After the eventful match against Getafe, Barça will host one of the most uncomfortable teams in the League, Sergio González's Cádiz. A team that will propose a game that knows how to play very well: defend in solidarity and wait for the opportunity. Here my 5 tactical keys for this meeting:
Barça will officially debut at the Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys. It will be super important for the team to acclimatize quickly and feel like their own from today. Because it is not the Camp Nou but it will be the Barça house this course. It is important that footballers take the reference points, the dimensions and the behavior of the grass. Xavi's men have to achieve that, far from being a limitation, it is a competitive advantage.
With Raphinha out for two games, the main unknown for Xavi's second official eleven is who will be his replacement. The most natural substitute for it is the option of Ferran Torres because, the right, is a profile in which he has been trained and the one in which he is most used to playing. That would mean that the team would not have to change the structure of the square in the center of the field or the wide band. Abde can give things that the team lacks and are very necessary: verticality, unpredictability and overflow. The negative part is that he is a player who is very used to playing on the left side. Ansu with a changed leg can also be a letter, although remote. But by football level and that fits with the way Barça plays, the best of all is that of Lamine Yamal. A player who has all the characteristics so that, from that location, he can find the last passes and dangerous actions. But the fact that you have to go step by step with the young talent will probably make Xavi rule out this variant. And the last option of all involves a change in the system to 4-3-3, placing two wingers on the sides (Ferran and Ansu, Abde and Ansu or Ferran and Abde).
Against the 4-4-2 of Cádiz, the free men will be the full-backs. A factor that will make these have a lot of weight in the game. Precisely for this reason it is very possible that on the right side it will be Koundé or Sergi Roberto. And it is that in most occasions, the centrals will have a frontal pressure that will prevent them from stepping on the opposite field and dividing easily. So both the start of the game and the progression will depend a lot on both full-backs and the pivots or pivots that come to help. Match with a lot of specific weight for these players.
One of the most visible and well-worked defensive characteristics of Sergio González's Cádiz is the permanent lateral-band player aid when the rival progresses from the outside. Something that, without a doubt, he will repeat today with more intensity. This is a mechanism that makes it very difficult for opponents to find good one-on-one situations and therefore overflow. But it also frees up the entire inside lane when it occurs. And that is something that Barça has to take advantage of every time they send the ball to one side in the last third of the field. Whether it's a one-on-two or two-on-two situation, the breaking entry of a third player will be impossible for the Cádiz team to stop.
Darwin Machís has been the signing of the summer and the most dangerous player in Cádiz today. A very fast, very powerful and skillful footballer to generate and finish plays. In the context of this afternoon's match, Barça will have to be very attentive to this player. Like the other band player: Iván Alejo, another agile player with good dribbling. Surely Cádiz will seek to leave quickly with them so the external surveillance will have to be very good. Finally highlight Rubén Alcaraz. A fixture for Sergio González in midfield and a player with a very good foot to move and for set pieces.
