La Liga 2020/21: Real Sociedad vs Villarreal

Last Sunday, Real Sociedad hosted Villarreal for a real peak of the table clash in La Liga. This season, were seeing the emergence of other title contenders not named Barcelona or Real Madrid, so 2020/21 is shaping up to be a blast.

And perhaps fittingly for two of the top teams in the league, the clash ended in a stalemate with each side only managing to score from a penalty kick. This tactical analysis will dissect both teams’ tactics and tell you how they effectively counteracted each other.

Lineups

We’ll start the analysis by looking at the team news and shapes in possession. Imanol Alguacil deployed a slightly rotated Real Sociedad side with Álex Remiro in goal and a quartet of Aihen Muñoz, Robin Le Normand, Igor Zubeldia and Aritz Elustondo in the backline.

In front of them, La Real had Mikel Merino and Ander Guevara in a double-pivot, while Mikel Oyarzabal, Roberto López and Ander Barrenetxea were positioned in a three behind the main striker, Willian José.

Most notably, Alguacil left Portu, Adnan Januzaj and Alexander Isak on the bench as Real Sociedad were deployed in a 4-2-3-1 formation.

On the other hand, Unai Emery went for a strong lineup with Sergio Asenjo in goal and a defensive line of Pervis Estupiñán, Pau Torres, Raúl Albiol and Mario Gaspar just ahead of him.

In midfield, we saw Vicente Iborra and Dani Parejo more centrally while Alfonso Pedraza and Manu Trigueros were the wide options. Up front, Gerard Moreno and Carlos Bacca led the attack as the likes of Samu Chukwueze and Take Kubo remained on the bench.