Two Strong Ball-Oriented Sides In An Intense Battle Bundesligafanatic.com Bayer 04 Leverkusen vs RB Leipzig. The battle of two pressing-sides. Two strong ball-oriented clubs, as they faced each other on an intense-Friday night in Leverkusen. After 90 minutes, Leipzig came out as the winner. As usual, the formation of Roger Schmidt was a 4-2-2-2 basic shape in their pressing -play.– a resting-press that allowed some space and time for the opposite central-defender to hold the ball but blocked any possible chances through the center. On attack, there were many interchanging positions, particularly between the striker-duo and the two advanced-wingers. Admer Mehmedi and Hakan Calhanoglu kept moving across the pitch whether to help create an overload or got involved in the execution-phase. Both wingers, especially Julian Brandt, were often found roaming far from the left hand-side to the right. The Leverkusen press also impacted Leipzig;s decision in playing as many as long-balls forward. But, on the other hand, this also came along with the typical build-up of Hassenhuttl’s boys. One scheme of the away side build-up relied on the strength of Yussuf Poulsen in bringing his teammates into play by utilizing his abilities in winning aerial-duels and hold-up the ball.. Similar to how Leverkusen approached the final-third penetration, the visiting side also displayed their strong ball-orientation since they needed to overload the ball-side area to generate penetration opportunity. RB Leipzig’s players were exemplary in executing such a scheme. They had to face an intense press by Schmidt’s boys but found success thanks to the spacing,close distance, and staggering which established some useful collective pressure-resistance. Hasenhüttl’s troops were just amazing at playing in the tight space. A fast combination using one-touch passing helped Leipzig by-pass Leverkusen’s press. But, in contrast to Leverkusen, Leipzig clearly felt comfortable relying on long-ball play more than the home side did. RBL didn’t play out of the back, but tended to directly play the floated-long pass to Poulsen. In other opportunities, they played the flat long ball forward to Timo Werner who often occupied the wide area in RBL’s counter-attacks. The latter had been one of the prime schemes playing directly to Werner’s proven ability to dribble with pace and agility. With Leverkusen known as a highly-compact side more than happy to keep it extremely narrow in the center, Werner;s wide-area occupation seemed to be a potentially highly-successful tactic.. The starting line-up before Compper got injured. Marvin Compper was taken out and subtituted by Benno Schmidtz. Stephane Ilsanker, who started at the right hand side, shifted to the center as Schmitz was plotted as the full-back. The winner was the one who handled the transitional-phase With both sides well-recognized as advocates of the intense-press, it had been difficult to create clean plays and chances through established-possession. Four of the five goals created in this match featured a transitional-phase in the process. The last goal of the match was also started by a transitional situation which gave RB Leipzig a corner-kick and ended-up with the winning header by defender Willi Orban. The final scoreline — Leverkusen 2-3 RB Leipzig. Of all the goals scored Friday, Forsberg’s astonishing equalizer epitomized the importance of the transition-phase. Keita recovered a loose-ball from a header by Halstenberg. The central midfielder made a short pass to Forsberg. Having received the ball, the former made a 45+ meters long dribble before releasing a screamer into Bernd Leno’s goal. And now, beyond almost anyone’s expectations, the RB Leipzig side led by Hasenhüttl and Ralf Rangnick are topping the table after just 11 matches in the Bundesliga !! For full read, please visit this link http://bundesligafanatic.com/tactic...ong-ball-oriented-sides-in-an-intense-battle/ Thank you for reading this and also thanks for visiting the site. You can find me on Twitter @ryantank100