How tactics helped Lyon beat PSG
Missing several key players, Paulo Fonseca's clever tactical shift made the difference for Lyon against Paris Saint-Germain last night. Get the latest in our analysis of Sunday's big Ligue 1 McDonald's clash.
Needs must
Paulo Fonseca has hardly had an easy time of it as Lyon manager. Last season was marred by his regrettable dust-up with a referee, and the current campaign has been hindered by a raft of departures over the summer (Rayan Cherki, Alexandre Lacazette, Georges Mikautadze, Thiago Almada). Not only has the Portuguese manager had to deal with the mercato, he's also been missing key players like Malick Fofana and Ernest Nuamah through injury for virtually the entire season.
The two wingers were joined on the sidelines for this encounter by Nicolás Tagliafico, captain Corentin Tolisso and Pavel Šulc, the team's leading scorer in Ligue 1 McDonald's. With so many absences, Fonseca set his team out in what was labeled a 4-3-1-2, but the nuances he added to the way the team approached PSG made it far more multivalent than that, underscoring the importance of tactical ingenuity when seemingly overmatched.
A flexible defence
The key element in making do without Tagliafico and Tolisso was to play the same system -- a 4-3-3, but with a wrinkle. In the example above, Ruben Kluivert is playing as a left back, with Abner Vinicius tucking inside into midfield, and Endrick shifting out to the the right. This allows the versatile Abner to both push forward in concert with Ainsley Maitland-Niles, with Kluivert dropping back into a 3-5-2, or to play a slightly deeper role on the flank in a 3-4-1-2, with Khalis Merah or Tyler Morton supporting Endrick and Afonso Moreira.
The above image also shows Khalis Merah playing as a false nine. A slight midfielder with great ability on the ball and versatility, Merah has been compared to former Lyon midfielder Maxence Caqueret. He has, however, never been anything close to a striker, so to see him as the furthest player forward underscores the other theme of the night beyond the versatility given to Lyon in this system.
A drop in pressure
Lyon's absences were countered by some of PSG's as well. Marquinhos and Nuno Mendes were missing in defence for the hosts, and without the captain's passing nous, or the left back's flying pace, the threat posed by PSG's defence to build play from the back was that much less. In the above image, Lyon's attack drops deep, into their own half, sitting off Ilya Zabaryni and Willian Pacho, two players not nearly as clever with the ball as their teammates.
This then has the knock-on effect of compressing the space in midfield, putting Luis Enrique's side under the cosh. With no João Neves from the off and Vitinha going off with injury, there was little opportunity to build play as they otherwise might. Thus, even without many of his best players, and in a hostile atmosphere against the leaders, Fonseca delivered a masterclass in throttling PSG, proving once more his capabilities as one of the division's top managers.
