Bayern 1-0 Lyon: Unremarkable game, fair result
Some unfavourable games for the goal-loving neutral can turn out to be the most interesting for the tactical enthusiast. Sadly, this wasn’t really the case tonight, as a toothless Lyon went down to a relatively subdued Bayern in a muted contest.
Bayern went for the expected side – Diego Contento at left-back and Danijel Pranjic in the middle. The Croatian sat slightly deeper than Bastian Schweinsteiger, tending to drift to the left to allow Contento to attack.
Lyon’s side featured a few surprises. Firstly, Jean-Alain Boumsong was not fit, so Jeremy Toulalan slotted in at centre-back, and Maxime Gonalons took the holding midfield role. Kim Kallstrom played a good passing role infront, whilst the major shock was that Michel Bastos was omitted, at the expense of the right-sided Ederson.
Claude Puel was maybe hoping that his first XI would be able to weather the initial Bayern storm, before introducing his wealth of attacking players on the bench. His side came under immediate pressure, however, and Bayern had three clear chances in the opening 25 minutes, none of which were converted.
Lyon’s main problem was that their wingers played so deep - sometimes it’s difficult to decide if a system like this is a 4-5-1 or a 4-3-3, but tonight Lyon’s shape was unquestionably the former, with the wide players sitting so deep when not in possession that they were sometimes playing behind Miralem Pjanic, the midfield player. Not only were they keen to assist their full-backs against the twin Franck Ribery / Arjen Robben threat, they also seemed to have part responsibility in picking up one of the Bayern central midfielders when the ball was on the opposite side of the park.
The effect of this was that Lyon constantly had no out-ball. They came into this game trying to play primarily on the counter-attack, but Bayern are very difficult to counter against through the centre, as they generally keep their two central midfielders very deep. The counter-attacking threat must come from the wide players, but Lyon could never find either in space when they won the ball.
Puel might feel he needed to be braver telling one of them to play higher up the pitch to give either full-back a problem – it would have meant Lisandro Lopez would have found himself less isolated – he was generally 30 yards away from his nearest teammates, and up against two centre-backs.
Bayern dominated without ever playing their best football. With Lyon’s wingers playing deep, Bayern’s free players were the full-backs, and both Philip Lahm on the right and Diego Contento on the left (who looks to be an excellent young player) had good games getting forward. The home side were able to stretch the back four well enough to constantly find holes in their defence, and Schweinsteiger, Daniel van Buyten and Ivica Olic all missed excellent chances, whilst Franck Ribery pulled a shot wide from a decent position.
The game looked to have taken a decisive twist just before half-time when Ribery was dismissed for an awful tackle on Lopez. Bayern moved Thomas Muller to the left-hand side and played a 4-4-1 shape, similar to how they rejigged against Schalke when Hamit Altintop was red carded, whilst Lyon stayed the same until half-time.
Having been so defensive in the first period, many would have expected an immediate substitution from Puel in order to take the game to Bayern, but there was no change in personnel from Lyon at half-time. It did seem like Pjanic was playing deeper in the second period in the ‘free’ area in front of Lyon’s defence (with Gonalons moving further forward) – but it was difficult to assess an, because soon Lyon were down to ten themselves, as Toulalan was sent-off for two bookable offences.
In fact, the half-time switch had been made by Louis van Gaal, withdrawing Olic and replacing him with Anatoliy Tymoschuk. Bayern had changed to something approaching a 4-2-3-0 system - with Schweinsteiger, Muller and Arjen Robben the furthest forward. After Toulalan departed, van Gaal inserted a striker, Mario Gomez, for Prajnic and reverted to the 4-4-1 shape.
The teams were essentially playing the same formation, but it was Bayern who adapted better, and deserved their goal through Robben – and should have won by more. van Gaal did well by stretching the game with a fluid, wide front three and this exposed Lyon’s tiredness and general disorganisation in defence, but at this stage the game was not about tactics – it was about fitness, desire and sheer ability.
1-0 seemed to be a scoreline the two managers were happy to settle for; van Gaal was content with a lead going into the second leg, and no away goals conceded, whilst Puel’s side never looked like scoring so were happy for the game to draw to a close at that scoreline. In the second half, they didn’t muster a shot on target.
It’s difficult to imagine who came out of this game happy. Bayern will feel they should have scored more, Lyon will be disappointed they played so badly and didn’t make Bayern pay for going down to ten men, the neutral won’t have been out of his seat, and the tactician finds relatively little to comment upon.
Bayern 1-0 Lyon: Unremarkable game, fair result
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Interesting to see that even though Toulalan didn’t last the ninety minutes he still managed to play at centre-back and holding midfield according to your formations.
Apart from that, another spot on article; keep up the good work.
Edited, thanks!
yeh, very boring game really. shame lyon played so defensively, not like them, but i guess the style is the norm for away sides in europe. will be interesting to see what they do 2nd leg what with the fear of the away goal from bayern.
Interesting to see how Tymoshuck almost always was free in midfield and distrubuted the ball very well after both teams were down to ten men. None of the Lyon players looked interested in him. Of course Demichelis stepping into midfield helped, but Tymoschuk’s midfield control was crucial to Bayern’s possession dominance in second half.
ZM,any chance that article comparing 4-3-3 and 4-2-3-1 coming out soon?
Re: Sam, 6 – Probably not for the time being, simply because there’s some big games coming up soon and a couple of articles on draft still to publish. Will look to write something soon though.
Hi ZM. Boring fare on the pitch; best sight of all game was the pre-match color cards raised at the stadium forming Bayern’s badge with the CL anthem playing on the background.
What about the late Robben substitution? OK, he missed a glorious chance 3-vs-2, but I feel van Gaal spurned his best chance at scoring one precious additional goal? Bayern didn’t need to defend, I mean, Lyon was really toothless and even Govou’s introduction shouldn’t change a thing.
Bayern’s passing statistics:
Player/Passes/Completed (%)
Van Buyten 48/56 (86%)
Demichelis 65/70 (93%)
Ribery 12/22 (55%)
Robben 41/56 (73%)
Olic 6/10 (60%)
Lahm 69/85 (85%)
Pranjic 30/34 (88%)
Mueller 28/38 (74%)
Contento 53/79 (67%)
Schweinsteiger 52/66 (79%)
Altintop 8/8 (100%)
Gomez 4/6 (67%)
Tymoshchuk 47/51 (92%)
Reveals the importance of Schweinsteiger and Tymoshchuk in the middle. Also impressive are Lahm’s statistics, especially for a fullback.
Also if you look at the heat map it reveals how central Lyon’s wide midfielders played, effectively leaving Cissokho and Revelierre pinned back for Contento and Lahm to pin back.
The fact that Lyon’s wingers played more centrally and deeper than one would expect I believe had the opposite desired effect, it allowed Contento and (more so) Lahm the ability to get forward. I guess I see the rationale, Robben cutting in the left is the main threat but that left Lahm with tons of space to exploit… and it’s not like they contained Robben either! It is a pick your poison with Bayern. Do you play Delgado high up and try to pin back Lahm? That way you isolate Robben and leave space for Lahm if he does get free. Or, as Lyon did, you can have your winger play a defensive role and try and fill the dangerous space, but it gives Lahm free reign. Personally, I believe with the extra central midfielder Lyon would have been smart starting Makoun ahead of Kallstrom and having him try and patrol that side along with Cissokho and Delgado.
And I can’t help but think Bastos would have been more useful than Ederson, with Delgado on the right…
I thought Thomas Muller was absolutely fantastic last night. He covered so much ground when eleven men were on the pitch, but after Ribery was dismissed he intensified his efforts further still, practically playing in two positions at once, as a midfielder and a target-man.
re 4, it seems pretty unusual these days to be so defensive in the first leg away. So crucial to get that away goal, as Lyon themselves showed Madrid by pretty much knocking them out with just 1 goal in Spain. Similarly Barca would have a much much bigger mountain to climb imo if that game had ended 2-0.
And Van Gaal was clever to take advantage of Lyon’s tiredness (Puel said they covered too much ground in the first half to make an impact in the second) and narrowness. The red-crad meant Lyon could not cover the flanks as well (because of less men and even mor work to do) so van Gaal played 4-2-3, with Muller drifting from left to centre.
They were then able to switch play very seamlesly and Lyon couldn’t cope, especially when it reached Robben.
I think, even the goal keeping was not good from Lyon. Also Lyon doesn’t have any aerial control. Most of the time, they lost position, when they should attack and put pressure on Bayern. Also watching Lyon for the first time, i thought – French League has only this much quality?
I think Schweinsteiger was the key man for Bayern in the second half. With both sides down to 10 men and only two players playing in central midfield on either side, the game was there for the taking, and it was Schweinsteiger’s decision to get forward – coupled with Tymoshchuk’s reassuring presence behind him – that forced Lyon onto the back foot:
http://tomwfootball.wordpress.com/2010/04/22/tactics-lyon-paralysed-by-chance-of-a-lifetime/
Leaving Michel Bastos on the bench: ridiculous. He and Govou should have played instead of Ederson and Delgado, and maybe even Gomis in place of Pjanic, though that would of course have necessitated a change in formation.
Perfect! Great job. Regards, Marcelo Costa.
The reason van Gaal took Robben down was that Robben didn’t hold the position in the last minutes. Louis van Gaal splits up the field in 18 rectangles and every player has a special job, Robben didn’t hold his position and endangered the organisation on the pitch.