World Cup 2018, Brazil vs Mexico: 3 Things that Mexico did wrong against Brazil

#2 Leaving spaces in the midfield

Willian started the counter-attacks

Tite is actually a coach who builds his team around a counter-attacking approach. He defends with a high-line, but whenever the team is forced back, two or three players on the edge always try to break on the counter.

This is exactly the same tactic that Mexico used to dismantle Germany a few weeks ago. In that game, Mexico had overrun the German midfield, making Sami Khedira and Toni Kroos look non-existent on the field.

Today, Brazil started cautiously, slowed the tempo but often took on Mexico through a devastating counter-attack.

This was mainly because Mexico’s midfielders were often caught off-position, wandering in the other half, when they were expected to track back and thwart the danger.

Despite playing a three-man central midfield with Raphael Marquez at the centre, Mexico were certainly disappointing while defending these quick attacks, as Marquez was way too slow to react to such quick situations.

Neymar dragged them out of their positions and then slid in simple balls for Philippe Coutinho as the FC Barcelona midfielder managed to get into good positions due to the space afforded to him by the Mexicans in the centre of the park.

Paulinho was allowed to drive the team ahead without any notable challenge coming against him, certainly showing that the midfielders were far off from their positions