Tactical analysis: Defensive shape

This season the U's have been painfully inconsistent. Keeping 1 clean sheet in the league in the opening 5 games and struggling to play consistently. The defensive issues have caused frustration in the fanbase as well as putting even more pressure on the forwards to bail the defensive woes out. This season we have seen a "swarming" method implemented. The logical question would be why. Either there is an arrogance from staff or players that they are "too good" for League 2 so they think they can swarm around the opposition and win the ball, or this is a genuine tactic from Harris. This then leads us to think that if they have the arrogance then we won't achieve anything. However, if this is a tactic then it begs the question, why would we do something you are taught as a kid not to do? I believe it is a tactic as Harris has said repeatedly about having a good defensive shape.

This season

Source: Cambridge United on Youtube

This was only a few weeks ago. This was the beginning of Swindon's second goal. The U's aimed to contain Swindon from a throw in, which can be argued is normal. However, the U's have contained themselves so much that even with 8 white shirts in that quadrant, Swindon are able to get out of it.

As you can see it is now a 3v2 in the home side's favour. The U's went from an 8v4 overload to a 3v2 underload. This is the worst place to have a numerical disadvantage as a shot can come from anywhere and should have a good chance of going in. The U's defended this well from this point. Or did they? They were able to unstick themselves of the 3v2 but still didn't shuffle across to no.19 quick enough.

As you can see, the ball still went out to no.19 and the U's weren't able to shuffle over quick enough. The closest player to the red circle in at least 1-2 meters too far away to block the cross. In the amber circle you can see what looks like a 3v3. Mathematically this is fine. Not preferable, but fine and manageable. However the issues lie that Brophy (furthest left in the amber circle) isn't marking a man, Bennet (the defender pointing) is likely worried about the Swindon man wearing white boots and Morrison (furthest right in the amber circle) is likely worried about both the attackers running in front and behind him. Suddenly a 3v3 turns into a 2v1 at the back post.

The red circle indicated where the ball is. The lack of communication and this weird "swarming" method has been undone by switching the ball and putting in an accurate cross. In the square you can see Watts unaware there is a man behind him and Morrison who is just a few steps too far forward as he is worried about both the man in front and the eventual goal scorer behind him. This causes him to jump a split second too early and Swindon take the lead. This happened all in the space of 15 seconds. In 15 seconds we had an advantageous 8v4, then was in a 3v2 underload and then still didn't recover quick enough and left our captain in a 2v1 underload. This is what happens when this "swarming" defensive ethos isn't effective.

This was the beginning of Swindon's third and final goal. A 4v2 overload out wide for the U's seems very easy to deal with. No. The attacker laid it off and the ball went in the box. If we are going to try and contain the opposition out wide we have to make it harder for them to play out of the space.

Despite a goalkeeping error no.26 is in acres of space. Once again you can see the U's go from a dominant wide position to a huge numerical disadvantage in the worst place possible. With the goalkeeper out of position and only 2 defenders in the box the U's were bound to concede.

In these 2 images you can see the lack of support when the cross goes back into the box and how slow the U's were to react to this. 3 defenders in the box when no.26 crossed the ball which includes Brophy who was about 5 yards away. Obviously there isn't much he can do as he previously tracked the striker during the first cross but there was no support around him. The eventual goal scorer easily peeled away from Morrison and it is only as his unthreatened header is goal bound that we can start to see the recovering defenders make their way into the box.

This all happened in 1 game. These pictures were taken in a total of under 30 seconds in a 90 minute match. The U's lost this match 3-2 and this shows that 30 seconds of poor defending can turn games and results on their head.

In the Harrogate game, the away side's goal was caused by "swarming" but rather lazy defending. We weren't able to block the cross well enough and the gap between intended target and closest defender is very poor. Bennet got the brunt of the abuse for this goal however I think Purrington has to block the cross. It is criminal that he didn't. Bennet should have met the cross too.

2018-19 Millwall

Millwall travelled to Norwich with Harris at the helm. You can see that they didn't try to contain Norwich out wide despite Hernandez being a good winger that helped create the first Norwich goal. Although there's 3 Millwall defender's nearby they are all either marking a space or a player. This is something we haven't seen much of this season at the Abbey.

Opposed to the midblock the U's sit in this season, Harris developed a very low block with 9 Millwall players behind the ball despite the ball being about 40 yards away from goal. This tactic is what Harris is famous for.

Cardiff City 2020-21

Despite the awful quality of picture, you can see that Cardiff don't overload any areas. They are set up in a man defence for the most of the time. If they aren't marking a man then they are covering their designated space on the pitch. This is so different to how the U's have been set up this season.

Gillingham 2022-23

Harris seemed to change his approach and focus on winning the ball in wide areas. Here you can see that Gillingham have a focus on forcing the opposition wide by the same tactic U's fans have seen this season.

After winning the ball the first and only idea is to thump the ball long. How many times have we seen Watts do this U's fans. This ball is picked off and Walsall put in a great cross that is inches away from forcing the keeper into a save.

Later in the day, the Gillingham defence swarm wide but Walsall are able to get out of the pressure and narrowly miss a great chance at 2-0.

Walsall eventually get their 2nd of the day and wrap up the win. However, we can see a 4v2 that is somehow won by the 2 in attack and leaves no.23 for Gillingham with a 2v1 situation.

With a 2v1 6 yards away from goal there was only 1 direction the ball was headed. This all happened because a numerical overload didn't work and left the second and third ball up for grabs. Even at League 2 level this tactic doesn't work as Harris found out during his tenure at Gillingham.

With that all said and done where does this leave the U's. I truly believe this is a tactic from Harris which can work so well. The upside is so high with hard working players like Gibbons and Bennet in the team who can put in a challenge and win the ball back in wide areas. However, if they don't we leave ourselves so exposed and that has been shown so many times. There might be an arrogance about it as Harris didn't do this at the Championship level but has only done it in League 2. Arrogance isn't always a bad thing but at the moment it is showing to be a horrible thing for the players. Obviously individual errors need to be weeded out but that'll happen as players get better and used to each other more.