00:00Right, hello there everybody, welcome back to the ACFC NYC HQ here in suburban New York.
00:06It's the middle of the afternoon for me, hence these impeccable aesthetics.
00:12And that is exactly why all those horrid little nerds like me who went to Tokyo once in their 30s
00:19told you that Japan were a very serious proposition for this tournament.
00:23But it's also, sadly, why Carlo Ancelotti is very, very, very good at football.
00:30And in the tournament's most tactical battle so far, it was Brazil, the most vibes team in it, we're told,
00:39who came out on top. I'm going to show you how that happened.
00:45Alright, so first up, Japan are one of the few teams in the whole tournament who are playing a back
00:50three.
00:50They had a number of quite big injuries in the lead-up, most notably Karu Mutoma.
00:55But the structure that Hajime Moriasu has brought into this team makes them one of the hardest to play against.
01:03And the idea behind the structure is because most teams who have a lot of the ball like to build
01:07with three at the back,
01:08the three attackers can either go man for man and press them all individually,
01:12or sit quite narrow and block off every single central passing lane.
01:17And the idea being that by blocking those central spaces, they hope to intercept the ball rather than win it,
01:23and then break from there. Like, if you remember the England game, that is how they won that.
01:27They weren't aggressive with Palmer, they just crowded them out, nicked the ball back,
01:31and then exploited the space either side of the single pivot.
01:35And I remember seeing that at the time and thinking it was a really, really good goal because of the
01:39way they finished it off,
01:40but it's entirely made by how quickly, once they get the ball back, they get the wrong side of the
01:47opposition number six.
01:49Now, in that game, it was Kobi Mayn who was having an absolute nightmare trying to play against this.
01:53But for the first chunk of this match, Japan was so brave and caused Brazil so many problems.
02:00They actually did press them unusually high. They went man for man over the entire pitch.
02:04They made it very difficult for them to get any sort of structured passing together.
02:08They kept forcing mistakes, and they looked like they turned up with a collective system here
02:13that was going to be too much for the individual talents of the Brazil side.
02:18And in the first half, especially, they just couldn't live with that.
02:21Like, Casemiro looked like he was having an absolute shocker, but part of that wasn't actually really his fault.
02:27It was down to the way that Ancelotti just hadn't made any adaptations for the fact he was playing against
02:33a 3-4-3.
02:35Because the way Brazil normally play, and yes, this is Brazil now.
02:38I haven't got any different coloured players.
02:41You do a 4-3-3, but you've got two very creative and attacking number eights,
02:45and you've got full backs who like to get high up the pitch so that your wingers can come infield
02:49a little bit.
02:50It leaves your single pivot, your number six, Casemiro in this case,
02:54with an awful lot of space to try and defend,
02:57with an awful lot of space that can then be exploited on the counter-attack.
03:01And that was Japan's game plan in the first half.
03:04They'd get the ball back, and they would attack into those areas.
03:07Like, it happens early on, and he's forced to rashly dive in and gets himself a booking,
03:11which, if you're Japan, that's absolutely brilliant,
03:14because the only player now defending this space can't even really jump in.
03:19He can't even make a tactical foul. He got it right on the edge already.
03:22And when you watch the goal, there is an argument that he should have made a tactical foul here,
03:26but he couldn't. Like, Japan aren't aggressive in trying to win the ball back,
03:30but they do shut off all the central options.
03:32They intercept it, and then, just like against England, they break at pace.
03:37Sano skips ahead of Casemiro like he's not there,
03:40and because he, A, cannot get back goal side, because his legs won't allow him to,
03:44and, B, cannot just take the foul and potentially a second yellow card,
03:48he's free to run all the way up to the edge of the box,
03:51where he applies a really, really smart finish.
03:55But, my dear friends, we are not here to talk about how Japan won this game,
03:59because, obviously, they didn't, so I'm going to show you now
04:01how Carlo Ancelotti completely changed the momentum and the pattern
04:06and set Brazil on a path to inevitably go and get the goals.
04:11Because, like, as we just said, what Japan want to do
04:14is win the ball back in the centre of the pitch,
04:17the middle and every sense of the word,
04:18somewhere around the opposition central pivot.
04:22And, in that first half, this is every single time they got the ball back,
04:27its tackles and its interceptions,
04:29and look at the central concentration of them in the very middle of the pitch.
04:33Not their own third, not the opposition third,
04:35those passing lanes through the centre.
04:38But then, look at how this changes in the second half.
04:42Suddenly, there isn't a single one more than a few yards from the edge of their own box,
04:47and this is their best weapon for how-to-hurt teams.
04:50So, how did Brazil completely take it away from them?
04:54And the very, very simple answer is that you cannot lose the ball in this area of the pitch
04:58if you stop trying to play it through this area of the pitch.
05:02Ancelotti moved both Vinicius and Ryan much further wide and much higher up the field,
05:07which then pinned Japan into a full-time back five,
05:11and then they built by accessing these wide areas instead.
05:16And don't get me wrong, there's a lot we can say about the way Japan defend.
05:19Part of the reason they have this back three is that, so, if they need to,
05:23they can just be in a back five.
05:25Because as one of the shortest teams in the tournament,
05:27what they can't defend with their physical height,
05:30they can then defend with numbers in the box.
05:34This isn't necessarily a bad thing for them.
05:37But the problem was, once Brazil managed to box them in a bit,
05:41they never got back out of that.
05:43And again, just to do another first half, second half comparison for you,
05:46these are all of Brazil's crosses in that first half.
05:51And yes, OK, those are certainly some crosses,
05:54but these are all of Brazil's crosses in the second half.
05:59They absolutely bombard this Japanese defence with balls into the box.
06:05And while, yes, obviously that's where the Casemiro goal comes from,
06:08possession built out wide, and then simply not enough good headers in the area
06:13to pick up someone extra running in from the midfield,
06:16this might actually be the most dramatic way to illustrate this for you.
06:20These are all Brazil's key passes.
06:22So these are all the passes that lead to a chance being taken on goal.
06:26As you can see, in the first half, again, they're all from this central area.
06:29They want to play through the middle, get here, create chances.
06:32That's what Brazil like to do.
06:34But it's also where Japan were taking the ball off them.
06:37Now, switch this to the second half,
06:40and all of a sudden there's virtually nothing being created
06:42in the central part of the pitch.
06:44These are all deep, long balls.
06:46And as you can see, loads of these are just crosses.
06:49Loads of them are just balls out wide.
06:51Even that brilliant Vinicius Junior chance,
06:53where he nearly scores maybe one of the best goals in the history of the World Cup,
06:57that is because Brazil get the ball in this position,
07:01decide we're not going to play it through the centre,
07:03and just go from inside the pitch to outside the pitch
07:06as directly as they can.
07:08And then, of course, as for the winning goal,
07:10you can see it here, that is a central pass.
07:12From that exact zone, what they were trying to do in the first half,
07:16but you go and you wind back how they physically get there,
07:19you can see the initial play, that starts in the wide areas.
07:22They don't actually go through the part of the pitch
07:24where Japan are good at winning it.
07:26They play it down the right,
07:27they try to find the edge of the box, lose it,
07:29but when it comes back into that area,
07:31win it again and play the ball laterally across.
07:34And I'm just going to show you
07:37maybe the most single heartbreaking thing I've seen
07:41in this tournament so far.
07:43Because you shouldn't really be able to find Martinelli
07:46with two defenders right here,
07:47but just as the pass is about to be made,
07:51have a look at Sugawara's head.
07:54He just checks to make sure
07:56Vinny hasn't snuck up on him to steal in,
07:58and then when he looks back,
08:00he checks his distance to Martinelli,
08:02and then when he looks back up at the ball,
08:05it has already been played.
08:07He does the right thing,
08:08he checks his positioning,
08:09he makes sure he knows where all the other players are.
08:12He's not ball-watching.
08:14But if he had been ball-watching,
08:16he'd have taken a step towards Martinelli
08:19before the ball was played.
08:21He'd have read that instead of having to react to it,
08:24and 96th-minute winner.
08:27But the thing is, as sympathetic as I am to this,
08:29and as brave as Japan were leading up to their first goal,
08:33both their own mentality and the changes Brazil made
08:37led to them losing a lot of courage,
08:40becoming a lot more passive as the game wore on.
08:42This is the cumulative goal threat as the game is played.
08:46Japan have absolutely nothing after their goal,
08:49whereas after the changes at half-time,
08:51Brazil just go and go and go and go
08:53to the point where both goals felt inevitable.
08:56Which, you know,
08:57as someone who did drop $100 on this kit
09:00the day he got out here,
09:01and has obviously really let his mouth go
09:03about Japan's chances,
09:05is incredibly frustrating,
09:06because the vibe you get from that game
09:08was if they hadn't then tried to defend
09:10their lead straight away,
09:12and they kept doing what they'd been doing,
09:14they could have continued to cause Brazil
09:16an awful lot of problems.
09:17And while not necessarily run away with the game,
09:20certainly not be defending as deep for as long.
09:23But still, at the end of the day,
09:25you have to give all the credits to Carlo Ancelotti here
09:27for what was a really, really smart tactical shift
09:30at half-time.
09:32And the Bruno assist for that goal,
09:35under that much pressure,
09:37that late in the game,
09:38with everything that is at stake there,
09:41that might be the best assist we've seen
09:43in the tournament so far.
09:44It might be the best assist we've seen
09:45in the tournament full stop.
09:47Like, there was only a very small,
09:49small percentage of players
09:50who could do something like that for you.
09:52So yes, my Japan Dark Horses tip
09:55did as well as my Scotland
09:56might actually be alright tip.
09:59So I can only assume that the nation of Brazil
10:04personally hates me.
10:08Which is tough to take.
10:09But of course, if you'd like to see
10:10all the other very many ways
10:11that entire nation is going to ruin my World Cup,
10:14you can subscribe to us here
10:16at the Adam Cleary Football Channel.
10:17Maybe I'll go buy a Brazil top now.
10:19That'll show them,
10:20and you can get me across all the social medias
10:22at AdamCleary, C-L-E-R-Y.
10:24And finally, for all the Japanese subscribers
10:27we've added,
10:27because I keep saying really nice things
10:29about their chances.
10:31O saki ni shitsuri shimasu.
10:34Except it's obviously the opposite way around
10:36because you're actually leaving before me.
10:38Which I didn't expect.
10:41Go men nasai.
10:43Sayonara.
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