Gett·ings Revenge
Tactical Analysis of Southampton's 2-1 victory against Leicester
Upon watching Chelsea’s 2-0 Boxing Day loss to Southampton, one aspect of the match stood out to me; Chelsea played like a hamster in a wheel. I mean that, in terms of their lack of any inharrent or glaring errors; with lots of decent possession and movement throughout the match. However, much like a hamster, Chelsea had gone nowhere (if not backwards) by the final whistle and Southampton had capitalized.
Regardless of Chelsea’s peculiar performance, I was clearly focused on the wrong thing. As Ralph Hasenhüttl and an in-form Danny Ings have turned the Saints’ season around since losing 9-0 at home to Leicester, back in October. They have done so with a simple, yet effective set of tactics. All of which, came to a head in their recent taste of ‘revenge’ against Leicester.
A Leicester squad who, on the other hand, have experienced immense and relatively unexpected success during the first half of the season. Despite their upsurge, I have yet to tune into any of their matches. So watching Leicester for the first time, their ultra-attacking mindset stood out to me. I was well-aware of the attacking threat that players like Jamie Vardy posed; but what I was unaware of was the means to which the rest of the team (particularly the full-backs) would take to get the ball into Leicester’s final third and subsequently into Vardy’s feet.
Clip.movTake a look at the clip above. In it, Leicester’s left-back, Ben Chilwell receives a pass from the centre-back behind him. Immediately upon receiving the pass, he turns, attempting to burst forward; all whilst instinctively looking up to see the options (or lack thereof) ahead of him. Chilwell’s first touch has been repeated and slowed down so that his attacking agenda can be adequately observed. Yet even after he is caught up to by Southampton’s Nathan Redmond, Chilwell still appears very eager to find a pass into Leicester’s attacking third. The direction in which he is looking is highlighted using the dotted blue line.
Nevertheless, Chilwell eventually retreats and passes back to the centre-back behind him, as somewhat of a last resort; and this is where Southampton’s attacking tactics take charge. As the two forwards in Southampton’s 4-4-2 formation, Danny Ings and Shane Long are responsible for putting pressure on Leicester’s backline. Thus, immediately after Chilwell released the back-pass, Southampton’s attacking press had begun. Ings can clearly be seen running down Chilwell’s pass and upon the next pass, Long follows suit. Their movement is shown using the dotted red lines.
The proof of Southampton’s effective attacking tactics can be seen in the statistics. Since the 9-0 loss to Leicester, Southampton have completed the most tackles and Danny Ings has scored the most goals out of anyone or any team in the Premier League (as of before the match). These statistics are clearly a direct result Southampton's press, which allows them to frequently win the ball off their opponents and set up the very in-form Ings.
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