Bayer Leverkusen 1-1 Bayern Munich: Tactical analysis

Muller’s Role

Thomas Muller has made his name playing just behind the main striker for the last few years, but Guardiola has tried him out in Mandzukic’s position in the last few games.

Muller is a player who manipulates space very well, and makes very intelligent runs on and off the ball, to create space for his team-mates. Personally too, he does well to find himself in space. This is why Pep has tried him out in the forward zone.

Yesterday, his role was to make the runs and create the space that suited the Bayern attacking mode, namely cut-backs. He made a number of selfless dashes towards the near post to attract the defenders, and create space for the onrushing players behind him.

The weakness is, that unlike someone like Mandzukic, Muller isn’t as good in the air. With Mandzukic in the side, Bayern have a lot of variety, and an air of unpredictability.

Bayern Wide Play

Leverkusen are a team that line up their three midfielders very narrow, and even the three forwards are quite narrow. This leaves a lot of room on the wings, as it’s almost always only the one defender who is protecting it. Guardiola decided to use this as the avenue for Bayern’s attacking play today.

A large number of passes were played out wide from the centre of the field by the likes of Kroos and Schweinsteiger, who then moved forward into the box to provide bodies. The full backs moved forward into the central midfield to keep the ball in the opponent’s half in case they manage to clear the cross.

The wide players, like Shaqiri and Ribery attempted to dribble into the area, get to the by-line and cut back. Muller made a dart towards the near post, with the opposite winger standing near the far post.

The central midfielder on the crossing side generally stood in the wide area behind the crosser to provide a passing option other than the full back, turned central midfielder, while the other central midfielder ran into the space behind Muller to meet the cut back.

Kroos scored his goal in this way. This is generally a very efficient strategy, as Rafael Benitez pointed out recently, and worked quite well for Bayern.

They should have scored a lot more goals, but were let down by their finishing. All in all, they attempted a massive 40 crosses during the game. Bayern were able to create an effective overload in the wide areas, and this worked very well for them, as they kept Leverkusen inside their own area for large periods.

Bayern Crossesvia squawka.com

Leverkusen were stuck in their own defensive third for large periodsvia squawka.com

Leverkusen’s Defensive Reaction

As a result of being overpowered in the wide areas, Hyppia’s team suffered in the first half. In response, the manager instructed his midfielders to get back and help out the full backs. This would allow the centre backs to stick to their positions, and hopefully stem the flow of crosses into the box.

However, this did take away a lot of the attacking potency Lverkusen had, and they struggled to put moves together in the second half, because the midfielders were too deep. It led to the team staying a lot deeper, and hanging in their own half. This is illustrated in the heat map provided above.

Conclusion

If one is to look at the numbers, Bayern Munich had 78% possession and 27 shots. They should have won this game easily. their tactics too, kept Leverkusen caged in.

The Bavarians however, can only blame themselves. A conversion rate of 3% highlights the weakness today. Leverkusen were well organised, but frankly, they were blown away by the Bayern passing machine. The home side should consider themselves very lucky to be getting out of this game with a point.

Over to you! That was our analysis of the game, was there anything particular that you (tactically) noticed? Let us know by dropping a comment below.

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