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Football News: Manchester United 3-1 Club Brugge Moonviews.

Manchester United 3-1 Club Brugge Moonviews.
Image from: Telegraph

The Wigan 2008 team has been used to represent Club Brugge

The Club Brugge manager mentioned before the game that his side intend to go out and attack Manchester United, a few thought that would mean the Old Trafford outfit would have plenty of room in behind to attack, the truth was far from that.

In the end the game finished 3-1 to Manchester United it what started out as a very nervy affair, within minutes and thanks to series of deflections Club Brugge were 0-1 up with the final call being a Michael Carrick own goal.

Minutes later, United were back in it after a glorious moment of magic from Memphis Depay bought the game back to 1-1. Depay then fired in another on the stroke of half time before Fellaini added a 3rd with the final touch of the ball in the 93rd minute.

 



For a brief moment everything that the fans had feared came true, Manchester United's European venture got off to a dreadful start conceding from a Club Brugge free kick after 8 minutes, to make matters worse the ball was stuck into the net by United favourite Michael Carrick.

The roar of the crowd and the buzz surrounding the clubs first outing in Europe for over a year went silent instantly, a serious question was asked of United's temperament and fight to recover the tie.

The free kick that the club conceded was borderline stupid. United had worked Brugge into a position which had no real outlet or threat. As you can see below the players had their own zone. Shaw and Blind in the central role could either stay in the middle or offer protection in the wider areas if it was needed.

In the immediate passing circumference for Brugge they had little in the way of an escape route. Mata is currently on the player with the ball; Darmian, Smalling, Carrick, Schneiderlin & Januzaj cut off the opportunities for Brugge which would have forced a long ball over to their right midfielder or towards their defence. Rooney was positioned in an area that meant the likely ball would have been to switch the flanks in which both Depay and Shaw would have provided suitable cover.

Overall the free kick was incredibly stupid to concede and bar a mistake Brugge would have most likely lost possession.



Minutes later it appeared that Brugge had simply provoked the beast, in a style that hadn't been seen since the days of Cristiano Ronaldo, Memphis Depay scored his first competitive goal for the club - flicking the ball over the defenders head before dribbling and dancing his way past another and firing the ball into the net, 1-1 and the magic was back. Michael Carrick and Memphis Depay were for a brief moment a vision of old between Paul Scholes and Cristiano.

It is what you didn't see though, that's where the real magic came from.

When Januzaj picks the ball up out wide and feeds it into Rooney you'll see Mata in the half zone, Januzaj simply drifting and Rooney occupying the middle space.

1) After Januzaj had played the ball to Rooney, Wayne dropped deep with the ball and as such the Brugge Central defender on the left side (for Brugge) moved over towards the inwards drifting Mata in order to pick him up whilst the left back moved on to pick Mata up.

2) As Mata continues his run in between the central defenders not only has he now picked up the LCB but he's also dragged the RCB out of position slightly in order to close the gap leaving a huge open hole in behind the RB for Depay to exploit.

3) The player who was originally marking Darmian has noticed the danger; dropped deep to cover Januzaj but in doing so has left the LB obsolete in the play. Both the LCB and LB are somewhat responsible for the goal as they're both providing Mata with more space in behind by giving him more room, If they played a steady line Mata wouldn't have been able to drag the RCB into the position he ends up in and ultimately Depay would have had less room.

4) Ultimately It's Mata's movement that causes the goal, the Spaniard recognises the deeper positioning of the LCB and LB and uses the resulting space to draw the RCB closer to him.

 

In American Football you'll often see this referred to as a weak side play, bringing the opposition in it's entirety into one part of the field in order to exploit the other side of the field with freedom to move.





As the game continued it was almost end-to-end throughout the first half, a chance that springs to mind for Brugge was started by a rare mistake from the ever-present Michael Carrick giving the ball away.

But if we take a look at the incident there is far more wrong that meets the eye. The first thing we notice is the lack of control over our defensive live as it staggers over 30 yards from left to right, as a result it allows the opposition players to drift in down the United right hand side and cause threats, with a better final ball and better awareness the score could have been 2-1 Brugge.

Aside from the Carrick mistake and a dreadful defensive shape concerns had to be raised about the lack of urgency from Carrick, Blind & Shaw in getting back. We all know that Carrick & Blind aren't the fastest and as such rely on their intelligence to read the game, when mistakes happen that is almost impossible to do, However Luke Shaw is one of the fastest players in the squad yet he failed to get back with any real urgency.

The point remains that the lack of pace surrounding Blind makes the high line a mistake waiting to happen on occasions, he needs to really be aware of what is around him and his defensive line - especially as some would consider him a senior figure among the rest of the defence.



If we take a look at the final ball delivered by Brugge you can see that United were lucky, although Darmian and Schneiderlin recovered and covered for their teams brilliantly a Brugge player (represented by Sibierski) could have made a central run (highlighted) and the score would have been different. It was a HUGE let off for the United back 4 and against smarter opposition United will be punished.

By this point, Blind and Shaw had almost resorted to a jog to get back, had they sprinted perhaps the possible chance for Brugge (Sibierski) would have been avoided.



Just a few minutes later, up the other end of the field United were looking strong, although the shot was wasted there was cause for joy as the adaptation of the 1-up-1-down system (covered in a previous article) was seen once again.

In an almost triangle like system Rooney drifted out to the left, Januzaj pushed up top and Depay came into a deep central role where the shot was blazed over.

One of the things this triangle did was it left a Brugge central defender (represented by Brown) in a somewhat 'lost' position while the other central defender moved across to pick up Januzaj, leaving a huge hole in behind the LCB for both Mata and Schneiderlin to run into while Darmian had the attention of both the LB and LM out wide which influenced the LB's lack of movement inside.

More importantly, and somewhat of a mistake in this instance, had Rooney pulled out wide onto the United Left wing completely it would have created space for Shaw to make an unmarked run through into a goal scoring position of which Januzaj, Mata & Schneiderlin could have also been part of.



Another beautiful moment appeared in the game during a half-break opportunity from United, with Januzaj and Rooney linking up in a similar fashion to the Welbeck & Mata run mentioned in the previous article.

The black arrows indicate the movements of the Brugge players, while the white arrows indicate the movement of the Manchester United players. As Rooney came deep to collect the ball he pulled in a Brugge player (represented by Kingson) as well as the player represented by Taylor. As Rooney picks the ball up deep and plays the pass to Mata the Brugge Player (Sibierski) attempts to close down Mata leaving a huge hole in behind for Januzaj to run into, as the ball is played the outside run of Depay occupies the RB and grabs the attention of the RCB causing him to not run down Januzaj, instead leaving him pointlessly static with no role in the play (circled), the midfield player represented by Nash does a good job to get back into position and close Januzaj down before the Belgian is bought down for a penalty appeal which was not given.



Late in the first half we see another United break with Rooney cutting across to the left wing, Depay moving central, Januzaj pushing into the half space on the left flank while Mata occupies a central position. This movement was somewhat of a quick break and the Brugge defence is trying to get back into shape, therefore the movement of the United quartet disrupts the Brugge shape massively.

As Mata darts in behind he leaves the midfield player (Nash) with a problem, does he attack Januzaj or close Mata, now it is likely that Mata was studied in training as opposed to Januzaj as the danger man, therefore it would make sense to pick up Mata however basic defending will tell you to always pick up the deepest man and play outwards if needed, not inwards toward your own goal as he would be if Januzaj received the ball whilst he was picking up Mata.

The Brugge LB struggles to understand his need to come inside after Mata drops into the middle spaces and as such provides and incredible amount of room for Januzaj. No defenders are operating the central zones, which provides United with a lot of room to work with, although that is expected from a counter attack.

 

Had Darmian and Schneiderlin made runs up the right wing and right inside zone respectively the likelihood would have resulted in a greater scoring opportunity than what had previous arisen. The lack of movement from the 6 out field players in the Manchester United half would have been concerning in this move.



The atmosphere was once again returning to Manchester United, the cries of it's 'only Brugge' didn't matter, United were playing European football and in true United style the game was once again turned on it's head, the chance had been coming all game and their were multiple warning signs from the United attack.
Memphis Depay, like many number 7's before him was not to be kept quiet, after adding a first goal with the touch of a genius that as much Dennis Bergkamp as it was Cristiano Ronaldo the young Dutchman added another to his tally for the season and doubled his goal return; In what was a lesson from two Dutchman as Daley Blind played in a pass that Xavi would have been proud of Depay picked the ball up, swivelled dropped a shoulder and curled a beautifully placed shot that Manchester United haven't seen since the departure of another famous number 7, David Beckham.



One of the only things noticeable about this goal is that Depay is operating in those half zones and the goal itself comes down to supreme skill over tactical set up.

As the game progressed into the 2nd half we saw the introduction of Bastien Schweinsteiger. His influence was there for all to see as he once again commanded the players around him in their passing routes. However, the defence did not make it easy for themselves against the pressing powers of Club Brugge - the other member of the Schmidfield - Morgan Schneiderlin, played an innocuous pack pass to Romero of which he hesitates to collect and the result could have ended up with Obbi Oulare getting himself on the score sheet.

Moments later, we saw another counter attack from the Old Trafford outfit, in another play which saw the switch up of zones.

With Depay picking the ball up deep he stormed from left to right and into the central area of the Brugge half before playing a beautiful weighted pass to Adnan Januzaj, which unfortunately ended prematurely.

The really intriguing thing about this play is from Wayne Rooney, now Wayne has received a vast amount of criticism since the beginning of the season however his intelligence in this situation is incredible.

Wayne originally darts for the box as you would imagine, however once the pass has been played to Januzaj you'll notice the space he is now in, this is because both the LB and LCB have been drawn into the run made by Rooney which takes him away from the goal, with assistance from Mata who is subtly drifting around. Had Rooney not done this then the attack may not have found it's way through and as such the opportunity wouldn't have arisen and the Belgium club would have been able to find their shape faster.



The game continued in this fashion, Brugge tired slightly and United gained a firmer grip on the game but overall it was played in a stretched environment, fortunately, thanks to a well timed substitution by Van Gaal, Fellaini's introduction and last gasp goal saved what would be an agonising 2nd minutes in Belgium next Wednesday.
The 3-1 win will still offer nerves for a few of the Manchester United faithful and Brugge will almost certainly be up for the fight in front of their home fans but if Van Gaal continues to impose his tactical genius has he has done all season then Manchester United should be in the group stage of the UEFA Champions League come Thursday morning.

Man Of The Match; Adnan Januzaj & Morgan Schneiderlin

Written by Jordan Lombard August 20 2015 17:48:42