Alfred Schreuder took over Hoffenheim during this summer after Julian Nagelsmann left the club and joined RB Leipzig. Hoffenheim finished last season in the ninth position and so they won’t take part in any European competition this season. Considering this, Schreuder and his team can totally focus on the Bundesliga.
Nagelsmann took over the Kraichgauer in February 2016 and rescued them from relegation. In the following seasons, they were among the best teams of the Bundesliga and finished fourth, third and ninth respectively. So, Schreuder took over a team which already showed during the last three campaigns that they are a side with a lot of potential and quality.
This tactical analysis will show Schreuder’s career so far, conclude the tactics and the philosophy of his previous team where he was the head coach and use a pre-season friendly to examine how Hoffenheim might will play in this season.
His way
After Schreuder ended his career as a player at Vitesse Arnheim in the winter break in 2008, he instantly became an assistant coach at the same club. However, he just stayed there until the summer break in 2009 and then moved to Twente Enschede where he was also the assistant coach until 2014.
He was also the caretaker manager in 2013 for four matches but he hadnt gotten the license to be a coach of a team in the Eredivisie and so he became the assistant coach again until the end of the season.
After he earned his license, he became the new head coach of Twente in the summer of 2014 and stayed there for the 2014/15 season. His team finished in the 10th position in the Eredivisie.
Then he moved to Hoffenheim to be Huub Steven’s assistant coach and stayed there when Nagelsmann took the team over in 2016. He was the German’s assistant coach for 77 matches before he joined Ajax in January 2018 to become Erik ten Hag’s assistant coach. He stayed at the Dutch champions until this summer and now returned to Hoffenheim where he’s now the new head coach.
Schreuder’s Twente in possession
The season 2014/15 was the only year until now in which Schreuder was the head coach of a team. Twente finished in the 10th position in the Eredivisie and reached the semi-finals of the Dutch club. There were some young talented players in the squad like Hakim Ziyech, Luc Castaignos and Jesús Corona. We will now discuss their tactics.
Schreuder usually lined his team up in a 4-4-2 with Castaignos and Ziyech upfront. Since Castaignos is a classic striker and his Moroccan teammate an offensive midfielder, Ziyech often dropped deeper to support the two central midfielders and so the formation turned into a 4-2-3-1.
Schreuders team mostly built up their game with short passes from the back. In some occasions, they also used long balls to find one of their two strikers. However, their general plan was to keep the distances short between the players to always create enough passing options for the player on the ball.
The two centre-backs and the two central midfielders organised the build-up while the full-backs pushed up. Besides, Ziyech often dropped deep to get involved in the build-up and get on the ball. Furthermore, the wingers often tucked in to create space for the full-backs. In the image below, all these aspects get visible. Ziyech is very deep while the centre-back is on the ball. Corona creates space due to his run into the centre and the left-back uses this.
