Space Evaders: The big reason why Man United lost to Olympiacos

Any one result is open to interpretation, and sometimes failure is often a matter of chance or bad breaks as it is tactical preparedness. But re-watching Olympiacos’ 2-0 victory over Manchester United in last night’s Champions League fixture, a pattern emerged. Here before we begin is a snippet of a match report chosen at random:

This was a performance riddled with errors from the players and the manager, David Moyes. United were too cautious in design, too clueless in possession and too generous with space, presenting Olympiakos with time and room to score. Beware Greeks burying gifts.

This is right in that one of the key problems with United last night was their generous allowance of space, but though space did play a role in Olympiacos’ second goal, it was much more pronounced in neutering United’s attack. Watching Moyes’ team, it becomes immediately obvious how, in possession, the players are careful to space themselves out across the pitch. This is in line with Moyes’ preferred approach in which he “segments” the field in training in order to get players to efficiently cover the width of the pitch and stretch the opposition defense.

I don’t know if United were trying to do that against Olympiacos last night, but what was apparent on several occasion was the enormous gulf between the player with the ball and his team-mates going forward, and the lack of passing options available. Here are three separate screen shots from the first half before the first Olympiacos goal, and their outcomes:

With his other options marked only one half good passing option behind him, Van Persie was forced to run back to the half-way line, was fouled, led to a free kick for United.

With three of his team-mates on the other side of the field Valencia was forced to run the ball past the goal-line for a goal kick for Olympiacos.

With only Valencia in front of him, who is yards away, Rooney attempts a long pass which goes out to touch for an Olympiacos throw in.

With no one in the gulf of space behind the play and the other players already marked in the box, Ashley Young crosses the ball which is easily caught by the Olympiacos keeper.

None of these instances ended with a dangerous chance. Now before you accuse me of selectively taking screen shots, you will see this pattern over and over again in the game. United players with the ball immediately marked by two Olympiacos defenders with almost no passing support. The pitch is covered well by each player involved and the play is indeed stretched, but it’s worthless as the player in possession has no good passing options.

Much has been made of United’s poor defense, but United were largely unable to keep pressure on the opposite goal or keep the ball in the final third for long spells. Part of this involved the enormous space between forwards, space Olympiacos was glad to fill with defenders. If United want to flourish in this approach they will need to greatly improve their accuracy in crosses and long passes.