INVINCIBLE Xabi Alonso Tactic
I am sure Xabi Alonso does not need an introduction, but he is a Spanish professional football manager and former football player.
He started his playing career, as a youth, at Antiguoko, a team that had in their ranks Andoni Iraola, Mikel Arteta or Aritz Aduriz among others.
His professional debut was for Real Sociedad, at the age of 18, in a cup match against Logrones, in December 1999.
From then on, Xabi Alonso made 114 senior appearances for Real Sociedad, before moving to Liverpool in 2004.
That move was an inspired one, unlike his penalty kick in 2005. Ok, bad joke, especially since he scored on the rebound.
He made 143 senior appearances for Liverpool before moving to Real Madrid, in 2009. At Santiago Bernabeu he was part of an illustrious squad, which had in the ranks players like Iker Casillas, Sergio Ramos, Mesut Ozil, Angel Di Maria and the most important one – Cristiano Ronaldo.
While playing for Real Madrid, he was part of Jose Mourinho’s team which played an entertaining counterattacking system.
In 2014, Xabi Alonso might have had enough of not winning trophies with Real Madrid, as he moved to Bayern Munich and played for the German side until 2017, when he retired from professional football.
Unlike other Bayern Munich players, he did win trophies with the club.
During his playing career, Xabi Alonso was coached by legendary managers, like Carlo Ancelotti, Jose Mourinho and Pep Guardiola. Complemented by Rafa Benitez and John Toshack.
As a player, he was teammates with the likes of Steven Gerrard, Cristiano Ronaldo, Kaka, Darko Kovacevic, Sergio Ramos, Arjen Robben and the list could go on. But none of them beat Mikel Arteta, who kicked the ball around with Xabi Alonso since they were kids.
Or, as Wikipedia puts it - the two would battle each other in exhibitions of technical ability.
As a manager, Xabi Alonso began down on the pecking order, when he was given the chance to coach the B team of Real Sociedad.
However, he must have done something good while managing the Basque team since Bayer Leverkusen came calling for him in 2022.
Admittedly, they were closer to the relegation zone than to the European places when they appointed him as manager.
But this was a match made in heaven. As Xabi Alonso led the club to a 6th place finish, qualifying them for European football.
However, the following couple of seasons were the one that made the Bayer Leverkusen board rejoice and pat themselves on the back for the risk they took on the young manager.
Glimpses of what could be, were seen when Xabi Alonso’s Bayer Leverkusen almost knocked Jose Mourinho’s AS Roma out of the Europa League and qualified for the final of the competition.
That was the German team’s first European semi-final since Zinedine Zidane’s iconic goal.
The 2023-2024 season, though, was the truly historic season for Bayer Leverkusen and Xabi Alonso.
Things started well, with a team rebuild and a tactical overhaul. And ended with Bayer Leverkusen finishing the Bundesliga campaign unbeaten, a fit unmatched in German football at the time.
Of course, this brought with it the German league title and the German Cup. The trophies won by the club in a million years.
I guess this is how you turn a team from Neverkusen to Neverlusen.
In Europe, though, the team lost the Europa League final against Ademola Lookman and Atalanta. But what they achieved that season was nothing short of a miracle.
As a tactic, Xabi Alonso started with a 3-4-3 in his first full season at Bayer Leverkusen. His system’s emphasis was on passing and counterattack play.
He made use of his wing backs, especially the right sided one – Jeremie Frimpong. This player was used more like a complete wing back on attack duty, being given full license to go in attack, often even overlapping the striker.
The magic of that tactic, though, happened in the midfield areas. Where players like Granit Xhaka or Florian Wirtz would unbalance defenses with pinpoint passes.
This season, Xabi Alonso tweaked the tactic a bit, not much. He often used the same 3-4-3 or 3-4-2-1 formation and rarely changed to 3-5-2 when he felt like the opposition could be broken down using this system.
The 3-4-2-1 formation is the one we will focus on, though. And in game, it can become a 2-3-5 formation.
And we start with a sweeper keeper on defend duty in goal. We need the goalkeeper to be ready to get off his line if needed, to sweep up loose balls. Or even become a passing option if the opposition presses our team.
The back three are a wide centre back on support duty, a central defender on defend and a ball playing defender on defend.
It’s important to utilise the wide centre back on the right side, as he is expected to cover for the wing back who goes up in attack.
I added a cross less often player instruction, to make sure that the player passes the ball often and does not try to be smart about it.
The ball playing defender, on the other hand, is asked to be smart about it, but only because he has more teammates close to him. So, he can pass the ball with ease when needed.
Although, I never stopped to think how he reconciles that with hold position.
The wing backs are a complete wing back on attack duty. No surprise there. And a wing back on support duty.
To make sure that the right sided player performs the role as expected, I would recommend using a Jeremie Frimpong type of player for this position.
If that is not achievable for you, then I would switch to a wing back on attack role, to try to emulate Frimpong’s movement as much as possible.
On the left side, the player goes up the pitch, but in the rhythm of play, due to the support duty. Which helps to keep the formation balanced and overload the left part of the pitch.
Which in turn creates opportunities to release the right sided wing back in attack.
The two midfield players are a deep lying playmaker on support duty and a regista. The deep lying playmaker is meant to emulate how Granit Xhaka plays for Bayer Leverkusen.
Being the passing hub of the team and the destroyer of counterattacks when defending.
As an alternative, you could use a Segundo volante role, but you need this player to counterbalance his deep lying playmaker friend, so I would stick to the regista role as much as possible.
As in real life, this player is not as aggressive as joining the attacks often, he tries to find the best position to be in, to play the best possible pass in attack.
All four players are asked to tackle harder and the midfield ones to mark tighter. To try and disrupt the oppositions build-up play as much as possible.
And the front three are two attacking midfielders – one on support duty and one on attack and an advanced forward.
The attacking midfielder role was chosen for both players as we need them to be dynamic in attack and to try to exploit attacking channel as much as creating goalscoring opportunities for their teammates.
Be careful, as the role on support does not come with pre-installed player instructions. So, you either add them yourself or make sure that the player used in this position has traits that you need, as they will dictate how he plays.
I asked the two attacking midfielders to tackle harder and the striker to dribble more.
By dribbling more and moving into channels, the striker might create space for the attacking midfielders to move into.
I kept the mentality on positive, but if you are the dominating team, attacking would also work. If you are not the dominating team, I would recommend using the balanced or the cautious mentality and change it based on each match.
In possession, narrow attacking width and pass into space.
Focus play through the centre, shorter passing directness and a slightly higher tempo.
Hit early crosses and paly for set-pieces. Play for set-pieces was more for my team, you can tick it off if you want.
In transition, counter-press, counter and distribute the ball to the defence, often by rolling it out.
And out of possession, a high press and a standard defensive line. Trigger press more often, prevent the goalkeeper short distribution, step up more and trap outside.
As you can see, this setup is a bit aggressive and tailor for a dominating team. If you are not managing such a team, maybe tweak these off and tick them on based on each match.
As I am managing FC Valletta in my building a nation save in Malta, we did what Xabi Alonso showed us last season and we were invincible domestically.
However, in Europe, we missed the qualification to the UEFA Champions League league phase. But we did qualify for the Europa League league phase and went as far as the round of 16.
This tactic is a fun one to play with, especially if you use players fit for it. Xabi Alonso has taken the world of football by storm and I hope we can see more of those good results in the future.
