Full-Back Overlap & Underlap Principles: How Wide Runs Unlock Defences With Arsenal, Fulham, Napoli, & Atalanta – Tactical Theory

There are many highly effective principles for attacking opposing defences in the final third; two of these principles are the overlap and underlap.

These two principles are among the most important weapons used by full-backs or, occasionally, centre-backs.

Teams aim to exploit the width of the pitch to attack their opponents, either through the free spaces on the flanks directly, or through the central areas as a result of the opponents full-back being pulled to the side.

In this tactical theory, we will delve into the tactical details behind the overlap and underlap, and how full-backs like Antonee Robinson, Ben White, Sead Kolašinac, and Giovanni Di Lorenzo execute their overlaps or underlaps, with some differences due to the characteristics and coaches ideas.

Left-Back Overlap And Underlap: Antonee Robinson

Lets start with the left-backs overlapping runs, as I have chosen Robinson as an example, since the Fulham player is one of the most prominent full-backs in the Premier League at making those runs under the coach, Marco Silva.

Robinson is fast, so he was more involved in making long overlaps.

In the long overlap, the player gains high acceleration as a result of running a long distance.

In the following image, we can see a long overlap, which means that he starts his run at a distance from the ball carrier.

Robinson keeps running to gain more acceleration and moves behind his teammate, who drives the ball inside to make free space for Robinson.

After driving the ba