Blessin Fixes The Structure, St. Pauli Gets Better

St. Pauli finally got a point in the Bundesliga this season. It came from a draw against RB Leipzig last Sunday night at the Millerntor. It was a good performance from St. Pauli and from this game, in my opinion, Alexander Blessin has successfully solved some of the problems his team had in the first 3 games, when they failed to get a single point (i.e. lost all those games).

***

If we look at some of the statistics, Blessin's system in the first three games works well. Take the pressing, for example. St. Pauli are second in terms of PPDA (9.53) so far this season, showing that the intense pressing system is able to limit the build-up/attack of opponents. St Pauli are in the top 4 (320 from 3 games) in terms of opponents entering their attacking third and in the top 7 in terms of opponents entering their penalty box. St Pauli have also conceded just 34 shots on target, a figure that is in the top 3 in the league. These are promising figures.

However, the problem is in how bad they are when they have the ball. St. Pauli are in the top 5 in terms of possession, averaging 59.47% in the first 3 games. That's a lot. But this statistic means nothing. Why is that? Because most of their possession comes from their own half. For example, only 24% of their 1552 total touches have been in the attacking third & opponent's box. And only 23% of their total passes are in the final third. They have the second lowest number of passes into the opponent's box and the third lowest number of key passes in the league.

Indeed, St. Pauli lacks ideas, and in my opinion the structure and the approach play a big part in this. I wanted to highlight the approach first. Under Blessin, St. Pauli often played their build-up directly to their two centre forwards, Johannes Eggestein and Morgan Guilavogui. The problem for me is that neither has the physical presence to play in such a system. Both have the dynamism and agility to play the first one-touch pass and combine it with quick movement, but they don't have the physical presence to be the wall striker who can hold the ball up well as a receiver. For the first three games, only three players in the Bundesliga have conceded more miss-controls and lost the possession in total than Eggestein has this season. He's also won just 3 of his 11 duels so far. Guilavogui, in the same period, also lost possession six times. And he has won less than 50% of his duels on the ground. They are vulnerable in this system, especially when their opponents have a physical advantage at the back (the game against Union Berlin being the best example in my opinion).

The structure in possession creates problems for both players. They stand next to each other, making it easy to create the first touch combination. St. Pauli has created some moments out of this situation, but this structure is so easy to predict and so easy to prevent. All the opponents have to do is get their defenders close to Eggestein and Guilavogui, then get the numerical advantage, and St Pauli's attacks will be easy to neutralise. Meanwhile, they also lack support. The number eight doesn't help much. Connor Metcalfe, who usually plays the more advanced role, offers little in the way of body up front and sometimes has to look after the flank because the left wing-back has to drop down more to help the build-up. As a result, St. Pauli often found themselves in situations where there wasn't enough body to counter the opposition's defensive line/block. Jackson Irvine sometimes tried to help with his run, but in this new system he plays deeper and then needs a lot of running and the right momentum to be able to help.

This meant that at times there were only three St Pauli players (2 strikers + Metcalfe) up front. The wing-backs don't really position themselves high up the pitch because they want to help the build-up and also because one of the number eight and the number six have to drop and stay low during the build-up. Fewer targets, easier to lose the ball, easier for the opposition to neutralise. Then some questions arise: If there aren't so many bodies to target, if the gap between players and lines is too big, why does Blessin insist on playing directly to the centre? Isn't it better to change the direction of the attack, or even change the structure of possession?

There was a moment against Heidenheim when St. Pauli had a chance (shot by Metcalfe) after playing the build-up to the right. The players who moved there together played in the short distance and were able to move Heidenheim's block to that side as well, thus creating space in the other direction. I don't want to try and compare it to Fabian's era, but that's what the players were doing in almost every game last season: They were playing up close, trying to overload one side to create space in the other. They tried not to be outnumbered when they had the ball. Obviously the opposition is important in this context, but why don't you try to develop that kind of approach for attacking or building up, so that you can get more players involved and reduce the chance of losing the ball, which is often the case.

Or why not try a different approach when in possession? If Irvine is the player with the highest expected assist (after the first three games), if we know that he's more dangerous when he's closer to the opponent's box, why keep him so deep in possession? He's not the player who has a high number of xGBuildup (i.e. other players' buildups are more valuable to the team's attack than his). Of course, Irvine is good defensively as a number six. Only one player in the squad has won more tackles than him, and only two have won more possessions than him. But Blessin could also look to exploit Irvine's ability to read the game in order to put pressure on the opposition from the early stages. And if playing two double sixes doesn't help to build the attack through the middle, why not just play one and let Irvine move forward as another target? In my opinion, Blessin sometimes used too many players (e.g. more than five) in the build-up. And if that led to nothing in the end, what was the point?

After three games, St. Pauli really needs to fix this in-possession phase, as they suffer a lot from it. Remember, of the 6 goals they have conceded so far, 3 have come from set-pieces (I counted FCA's first goal as a set-piece) and the other 3 from counter-attacks. Being easily caught out on the counter-attack means two things: Firstly, the inability to be effective in possession, as you lose the ball too easily and too often. Secondly, you have a poor rest defence. And St. Pauli have the second. Two of FCA's goals were scored for exactly this reason (or, more generally, for both reasons). Well, in the context of the rest defence, the duet of Wahl and Karol Mets plays a role, because they don't have the speed as the last unit of the rest defence to cover the space behind them. In addition, they are sometimes too close together and the players in front of them are also too slow to cover. So both players have to cover a lot of space with their limited speed. That's something that really needs to be fixed, either with a change in personnel or a change in structure. Minimising the space between each line could be an option, but with large spaces to cover behind, that might not be the best idea either.

Fortunately, Blessin was able to solve these problems against Leipzig. St. Pauli are more direct, and this directness makes sense. First of all, the structure of possession. Yes, the switch to a 3-4-3 is important in this context, but Blessin has also realised that it is not just about formation, but more about structure. In this 3-4-3 formation, he could have just three targets, but he prefers four. With four targets up front, the St. Pauli attack was not going to be easy to neutralise. Eggestein has not one, but three players close to him. They stood next to each other - the wingers did not always stay out wide to create width; Afolayan, for example, often positioned himself in the middle next to Eggestein when St Pauli started the build-up from the left.

Irvine also became a player who benefited from this new structure. He is still number six, but during possession he or Carlo Boukhalfa can move up to join the front three. No wonder Irvine had two chances from set-pieces against Leipzig. This structure, in fact in general, makes it easy for the St. Pauli strikers to create combinations and win the second ball. In total, they created 14 key passes and had an xG of 1.34. Both figures were the highest they had recorded in a match this season, and given that Leipzig were their strongest opponents so far, this really does sound like an improvement.

Their build-up is also more flexible. St. Pauli do not just keep the ball in their own half and then play it straight into the middle. Instead, they tried to use their full-backs to create in wide areas and direct the attack. Or, if they thought Leipzig were ready to give more pressure, they would play long balls directly forward. They had four targets there anyway and were generally so aggressive in winning the second ball. They weren't always forced to play the ball straight into the centre area. And this flexibility has made St. Pauli stronger defensively. Against Leipzig, they conceded just 10 shots, for a total xGA of 0.66. That is the best figure they have recorded in a single Bundesliga match this season. Most importantly, they rarely faced dangerous transition attacks.

This is good, as all of their goals in open play have come from counter-attacking situations. St. Pauli also showed that they can be less aggressive on the ball. They had a PPDA of 19.21 against Leipzig. Blessin prefers his team to wait for their opponents in the middle of the park, block the midfield and force Leipzig to attack with long balls or from the flanks. They didn't jump aggressively to create pressure, but rather waited for the right moment to jump. In turn, this approach allowed St. Pauli to successfully prevent a number of dangerous attacks from their opponents.

It is only one game with this structure, so anything can happen: This system could get better and lead to more points for St. Pauli, or their opponents could find a way to neutralise it first. But there is also an optimistic side to this. Keeping a clean sheet against a team of Leipzig's calibre is a good start. Now it is up to Blessin to find a way of converting their chances into goals. So far, that has been the missing link in his St. Pauli team.