The so-called three-center-back system refers to the team's attack, the full-back or center-back position before the midfield, forming a three-center-back position.

The benefits of this are quite numerous:

First, the positioning of the three central defenders makes their own side lack full-backs, and the width of the defensive line is reduced, and if the opponent wants to continue to carry out the tactics of pressing high, they need to let their winger position advance to press their two wide central defenders.

Manchester City's midfielder has an extra player, which will further force the opposition to put in the midfield, so that their formation is forced to shrink into a trapezoid.

In this way, the passing routes of Manchester City's two wings will also come out, and the full-backs can directly hand the ball to the wingers, so that the wingers can take the ball to organize the attack.

And thanks to the contraction of the opponent's defensive formation, the wide players have more room to move when attacking with the ball, and will not be disturbed and intercepted at the first time, which makes it easier for them to advance with the ball, and the possibility of attacking the opponent's half or even the 30-meter area is also greatly improved!

Pep Guardiola is worthy of being a world-class coach, and the tactics he came up with can greatly improve Manchester City's attacking strength, but he himself is still quite nervous at this time, and he is not sure if this trick will work.

On the other side, in the dressing room of Liverpool.

Jurgen Klopp is encouraging his disciples: "You did a great job in the first half, I'm so proud of you! ”

Hearing Klopp's praise, the Liverpool players puffed up their chests one by one, and their hearts were full of pride and pride.

The stronger the opponent, the more it shows their strength.

'But Man City are not an underdog, and the Etihad Stadium is not such an easy field to attack, so I need you to continue to give your full form in the second half, not to be arrogant, not to fight for every goal, not to give our opponents any chance, and I hope we can return to Liverpool with a win in the end.'

After saying this, Klopp's eyes sharpened, and after glancing at the Liverpool soldiers in the dressing room, he asked loudly:

"Tell me, can you do it?"

"Yes!"

The Liverpool players shouted at the top of their voices, vowing to win the victory as a gift to the coach and fans!

"Okay, then go take them down!"

Jurgen Klopp pushed open the door to the dressing room, waved his hand, and stood in the door to high-five every Liverpool player who came out.

The dressing rooms of the two teams are not far away, and the Manchester City players next door can hear the commotion on Liverpool's side clearly.

However, there was no expression on their faces, and they all walked towards the court in silence without squinting.

The morale of the opponents is high, and what awaits them in the second half is bound to be a tough battle.

Such a bitter battle has not been seen for Manchester City for a long time.

But will Manchester City be afraid?

I'm afraid it won't be called Manchester City!

With the referee's whistle, the second half of the game officially began.

Manchester City took the lead in making substitutions, the in-form Aguero was replaced by Son Xingmin, and Lin Quan's position was advanced and he stood in the forward position.

When Klopp saw this, his heart was shocked: Is it coming?

He had obviously watched the derby between Manchester City and Manchester United, so it was no surprise that City had replaced their strikers.

However, if you want to play without a striker, shouldn't you replace the striker and add a midfielder?

But what does it mean for Pep Guardiola to switch to a winger?

Is it because the score is behind and you don't want to take off an attacking player?

But without the containment of the striker, the players in Liverpool's backfield can press forward more boldly, and Manchester City does not send a back three, can they withstand the impact of Liverpool?

Klopp couldn't figure out why Guardiola did this for a while, but given Guardiola's quality, he didn't consider it a low-level mistake made by the opponent.

Instead, I worry about whether the other party has taken into account something that I can't see.

If that's the case, I'm afraid the situation is a bit dangerous.

Thinking of this, Klopp brace himself and concentrate on watching the game.

This observation immediately reveals the difference.

"City's formation has changed!"

When he saw City attacking, right-back Zabaleta left his position and moved into a midfield position, while the remaining three defenders shrank down the middle to form a three-centre-back formation.

Is this Guardiola's backhand?

Without reducing the number of attacking players in the frontcourt, through the premise of full-backs, to ensure that you have enough interception ability in the midfield position?

But the question is, isn't Zabaleta a real midfielder?

Will he be up to the duties of this position?

It's not just Jurgen Klopp who sees this, but Liverpool's players also see a change in City's formation.

At the beginning, they didn't care, and even wanted to take advantage of the decline in the number of Manchester City's backline to further increase the pressing gifts in the front, and their two wingers directly hit the faces of the central defenders on the left and right sides of Manchester City, and the overall formation was very forward.

The advance of the two winger positions forced the Liverpool midfielders to step forward to ensure a reasonable distance between their three lines.

The Liverpool players took Klopp's demands in the dressing room seriously, and they used aggressive running and scrambling to limit the passing and linking of the Manchester City players.

In the process, the whole of Liverpool is like a machine, every component is running at high speed, and no one is lazy.

However, they found that their high pressing effect in the second half was far worse than in the first half.

City stepped up their attacking efforts in the second half, with their two wings frequently finding their own half and even creating good chances to shoot.

In the 52nd minute of the second half, Lin Quan chose to cut inside after a successful breakthrough on the side, and the ball hit the crossbar, which made the Liverpool players can't help but sweat in their hearts.

It's so dangerous, it's a little bit worse than that, and their lead is only one goal left!

Although the goal was not scored, it was a wake-up call for Liverpool, and their defensive tactics were in trouble.

But what's the problem?

On the sidelines, Klopp also noticed this, he frowned, and carefully recalled in his mind the whole process of the initiation, organization and end of Manchester City's offensive just now.

"Why didn't Lin Quan's wing players come forward to press him the first time he received the ball?"

A question popped up in his mind, and he was very focused on defending on both sides of the pitch for Manchester City.

Especially for Manchester City's top scorer Lin Quan, it is even more vigilant.

But he clearly remembered that when Lin Quan received a pass from his teammates just now, Liverpool's full-back did not step forward to interfere and intercept at the first time.

What's going on?

Was it because the players were lazy and didn't execute their tactics, or was there something happening on the pitch that they didn't notice?

Thinking of this, Klopp's eyes widened, staring closely at the position of the Manchester City players on the pitch.

In fact, for the manager, because they are on the same level as the players, it is not so easy to observe the position of the players at once.

If Klopp was standing in the stands at this time, he could clearly see that the defensive position of the Liverpool players had changed unconsciously.

And this change is not the result of Klopp's active adjustment, but the result of passivity.

After Zabaleta's premise, the opposing midfield now has 4 players, if they continue to follow the first half of the pressing, they will have to grab more with less, even if they run diligently, it is difficult to make up for the gap in numbers, unable to form enough pressure on the opponent.

As a result, Liverpool's formation was forced to retract and retreat to the middle.

There is no way around it, the players did it spontaneously, and Klopp would not feel anything abnormal even if he saw it, because even if he played, he would do it subconsciously.

But it was this natural thing that made Manchester City's attack come alive.

After Sun Xingmin came on the field, he frequently relied on his speed to run wildly with the ball on the side, and his ability to cut inside was limited, so he only needed to use his speed to advance the ball to the front, and then find a way to hand it over to Lin Quan to complete the task.

And Lin Quan will also take the initiative to approach the side when Sun Xingmin is dribbling the ball to meet him.

Lin Quan caused Liverpool's full-backs to stick to restrict Son Xingmin, so he could only choose to stand in the middle of the two and cut off the connection between the two as much as possible.

This kind of position, there is almost no way to bring any interference to Sun Xingmin, he can dribble the ball very comfortably and complete the pass!

What's worse is that in the process of this attack, Manchester City's resources are very obviously skewed.

At that time, not only Son Xingmin and Lin Quanhui will be active on the side, but De Bruyne and even Zabaleta will lean towards this side to form a local numerical advantage.

And their positions are still very scattered, not the kind of positions that are crowded together and let others lose their space to flicker and move.

This made it much more difficult for Liverpool to defend on the flanks, as they were unable to intercept Son Heung-min's dribbling and passing.

And once the ball is handed over to Lin Quan's hands, with Lin Quan's explosiveness and breakthrough ability, their backs and defenders can't stop him at the first time.

In this way, Liverpool's defence can be described as precarious, and it is only a matter of time before he scores.

Sure enough, shortly after Lin Quan's shot hit the crossbar, in the 58th minute, Manchester City made a comeback.

It was still Sun Xingmin who drove the ball on the side, and after he brought it to the 30-meter area, he did not go directly to the bottom, but after glancing at the direction of his teammates, he passed it back to Lin Quan, who followed up.

After receiving the ball, Lin Quan continuously smashed the ball and changed direction, shaking past the defenders and entering the penalty area.

This time he didn't rush to shoot, but after the goalkeeper attacked, he made a light pick, provoked a beautiful arc, and sent the ball firmly into the goal.

2:3！

Manchester City chased one more goal, and the score gap between the two teams was only the last goal!

On the sidelines, Klopp couldn't sit still.

His eyes widened and he stared at the Manchester City players on the pitch with a solemn expression.

It was not Lin Quan who appeared in his sight, but Manchester City's right wing-back Zabaleta!

It was the change in this person's position that caused this series of chain reactions.

It turns out that Guardiola's formation of three central defenders is here!

Klopp didn't hesitate, he immediately beckoned the two strikers on the bench to warm up and get ready to play.

Manchester City's tactical offensive ability has indeed improved a lot, but the sacrifice of defense is also visible to the naked eye.

Players such as Coutinho are almost exhausted and can't put more pressure on City's backline.

In this case, he gave all three substitutions to the striker, and used more physical substitutes to impact Manchester City's defense.

I'd like to see if your Pep Guardiola's formation can hold up!

After making the decision to make substitutions, Klopp called Coutinho over and asked them, the players who were about to be replaced, to run desperately on the pitch and use various methods to drain the physical energy of Manchester City's defenders.

Anyway, they will be able to rest in a while, and it doesn't matter if they consume more at this time.

Klopp's ruthlessness and decisiveness made Guardiola on the side worried.

Seeing the other party's actions, he had already guessed Klopp's intentions in his heart.

Changing three people in a row, this kind of courage is still not available to everyone.

He really didn't have the confidence to withstand the impact of the other party, after all, Manchester City's new tactics were just the result of his brainstorm, and he didn't conduct too many experiments.

According to the words of the media and fans, this is his whole job, whether it can be done or not, Guardiola himself is not too sure!

Jurgen Klopp was more ruthless than Pep Guardiola had imagined, not only did he bring on three attacking players in one go in the 65th minute, but he also pushed the team's formation even further, and when attacking, both of Liverpool's full-backs rushed forward.

Their overall formation changed to 2-1-4-3, with the two full-backs completely bottomed, further increasing the width of the team's attack and the pressure up front.

As a result, it is no longer so easy for Manchester City to smoothly hand over the ball to the wide players when they switch from defense to attack, and they must wait until Liverpool's full-backs exit.

Of course, it is also possible to take the risk of a long pass to find a wide side, but then it is easy to fall into Liverpool's offside trap.

There is no one in the backfield, if you don't cooperate with the offside trap to strengthen the defense, then Liverpool can be said to be open in the middle of the door and lie down to death.

The coaches of the two teams may not be able to understand the moves of ordinary fans.

But they clearly felt that the competition had become more intense and exciting!

"Worthy of two of the world's top coaches, Pep Guardiola's three central defenders strengthened the team's wide attack, while Klopp's frantic pressing and full-backs' complete bottoming pushed back the two wing corridors that Manchester City had just created!"

"Pep Guardiola's adjustment can be called a stroke of genius, and I think his attacking system is likely to spread throughout the football world in the future.

And Klopp can see the opponent's intentions so quickly and make timely adjustments, and his on-the-spot command ability can also be called the top in football. ”

On the commentary panel of Sky Sports, Martin Taylor praised from the bottom of his heart.

"These two can be described as chess opponents, and they will meet good talents! This kind of Premier League is good-looking! ”

(End of chapter)