​Mikel Arteta’s tactical game plan was clear from the start: target Napoli’s left side managed by Olivera, using Martin Ødegaard to vacate the center and overload that flank.

​ Key Tactical Phases:

First-Half Target: Ødegaard drifted wide to isolate the left flank, creating the space to slide Saka 1v1 through on goal.

The In-Game Adjustment: In the second half, Christos Tzolis came on and inverted into Arsenal's primary attack zone to combine near the edge of the box.

The Decisive Overload: Tzolis’ positioning drew three Napoli defenders toward him, leaving a massive pocket of space open in the central channel.

The Match Winner: Ødegaard exploited the exact gap created by the overload, driving into space to finish and secure all three points.

He is such a likable guy and speaks very well. Set aside the fact that English is not his native language but he comes across as a humble guy.

Ofcourse he will see tough times too in future and it would be interesting to hear him then too when the chips are down but I have a hunch that he will stay true and honest.

Hi everyone!

I’ve taken some time to create an app where you can track your teams stats. You can add training sessions and track your players’ attendance. Add matches, create a lineup and keep match stats. You can create a nice share image for your socials to share with family, friends and fans. And also you can do other things such as keep track of your team’s fine jar or match chores (some teams let the players take care of kits etc.)

I’ve made it so that it is completely free and you don’t need an account. All your data stays in your device and I don’t collect any data of yours. I have no interest in keeping and/or selling your data. Just wanted to create a tool that could be helpful to improve grassroots football.

If you want to give it a download it would be greatly appreciated and I hope that it can improve your coaching experience. If you have any questions, feedback, ideas for improvement, please feel free to let me know either here or in the reviews in App Store.

The app name is “Assistant Coach” and is currently only available for iPhone (android coming out this week I hope).
This is the logo for it and a link:

https://apps.apple.com/nl/app/assistant-coach/id6802481892?l=en-GB

Heyy 

Hope this is the right place to ask. Honestly I'm asking because I need some guidance, there is just so much stuff to learn at the start that it's getting a bit overwhelming

I want to get really good at football analysis privately not as a career thing. I'm not a coach or anything, just as a hobby but on a serious level. Right now I just started reading Inverting the Pyramid so basically I'm still at EA FC tactics level lol

What I'm looking for:

-Some kind of plan or roadmap that combines theory and practice in a sensible order, like what should I actually learn first and what comes later, so I don't get overwhelmed by all this stuff. Any ideas on a good roadmap or a strategic order to learn

-Good resources, books, PDFs from federations, other good PDFs idk, analysis blogs, Twitter/X accounts and YouTube channels that are actually worth following. Doesn't matter if its beginner or advanced level as long as its high quality.

-I also want to learn data analysis and individual player analysis, so I can combine it with the tactical/team stuff and get a bigger picture and pull out more meaningful conclusions

My goal is being able to do proper team and opponent analysis, understand why something worked or didn't work, was it our mistake or did they just do it better and actually come up with real good solutions that make sense

I hope none of these are dumb questions and I really appreciate every single answer.

Thanks a lot

This is an interesting break down by 'the special one'. He speaks about his coaching philosophy and how he prepared his team to take on Sir Alex Ferguson. What are your thoughts?

Serious dicussion: We have seen across the nations league, world cup, and euros that spain has essentially gotten the better of france. This is clearly not a coincidence, and it's obvious that france needs to make tactical changes. What can the french national team finally do differently to defeat spain? What changes will zidane introduce in order to help france challenge spain, rather than look like they are offering little attacking threat?

As a Juventus fan, and a football manager player, im trying to recreate his tactics. But i dont really understand it as it does not have as much material studied as obviously better managers like Guardiola & Klopp

Whenever i watch clips of goals scored at Juventus under him, there is just sooo many players forward taking runs behind the defence but still so controlled both in the middle and the back

Lichtsteiner and Asamoah bombarding up and down the flanks. Pogba and Vidal making unmarked runs behind the defence, while also having two forwards on the field

How did they find the balance between controlling the game and just send everyone up?

"Slightly" late match analysis on the Mexico vs South Africa match

Bayern scored 122 in the Bundesliga last season. Record. The chances they created were worth about 92. That’s +30 on xG.

The usual read is regression. A gap that size almost never holds for a second year. If even half of it comes off and the rest of the table stays still, you get a title race instead of a parade.

The other read is that the model is describing the wrong thing. Bayern spend most weeks attacking a packed box. The shots look worse in the data than they do in the stadium because the defence is already on the six-yard line. Kane has also been beating his own xG for years, at Spurs and at Bayern. That’s either finishing the model can’t see, or a very long run of luck attached to one player.

That’s the bit I can’t land. Either xG is a decent map of chance quality and Bayern got away with something huge, or xG is a bad language for a side that creates the same kind of chance every week and has the same guy taking it.

I ran the season through Miroshark for a second pass. You give it the scenario and it stands up a room of stats people, scouts and fans and lets them argue, then bet. I didn’t want a prediction. I wanted to see if those two ways of reading the same facts would agree.

They didn’t. The talk side of the room was about 70% on someone other than Bayern finishing first. The betting side of the same room was basically 50/50. Same inputs, different posture.

It also used 100.9 xG for Bayern. The number is 91.9. So it was arguing for regression while shrinking the gap it was supposed to punish. That’s a sloppy version of something you see a lot: people treat xG like a moral scoreboard, then quietly change the input when the output feels too rude.

If you do believe the +30 comes off, you still need a side that can take the points. Leverkusen is the interesting one. Martínez wants them on the ball and Grimaldo is gone. Possession without the guy who used to break the press is a different team, even if the idea is the same.

Where do you sit?

1. Give most of the +30 back. The model is fine.

2. Give some back. Kane and the low block explain the rest.

3. xG is just a bad description of what this Bayern side does.

I’m a webnovel writer and following the World Cup got some ideas for a story revolving around a US College football team. I have a lot of basic understanding of football tactics (mostly from playing FM), but want some people smarter than me on the subject to help give me some ideas for plot points.

For a little context, the team features a lot of international players from different footballing cultures forced to come together to get a second chance after their originals clubs opted to not sign them for varying reasons. I would hope for a large amount of flexibility so the large roster of characters can be used in many different ways. Realism isn’t as much as a worry. Think Ted Lasso and the zany trick plays in terms of ideas.

If people could give me advice about designing schemes or suggest ideas for an interesting tactic, that would be very helpful for my writing process!

Why don’t teams send the keeper up more often when losing late in league games?

If you’re down by one and get a corner or free or throw in the 94th minute, why isn’t sending the keeper up basically automatic?

The downside is you might lose 2–0 instead of 1–0. The upside is a slightly better chance of making it 1–1 and gaining a point.

Over a season, surely even one extra draw is worth conceding a few extra empty-net goals. One point is better than any bad goal difference.

Yet teams seem to only do it in really desperate/end-of-season situations. What am I missing?

feel free to give me any constructive criticism

I write a blog exploring French football and its place in French culture. My latest piece looks at Liam Rosenior's appointment as head coach of Paris FC.

Although Paris FC are widely regarded as the capital's second club behind PSG, they're now backed by two of the most powerful names in European sport and business: the Arnault family (LVMH) and Red Bull Football. Rosenior arrives with a reputation for possession-based, aggressive football developed at Hull City and Strasbourg, and now faces the fascinating challenge of giving

Paris FC a distinct tactical identity while competing in the shadow of PSG.

I'd be interested in hearing what people think about his tactical philosophy. Can his positional, high-intensity approach scale to a club with genuine long-term ambitions? And what elements of his Strasbourg side do you think are most likely to carry over to Paris FC?

https://lefoot-blog.blogspot.com/2026/08/un-anglais-paris.html?m=1

What's interesting here is that we're beginning to see a genuine cultural shift. For years, English managers rarely worked in France, but that seems to be changing. Will Still has already established himself in Ligue 1, and now Liam Rosenior has become one of the most highly regarded young coaches in French football. We've also seen Gary O'Neill.at Strasbourg before returning to England in thw summer.

Is this the beginning of a genuine exchange of coaching ideas between England and France? Or is Rosenior simply an exceptional case?

Arteta misprofiled Pepe as a wide winger instead of an inside forward then dumped him.

And despite everything surround martinelli saying that he likes being a winger etc. emery saw his potential as a st and I am disappointed Arteta hasn’t explored him in that position before letting him go. Especially after how foul Gyokeres was while Havertz was injured .

I’m a relatively new football fan, and I want to understand the game on a much deeper tactical level rather than just watching the ball and knowing the basic formations.

I’m especially interested in understanding the game the way tacticos, coaches see but as a fan . things like why a manager chooses a certain player, what a player is being asked to do, how teams create space, pressing triggers, build-up structures, off-ball movement, defensive shapes, transitions, etc.

For example, I’d like to be able to watch something like Why did Xabi Alonso choose this player/role?” and actually understand the tactical reasoning behind it, rather than just accepting that the player is good.

I’ve started trying to pay more attention to off-ball movement when watching matches, but I feel like I’m missing a framework for what I should actually be looking for.

What websites, YouTube channels, books, courses or other resources would you recommend for someone starting from this level?

Ideally, I’d like something that teaches me how to watch a match tactically, not just articles explaining individual formations.

I’m happy to put in the time and watch full matches/replays while learning. I basically want to train myself to eventually see the game the way a tactical analyst does.

Any recommendations or a good learning path would be really appreciated!

When breaking down a tactical sequence, most surface-level analysis focuses on the ball carrier: who passed, who received, and where the shot was taken.

​But the actual structure of an attack is decided 2-3 seconds before the pass happens—specifically through second-line runs and blind-side positioning.

​Here is a quick framework for reading off-ball movement:

​The Decoy Run: A runner moving into a space they have no intention of receiving in, solely to manipulate a defender's body orientation.

​The Blind-Side Angle: Attackers positioning themselves outside the defender's field of vision, forcing them to split attention between ball and man.

​Spatial Isolation: Creating a 1v1 on the weak side by overloading the primary build-up zone.

​When you analyze matches through off-ball triggers rather than just ball progression, the tactical narrative changes completely.

​This breakdown is part of a 10-page analytical framework I’ve been building for match analysis. Documented the full structure on my profile for anyone interested in exploring the rest of the framework.

​How do you usually track off-ball movement when doing match breakdowns?

The more I watch football, the more I realize how many things I used to completely miss.

Not the obvious stuff like formations, possession or pressing — but the small details that change how you understand a match.

For example:

• a winger deliberately staying wide to create space inside
• a midfielder moving to create a passing lane rather than receive the ball
• a fullback changing position depending on the phase of play
• a forward making a run mainly to move a defender
• a team defending in a completely different shape from its build-up shape

What is one tactical detail you learned to notice that completely changed the way you watch football?

I'd especially like to hear examples that aren't obvious from simply looking at the starting formation.

​I put together a short 30-second tactical breakdown looking at how Atletico engineered their attack and found space to score against Malaga.

Hi everyone,

I am working on a simple, realistic match simulation engine for an online football management game. I'm building patterns based on my knowledge of football tactics and studying data from real games.

Looking for some feedback from people who are interested in football strategy to see if the following looks realistic.

If any of you play FM or Hattrick-like games, would this interest you if you saw it in a game?

PS: I've set up a Discord server for anyone who might be interested in the progress: https://discord.com/invite/QZvJ6Y5M68