After suffering two straight losses at the start of their 2020/21 Ligue 1 campaign, PSG managed to earn their second straight league win this past weekend as they cruised to a 3-0 win over OGC Nice at the Allianz Riviera.
Meanwhile, in contrast to Les Parisiens, this past weekend’s game condemned Nice to a second straight Ligue 1 defeat, after they got off to a perfect start in their opening two games of the season, meaning that these two teams are now level on six points each four games into the 2020/21 campaign.
In this tactical analysis piece, we will look at the tactics behind Thomas Tuchel’s side’s dominant victory away to Patrick Vieira’s Nice. We will provide some analysis of both of these teams in and out of possession and we will attempt to determine what the key aspects to this game were for both teams from a tactical perspective.
Lineups and formations
Firstly, we will take a look at how both of these two teams lined up in this past Sunday’s Ligue 1 fixture. Starting with the home side, Vieira’s team lined up in a 4-3-3 shape for this clash with Les Parisiens.
Walter Benítez started between the sticks for Les Aiglons here, while a back four consisting of right-back Youcef Atal, left-back Jordon Lotomba and the central defensive pairing of left centre-back Dante and right centre-back Andy Pelmard played directly in front of him.
Morgan Schneiderlin started this game at the base of Les Aiglons’ midfield, while Pierre Lees-Melou and Khéphren Thuram played either side of him in slightly more advanced central midfield roles.
Hassane Kamara played at left-wing in this game, while Rony Lopes played on the right-wing and Amine Gouiri started this game in the centre forward position for Nice.
As for the away side, Tuchel lined his team up in a 4-2-4 shape for this one.
Keylor Navas started in goal for Les Parisiens in this one, while right-back Alessandro Florenzi, who is on loan with Paris from Serie A side AS Roma, left-back Mitchel Bakker and the central defensive duo of right centre-back Marquinhos and left centre-back Presnel Kimpembe made up PSG’s back four for this one.
Marco Verratti and Idrissa Gueye were PSG’s two starting central midfielders, while the PSG attackers were a quartet of Julian Draxler, Kylian Mbappé, Ángel Di María and Mauro Icardi.
PSG in possession
Moving onto the tactical analysis portion of this piece, firstly, we are going to look at PSG’s tactics in possession of the ball during Sunday’s clash with Nice.
The away side utilised the wings quite heavily in this game and as a result, their full-backs were integral to their tactics when in possession of the ball. Left-back Bakker, in particular, played quite a significant role for his side in the build-up and in terms of actual chance creation.
Bakker played 55 passes in this game, while PSG’s right-back, Florenzi, played just 29 passes, with both players remaining on the pitch for the full 90 minutes. This gives us an indication of just how involved the 20-year-old Dutchman was for his side last Sunday.
The heavy focus of PSG attacks on the left side of the pitch may also have had something to do with the fact that Mbappé was usually situated towards the left side of the pitch, either in a left-sided channel whilst occupying the centre forward position, or actually on the left-wing.
In this image above, we can see how PSG liked to create overloads on the left-wing by stretching the play via a pass from either the centre-back or central midfielder, in this case Verratti, out to the overlapping Bakker.
