Dante has been an ever-present at the heart of Nice’s defence for each of their first six Ligue 1 games of the 2020/21 campaign. As one might conclude by the fact that he has been on the pitch for the full 90 minutes in each of Nice’s six Ligue 1 games at the start of this season, the 36-year-old Brazilian has also been one of Les Aiglons’ most important players this term, and in particular, during Nice’s build-up play.
At present, Nice sit in third place on Ligue 1’s possession table for the 2020/21 campaign, with Patrick Vieira’s side having kept an average of 58.6% possession in their first six league games of the season. They have also played the second-highest number of passes (3349) of any Ligue 1 side at this point of the campaign trailing only Paris Saint-Germain.
Dante has been central to Nice’s heavily possession-based style of play thus far in the 2020/21 campaign, with the centre-back having played the highest number of passes (480) not just of any Nice player so far this season, but of any player in Ligue 1. Additionally, the former Bayern Munich man has got a 92.92% pass accuracy in France’s top tier from his opening six games of the campaign, which also, impressively, gives him the 28th-highest pass accuracy of any player in Ligue 1 despite the fact he has also played the most passes.
In this tactical analysis piece, in the form of a build-up-focused scout report, we will specifically look at Dante’s role for Nice in possession and during the build-up. This tactical analysis piece will show how important the 36-year-old’s ball-playing ability is for Vieira’s tactics and how important it is for his side when attempting to build attacks from the back.
Dante’s Positioning
To kick off this tactical analysis piece looking at Dante’s role in the build-up, we’re first going to look at his general positioning within Nice’s tactics.
The left-footed Brazilian plays in the left centre-back position for Nice, usually alongside right centre-back Andy Pelmard, who is 16 years his junior.
Nice’s central defenders tend to spend a lot of time on the ball and are usually required to play plenty of passes in a given game, as Les Aiglons are a heavily possession-based side that focuses on building up their attacks patiently from the back.
Dante’s left-footedness is, then, important for the left-sided centre-back in this system, as it tends to be easier for left-footed centre-backs to receive the ball on the left side of defence than it is for right-footed centre-backs, while left-footed centre-backs playing on the left side of defence can also create better passing angles and can potentially enjoy more potential passing options than a right-footed centre-back would in this position.
The image above shows us Dante’s heatmap from the first six games of the 2020/21 Ligue 1 campaign and as we can see, this also shows us that the position he generally occupies is the one you would typically associate with the left centre-back. While the 36-year-old doesn’t venture much beyond this typical left-sided centre-back position, however, it is clear that he covers plenty of ground in this general area and isn’t totally ‘stationary’ per se.
We will look at Dante’s movement, the area that he covers and the variety of exact positions that he moves into in his left centre-back position, at greater length later on in this tactical analysis piece.
