From the man behind the football king to the football king.

Chapter 806 Offense and Defense
As the saying goes, old ginger is still spicy. In this Bayern Munich team, there are six veterans around 30 years old, which can be said to be a lot of veterans.

In comparison, the oldest player in Manchester United's starting eleven is Gundogan, but the German midfielder will not turn 30 for another two months.

In other words, no one in Manchester United's starting lineup is over 30 years old!
This is both a disadvantage, after all, the veterans may have physical problems and cannot compete with the young and strong guys; but it can also be an advantage, as their age allows them to have more game experience.

For example, now, this group of veterans clearly understand the coach's intention. They know clearly that they cannot be anxious at this time. The more anxious it will be, the more chaotic it will be, and the more chaotic it will be, the worse it will be.

As a result, a group of Bayern Munich veterans led by Boateng, Muller and Lewandowski quickly stabilized the situation.

Bayern Munich began to shrink their defense, which allowed Manchester United to launch a strong attack, which directly hit Bayern Munich's iron wall.

To be frank, the 4231 formation is also conservative because of the presence of two defensive midfielders.

Even if necessary, the two wingers can retreat to protect Bayern Munich's flanks.

In this case, there will be as many as eight defensive players in front of Bayern Munich's goal.

Of course, this only happens in extreme cases, after all, this situation is equivalent to sacrificing offense. At least in the Bundesliga, almost no team can force Bayern Munich into this predicament.

But today, the powerful Manchester United has forced Bayern Munich into such a desperate situation!

Manchester United's idea of ​​swallowing up Bayern Munich in one bite is simply impossible to implement.

………………

Among the materials provided to Bruno by the Manchester United coaching staff, there is one that specifically analyzes Bayern Munich's formation in detail.

Head coach Mourinho and the coaching staff all agreed that Bayern Munich's success this season stems from Flick's tactical adjustments. Playing with Thiago and Goretzka and adopting a double defensive midfielder style is the key.

The basic configuration of the 4231 formation is four defenders, two defensive midfielders, three attacking midfielders and a single striker. This formation has very high requirements for offense and defense.

The requirements for the two full-backs in the back line are relatively high. They must be all-around players who can attack and defend well. The requirements for the two defensive midfielders in the midfield are even more stringent. One of them must have excellent physical fitness and defensive running ability, mainly responsible for the defense of the midfield, and the other needs to have excellent dribbling and passing skills and the ability to control the rhythm of the game. Goretzka and Thiago are the golden partners in this position. The requirements for the crossing ability of the two wing forwards are relatively low, but they must have excellent inside breakthrough and scoring ability.

The attacking midfielder in the 4231 formation is the soul of this formation. He not only needs to have the traditional attacking midfielder's ability to organize passes, but also has a strong ability to score points on his own.

The division of labor in the entire midfield is very clear. The two defensive midfielders are responsible for defense and connecting the midfield and frontcourt, and the three offensive midfielders must cooperate with the single striker to attack.

Because a single striker is used, the midfielder shares more offensive responsibilities.

In this formation, the striker must be a strong center forward who is good at grabbing points, protecting the ball, holding the ball with his back to the goal and has the ability to score. And Lewandowski is undoubtedly this type of striker.

………………

To control the situation on the football field, you must either control the ball or control the space, and to get these two things, you cannot do without people. So some people say that the advantage on the football field is all about how to create a numerical advantage in a local area and play to that advantage.

At the front of the penalty area, if the attacking team has two people and the defending team has only one, they are doomed.

If it were the other way around, the attacking side would probably be doomed.

The principle adopted by Bayern Munich is the same. They arrange six players in the penalty area and in front of the penalty area, plus a front midfielder. This ensures that Bayern Munich can press all opponents who enter the 30-meter area, forcing them to shoot from a long distance and making it difficult to create threats because the most threatening and critical areas inside and outside the penalty area are occupied by them.

But everyone also knows that on the football field, relying solely on defense is not enough. No matter how good the defense is, without sufficient offensive threats, sooner or later you will be defeated by the opponent, so there are two wingers and a forward in front.

The three of them have always been standing in a triangle, and each has different characteristics.

Lewandowski is good at positioning and weaving in behind, and has the best scoring ability on the planet; Gnabry is fast, explosive, good at attacking from behind and dribbling through the middle; Kingsley Coman is more comprehensive, very creative, and has outstanding passing awareness.

The three players have complementary characteristics and echo each other, forming a tactical level when attacking.

They can move to the side, play small cooperation in the middle, or launch quick counterattacks.

Facing such an offensive combination, no team dares to be careless, and the full-backs dare not rush forward rashly, because Kingsley Coman and Gnabry can create threats on the wing.

………………

But how can there be a perfect tactic in the world?
One of the weaknesses of the 4231 formation is that the team is very far away from the goal when switching from defense to offense, so in essence, this is a very conservative defensive counterattack tactic. So how do we solve the problem of being too far away?
Thiago's long pass and Thomas Muller's close pass!

Another problem is that it is easy to get out of touch.

Manchester United's goal in the first minute of the game was the best proof.

After the kick-off, Bayern Munich launched a pressing attack in the midfield and frontcourt, trying to control the ball from the beginning. As a result, Manchester United made a long pass behind them. The midfielders of Bayern Munich had no time to return to the front of the penalty area, which led to Gundogan's easy search for Bruno when he got the ball and assisted him to score with a header.

At that time, Manchester United used their speed to disconnect the middle and back lines of Bayern Munich's defense.

In addition, the width of the attack is heavily dependent on the two full-backs. Without the support of the full-backs, the attack is too concentrated in the middle, which makes it easier for the opponent to defend.

After Manchester United scored the first goal, the trend of the game basically fits the 4231 formation.

After taking the lead, Manchester United took the initiative to attack, but at the same time, whether it was Bruno who was advancing forward, or Kante and Gundogan who were lagging behind, they all firmly held the middle.

Cancelo and Luke Shaw on the two wings did not dare to press too hard, and at most they were on par with the two defensive midfielders.

In the frontcourt, Bruno pinned down Kimmich and Goretzka, while Mbappe attacked Bayern Munich's left wing with all his strength, not only suppressing Kingsley Coman but also frequently creating threats on the court.

Read the error-free version at 69shuba! 6=9+shu_ba is the first to publish this novel.

This made the situation on the entire field for Bayern Munich very embarrassing, even awkward.

………………

In this first half, the front four that Bayern Munich relied on, Lewandowski didn't have a single shot, Kingsley Coman had a long shot, Muller and Gnabry were invisible throughout the first half.

It can be said that Manchester United's tactics were very successful throughout the first half. Bayern Munich was left with no room to fight back and it was difficult for the attack to pass through the midfield.

On the other hand, Manchester United frequently created threats. In addition to Bruno's lightning goal at the beginning of the game, he also dribbled the ball inside from the left and passed it diagonally behind him with his right foot. Mbappe quickly inserted behind Kingsley Coman and passed the ball into the penalty area. Gundogan inserted and shot, but it was slightly off target.

Bruno then made a wonderful pass from the right, which was passed to the back post. Rashford followed up and shot directly, but still missed.

When the game reached the 30th minute, Cancelo made a precise cross from the right, which landed at the back post.

Bruno quickly inserted, headed the ball in front of the baseline, and headed it back to the goal. Harry Kane shot from close range in front of the goal. As a result, Bayern Munich goalkeeper Neuer blocked the shot as if assisted by God, and then Gundogan's follow-up shot was also blocked by Goretzka.

In the 32nd minute, Bruno created a long-range shot opportunity for Gundogan. The German midfielder fired a powerful shot that hit the crossbar directly and still failed to score again.

In the 36th minute, Mbappe created another chance from the right and sent the ball into the right side of the penalty area. Gundogan got the ball and passed it across the goal. Due to the interference of Harry Kane and Boateng, the shot failed to gain strength and was cleared by Kimmich in front of the goal line.

………………

It can be said that Manchester United had the upper hand throughout the first half. Except for ball possession, Manchester United was ahead of Bayern Munich in all offensive statistics, and the number of shots was far ahead.

But even when they had the advantage and everyone thought that Manchester United would be able to score again soon, Bayern Munich equalized the score.

After the first half entered injury time, Manchester United's offensive slowed down and Bayern Munich took advantage of the opportunity to launch a quick counterattack.

At that time, Kingsley Coman was tackled out of bounds by Kante while dribbling the ball on the left. After Bayern Munich threw the ball out of bounds, they reorganized the attack and sent the ball into the penalty area. Maguire headed the ball away, but Thomas Muller got the ball first outside the top of the penalty area, and Gundogan fouled while defending.

When Kimmich took the free kick, Lewandowski, who was in the wall with Manchester United players, stepped sideways and the ball hit his left upper arm, turned a curve and hit the Manchester United goal.

De Gea judged the original trajectory of the ball, but he didn't expect the ball to change direction after hitting Lewandowski.

This is absolutely an unbelievable ball of luck.

Manchester United players immediately signaled to the Italian referee Osato that this should be considered a handball, but Osato said that Lewandowski's arms were not open at the time, and he had no obvious active handball awareness, he just passively touched the football, so there was no problem with the ball.

The video assistant referee also agreed with the referee's decision, and he did not even prompt the referee to watch the video replay.

(End of this chapter)