Brazil was widely tipped as a potential winner of the FIFA World Cup 2018 in Russia and its been so far so good for the Brazilians. After topping a difficult group, they sealed their passage into the last eight by beating Mexico 2-0. This strong nation will class anything other than a trip to the final as a failure. This leaves the side under a lot of pressure to beat Belgium and advance into the semi-final.
Head coach Tite will have a plan though. The coach has done brilliantly since taking over the reins and Brazil always look well-prepared. Prior to their clash with Belgium, Ive looked at two key areas where Brazil can look to hurt their opponent.
Expose Belgium on the wings
When looking through Belgiums games, and how theyve conceded chances, it became clear that they have some issues regarding how they defend wide areas. Especially the space between centre-back and wing-back. With such an attacking player as Yannick Carrasco playing as a wing-back, its clear he will be an attacking asset rather than defensive. Sometimes he is caught high up the pitch leaving lots of space to exploit around Jan Vertonghen. Vertongen is a fantastic player but hes not the quickest. As Japan showed, his lack of pace can be exposed.
In the image below we see the build-up to Tunisias second goal versus Belgium. The ball is played between the left-sided centre-back and the left wing-back. A Tunisian player attacks the space in-behind and cuts it across for a teammate to score.
As mentioned above, Japan exposed Vertonghens lack of pace when scoring their opening goal. First of all, Japan found plenty of space in central midfield, which Ill discuss later. Belgiums central midfielders, Witsel and De Bruyne, are overplayed and Japan progresses the ball into a dangerous position. Note the high position of Belgiums left wing-back in the bottom left corner.
Below, Japan winger Haraguchi makes a run into depth behind Ve
