Match date: 25 May 2013

The all-German Champions League final has been building throughout the weeks and has plenty of sub-plots to go along with it. The game itself was a wonderful advertisement for football; two teams going for it and trying to impose their own style of play on the game rather than simply counter their opposition’s.

With the absence of Mario Götze, Klopp, as mentioned in the preview to the match, had the biggest decision to make in terms of his starting XI. It became a question of where Gündoğan was going to play and based on that, whether Nuri Sahin or Kevin Großkreutz were going to play. Klopp chose the latter, meaning that Gündoğan would continue to play in the deep-lying playmaker role that he has become known for rather than play further up the pitch in support of Lewandowski. It also meant that Marco Reus was going to play in the hole behind Lewandowski, with Großkreutz playing on the left of Dortmund’s attack, which would help Schmelzer contain Robben and Lahm.

Dortmund’s First Half Pressing

Dortmund came out the far better side as they kept the game at a incredibly high pace while containing Bayern Munich’s main threats in Ribery and Robben, through the good defensive work of Blaszczykowski and Großkreutz.

Part of reason Dortmund’s rise over the last five years under Klopp has been so successful is become of their quality in pressing the opposition when without the ball. Their first half display saw the gegenpressing of Dortmund work to great effect against Bayern Munich as it pushed them deep and forced them to pass backwards. Notably, Dortmund’s pressing pushed Bastian Schweinsteiger very deep, picking up the ball between the two centre backs rather than 10 yards in front of them. It was a theme of Bayern’s first half as they struggled to get the ball forward and were forced to pass the ball backwards, retaining possession, but failing to get the ball into the feet of any of their forward players.

Above are both Schweinsteiger’s and Bayern’s passes in the first. You can see that Schweinsteiger picks the ball up deep and doesn’t have the ability to play the ball forward and that much of Bayern’s play occurred in their third of the field as they looked to, but struggled to play past Dortmund’s first line of pressure.

The biggest difference that has been noted between the pressing of Barcelona and gegenpressing is that as the attacking players press, so do the defense. Dortmund played a high line throughout the first half to match their forward and midfield lines in the pressing. This pushed Bayern’s forwards further back which is can be seen in the picture above as Bayern have few successful passes into the final third.

Throughout the first half, the high line of Dortmund and the pressing of their midfield and forward lines led allowed them to be successful in winning the ball higher up the pitch. Below you’ll see that they were able to intercept the ball and tackle well about 25 to 30 yards away from their goal which allowed them to get the ball forward to Reus and Lewandowski quicker to start their own attacks.

Reus

With Dortmund defense and midfield winning the ball back well, Reus made himself available well in the space between Bayern’s pressing midfield and their back four and in wide areas, both of which Mario Götze has done so well for Dortmund through the season.

The Dortmund three behind Lewandowski, usually Reus, Götze, and Blaszczykowski, are incredible fluid. Götze likes to find space in the wide areas and they all like to overload the wide areas, with either Reus or Blaszczykowski drifting to the side of the ball to create a numbers-up situation. With the absence of Götze and the inclusion of Großkretuz, they weren’t able to overload the wide areas as much as usual, but Reus found himself playing in wide areas a significant amount anyway, receiving the ball on either side and creating 3 chances from the right side of Dortmund’s attack.

As he did well in the first match of the semifinal against Real Madrid, where he ‘out-Ronald-ed, Ronaldo’, Reus ran at the Bayern Munich defense well. He again was able to pick up the ball in the space between Bayern’s midfield and defense, turn with the ball, and run at them, resulting in him suffering four fouls, though, other than winning the penalty, which Gündoğan dispatched, as a result of a clumsy challenge by Dante, only one was in a particularly dangerous area. Nonetheless, Reus’ play in the hole allowed Dortmund to create attacks once they won the ball back.

Dortmund’s Second Half Pressing

Towards the end of the first half, Bayern began to grow into the game and aside from a spell just after half time where Dortmund were again on top, Bayern started to possess the ball in more dangerous areas. This happened for two reasons, the first being because Dortmund started to drop off a bit more and the second being Heynckes tactical swap of Robben and Müller. Their high line started to drop off, inviting Bayern to possess the ball higher up the pitch and their pressing wasn’t as effective higher up the pitch. Below are Dortmund’s tackles and interceptions from the second half, which occur much deeper than the first half events did.

Instead of winning the ball back about 30 yards away from their own goal, Dortmund were winning it much closer to their own goal, which made it harder for them to create going forward as it allowed Bayern’s players to already be higher up the pitch for when they looked to press. They attempted less passes forward in the second half compared to the first, with the same success rate, but the passes were being made from and received in deeper positions in the second half.

With Dortmund’s pressing in the first half, Bayern were forced to play the ball back very often, with almost a third of their first half passes going backwards. In the second half, with Dortmund dropping off, Bayern attempted less than half of the number of backward passes as they did in the first half and it accounted for just 20% of their overall second half passes and even then were occurring in positions higher up the field.

Heynckes’ Robben-Müller Swap

Throughout the first half, Arjen Robben failed to receive the ball in dangerous positions. This was in part because of Dortmund’s better play, pushing higher up the pitch and pressing well in the first half, and because of Großkreutz, a more defensive player than Dortmund’s usual left sided player in Reus, on the left side of Dortmund’s midfield. Most of the time, Robben had to drop deep to get on the ball, something that he can do, but he’d rather receive the ball higher up the field and be isolated with his full back.

With his limited impact in the first half, Heynckes decided to swap Robben and Thomas Müller, with Robben now playing upfront alongside Mario Mandžukić. It was a tactical swap that allowed Robben to not only get into the game, but make Bayern’s attacking four much more of a threat as Robben’s ability to run at Dortmund’s centre backs made it harder for them to track the other runs. It also allowed Robben to pick the ball up in better areas than he had been in the first half as he was able to drift from side to side.

Robben’s assist to Mandžukić came from the right side of the area, prior to which he picked the ball up in the middle of the centre circle and played the ball out wide to Ribery who drew three defenders, allowing Robben to make a run in behind.

His goal came from a central position after a simple long ball from Boateng found the chest of Ribery just outside the middle of Dortmund’s penalty area. Piszczek was deeper than his centre backs, both of whom were ready to fight off Mandžukić for the header, and allowed Ribery to take the ball down, hold it up, and attempt a cheeky back heel to Robben.

Conclusion

It was fascinating game overall and a great display for, not only German football, but football in general. Both Neuer and Weidenfeller kept the score low with good saves in what a very open, attack minded game.

Dortmund, the supposed less favoured side to win, started the game much the better side with their intense pressing and high line, but it was Heynckes’ tactical change of swapping Robben to a central position that saw Bayern Munich capture their fifth European Cup and redeem last year’s loss.

Dortmund and Klopp will come away from the game knowing that little separated the two sides on the pitch and in a larger picture, is a testament to Dortmund as a club as it was just eight years ago that they were on the brink of bankruptcy.

Stray Observations

– Jupp Heynckes won the Champions League with Real Madrid in 1998 and was sacked at the end of the season. He’s now won the Champions League this year with Bayern Munich. This time he was sacked prior to winning it, with Bayern Munich announcing in January that Pep Guardiola would take over as manager next year. Hard luck.

– It is well known that Mario Götze is leaving Dortmund for Bayern in the summer so that he can work with Pep Guardiola and the director of the final knew it as well and seemed to always make sure there was a camera Götze on when the ball had any hint of going in. When Bayern scored their first, Götze certainly didn’t look happy, but when Dortmund got the equalizer, he was jumping around. Dortmund had to accept Bayern’s bid as it met the release clause in Götze’s contract, but it was up to Götze to agree to personal terms. In the end it seems that the ambition to work with Guardiola was valued more so than his loyalty and passion for Dortmund. Fair enough.

– With all this talk about German dominance of football, just remember this is the first time in 8 years that a German player has won the Champions League. Didi Hamann won it in 2005 with Liverpool.