Welcome back to the Tactical Analysis, the (supposedly) weekly article where we here at Quail City Soccer break down the numbers, the lineups, and the tactics that make Republic tick. Unfortunately, it’s been a few weeks since our last one of these—a combination of vacation, illness, and life has gotten in the way of things. Fortunately, Republic hasn’t lost a game in that time. They’ve gotten at least a point in their last 12 matches, setting a club record undefeated streak and getting hot just in time for playoffs. 

While this 12 match undefeated streak has had some fairly notable results (the 3-2 win over second place New Mexico, a late 1-1 draw in Tulsa, etc.), none have been as impressive as this week’s 1-0 win over first place El Paso. El Paso hasn’t lost a home match since August, in a USL Cup loss to New Mexico, and haven’t lost a home.

It’s become a bit of a meme at this point, but for the first time since June 26th, Michel Benítez has started a match for Republic and he performed like a player who hasn’t missed a step, putting up the third-best player rating of any Republic player on the pitch. As Republic continues to get healthy, just in time for the playoffs, Collins has been given the luxury of choice in the starting XI. This has allowed him to rotate players when necessary, with a clear eye on having a fully fit squad in time for the first round of the playoffs on November 1. 

With that in mind, Collins made several changes to the starting XI in Republic’s standard 4-2-3-1 formation compared to the previous week’s match against Colorado. With Benítez stepping into the left back role, Desmond moved back to pair at center back with Timmer and Collins was able to rest Freddy Kleemann, who has just recently returned from injury. Gurr kept his usual start at right back, and the defensive midfield pivot of Crisostomos and Casas remained the same, but both wings were swapped out, with Ajago and Malango stepping in to start in place of Spaulding and Willey.

Up top, the one man wrecking crew that is Memo Rodriguez continued his run of form in an attacking midfield role. Memo has started each of the last 10 matches—in those 10 matches, he’s put up a ridiculous player rating average of 7.78 with 6 goals and 3 assists. Those are MVP numbers. In front of him sat Cal Jennings, who is… still hitting his stride, let’s say.

The subs were fairly standard, with one welcome exception: The return of Mark-Anthony Kaye from injury. His first appearance in 2 months after a knee injury was a short one, just 8 minutes, but it resulted in the game winning assist as he fed a clean pass through the middle of the El Paso box to Memo Rodriguez.

El Paso utilized what is on paper a 4-3-3 but in practice operated more as a 3-4-3. This formation heavily relies on the 2 outside players, let’s call them the right mid and left mid, to provide all of the width for the team up and down the entire length of the pitch. This allows the Locomotive to have those wide players drop into the backline and shift into a 5-2-3, as you can see here:

Where you have 5 defenders and 2 midfielders, before quickly springing forward counter attacks by switching to a 3-2-5, as seen here:

Where both outside players are now well forward (and one is off-screen and up pitch). This also puts a lot of pressure on the middle 2 players to act as a double pivot, linking the back 3 (or 5) with the front 3 (or 5) in transition.

If you look at the attacking areas, you can see how this plays out. For the following graphics, the brighter the color the square, the higher the concentration of play, and the longer the arrow, the more the team attacked on that part of the pitch. First, look at El Paso’s attack:

Most of their play is around the half line, and they had a fairly balanced attack into Republic’s third. Now compare that to Republic’s attack:

Where Republic fairly clearly favored the wings, particularly the left. 

So let’s get into the numbers of how these 2 tactics played out. The biggest and most obvious impact was the offside flag, which was raised against El Paso an eye-watering total of 10 times. El Paso is averaging just 1.9 offside calls against them this season, so 10 is a huge departure from their norm. And the main reason for this is just how high Republic’s backline sat when under attack. Take this play, for example, where El Paso get called for offside on the next pass:

El Paso is driving into the Republic box, but Republic sets their line outside of their own goal box. Often, Republic would draw their line so high, they completely disregarded several offensive players. And take this instance towards the end of the game:

El Paso has 2 players completely free on the far side of the ball, but Republic holds their line and forces El Paso to try and pass through it—which they failed to do. 

To stop Republic’s attack, El Paso focused on the middle of the pitch and seemed content to allow Republic to cross the ball into the box. Republic had 20 crosses to El Paso’s 13, but connected on just 3 of those. With El Paso keeping bodies in the box, Republic found it difficult to take advantage of the space they were given on the wings. For example, look at this positioning late in the first half: 

El Paso has 5 players in the box and largely lets Republic have the wing until Republic move forward.

Even here, El Paso get a bit lucky—Malango is double teamed, but still wins the header on the ensuing cross, but he puts it wide. In fact, El Paso was lucky a few times—Republic had 3 big chances and missed 2 of them. This could have easily been a 3-0 game. And that’s not counting the clear penalty that should have been awarded to Cal Jennings when he was wiped out by the El Paso keeper, who, on replay, doesn’t get so much as a sniff of the ball. I would show you the replay here, but USL very conveniently did not include it in any of their highlights. USL’s testing of Football Video Support (FVS) in the USL Cup seems to be going well, and one can hope that means it will make its way to league play soon. 

Republic finally found the breakthrough in the 87th minute in a large part because of all the bodies that El Paso put into the box. As MAK takes control of the ball here, he is swarmed by 4 to 5 different El Paso players: 

But because there are so many defenders, the Locomotive players actually lose their marks, which allows Memo to get free in the center of the box. MAK makes an extremely difficult pass through traffic to get it to him, but once Memo has it, there’s no one on him at all:

It’s late in the match, El Paso has tired legs, and MAK had just subbed on, but someone on the defense still has to pick up the free man in the box. Republic will happily take the breakthrough. 

5 Minutes
The amount of time it took for MAK to pick up an assist in his first appearance in 2 months. 

56%
The win rate for Republic on all duels, including going 19 for 29 on duels in the air. 

0.35
El Paso’s total xG, the 4th lowest against Republic on the year.

9
The number of goal contributions from Memo Rodriguez in the last 10 games. 

113 Days
Days since Michelle Benítez’s last start for Republic.

I will say, this match did not need to be as close as it seemed. Republic missed several chances, and the struggles from Cal Jennings up top continues to be of concern. He missed a sitter in this match and, in 10 games with Republic, has scored just once in 7 starts with an average player rating of just 6.43, by far the worst player rating average on the team. Republic continues to be a place where good strikers go and struggle before leaving for greener pastures and playing well again. For other examples, just see Khori Bennet, Russell Cicerone, or even Cristian Parano.

That being said, Republic’s scoring issues have largely been neutralized by an on-fire Memo Rodriguez and Kyle Edwards. In this streak of 12 games undefeated, the 2 have accounted for 10 of Republic’s 15 goals, and have provided assists on 4 of those 15.

The undefeated streak has thrust Republic into a place unthinkable just a month ago—a shot at first in the West. It’s not completely in Republic’s hands, but a win this coming weekend in the final match of the regular season against local rival Oakland would guarantee Republic a top 2 finish—meaning 2 guaranteed home playoff matches—and a draw between New Mexico and El Paso would put Republic in first. 

It’s all to play for in the final week and Republic is hitting their stride at just the right time.