Women's Champions League tactical analysis: Chelsea 0-2 Barcelona (agg 1-2)
Monday, April 29, 2024
Article summary
UEFA's analysis unit explains how Barcelona overturned a first-leg deficit to triumph against Chelsea in their UEFA Women's Champions League semi-final.
Article top media content
Article body
To secure a fourth consecutive appearance in the UEFA Women's Champions League final, Barcelona had to do it the hard way as they came from behind to win their semi-final against Chelsea.
For the reigning champions, their 2-0 second-leg win in front of a Stamford Bridge crowd of 39,398 – a record for Chelsea Women – undid the damage of a 1-0 home loss a week earlier and highlighted once more the importance of Aitana Bonmatí, the Player of the Match who scored the first goal and won the penalty for Fridolina Rolfö's winner.
If Bonmatí caught the eye of UEFA match observer and Norway national coach Gemma Grainger, there were other factors that merited inspection from her and the UEFA performance analysis unit, including – as this analysis will explore – the way in which both teams sought space out wide.
Aitana's big impact
"Bonmatí was outstanding in all phases and dictated so much of Barcelona's play," said Grainger, the match observer who highlighted the midfielder's work on the right side, in particular.
The first clip of this first video provides a clear illustration of how Bonmatí moves into pockets of space, notably in that triangle between the opposition's left-sided centre-back, left wing-back and defensive midfielder.
As the UEFA performance analysis unit observed, she is always adjusting her position to find space in between opposition players. Because of this, as the sequence unfolds, she is able to drive the ball forward – one of four ball carries of 10m or more by her at Stamford Bridge, a total bettered only by Lucy Bronze (seven). And thanks to a cute piece of improvisation, she then puts Caroline Graham Hansen into an excellent position to deliver a dangerous cross. Overall, she made 83 passes in the attacking third – 12 more than the next player – with an 83.3% success rate.
Grainger also cited the 26-year-old's "desire out of possession" and clip two offers an example of her aggressive ball-winning work. Straight after Barcelona lose the ball, she is on her toes, ready to win it back – and she duly does just that from Melanie Leupolz before setting up a shooting opportunity for Rolfö.
"We recovered many balls in the opposition half," said the Barcelona coach Jonatan Giráldez and, as a measure of Bonmatí's contribution, she ended the match with eight recoveries – a total that only Rolfö, among the other Barcelona players, was able to match.
Giráldez also said that Barcelona "found a good balance with the ball and without the ball" and the third clip is noteworthy for showing their set-up in rest defence – a compact shape which enabled them to counterpress and win second balls. Here Bonmatí herself picks up the ball from Leupolz's headed clearance and, after laying it off to Keira Walsh, she is on the move again. This constant movement and searching for space is a lesson for any young player – and we see it rewarded as Bonmatí collects the pass from Patri Guijarro and finds the room to strike her fifth goal of this European campaign, the ball beating Hannah Hampton with the help of a deflection.
Chelsea create opportunities
Though Chelsea failed to score, they had their chances with their most menacing moments coming via the wings.
This second video begins with one such example from the first half as Lauren James and Catarina Macário combine down the left with the former cutting the ball back for Leupolz to rattle the crossbar. Even if James may have strayed offside, it offers an example of how "she did her best work down the sides" according to Grainger. And it is also worth noting the desire to get forward of the wing-back on the right side, Johanna Rytting Karneryd, who ensures Chelsea have two players free at the far post as the ball is cut back.
Soon after, as we see in clip two, Chelsea went close again following excellent pressing in the Barcelona half with five home players getting tight to the yellow shirts and Leupolz dispossessing Bonmatí. Eventually the pressure forces an error with Irene Paredes' underhit back-pass but Sjoeke Nüsken's cutback just evades James. The sequence recalls some of Chelsea's best work in the first leg when as the UEFA observer for that game, Jayne Ludlow said, they had success in "forcing loose passing and ball-winning in Barcelona's half".
By contrast, the chances displayed in clips three and four come from structured possession play with the wing-backs combining with James each time. The third clip shows James and Rytting Kaneryd at work on the right, with the latter's cross so nearly bringing an opportunity.
In the final clip, we see James hold up the ball well centrally before taking advantage of Barcelona's narrow back line to launch a crossfield ball to Ashley Lawrence, the wing-back in space on the opposite side of the pitch. From her cutback, Nüsken, at full stretch, steers in a shot which brushes the far post on its way wide. Coming 120 seconds before the 59th-minute sending-off of centre-back Kadeisha Buchanan, it was a pivotal moment. "Chelsea had three big chances and the game could have been so different if they had taken them," said Grainger.
Barcelona profit from extra player
The focus shifts here to how Barcelona exploited their player advantage in the final half-hour. From a coaching perspective, it is instructive to see just what the Spanish titleholders did to break down opponents sitting deeper after being reduced to ten players. Barcelona moved the ball around and looked for spaces in the now stretched Chelsea back line – targeting, in particular, any spaces down the sides of the penalty box. "Barcelona had a number of runs threatening the Chelsea backline and the penalty came from this," said Grainger.
To achieve this, the visitors overloaded the sides and in clip one of the final video we see more than one player attempt runs in behind on the left. Eventually Bonmatí's movement is rewarded with a pass though Chelsea do well to force her out wide, ensuring Mariona Caldentey can only cross from wide on the touchline.
In the second clip, Barcelona look for space once more on that left side – and again Bonmatí is the player making the run in behind. In the final clip, meanwhile, they cannot penetrate down the left and so switch sides and, in the process, they are able to stretch Chelsea on the hosts' left side, so enabling Bronze to supply Bonmatí who breaks into the box to win the penalty kick which decided the tie.
"Chelsea made it really difficult, they had so much intensity and even with ten players they really pushed us but moments of quality showed through for us," said Bronze in a post-match interview, before adding a word of praise for the Player of the Match. "Aitana is one of our players who can make something out of nothing – you saw with the penalty and with the goal that she's involved in everything we do."
