona at the Emirates. They may not have scored, but their pressing shocked us out of our game; we’re simply not used to being played like that as most premiership teams defend deep and allow us possession. We have to learn to press beyond the half-way line and as unit. Not only this, we have to know when to press fiercely and when only to the half-way line; Barcelona almost got it right but were their tired legs were exposed by pace late in the game.
we did the pressing in beginning of last season n it worked, then they just stopped doin it
i know, does anyone know why? surely not because rvp got injured?
You’re right, we did do it at the beginning of last year. I think as the season progressed the team as a whole got more and more tired, especially as injuries started mounting, so we stopped doing it. But I remember the first game of last season against Everton, us pressing high up the pitch whenever we didn’t have the ball was amazing and so effective.
Thank you. i hope this is true. Arsenal try to pass like Barcelona, but we don’t defend like them. When they don’t have the ball, they surround the opposition so fast and win it back. They know the position doesn’t have the same technical ability to pass even though 3 players are around them, so Barcelona does it effectively
our biggest problem is our mentality. Arhsavin couldn’t make Barcelona team because he doesn’t have 2 aspects of his game. Arsenal focus on one aspect. That’s why Chelsae and man when they play us, they control the game without having the ball because they defend with the team and cover each other.
We need to learn how to defend as a team again and press more.
This is the most helpful comment i have seen in a long time. I hope we do defend as a team because we don’t necessarily have a goalkeeper or defender problem, but a team defensive problem! Closing down and pressing opponents is one major thing that separates us from Chelsea man u and Barcelona. Even the new real Madrid team being star studded sits back and can close down and defend. We only have been train in one way, and so we have less dimensions… until now i hope.
IF Arsenal can get the PRESSING side of the passing game right, we’ll surely shock the big teams like Chelsea, Man Utd and Man City and WIN something;its the missing part or the jigsaw, we get it right, we shut the likes of Mourinho up, for once! It means 2 things though: the likes of Arshavin, Cesc, Walcott, Denilson and Diaby will have to raise their work rate.Two, the Reserves would have properly imbibed the mentality by the time they reach the first team. Good times are ahead!
Pressing has always been regarded as the only way to be defensively secure in a 4-3-3 formation and we did use the tactic last year as well
but the amount of injuries we suffered meant we couldn’t rotate players and the same players had to play 2-3 games every week for 2-3 months
if we stay away from injuries then we have a chance to use this tactic but if we suffer the same amount of injuries then its just not possible
We won’t go trophyless this season.
This has always been the missing peace of the puzzle
Last example is wrong, Monteiro had a 2v1 against thus he couldnt press the guy who had the ball, pressing is meant to be done as a unit not individual. The biggest problem is Webb being out of position, because the defensive transition began with Webb giving possesion away. If was in the right position then option to press is available as Webb can press the guy with the ball & Monty can pick up the Bunn & Angha can pick up Roman.
Not a 2v1 at all. It’s identical to the Miquel one. One centre back facing his man, the other to the side and the DM out of position.
J I know its not your area but after wengers press conference where he said “At the moment, it is all dead.” I have a feeling no goalkeeper is coming
have you got any idea about that are we in the market for a keeper or has he given on getting one?
would really really appreciate an answer on this
Wrong Sanderson, the difference in both phase of play was Nordtveit didnt have any one mark in the box thus he could go out to close the ball down.
In the Under 18 match, there was the guy on the ball, Bunn and Roman, for us We had Angha and Monty. Angha could even said is looking after Roman plus another player hovering behind so if Monty presses the guy with ball, Angha cannot make up the space to stop Bunn crossing to 2 unmarked players at the back post.
Also if Angha moves too quick trying to back-up Monty, ball can go direct to Roman via the guy who has the ball in the snapshot. It all about numbers NOT one phase of play looking similar.
Andrew,
I don’t believe we’ve got any other targets than Schwarzer in mind as a goalkeeper.
Supergunner07,
It’s not wrong. Nordtveit was marking the Bolton number 7 and pulled off him to cover over. Yennaris then picked up the number 7. Angha also had a marker, and if he would have come over, Rees would have picked him up. Both are exactly the same.
If you don’t think that’s right, fair enough. But an opinion can never be wrong, even if you don’t agree with it. But the facts are there.
You keep making untrue statement, watch the video again when Bunn cuts inside Monty, Rees was never in position to mark 2 players that Angha would have left him if they did press.
In contrast, Yennaris is marking Riga when Nordtveit goes wide to close the cross. Get your facts right, You asking Monty Rees & Angha to press when you can drive a bus thru the gap between all of them. The 2 scenarios aren’t the same.
If arsenal get a keeper and if they start pressing hard when they lose the ball i dont see why they wont win the premiership
If arsenal get a keeper and if they start pressing hard when they lose the ball i dont see anyone who can stop us from winning the premiership
I agree at the start of last season we were pressing teams alot more but then it seemed to fayed away. The main culprits were Arshivan, Diaby and Walcott weather this was either not being fit enough??? or having a bad attidue. When playing such a system and one player is not pulling with the team ….its f**ked which was exactly why barcelona looked excellent cos Arshivan and Diaby were pressing hence there man stepped off and Bara always had a outlet. It also throws a extra workload on the other players who in turn get pi**ed off and stop doing it.
Wenger should instruct all players to press hard if there are tired thats what the bench it for … jet, rosicky, vela etc I love Wenger but I dont think he uses he bench to full effect.get some fresh legs on the last twenty minutes.
I hate to say it but Ferguson is a master at this they are up 2/3 nil the game is over okay who are my most important players Rooney,Scholes, Vidic all come off and are freasher for the next game or less prone to injuries.
And i agree with you man thats wat we have to do if are 2-3 nill up we should take off some of our top players and put on some fresh legs cause if you notice wen we are 4 nil up near the end of the game some of our players lose concentration and i know its the start of the season but if your level on points on the top of the table sillie goals at the start and middle of the season can cost us the title
Pressing takes fitness and it is definitely a team thing. Pressing takes a lot of mental effort as well. Arsenal’s main focus is keeping the ball, and so they sacrifice i guess on other aspects which include pressing. Arsenal cant sit back and soak up pressure. every winning team can. Man u, Chelsea Barcelona can all soak up if they want. We can’t. If we don’t have the ball we lose. Chelsea vs arsenal last season… they didn’t need most possession to win. I like flamini because his presence motivated other players to dive into tackles. I think its just a mentality issue. Change the mentality.. drill it into them from youth and reserves and let it creep into the club. Once we were the 1-0 to the arsenal kinda team that was really solid. Wenger changed this slowly but surely, to triangular passing, till the culture of arsenal is accurate passing. Wenger cultured it into us that people refuse from striking the ball around the 18, and would rather pass it into the box.
I think he should add closing down, defending, and clean sheets as a cutlure even if it takes a while to seep into the psyche of the players.
No offense but I think this is fairly obvious. The other thing is wing have been playing some time with 5 actual central midfield player rather then 2 real wingers which causes us to have the ball a lot in the middle of the field. That leads to losing possession in the worst place to lose it (the center of the midfield) which gets you counter attacked.
Very good article, and good to see some more analytical articles JS.
I noticed this quite a lot in pre-season so I’m not surprised that the youngsters have also implemented it (seeing as tho we played quite a few youngsters there). Talking of the first-team these are the pluses for pressing so high:
– We don’t have tall CB’s or a reassuring GK who claims high balls. So by playing a high line we won’t be subjected to as many long balls into the box.
– We have quick CB’s so if a ball is played through they can chase down most strikers.
– Our AM/wingers have very good work-rate. Guys like Nasri, Rosicky, Bendtner, Chamakh will close full-backs down very quickly.
– When playing mid-lower table teams most of their defenders and DM’s can’t pass under pressure. So if we play a high line there’s a good chance they’ll just put it into touch or send it to our GK. That’s a lot better then giving them time to bomb the ball into our box if we sag back.
Here are the negatives that I’ve seen so far:
– I’ve noticed our defenders “stop” when a ball is played to a player who is passively offside but does not make an attempt to play the ball. Another opponent then goes sprinting onto the ball while all our players are appealing for offside. This happened 2 or 3 times in pre-season and I can see us getting caught out at least once during the season.
– The better teams might rip us apart by passing from the back. This was slightly evident with Blackpool. They really only had one good passer (Adams) but he still managed to pick us apart once or twice in the first 15mins.
– Our DM is being pulled out of position. I noticed when B’pool had 11 men Diaby was being drawn into either full-back position because everyone had pressed and he had to mark the runner. On a couple of occassions that left the middle quite exposed. I don’t like seeing our 2 CB’s and DM being dragged out to the wings. They are 3 players who should maintain their positioning and let everyone else press. Protecting the middle is the most important thing in football and I’m surprised how little recognition this gets in the media and amongst some coaches.
So in conclusion I think this will work against most teams. I’m not sure it will work against the likes of Utd and Chelsea but considering we struggled against them last season it’s worth a shot. Plus I’m sick of seeing Drogba completely bully our CB’s in the box when we sit deep. He just has his way with them cos he’s so strong. Hopefully playing a high line means he has to play more out of his box. We just have to watch the likes of Anelka and Rooney making runs behind our defense when we play those 2 teams.
One of the best defensive seasons we’ve had in quite a number of years was when Flamini played DM. He was just so quick when the opposition went for a counter attack he would just chase down the player with the ball and either dispossess him, force him into an error or run him to the corner flag. That just goes to show how defensive pressure can break down a teams move. Since he left (and unfortunately Diarra left before him) we have been sitting deeper and teams have just been sending the big blokes forward and bombing it into our box.
This weekend will be a good test for the pressing game with us playing Blackburn.
I have no doubt that if the youngsters get the pressing game right they will sweep all before them. The most important thing at that level is having CB’s who can orchestrate how high the line should be and when to sag back.
Pressing takes extra effort and you need players to have energy left to do what they are primarily on the pitch to do, namely attack. TH14 didn’t do much pressing and that left him with the spare energy to utilise his major asset. Other strikers have been allowed that priviledge but have not balanced it out with anything like as many goals. Finding the balance is the coaches challenge.
Having quicker, tighter marking, centre backs (even at the expense of height) is key to this. They rob the striker of the ball before he’s got it fully under control and shouldn’t be beaten for pace when the ball gets put into the space behind them.
But none of this cures the problem of dealing with high balls into the box, especially from set pieces – and that’s what Wenger is trying to ‘cure’ at the moment via his comments on goalkeeper protection. The fact that it’s Blackburn tomorrow, scorers from the most blatant foul on our keeper last season, is not a coincidence!
King of the World was correct – we were pressing very well at the start of last season (I even gave Bendtner some credit for it) and for some reason it just stopped.. And its a pity, cos it was working. That allied to some efficiency in front of goal meant we had some crazy goals per game ratio before christmas.
the pressing is good but it only works if everyone presses tight, because if one person is not concentrating and leaves an easy pass to someone with space its all the others hard work down the drain.
Could someone tell an idiot why pressing doesn’t work for all teams?
Pressing requires players with good game understanding, teamwork, teams who alot of quick/dynamic players that are good in 1v1 situations. So if you have a tall team but are slow, then that team is likely to drop deep to the edge of their box waiting their team shape for when opposition crosses the half way line before engaging the ball.
Pressing very good when especially if opposition has a deep-lying playmaker who his fundamental to their team’s play bcuz it allows you to push players onto him higher up the pitch to engage/ harass him to give your team the ball [denying him space to operate]. Arteta, Pirlo, Aston Villa’s Petrov [even though Villa always bypass him with long balls] and Blackpool’s charlie adam although his role is slightly more complicated.
Fook me give these lads a break – they are 18 FFS!! they are learning their trade.
When the 1st team get lazy, don’t press and concede easily then we can criticise
Are we actually doing a pressing tactic
We are but its not intense pressing like last season [it more subtle], pressing at the moment rather than all the time
Is that good or bad
Wil we be doing it against blackburn tomorow
What is different this season compared to last season is that we are playing a pressing game AND a high defensive line. The second part is why I think these types of tactics will work best against the likes of Blackburn and Stoke. Previously we would sag back and they would hoof it forward. If everything goes to plan when they play it out from the back their full-backs will be under pressure and will have to play it over our CB’s. There’s more chance of the ball going out into touch or just back to Almunia.
Blackburn have only been converting 56% of their passes in the first 2 games so with any luck we can force them into turnovers and control the ball. In past years Allardyce’s team would pump the ball to the flanks and try to draw a foul. Because the wide flank areas is exactly where they want to curl the ball in from with set pieces (they scored almost 60% of their goals last season from set pieces). So if we do get into those situations hopefully our full-backs don’t get sucked into giving away cheap fouls.
Thats the point Marko, Pressing works against Blackpool bcuz they pass it thru midfield however Blackburn & liverpool will pump long balls past all the players that you have pushed foward to press thus it is waste. Remember all teams in Spain will pass it thru midfield thus it suits Barca really well.
Specifically what we did against liverpool was that the right wing forward [Eboue] will block the path ball down the line from the LB forcing him to pass it across till it gets to Carragher then we rushed him to play long ball
However bcuz Carragher aimed all of towards Kuyt who tends to win alot aerial duel against fullback thus giving them foothold higher up the pitch. But that was short-lived as we look after Joe Cole very well. Liverpool’s main chances were from setplay not openplay as were significantly taller than us.
Vdeos showing our pressing in game against Liverpool
Vdeos showing our pressing in game against Liverpool
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P57N8YwUsn0
Goal that we conceded today was the perfect example of letting mistakes in your pressing.
Its easy to say that Koscielny was well beaten by Diouf’s pace and power.
But it all started when Diaby gets lazy in his pressing and allows Blackburn to build up.
Diaby was the closest to the Samba when he gets the ball near the half-line, and doesnt even bother to close him down. May be Diaby felt that Samba aint gonna pick a pass. But he does, and Diouf does his part.
goal we conceded today was koscielny`s fault 100%..Vermaelen would have hacked the ball from diof before crossing.
Kos watched..
Agreed, there were 3 more mistakes, RVP Cesc Theo failed put a tackle in then Kos beaten 1v1 the Verm & bloody Clichy were far too square to the ball and arent watching movement of the opposition.