Introducing the most dangerous pass in football

A sharp, anxious intake of breath, followed by a round of applause that carries a mixture of quiet admiration and, more than anything, relief. On other occasions, it ends with supporters shaking their heads and asking why.

We are talking about the crowd reaction to — and I’m borrowing this description from a colleague who is a regular at Stamford Bridge — “the most dangerous pass in football”.

It’s the short, vertical ball from the goalkeeper to — typically, but not always — the midfield pivot, who is receiving under pressure, back to goal and close to their own penalty area.

Exhibit A: Chelsea’s Robert Sanchez trying, and failing, to pass to Moises Caicedo against Brighton earlier this season, when Carlos Baleba scored.

It was a case of role reversal for Baleba against Fulham when Alex Iwobi profited from a stray pass from the Brighton goalkeeper Bart Verbruggen.

As for Chelsea, they got their own back at Southampton, where Noni Madueke read Joe Lumley’s pass (35 seconds onwards in the clip below) to Kyle Walker-Peters and set up Christopher Nkunku for their second goal.

Fulham? It’s a minor miracle they didn’t concede against Newcastle when Bernd Leno signposted a pass to Emile Smith Rowe and Newcastle’s players were left shaking their heads in disbelief after Fabian Schar somehow failed to score.

Brentford had a reprieve against Ipswich, who were perilously close to serving a goal up on a plate to West Ham in October. A VAR offside call rescued Tottenham Hotspur’s Fraser Forster at Bournemouth, whose goalkeeper, Kepa Arrizabalaga, was lucky that Gabriel Martinelli didn’t punish him for a loose straight ball against Arsenal, which is where Mads Hermansen passed Leicester and Harry Winks into trouble (see below) in September.

As for Manchester United, the awful goal they conceded against Viktoria Plzen in the Europa League last week was yet another example.

The list goes on and on and, in many ways, provides fuel for those who wonder why so many teams continue to take such chances playing out from the back and in particular by using this type of pass.

There are probably a few ways to answer that question. The first thing to say is that, on a broader level, the coaches that play this way believe it makes far more sense to attack in a controlled way, in possession, through a mix of established principles and rehearsed movement patterns, even if that leads to the odd mistake, rather than tossing a coin and hoping it lands heads up — which is how they view knocking longer balls forward.

The second point — and this shines through when you discuss some of the incidents highlighted above with coaches who are proponents of this style of play – is that the execution of that bounce pass close to goal, taking in the decision-making around it, the positioning, and the movement and the timing, is the problem when it goes wrong, not the pass itself.

Third, it’s inevitable that the moments when it breaks down will get far more attention than the good passages of play.

Before we look at some more examples, it’s worth pointing out that some Premier League clubs — or maybe that should be ‘some Premier League managers and goalkeepers’ — have little or no inclination to play this game of risk and reward. The goalkeepers at Bournemouth (Arrizabalaga went off-piste against Arsenal), Crystal Palace, Everton, Newcastle United and Nottingham Forest in particular tend to play short sideways passes in build-up or go long.

In fact, even when the No 6 drops deep to receive a vertical ball in space with no sign of any pressure, the pass is often turned down by their goalkeepers. Below is Nottingham Forest’s Danilo, arms outstretched, asking for a ball he was never going to receive from the goalkeeper, Matz Sels.

Newcastle’s Nick Pope does the same (Bruno Guimaraes is pointing out that Sandro Tonali is free below)…

… as does Everton’s Jordan Pickford.

That said, Pickford bizarrely deviated from the script at Arsenal on Saturday. What followed was a car-crash moment between him and James Tarkowski, as the Everton goalkeeper bobbled a pass that the centre-back struggled to control, encouraging Martinelli to press. The expressions on the faces of the two Everton players afterwards said it all.

Time to look at some passages of play that show the reward and not just the risk, beginning with Arsenal’s 1-1 draw at Chelsea in November.

Declan Rice is the player to watch here. He takes up a starting position behind Nicolas Jackson, on the opposite side to the free man (William Saliba) he wants to find after Arsenal have provoked Chelsea’s press with a short goal kick.

Cole Palmer makes the standard run (curved) for any player leading the press in this situation, attempting to force the ball one way. Jackson, meanwhile, is ready to jump to Gabriel if David Raya returns the pass.

Timing and understanding are absolutely key to what happens next. Rice waits until Palmer gets closer to Raya and then runs on the blind side of Jackson to receive a soft pass in front of him that…

… he can play first time to Saliba, and Arsenal are out.

It is a pattern you will see again and again at Arsenal and elsewhere.

Below is an example of Ryan Gravenberch doing the same thing for Liverpool on the opening day at Ipswich.

Gravenberch is an interesting player to watch when receiving straight passes because of his exceptional ability to take the ball under pressure on the half-turn. In the image below, Chelsea’s Romeo Lavia is pressing him.

But Caoimhin Kelleher’s pass is ‘safe side’ (away from where Lavia is approaching), and Gravenberch is a master of getting his body between the opponent and the ball to protect and turn in one motion.

Not only are Arsenal and Liverpool retaining possession in these images, but they’re also taking opposition players out of the game while building an attack.

Take a look at this example of Manchester City playing out against Liverpool at Anfield at the start of December. The image that starts this phase of play is remarkable and, in many ways, captures the modern game: Ruben Dias is playing one-versus-one against Luis Diaz, 10 yards out, with nobody in goal (Stefan Ortega is on the corner of the six-yard box, out of picture).

As soon as Dias passes to Ortega, Manuel Akanji knows he has to connect with the City goalkeeper. Cody Gakpo, circled on the left, is already anticipating the pattern and preparing to press Dias.

The natural thing for Akanji to do — and what happens 99 times out of 100 — would be to pass to Dias.

Indeed, Mario Lemina did exactly that against Liverpool in September. Salah read him like a book but, uncharacteristically for him, shot wide of an open goal.

Akanji, however, scanned prior to receiving from Ortega and, aided by Dias also pointing where to play next, recognised both the need and the opportunity for a different (and much more progressive) pass to Kyle Walker.

As the City right-back travels forward, a line of four Liverpool players are out of the game.

But that’s Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester City, I hear you say. What about clubs outside the traditional ‘Big Six’?

Brentford are a fascinating case study, in part because of their evolution under Thomas Frank. The percentage of long passes from their goalkeepers has dropped by a third in less than two years. Furthermore, the bounce pass to play out has been used frequently this season and with the exception of a mix-up against Ipswich that went unpunished and a slightly nervy moment in the first half against Chelsea on Sunday, it has worked extremely well.

The example below is from Brentford’s game against Villa and starts with Ethan Pinnock passing a goal kick to Mark Flekken. Vitaly Janelt’s clean technique and game intelligence really stand out in these scenarios.

In the image below, Janelt has his right hand outstretched, preaching calm and telling Flekken to wait as Ollie Watkins starts to make that familiar curved run. Clearly, this passage of play asks a lot of Flekken — or any goalkeeper. It’s not just about being good with their feet; they need to be calm, trust their team-mates, and make smart decisions in response to the opposition press.

When Watkins gets closer, Janelt makes his move, arriving at pace and running off the back of John McGinn, who has his eyes on Flekken and Pinnock.

Youri Tielemans leaves Yehor Yarmoliuk and jumps, along with McGinn, to press Janelt. But the Brentford midfielder and Flekken have worked it perfectly and Nathan Collins is ‘out’.

Three Villa players have been bypassed as Collins drives forward and…

… a few seconds later, Yoane Wissa has the ball inside the Villa half and Brentford have a four-versus-four attack.

The instinct is to say that the passages of play highlighted above look relatively straightforward. In reality, they require hours and hours of practice on the training ground as well as players who have both the technical ability and the mental fortitude to handle the ball in these situations and deal with the crowd anxiety. Indeed, that leads into a question that football fans will often ask about their team: are our players good enough to play this way?

Let’s analyse some clips of where it goes wrong.

The clip below is from Manchester United’s game against Tottenham in September. Diogo Dalot, playing the role of auxiliary No 6, receives a straight pass from Onana with his back to goal. Both United centre-backs — Matthijs de Ligt and Lisandro Martinez — are higher than you would expect in this scenario.

Normally, the pass made from the player occupying Dalot’s position here would be first time and with the left foot given where Dejan Kulusevski is pressing. But Dalot takes a touch to control with his right foot…

… turns his whole body around and passes with his right foot, too, allowing Kulusevski to get close to blocking. That extra touch also means Brennan Johnson is able to press Martinez easier (admittedly, Martinez’s lack of depth doesn’t help).

Panicked, Martinez blindly helps the ball on…

… and Pedro Porro is now on the attack for Spurs.

Some coaches are a lot more detailed with their messages than others. They will talk, for example, about the importance of goalkeepers receiving the ball in a neutral position, so that the opponent leading the press doesn’t know which side to jump and also discourage goalkeepers from making sweeping actions with their passes (picture that awkward Pickford ball to Tarkowski at Arsenal) to prevent the ball arriving with a bounce or with spin on it.

In other words, completing a pass to a team-mate isn’t enough when playing out against a press; it’s about giving the player receiving the ball the best possible opportunity of making their next action perfect — after all, multiple passes will often be required. It’s interesting to hear Liverpool players talking about how their manager, Arne Slot, has stopped training sessions because passes have not been played to the back foot of the receiver.

The problem with one sloppy pass is that it often leads to another. In the next photo, the Ipswich goalkeeper, Arijanet Muric, plays a ball around Tottenham’s Dominic Solanke using the outside of his right foot. It’s high risk and comes off, but the pass isn’t easy for Sam Morsy to play first time and that contributes to the next pass being untidy…

… which ends up with Dara O’Shea jumping to try to get the ball under control and encouraging Spurs to press even more.

Ipswich are committed to playing out from the back under Kieran McKenna and their build-up involves a lot of straight passes that they generally execute well — the montage below is from Saturday’s game at Wolves.

McKenna — and this feels important for any coach who wants to play this way — took time to explain his philosophy to the Ipswich fans to try to manage the apprehension that often builds in stadiums during these phases of play.

Away from home can be more challenging, though, and rival supporters will revel in the sort of moment that Ipswich endured at West Ham earlier in the season.

The first thing that jumps out when you watch the passage below is the setup. As well as being very close to the penalty area, both of Ipswich’s defensive midfielders, Morsy and Kalvin Phillips, are marked from behind before the goal kick and that feels like a red flag.

Morsy is unable to arrive at speed or on the blind side of an opponent. As for Phillips, he makes the penalty area more crowded by dropping inside and bringing Lucas Paqueta with him.

In fact, Phillips almost gets in the way of Morsy’s pass…

… which ends up at the feet of Paqueta.

Amid a scene of chaos in the Ipswich penalty area, O’Shea clears off the line.

On the subject of overcrowding, there were 14 players (8 v 6) in a tight space when Southampton tried to play out against Villa this month (see the image below). Southampton survived this one, but they conceded against Liverpool in a not-dissimilar fashion and there was the Chelsea goal, too.

Watching Southampton this season, it was hard to avoid the conclusion that neither Lumley nor Alex McCarthy, both of whom deputised for the injured Aaron Ramsdale, were equipped to play Russell Martin’s brand of football at this level — and maybe they weren’t alone.

Clearly, there are times when the straight pass isn’t on and the goalkeeper needs to adopt a more pragmatic approach. Fulham’s Sander Berge is pictured below signalling to Leno that he should miss him out and go over the top of Brighton’s aggressive press.

Getting caught in two minds is probably the worst position for a goalkeeper to be in and that’s what happened to Tottenham’s Guglielmo Vicario against Brentford (below). It’s almost as if Vicario is so programmed to play that straight pass (it’s central to the way Spurs build up under their manager Ange Postecoglou) that he doesn’t recognise an alternative. Fabio Carvalho capitalised on Vicario’s indecision but, to the Spurs goalkeeper’s credit, he recovered and denied Bryan Mbeumo moments later.

Both Vicario and Forster, his deputy, have had their share of close shaves this season, most recently at Bournemouth a couple of weeks ago, where Kulusevski felt like a sitting duck for Tyler Adams when the straight pass arrived.

On Sunday, against Southampton, Spurs were at it again right from the kick-off.

Four passes later, James Maddison was running through on goal and putting his team 1-0 up.

The risk, Postecoglou and others will argue, is worth the reward.

(Top photos: Getty Images; design: Meech Robinson)



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