Roma 0-2 Napoli: two more for Cavani
The starting line-ups
Napoli recorded an important win to maintain their challenge for Lo Scudetto.
Claudio Ranieri had a shortage of centre-backs, so Marco Cassetti moved across into the middle, with Aleandro Rosi coming in at right-back. Francesco Totti and Jeremy Menez were both left out.
Walter Mazzarri used his expected starting XI.
The first half of the game was dominated by the referee - both sides were committing too many fouls, and the match quickly became stop-start and lacked rhythm or outright goalscoring chances.
Formations
Napoli’s system was the same as ever – 3-4-2-1. Roma’s shape was strange, however – Mirko Vucinic played wide to the left of Marco Borriello, and in midfield a central trio was complemented with Rodrigo Taddei out to the right – almost as a carrilero. This made for a slightly disjointed performance from Roma, and they struggled to get the ball up to their forwards.
Regardless of what you want to call the formation, it produced a neutral game. To break the systems down, Roma had 4 v 3 at the back, Napoli had 3 v 2 at the back, at it was broadly 4 v 4 in the centre of thepitch.
Napoli more promising
Still, the midfield battle favoured Napoli, as their four were spread acrosss the park, and they expanded the active playing zone when they had the ball, stretching Roma and forcing the home side’s midfield to get through a lot of running. Walter Gargano had a good game in the centre of the pitch – he played a couple of misplaced passes, but he broke up play well and spread the ball from side to side, encouraging the Napoli wing-backs forward.
Napoli’s particular area of joy looked likely to be down their right, where Christian Maggio was able to outpace John Arne Riise. On the other flank, Roma had Taddei dropping back to help Rosi with Andrea Dossena, but down Napoli’s right it was 1 v 1, as Vucinic stayed high up the pitch against Hugo Campagnaro. In a rare threatening moment in the first half, Riise had to perform a desperate late tackle on Maggio inside the box.
Second half
Ranieri made a change at half time, with Taddei making way for Jeremy Menez. The Frenchman interpreted the position in a different way – Taddei had stayed disciplined and relatively deep, but Menez played higher up the pitch and went wandering much more – sometimes looking like a winger, sometimes like a trequartista. He was Roma’s most promising player in the second half, but by moving across the pitch he didn’t do Roma’s shape any favours, and the rest of the side looked increasingly clueless with the ball.
There was only one noticeable change in Napoli’s shape – with Maggio causing Riise enough problems on the flank, Marek Hamsik played more centrally, and higher up the pitch. This had an almost immediate effect upon the game – he chased a ball over the top and was brought down by Juan, with Cavani converting the subsequent penalty.
Substitutions
Ranieri took too long to change things, waiting until the the 77th minute to bring on Francesco Totti. Roma continued in a shape that wasn’t working, and Napoli became increasingly defensive – looking like 5-4-1 for much of the second half, as Mazzarri replaced attacking players with more defensive-minded ones.
The second goal was assisted by an unlikely player – Paolo Cannavaro found himself up the pitch following a set-piece, and provided perfect cross fro Cavani to bundle in. That goal owed little to tactical design, but wasn’t unfair based upon the run of play.
Conclusion
Napoli were better in attack, midfield and defence. they were more comfortable in their shape. Whereas Roma struggled to get the ball forward quickly, Napoli had two clear players – the wing-backs – who made the transitions from defence to attack possible.
This was Napoli’s ninth clean sheet in the last eleven games, a tremendous record and a huge credit to the back three. On paper, the defence is the weakest area of the side, but they have such a good record at the back because of tremendous organisation and a willingness to change how they defend to suit the particular game.
Roma 0-2 Napoli: two more for Cavani
Roma are showing a huge problem with creativity – with Totti on the bench and Pizarro injured, it’s not surprising. Simplicio and Perrotta are more all-round player than creators, Menez is erratic, and not very efficient as a trequartista.
Agree with all that. I hate Roma without Pizarro.
Simplicio is so simple hahaha
to be honest i dont think that this game should have any consideration at all . it was a hopeless game you should do analysis when both teams are of same strength and are playing well . clearly roma were hopeless last night they lacked cohesion and they didnt had any imagination at all . i dont know why risse moved too much high of the pitch and raneiri let him do that when napoli were trying to exploit that space . to be honest sometimes the way these teams played it looked like that amateurs at least the way they defended . hope you do some better games rather than just going for big games .
let me tell you my take on tactics tactics are applied when you are short handed and you know that the opponent is better . it is used to stifle him and force a win out of situation .
its still football , just saying
k bob
ZM, I have noticed, that you often cover big team’s matches when they lose. Now would be the perfect time to cover my favourite Barcelona’s 1:1 draw with Sporting Gijon. It would also be a kind of a preview before the Arsenal match-up.
Some of the interesting stuff which happened in the game:
- Dani Alves playing marvelously in the attack.
- Barcelona newcomer Ibrahim Affelay got his first start in La Liga. Ended being substituted at half time though.
- Gerard Pique played in an extremely advanced role during the second half, joining the attackers in box during the open game, while also covering his CB slot.
- Gaby Milito was subbed for Keita. So Mascherano dropped back to become a full-time CB.
- David Villa scored his superb goal while being out of position on the right flank (he played the game on his usual left flank).
- For the final 10 minutes Pep brought on Bojan for Iniesta and Barcelona formed a 4-2-4 formation, which, however, did not seem to work very well, because the front four (or perhaps three, as Messi usually dropped deep to pick up the ball) did not get the service as they had when they played 4-3-3.
ZM posts most, if not all, of the games he’ll be covering BEFORE the matches are played. Don’t know why you think he chooses these games after the fact. Nobody knows how the games will turn out.
I, for one, think he’s doing a fantastic job selecting these games! I’m a Milan and Newcastle supporter, but I don’t expect him to cover their games as much because there’s not much interesting in terms of tactics. As a supporter, I simply want results. As a fan of tactics, I prefer the games ZM has been covering.
Having said that, Napoli have been my favorite club to follow this season. With more and more Serie A teams playing 4-3-1-2, it was almost predictable that Napoli would have more success this season, compared to last when they played the same system, same players, but they faced more 1 man striker systems.
They’ve coped well this season against such systems and made adjustments, but their adjustments are small and keep the squad reasonably comfortable and familiar with their roles; more so than the adjustments their opponents are having to make when coming up against them.
On paper, tactics can look fine but the players on the pitch must understand their roles… and changing systems often leads to confusion, uncertainty, and less fluency.
I know ZM decides what to cover before the match actually happens but it would be nice to see sporting-barcelona. Sportings shape, especially in the first half, worked very well and I would be interesting to see ZMs take as to why.
Fair enough.
Would be interesting if ZM dedicated one match a week to a subscriber poll. Let us vote on a match that we would want to see covered.
In fact I would hate the idea of supporter poll.
Why did I think, that matches are chosen, when the results are known?
Most of the AC Milan matches, which are covered, show AC Milan lose. Which is strange, because they are at the top of the table.
And it seems like there is a big share of big club matches, where they don’t start out very well against a smaller side. Sometimes they equalize or come from behind to win, sometimes they lose.
Anyway, where are the matches posted, which are to be reviewed?
http://www.zonalmarking.net/upcoming/
did you even look?
Wow! I never did see that!
One of the things about Napoli’s defense that works so good is that it changes not only in relation to the opponents formation, but it changes depending on what third of the pitch the ball is in. When the ball is in the opponents third they play three at the back and cover space. When the ball is in their defensive third they play 5 at the back and mark tightly defending with nine. And really, once you are in your own third and defending with 9 it matters little whether it is a 4-5 or a 5-4. It’s about player density in the center and denying time.
Wenger would never do it, but I think a version of Napoli’s shape would be an interesting way to deal with Barcelona. And Arsenal have the personnel to do it. If you are playing against a false nine and inverted wingers, 3 CB’s are better positioned for this than a 4 man line. And you can’t press their defense if you have the wingers tracking the fullbacks – they have to be passed off as the fullbacks move up field, and wingbacks are the best way to handle this. And after reviewing your recent piece about Alvez, and his ability to blaze past fullbacks on the weakside and connect with crosses, 5 at the back against them is probably a necessity once they get the ball forward.
The problem in this case is that Napoli’s main creative players, (lavezzi and hamsik) would be driven too deeply into their own half due to lack of possession. The counter wouldn’t work well enough unless lavezzi and hamsik were very bold and occasionally ahead of the ball.
Spot on, though your chalkboard shows Burdisso instead of Cassetti.
Palermo-Fiorentina looks like a really good match to assess.
the hamsik dive changed the game.
roma had 65% possession before the PK. this forced roma to play more direct, away from their usual short passing game. at the end of the game, roma were down to 58% possession. game wouldn’t been a lot different if the ref/linesmen actually had eyes
You could atleast pretend not to be a Roma supporter
It was a PK in my book
Napoli fan here,
Hamsik has never been one to dive. Secondly, If you watch the replay you can see that Jaun clipped him. When running at full speed, it is almost impossible not to fall when clipped. Lastly, why would he take that dive when he had perfect ball that would have been an easy finish?
Maybe a little bias from me, but I thought it was a clear penalty
Come on. I’m a die-hard Roma fan, but the game’s result is fair and square, ref or no ref. Napoli were clearly the better team.
The main problem with the creative aspect of roma is perrotta, everytime he gets the ball he either 1)gives a wrong pass, 2) gives pass straight to opponent, 3) tries to dribble unsuccessfuly. This is what happens when you play such a player in the final third where creativity is very important, and this is why roma were unable to create anything. ranieri should grow a pair and play more attacking football, he plays like this even against the likes of brescia and cesena. now i see why he has always been second best.
thank you so much for your deep and penetrating insight. I’m sure that skill set was precisely how Perrotta earner his spot on the world cup champion team…
CAVANI IS INCREDIBLE.