Lately I've been exploring a topic that has its roots in some of South America's most exciting and flamboyant teams and was wondering if it could be advantageous in the European footballing landscape. After a few discussions on X and after doing research for my River Plate analysis, which you can watch here, I thought it would be appropriate to dedicate some time to write about it and try and explore this in more detail as well as touching on some examples that I've seen in games this week where it has been used both efficiently and not quite so.
Europe and South America have always took ideas from each other, from the back 4 spreading from Brazil, the total football of Rinus Michels, also in a more radical and more recent example- the 'Europeanisation' of South American football (the Positional vs Functional debate). From more defensive tacticians like Bilardo and Herrera to more ' romantic' coaches such as Menotti and Bielsa (unintentionally all Argentinian) it's undeniable that South American coaches have shaped the way football was coached in Europe both directly or Indirectly through their many disciples.
One of the most notable concepts associated with South American football tactics is the idea of asymmetric formations and diagonal alignments of players, used to facilitate diagonal entries into the attacking players. Asymmetry would result in players playing very close together with an overload on one flank for local combinations and the development of certain inter relational dynamics, whilst spaces on the opposite flank spaces were vacated for deeper players like the full back to arrive unexpectedly.
The example bellow shows the structure adopted by Boca Juniors back in the 1943-44 season, here we can see several behaviours of individual players that create the lopsided shape. Lazatti was more defensive and was staggered on a deeper line to 2 shuttling midfielders Persica and Corcuera - who operated only on the right whilst Persia was more central. In the deepest line, Carlos Sosa was given freedom to advance in the space Boyé vacates, whilst Valussi had more defensive responsibilities. We can also see the diagonals that appears with Varela, Sarlanga, Corcuera and Alberto, whilst on the other side with Royé, Sarlanga, Persica and Valussi.
Photo Credit- @JulioArguelles on X
In the early eras of football, where it was most common to adopt man marking, team's had found it difficult to neutralise attacking shapes that were lopsided or looked to overload specific areas. Teams were reluctant to follow as it manipulated their marking structures, leaving space for wide defenders to arrive late and would also create situations of chaos and unpredictability when defending on the ball side. Against more aggressive defences, this would create situations where attacking teams could be cunning and use dummies or flicks or one/two's to isolate the defender.
Asymmetry was arguably best interpreted by the Brazilians, who instead of using the full pitch as we see in the Boca example, they decide to instead form clusters of players on the ball dominant flank and vacate space on the far wing. In this example you can see the players positioning affords better relationships and the emergences of certain structures like an Escadinha or toco y me boy/tabela to climb these ladders can happen more frequently and were constantly emerging and re-emerging.
A perfect example of this was Carlos Alberto's famous goal in the 1970 World Cup final for Brazil against Italy. Brazil commit several players to the left flank forcing Italy's defence to adjust its positioning, before Alberto the deep defender arrives to shoot across goal after the layoff from Pele.
Several diagonal lines are formed as a result of the self emerging structures, both on the flanks and inside the pitch outwards- like an X shape. River Plate under Demichelis' would often generate these X shape alignments naturally through the players intuition, behaviours and need to relate and connect themselves to form efficient attacking combinations. This affords the players new solutions and a new attacking stimulus depending on which pass, faint, change of body direction they opt for.
Perception is incredibly important when forming these diagonal lines, the player must not be treated as an abstract, football is performed by human beings and that they can be quite eccentric and often thrive in environments of self expression, opposed to positional play where the environment creates a constraint to a players desired behaviours. Relationism proposes the opposite, an environment where interpretation and individual expression takes centre stage, where decisions made by the individual are self orchestrated not by the coach and rigid patterns.
It's important that note that asymmetry isn't just associated with relationism or functional football, for several years positional teams have been trying to find innovative ways of achieving a clean build up and by doing so have been adopting similar asymmetrical structures. A common one I would make reference to is when teams would build up with the orthodox 4-box-2 shape but would vacate one wing and would move the 'winger' inside into the half space to form the midfield box.
In this example, Brighton done this with the intention of moving the FB on the less dominant side into the vacant position to pin the opposition full back and form the 3-2-5 or 2-3-5 shape once the initial pressure had been broken or if Villa fell into their mid block. This simple movement of 15 yards creates the 3-2-5 vs mid/low block 'snooze fest's' that we've (unfortunately) been accustomed to seeing too much of.
Essentially, asymmetric or flawed positional formations were seen as a transition shape for positional coaches, they were never designed to be the end goal but asymmetry would be a means of helping the team get up the pitch through the numerical and positional superiorities it may afford. After the goal kick rule change in 2019 more teams looked to build up through the centre and dropping their double pivot deep to entice pressure and leave gaps, rather than relying solely on wide overloads. These shapes helped positional teams gain more control to generate such superiorities.
These asymmetric shapes are used to create something that is artificial, imposed freedom or in the confines of constraint, superiorities generated rationally through geometry, occupied space and precise angles. As Juanma Lillo said in an interview with Descrifando el Juego- ''Now there is an eagerness to scientificize football, the eagerness to convert it. Now, whatever football is, you don't study it, you live it"
It might have also been implemented to achieve qualitative superiority, for example in Xavi's first season at Barca he struggled to fit so many playmakers in the team- a team that boasted the likes of Gavi, Pedri, De Jong and Busquets that didn't fit into Barcelona's traditional 4-3-3. Having an attacking full back like Balde meant that Xavi could exploit his qualities by having him less involved in Barcelona's attacking construction and would move into the wing position, allowing Gavi and Pedri to operate between the lines with De Jong and Busquets to form the double pivot.
However, I'd still say that managers like Xavi, Arteta and Maresca are more worried about getting the players to fit the structure than making the structure to fit the structure, you must conform to it and become the player they're looking for, if not you are frozen out. The only way that flexibility or adaptation is evident in these globalised structures is how they form them, based the players they have. E.g- 3 natural CBs or 2 CBs/1FB, 2CB's/1DM.
In simple terms, the diagonal method is an emphasis on diagonal ball progressions, aligning players diagonally creates overloads that are staggered towards the centre (Zone 14) but not inside it. Therefore, it create's an environment for better combinations such as toco y me boy, tables as relationships to form and flourish. Diagonals begin to form in different directions due to the teams asymmetric shape, allowing for the emergence (and disappearance) of Escadinhas.
River Plate under Martín Demichelis is a brilliant example of this, diagonal progressions and overloading players towards goal can be efficiently used to break defensive structure, a number of short diagonals begin to emerge facilitating short combinations, toco y me voy and Escadinha emergence. When most coaches look to stretch the pitch to find gaps in between the defence, the best opportunity could be using inside routes to the overloaded or congested area, combine quickly and allow players to find creative solutions as a means of penetration in the final third.
A key part of diagonal entries is forming diagonal overloads, rather than conventionally looking at a football pitch in a vertical reading (3v2 in midfield or a 4v3 on the flanks) we can look at the pitch diagonally and see what advantages it affords us as a result of the players alignment. Players can relate and be very close together but at the same time operate on different lines of the team, known as staggering, which is a very efficient way of progressing the ball due to the potential combinations and moves that could emerge in this small space.
Potentially, diagonal overloads can create mismatches that would not happen if we was aligning our players vertically, which could be considered easier for defenders to jump out and it better suits the zonal behaviours of a defensive block. River are able to create a 4v2 diagonal overload in the centre of pitch, showing how diagonal entries can be an effective way of deterring compact block's from stepping out of their shape or the problems it could give them in exchanging their zonal marking duties or 'passing players over'.
Another good example of this could be this diagonal entry from Gremio, instead of abandoning the far side flank they opt to abandon the ball side flank so players can align towards an advantageous position. This forces the opponent to compromise their defensive shape and they start defending diagonally themselves to try and give themselves as much coverage on the pitch to neutralise it, which ends up in one of the players making a run into that space. The type of diagonal entry could be an Escadinha, a series of give and go's, or just a straight, direct pass into the ST's feet from a wide area.
Coincidently, last night I was watching Fight Club, one of my favourite films and one that I never tire of watching, a film with a very anti establishment and anti conformity message that I think still today resonates with a lot of people. I've been thinking about how these values link to Relationism, in an era gripped by mirrored tactics that we see in Europe.
I go back to an X post that I made a few weeks ago; the narrator speaks about the idea of feeling complete (a man trapped in consumerism and trying to replicate his kitchen to one akin of an IKEA catalouge) and Tyler Durden responds- ''never be complete, stop being perfect, let's evolve and let the chips fall where they may". This is a perfect way of thinking about what is proposed in relationism, asymmetry champions over geometry, our structure (and our lives) are always flawed and incomplete. Fitting that Project Mayhem would be a good alternative name for Relationism or functional football.
In another scene it explores more about consumerism and conformity, which we can see also in the mirage of modernity in football tactics, building our teams in the image of somebody elses' ideas not strictly our own. ''I felt sorry for guys packed into gyms trying to look how Calvin Klein or Tommy Hilfiger said they should" in our case coaches that have built their whole game models and patterns watching De Zerbi's Brighton endlessly, dissecting every part of them as if he was some sort of botanist. I beg the question- is that what a real coach looks like?
https://x.com/JOGOFUNCIONAL1/status/1829527379204591804
Earlier I mentioned the quote from Juanma Lillo, I feel like this is a good time to touch on what he's been doing this season at Man City as assistant to Pep Guardiola. Lillo is an interesting figure in football, being one of the pioneers of positionalism in Spain in the 90s with Oviedo and Salamanca, his work in Columbia with Nacional and having assisted both Guardiola and Sampaoli (the two most positional coaches I can think of). You wouldn't necessarily expect him to be rebelling against an idea that has defined his career.
In 2022, around the time of the World Cup, he had opened up on his thoughts on Positional Play in the modern game and the state of football globally. In the interview he said along the lines of-"we have globalised Positional play, Brazil and Cameron could have swapped shirts at half time and you still wouldn’t have known which side was who”. He then went to coach in Qatar not long after using Relationism principles or ideals, a tactical analysis I had read on him at the time was actually my first encounter with relationism.
Subsequently, he has gone back to work with Guardiola, as much as City are the prototype of positionalism, it's interesting to see the growing impact he has had. This season there are a lot more diagonal progressions, changing to a 3-1-6 consistently has allowed City to use the 4 players between the lines to overload Zone 14 and there are times where they align diagonally and all cluster more towards the ball. Being so close together in a key position facilitates some devastating exchanges.
In the example bellow against Arsenal at the weekend you can see this change in tactical behaviour in motion , players are still occupying spaces (never expect Guardiola to radically shift away from positionalism) but the entries can now be made into congestion. This can give City another dimension to their attack, rather than just relying on isolating the winger 1v1 against the full back and waiting for the space to open up for the half space underlapping run from the 8s or the winger running out to in for the cutback.
Picture courtesy of- @Jon_Mackenzie
Let's take a look at an example of how Relative width, opposed to maximum width, can benefit a team's chances of penetrating a deep defence. Vincent Kompany's Bayern Munich are what I would describe a Positional team, based on their structures and the overall aesthetic of how they form attacks. However, it's interesting to see how bringing their wide players inside and off the touchline facilitates more direct and inventive combination play.
Like Nagelsmann's Bayern a lot of play is focused through the centre and the players here opposed to searching constantly for the 1v1 out wide or triangles afforded by the structure. Against Bremen, combinations are afforded by local connections and this allows players to find more creative solutions. Self expression and interpretation can be more effective than depending on rigid patterns and positional logic.
Bayern are also exploring ways of implementing diagonal overloads in their play, but unconventionally we are seeing them from kick off routines. Their goal against Holstein Kiel after a matter of seconds is a perfect example, the ball goes back to Neuer and is played up field and the players begin to align themselves diagonally, several diagonal lines are created enabling them to move the ball forward quickly with delicate flick ons, one touch moves, give and go's before Musiala penetrates the defensive line and scores.
Thank you for reading, please get in touch on X if you want me to explore other topics or if you have any opinions on what I've spoken about in this article.
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