Champions League performance insights: Inter's effective pressing vs Atlético de Madrid

The defensive organisation of both sides was a key feature of this week’s UEFA Champions League round of 16 encounter between Inter and Atlético de Madrid.

To build on their initial post-match review of the action, the UEFA analysis unit has taken a closer look at the pressing game of the two teams on Tuesday night – and found that, overall, Inter had the edge, pressing higher and, crucially, to better overall effect.

Regain locations

The first graphic shows the regain locations for the two sides at San Siro – and it tells us that Inter were winning the ball higher up the pitch. In their home leg, they looked to get on the front foot and their pressing game helped them set the tone. Atlético pressed high too but less often – which we elaborate on in the chart that follows.

Defending shape

‘Defending’ refers to the shape of the team when they are applying pressure and this pie chart offers a simple breakdown of the approach of the two teams, who will meet again in Madrid on 13 March. Inter defended in a high block two-thirds of the time (66%) – a ratio which includes moments in transition as they counterpressed.

As for Diego Simeone’s Atlético side, half of their defensive work (51%) was done in a high block. Although they had one more pressure than Inter over the course of the match – 57 to their hosts’ 56 – they are not a team who press high at every opportunity and so, when out of possession, fell back into a compact mid-block almost as often (49%).

Passes prior to first press

This data tells us how quickly the teams applied pressure – and it shows that Inter were quicker to press. The first column of the bar chart reveals that 82% of the Italian team’s pressing actions came after no more than two opposition passes. In Atlético’s case, they recorded almost two-thirds (63%) of their pressing actions after 0-2 passes but also roughly one-third (32%) after 3-5 passes. At times they allowed Inter a couple more passes as they dropped into a mid-block, and this explains their higher percentage of pressures in a mid-block defending shape, as mentioned above.

This video clip above offers an example of Inter thwarting an Atlético attempt to play out from the back, which belongs to the category of a pressure within 0-2 passes. Other such interventions came during transitional moments as they looked to stop the visitors countering – of which more in the next section.

Type of pressure

This chart shows the types of pressure from the two sides at San Siro on Tuesday night. For Atlético, the team press (44%) accounted for almost half of their efforts. A team press is one which involves five players or more, or which takes place in the high block – and in their case, the Madrid team did much of their pressing work when Inter were in organised possession. The video below gives an example of Atlético pressing in this way.

From an Inter perspective, it is worth noting that 43% of their pressures came when they were counterpressing – which means attempts to regain the ball in the opposition half within five seconds of losing it. In this way they sought to stop Atlético from creating quick attacks and, moreover, to dominate the play in the opposition half.

Pressing outcome

Among the key numbers in the chart above are the regains – and when added together, they show that when Inter pressed they won the ball 45% of the time. For Atlético, the ratio was lower at 32%.

Inter also did better in their attempts to resist opposition pressure – indeed they managed to either retain possession or progress the ball up the field 68% of the time. The clip below shows an example of the latter as, from a goal-kick, they play through the press, with Henrikh Mkhitaryan making a driving run as they advance the ball into the visitors’ half of the pitch.

As a final point, to cite a couple of individuals in the Inter team, midfielder Nicolò Barella’s energy was significant as he won seven of his ten duels (70%). Lautaro Martínez posted impressive numbers in this respect too – 12 duels with an 83% success percentage.

Supporting Player Development

"These performance insight articles aim to provide clubs and national associations with granular data linked to video, which can be tailored towards a deeper understanding of individual and team performance from our senior club and national team competitions. By looking deeply into certain trends, UEFA can be in position to offer knowledge about actionable trends which will help support player development across the European landscape and beyond."
UEFA’s Head of Technical Education & Development, Olivier Doglia