Betis 1-2 Barcelona – Tactical Analysis

FC Barcelona beat Real Betis in a match dominated from start to finish by Xavi’s team.

FC Barcelona

In possession

Barça played again with 4 midfielders leaving Rapinha on the right wing and Balde on the left, who showed a lot of depth. This made the Betis defence very wide and allowed Barcelona to take advantage of the space between the lines.

Here we can see Gavi receiving in the build-up, the pass breaks a line and no Betis player comes out to press Gavi who has time and space to turn.

The same happens in the opponent’s half, Gavi receives and there are doubts in Betis whether to go out or not to try to recover the ball.

One of the situations that created more problems for Betis was when Pedri received in these positions, generating 3vs2 plays with Lewandowski and Raphinha. Pedri turns and the Betis defense forced to retreat inside their box leaving Pedri plenty of time to make the best decision.

It should be noted that Pedri played very close to the Betis box, being even more influential than in the rest of the games played this season, although he wasn’t accurate in finishing.

The depth of Balde that we saw at the beginning was key throughout the game, with Barça’s midfielders playing inside, leaving the left flank free for him.

Barça took advantage of it in the goal, Balde with a lot of space, Ruibal who is playing as a right back this season has a hard time defending in many plays and Rapinha scores the goal.

Real Betis

Attacking transition

Throughout the match the only opportunities for Betis to generate danger were in attacking transition, having good situations. They lacked better decision making and speed, having several counterattacks with superiority against the defence.

Barça won playing one of their best games of the season.