At the end of January, the defending MLS Champions unveiled their newest addition to the squad. Joao Paulo was announced as Seattle Sounders third designated player, a sign that they were only planning on improving as they headed into the 2020 MLS season. The player made the move from Botafogo on loan.
But to fans of the MLS, Paulo might be a relatively unknown player. He has been playing competitive first-team football since 2010 but has only played in his home country of Brazil before making the move to America. This tactical analysis and scout report will hopefully introduce Paulo to curious fans and identify exactly how he might fit into Brian Schmeltzers tactics.
Background
Paulo started his career in Brazil and has played there his whole career. He has played 125 games in the countrys first-tier, and 69 in its second. In those games, he has scored a total of 12 goals and recorded 15 assists. He plays as a central attacking midfielder but has experience playing on the right side of the midfield as well.
Despite having a low direct goal involvement, Paulo is dangerous in his teams build-up. He is also known for his good deliveries from set-pieces as well. In the rest of this analysis, we will identify how these skills will be a benefit to the Sounders as they look to successfully defend the MLS Cup.
Forward passes
One thing that Sounders fans can expect to see from their new recruit is forward passing. When Paulo receives the ball, his first look is almost always forward. The player averages 47.61 passes per match, 84.5% of which are accurate. Of those passes, he averages 16.16 forward passes per match, with a 73.8% accuracy. He only averages 7.93 backward passes per match, although 95.4% of these are accurate.
When taking up a central position, Paulo looks to receive balls from his teammates and quickly transition up the field. Many of his passes look to release players into space in wide areas. We can see an example of this in the image below. As he dribbles into the free space, we can see his teammate making a darting run down the left-wing.
Paulo plays the ball into the deep area, allowing his teammate to explode into space. This passage of play breaks the midfield lines and creates a 1v1 in a wide area.
The above example shows ho
