FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023: Why Spain must prepare for Japan’s premium possession play and varied attacking threat – tactical analysis

On Monday, we’re going to be treated to a major clash in the World Cup Group C, with Japan taking on Spain. Both teams are already guaranteed to advance to the knockout stages of the tournament, having both beaten their other group opponents, Zambia and Costa Rica, in convincing fashion. However, there’s still a lot riding on Monday’s game, as it will determine which of the two sides top the group, potentially earning a more favourable draw in the first knockout round.

Spain and Japan have undoubtedly been two of the in-form sides at the tournament, demonstrating some highly admirable football in their opening two games. This tactical analysis will focus on the structured and effective in-possession play that’s been demonstrated by Futoshi Ikeda’s Japan so far at the World Cup, highlighting what Jorge Vilda’s Spain need to be prepared to deal with.

In our scout report, we will provide analysis of Japan’s general in-possession structure from their first two World Cup games, look at the similarities and differences in how this structure, along with the coach’s strategy and tactics, broke down their first two opponents — Zambia and Costa Rica, respectively — before previewing the upcoming Spain clash.

Japan vs Zambia: Why were the central midfielders instrumental?

Starting with their first game versus Zambia, Japan delivered a masterclass in breaking down your opponent in this game — take nothing away from them. However, Zambia also failed to provide adequate defensive organisation and energy; this made life easier for Ikeda’s side than it really should have been.

Nadeshiko Japan have utilised a 3-4-3 shape in the World Cup, while Zambia defended in a 4-1-4-1 against Ikeda’s team. At least, that’s what their shape was on paper — in reality, Japan did an excellent job manipulating the Copper Queens’ positioning via their passing, dribbling and off-the-ball movement. This resulted in Zambia’s shape being regularly distorted, especially in midfield.

Japan’s 3-4-3 shape naturally creates diamonds between the wide centre-backs, wing-backs, central midfielders and wide forwards on either side of the pitch. This diamond shape creates favourable passing angles and plenty of options for the ball carrier.

We saw plenty of evidence of how this can be valuable for ball progression versus Zambia, with the wide centre-backs frequently finding themselves with time and space to start attacks and pick out passes into more advanced positions from where their team could then advance into the final third, largely thanks to the structure that the team have trained.

Ikeda’s team play in a very orderly manner, frequently demonstrating very well-prepared and orchestrated movements and automatisms. Zambia struggled to cope with the speed of play Japan could generate from their well-trained moves and never really got to grips with Japan’s wide diamonds. This was fatal for them in this game and led to Nadeshiko Japan generating chance after chance.

We have one example of Japan’s 3-4-3 in the ball progression phase here in figure 1, showcasing a Japanese attack from the fourth minute of the game. We can see how it and the players’ movements manipulated the opposition’s defensive structure and created problems.

Firstly, we can clearly see the wide diamond Japan’s structure creates in the top image. With the right-forward positioned dangerously in the half-space — and Zambia’s holding midfielder unable to mark the two Japan wide-forwards in these spaces between the lines — the Copper Queens’ right central midfielder drops, essentially getting pinned back to Japan’s wide forward. This forces the rest of Zambia’s midfield narrower. We saw this reoccur throughout the game.