Champions League performance insights: How Paris varied their press against La Real

Paris Saint-Germain's pressing game was a noteworthy feature of their UEFA Champions League victory at Real Sociedad this week.

Pressing aggressively high up the field, Luis Enrique's team gained an early stranglehold in the second leg of this last-16 tie, scoring to extend the aggregate lead to 3-0, and in the process effectively extinguishing the hopes of their hosts.

"We pressed them very well" was the verdict of the Paris coach and in the following article, the UEFA analysis unit offer a breakdown of the pressing strategy that proved pivotal.

The first point to make is that the French league leaders took an 'all in' approach – meaning they either got high up the pitch to put La Real under pressure, or they dropped off – and this is illustrated by the fact 100% of their pressing in the opposition half was done in a high block.

The video above offers an example of Paris applying pressure in a high block, and to add another layer of detail, we can add that 50% of their pressures came when they were in an organised press with the other 50% in counterpressing moments when in transition.

Passes prior to first press

The first chart offers another perspective on their aggressive work in opposition territory on Tuesday night, showing how many passes they allowed La Real prior to each pressing action.

Of their pressing actions in the opposition half, 89% were made within a maximum of two passes. The remaining 11% were after between three and five passes. In short, it reiterates the fact that this was a team pressing high and with intensity.

Timing of pressing

Two-thirds of Paris's pressing came in the first half of Tuesday's match. And to highlight their early intent, they made 25% of their pressing actions inside the first 15 minutes alone. If there was then a reduction – which followed directly Kylian Mbappé's 15th-minute opening goal – they upped the intensity again before half-time with 31% of their pressures effected in the final 15 minutes of the half.

Pressing outcomes

This third chart shows the various outcomes of their pressing efforts. The key figure here is that 78 per cent of their pressure reaped some form of success – either by Paris winning the ball or by not allowing La Real to progress. To break this number down, they regained the ball with 50% of their pressures – a mix of open-play (14%), out-of-play (11%) and own-half regains (25%).

From the perspective of La Real, they retained possession 28% of the time – in other words, keeping hold of the ball albeit without moving forward. As for actually progressing the ball in the face of Paris's pressure, they achieved this 22% of the time.

The video above shows an occasion when La Real did work the ball upfield successfully though their coach, Imanol Alguacil, admitted that overall his team had found it difficult to handle Paris's pressing as he said: "If today you didn't see us at our best with the ball, it was because of their pressure."

The video above illustrates the difficulty that Imanol spoke of, offering an example of Paris regaining the ball in the hosts' half of the pitch in a sequence that leads to an Mbappé near miss. An additional metric we could use to underline the French side's defensive sharpness is that their number of interceptions (14) was bettered only by Bayern München in the Champions League this week.

Location of the first pressure

This 3-D visualisation allows us to see the locations across the pitch where Luis Enrique's men applied their first pressures – that is, the first player to step out of their defensive shape and close down the opponent on the ball. We can see that work was done almost exclusively (94%) in the final third, which reinforces the point about them trying to win the ball high and early.

As we can also see, almost one-quarter (22%) of their pressures came inside La Real's penalty box.

Regain locations

With this final visualisation, we see the locations on the pitch where Paris succeeded in winning the ball back.

As the graphic displays, Paris had some success winning the ball in the wide positions high up the field (23%) though exactly half (50%) of their regains came inside their own half, which came as a consequence of them forcing La Real to play longer from the back.

A particularly strong example of a regain in their own half comes from the lead-up to the opening goal when they cut off goalkeeper Alejandro Remiro's passing options and his long kick is gathered by a dark blue shirt inside the centre-circle – and within 12 seconds the ball is in Remiro's net.