UEFA EURO 2024 Final: How set pieces could decide the European Champions – tactical preview

On Sunday, the Euros come to an end as the eagerly anticipated clash between two titans, Spain and England, takes place at the Olympiastadion in Berlin. This preview will solely focus on both teams from a set-play perspective to discover how they might be able to score the decisive goal to win the European Championship.

So far, Spains success has primarily come from open play, but they have managed to create multiple key chances from set plays, including a goal against Croatia following a short corner kick. From 34 corner kicks, it is fair to say they have been inefficient, but with an average of nearly six corners per game, Spain will have plenty more opportunities to create chances from dead balls in the final.

England, on the other hand, have failed to score from each of their 22 corner kick attempts. Averaging just under four corners per game, alongside the fact they failed to win a single corner kick in the semi-final, England will likely obtain minimal opportunities to create from corners. However, England have achieved success in other ways, including goals from a free kick and a throw-in during the round of 16 victory over Slovakia.

Last weeks article detailed the weaknesses of each of the last eight, including the two finalists, highlighting the most vulnerable parts of each teams defensive structure. This week, we will discuss how each side attempts to create chances from dead balls and whether the match-up of the offensive and defensive structures could possibly lead to a goal.

This tactical analysis will provide a detailed examination of the significant set-piece tactics to anticipate from both teams ahead of the fixture. This analysis will draw on crucial set-piece strategies exhibited in their respective semi-final appearances while considering the approaches observed in earlier rounds.

Spains Set Piece Threat

Before we look at how Spain could create from dead balls, we must look back at how England have prepared to defend corner kicks in each of their previous games during the tournament. England use two zonal defenders, protecting the central space at the six-yard line with other defenders man-marking any free attacker. The ways in which Englands structure could be exposed had already been discussed in the prior article, but put most simply, the deep and underloaded number of zonal markers means that the Spanish players have plenty of space to attack outside of Englands zonal presence, with the only necessity being for a Spaniard to gain separation from his marker.

In the previous game against the Netherlands, 2 out of the three corner kicks won; the Dutch were able to make the first contact in the areas shown below, where the deep zonal presence meant no one was already in a position to attack the ball. As a result, the space just outside the near edge of the six-yard box is one that can be accessed by an attacker arriving from deep, whose only job is to lose his marker. This can be achieved in several ways, whether that is by gaining separation through sharp movement, arriving from the blindside, or gaining the dynamic advantage by using runs from deep.

The fact that England are vulner