Since Manuel Pellegrini has taken over as Manchester City manager, he has encouraged the use of attacking full backs due to the high energy players we have at our disposal in those positions. All four of our full backs are different in the way they attack, but they all have high stamina which means they can provide an overlap for the whole ninety minutes. This essentially means teams are always being stretched and the teams that play with wingers often end up with their wingers being dragged all the way back to their box.
Aleksandar Kolarov and Pablo Zabaleta are the best full backs at the club. They are both energetic, quick and good at providing consistently dangerous final deliveries. When both of these players are bombing forward it is very tiring for teams, and Swansea were the latest team who fell victim to City’s high tempo style of play.
The picture above is the build-up to our first goal against Swansea, where Pablo Zabaleta is the player nearest to Swansea’s left back Neil Taylor. Zabaleta had originally played the ball into David Silva who is on the ball in this shot. Zabaleta proceeds to overlap and provide an overload, which essentially drags more Swansea players across into the danger zone as they see a 6 on 5 situation in City’s favour. Nathan Dyer is running across to help leaves Aleksandar Kolarov open on the left. Zabaleta continues by making a run across the box; this takes away Jonjo Shelvey and leaves Yaya Toure open on the edge of the box for an open long shot. Zabaleta made this goal; he gave the ball into Silva quickly and decisively which allowed City to get at a disorganised Swansea back line. The decoy run essentially created a domino effect which allowed Toure an extra second to set his sights and score.
Also in this screen you see that Alex Kolarov is wide open on the left. City could have played him in on the left as there is no cover due to Dyer moving across and Swansea’s back four being fixed on the left side of the pitch. Also noted in this image is how both of Swansea’s wingers have been dragged deep. This essentially limits a team’s counter attacking ability. This is even more relevant now as City have switched to a 5 man midfield to give more cover.
The picture above is a more typical Manchester City full back play. Aleksandar Kolarov moves off of David Silva on the overlap and aims to fire a quick, drilled cross through the six yard box; these crosses are both dangerous and extremely effective. Defences hate having to deal with them and City’s strikers are suited to these crosses over floated high crosses that a team like Manchester United do to get the best out of Marouane Fellaini and Falcao. These crosses amount for a fair few of our goals we have the option to drill them through the box or cut it back to take advantage of backtracking defences and onrushing attackers. This cross didn’t result in a goal against Spurs, but what it did do was create panic and force Spurs to drop deeper every time Kolarov attacked, this creates further room for cutbacks. Below is a cutback situation, where the Palace defence has moved with Kolarov on the run, but Silva has held his run which leaves him in space between the lines. This passage of play ended with a goal for David Silva against The Eagles.
This is no doubt one of the most effective methods deployed by City to open teams up. Teams’ wingers are often forced back into deep positions which hampers their ability to counter attack and tires out the wide men. It also creates space on the edge of the box where players like Silva, Toure and Fernandinho thrive on long shots and intricate through balls. I have been extremely impressed with the revival of Kolarov in recent weeks, as he was a player many wanted to sell, but his attacking prowess makes him more valuable than Gael Clichy in the long term. Zabaleta makes intelligent runs both on the overlap and on the inside of the full back, and this creates space as we saw against Swansea. No matter who City have in charge next year, the attacking full backs must remain part of our game as they are so integral to what we do.
