Couple of things here.
‘First off, there really wasn’t much of a tactical change by Sevilla between the first leg and second leg. ETH knew they were going to press high very aggressively from goal kicks. He also knew they were going to be quite conservative by committing 5 players I. The high press, but really dropping the back 4 + one midfielder back, leaving acres of space in the middle of the pitch. Bruno wasn’t playing, so even when we played out of the back and broke the press to the middle of the pitch. The through balls to the wings were lacking the inventiveness/ precision.
Secondly, their out balls to their wings were followed by an overload. We failed to take advantage of that on the turnover because all progression was too slow. Not enough precise switches of play. Again, we missed Bruno.
In retrospect, he should have benched Sabitzer and pushed Eriksen into the Bruno role. I know Feed is in the doghouse right now, but he should have started him alongside Casemiro. He’s better in defending the overloads because he’s a pesky attack dog defensively.
‘Finally, why constantly try to play through the press when we’ve seen Maguire consistently give away balls when playing out of the back. The combination of DeGea, Maguire and Lindelof trying to play out of the back is just way too dangerous. DDG didn’t exactly help Maguire with that pass… Maguire muffed it and it’s suddenly 1-0…
In terms of blame for the loss, it has to go DDG, Maguire and ETH, in that order. Erik has to be responsible for the loss, and frankly, while his tactics worked really well in the first 70 minutes of the first leg, he failed to recognize that it would be difficult to play that way without Bruno, Martinez and Varane.
So, I would say while the players absolutely deserve blame, is it really their fault when ETH asks them to do things that they have shown time and again unable to do with this starting 11?
‘First off, there really wasn’t much of a tactical change by Sevilla between the first leg and second leg. ETH knew they were going to press high very aggressively from goal kicks. He also knew they were going to be quite conservative by committing 5 players I. The high press, but really dropping the back 4 + one midfielder back, leaving acres of space in the middle of the pitch. Bruno wasn’t playing, so even when we played out of the back and broke the press to the middle of the pitch. The through balls to the wings were lacking the inventiveness/ precision.
Secondly, their out balls to their wings were followed by an overload. We failed to take advantage of that on the turnover because all progression was too slow. Not enough precise switches of play. Again, we missed Bruno.
In retrospect, he should have benched Sabitzer and pushed Eriksen into the Bruno role. I know Feed is in the doghouse right now, but he should have started him alongside Casemiro. He’s better in defending the overloads because he’s a pesky attack dog defensively.
‘Finally, why constantly try to play through the press when we’ve seen Maguire consistently give away balls when playing out of the back. The combination of DeGea, Maguire and Lindelof trying to play out of the back is just way too dangerous. DDG didn’t exactly help Maguire with that pass… Maguire muffed it and it’s suddenly 1-0…
In terms of blame for the loss, it has to go DDG, Maguire and ETH, in that order. Erik has to be responsible for the loss, and frankly, while his tactics worked really well in the first 70 minutes of the first leg, he failed to recognize that it would be difficult to play that way without Bruno, Martinez and Varane.
So, I would say while the players absolutely deserve blame, is it really their fault when ETH asks them to do things that they have shown time and again unable to do with this starting 11?
