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| Source: @svenskfotboll |
Fifa Women World Cup reached the quarter-final stage and one of the more interesting clash was between the Japanese team, who dominated its group also thanks to a 4-0 win over Spain, and the Swedish team who eliminated from the competition the US team after a dramatic sequence of penalties.
Both team are recognized as having a clear identity on the pitch while also able to be very pragmatic during each match by accepting both scenario in which they are deemed to play the ball or leave the control of the play to the opponents.
The clash ended with Sweden winning 2-1 thanks to a better interpretation of the match for about 70 minutes, the last third of the match was quite dominated by Japanese team helped by a physical (and mental?) drop of Sweden team. However it was not enough to change the outcome, with yellow-black girls reaching the semifinals.
This article wants to describe the main pattern of both teams.
LINE-UPS
Japan and Sweden faced each other with their typical line-up, Japan starting with a 3-4-3 (and specific development as we will see) and Sweden with a 4-2-3-1 which shape is very fluid based on the phase of play.
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| Source- Sofascore |
STRATEGIES TO OPEN THE LOW BLOCK - SWEDEN
One point in common between the two teams is that they do not use to press high, preferring to sit in a mid-low block closing the access to the centre of the pitch. Therefore, most part of the tactical clash was focused on trying to manipulate those blocks.
Sweden had the duty to try to manipulate the low block created by Japan, which purpose was not only defensive but also offensive: in fact the speed of the Japanese players allows them to sit in a medium-low block and then fire their arrows in transition.
Sweden proposed the same pattern already seen in the previous matches when building-up: the right-back Bjorn tucks in creating a first line of three players together with the two center-backs, the second line is composed by the midfield duo Rubensson-Angeldahl. On the other side Japan shape moves from 3-4-3 to 5-4-1 where the wing-backs go deep with the three defenders while the two wingers join the two midfielder in order to close space to advance the ball. In this example midfield duos are paired in the center while left winger Miyazawa is closing passing lane between Bjorn and Angeldahl.
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| The shape of the two teams during Sweden build-up |
The solution Sweden tried to find in order to manipulate this cover was to create some wide rotation to create numerical or dinamic superiority.
Numerical superiority was created when Bjorn decided to carry the ball to attract Minazawa while Kaneryd, by keeping width, dropped in order to force Sugita to choose if following her or maintaining the position in the defensive line. She takes the decision to not follow Kaneryd allowing Sweden to create a temporary situation of 4vs3 which could be used to advance on the pitch by using wide combinations. However Japan 5 player's defence allowed them to be able to avoid too much risks but it allowed Sweden to keep control.
Dynamic superiority was created by using wide triangles in order to create space behind last line to attack. In this example the triangle is created still by Kaneryd dropping wide, Angeldahl who advances to provide wide support taking the position behind Minazawa and finally Asllani who moves into the left half-space; this movement is followed by left half-back Minami creating a space behind that could be used as a third-player run by Kaneryd through a one-two with Angeldahl. Alternative solution would be Asllani receiving in half-space and carrying the ball centrally.
An other important consideration to be done in relation to this mechanism is that even if it didn't allow to create huge menaces for Yamashita, as said above it was useful to keep control. The reason is that creating superiority allows to have more players available in case the ball is lost. In this example the triangle is composed by Bjorn who carries the ball from build-up, Kaneryd and Asllani who has the possibility to attack the gap between Minami and Sugita, still manipulated by the movement dropping deep of Kaneryd. However what is also important to observe is the movement of Angeldahl who recognizes Bjorn is advancing and decides to make a step-back in order to provide cover in case the ball is lost.
In the situation the ball is lost, the movement stepping-back of Angeldahl allows Sweden to have a rest-defence against Miyazawa, her positioning together with the rest-defence structure of Sweden allowed them to keep numerical superiority against Japanese transition, therefore taking away from them the plan to try to expose the slow pace of the two central defenders through counter-attacks. Sweden suffered a lot in the initial match of the World Cup against South Africa when opponents used to exploit the space behind defensive line, it was taken as a lesson by Peter Gerhardsson, that's why Sweden did not concede anymore in the remainder of the competition.
STRATEGIES TO OPEN THE LOW BLOCK - JAPAN
When having the ball Japan had to face the same problem of Sweden in the same situation: manipulate the low-block. As indicated above, the pace of the central defender is very slow, therefore the purpose of the low block was to deny central spaces and also the space behind defensive line.
During build-up situation Sweden reverted from 4-2-3-1 to 4-4-2 which allowed them to be narrow and compact in order to close vertical connections in the centre of the pitch for Japan. Asian team tried to overcome this block by trying to create an overload in the center of the pitch, for this purpose the shape in the build up was a 3+1 composed by the central defenders and the midfielder Nagano. The other player composing the midfield duo (Hasegawa) was staggered in order to create numerical superiority in the center against the two Sweden midfielders.
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| This is how Japan tried to create numerical and positional superiority centrally. |
As it is possible to appreciate from the picture above, the answer of Sweden to this issue was to stay very narrow in order to use Rolfo and Kaneryd as additional outlet to close passing lane between the defense and midfield line, therefore forcing Japan to go wide.
Forced to go wide, Japan tried to create quick combinations in order to find spaces between Sweden's players and at the same time trying to manipulate the compactness of their lines. In this example Hasegawa creates a triangle with wing-back Shimizu and winger Fujino, this wide movement of Hasegawa forces Rolfo to close on her and at the same time left-back Andersson must break the defensive line in order to close Shimizu, this creates a space behind Andersson that could be exploited by completing a quick combination and using dynamic superiority given by Shimizu's run. However the vertical compactness of the Sweden 4-4-2 did not allow Japan to create anything concrete from this kind of situation as the penalty area was difficult to access through crosses or cut-back.
The tactical context described above is mirrored by the following passmaps.
SET PIECES DECIDED THE MATCH
Japan and Sweden are two teams which specificity are given by the physical structure of the players: Swedish players are definitely taller of the Japanese (and also of all other teams playing the tournament), while the Asians have a quicker pace and huge athletic resistance.
This difference in the structure of the teams is mirrored on how they handle the set pieces.
Japan could not compete in aerial plays against Sweden, therefore they tried to find some routine from the corner kicks. In this example we can see that there are only two Japanese players in the goalkeeper area. Sweden is zonal marking by using two lines. Japan try to move the two lines through a short corner routine which could end with early crosses in the penalty area. However the attempts did not provide the right outcome, Japan was ineffective from set pieces.
On the other side Sweden scored many goals from set pieces, so there is no surprise to acknowledge that the top scorer of the team is Ilestedt, the central defender of the team, who scored 4 goals in this competition, one of them was the goal who broke the deadlock of this match. However the example is not taken from the set piece from where the goal was generated nor the corner kick generating the handball for the penalty of the second goal. This is a corner kick taken on the first half in which we can see there are five Sweden players occupying the goalkeeper area and the corner are always kicked with the inverted foot in order to create an inswinging trajectory. This situation creates a lot of panic in the opponent's defence considering the physical gap with Swedish players. This routine is working a lot for Sweden and many coaches took note about it and they are using it in other national team in this competition but there are also examples from some male teams during this preseason.
So, final conclusion is that Sweden was able to win this match cause they managed to use their strength (physical superiority) and reduce their weakness (lack of pace), on the other side Japan was not able to activate their athletic superiority and pace (better, theuy was able but probably too late) and it costed the elimination from this World Cup.
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