Developing a Style of Play - Defensive Transition

This is an excerpt from our new book, Developing a Style of Play by Jordi Pascual.

The excerpt is from Chapter Three that looks at various principles of Attacking, Defending, Transition From Attack to Defense and Transition From Defense to Attack.  This particular part looks at the principles of Transition From Attack to Defense.

Developing a Style of Play - Chapter 3.4

We'll go into Defensive Phase from the moment that the opponents have recovered the ball and don't do counter attack, either because they refuse to do it, either because we managed to stop it, but they still have the possession of the ball. Since our aim is to have the ball in attack, this means that, the objective of this phase is that the opponent team make a mistake and, as a consequence, make them lose the ball.

Here we have the following Principles and Sub-Principles:

The First Principle is what is referred to how our defense will be

PRINCIPLE 1:

AGGRESSIVE PRESSING ZONE

OBJECTIVE: To bring the opponent into making an error, using collective actions

SUB-PRINCIPLES
1. Detection of the zone of pressure
2. Doubling the pressure (Coverage)
3. Accuracy in tackling and anticipation

Sub-Sub-Principles
1. Tackling technique
2. Anticipation technique
4. 3 types of pressure: Conditioning, Aggressive and Very Aggressive
5. Spatial concept. Coverage
6. Inside defense (Closing spaces)

Sub-Sub-Principles
7. Diagonal movement
8. Formation of triangles and diamonds
9. Extreme definition in defensive movements
10. Aggressive zonal pressure, avoiding passing lines of the opponent

This is an excerpt from our new book, Developing a Style of Play by Jordi Pascual.  Pascual also authored, Coaching Spanish Soccer