Analysis Corner: How Scotland's unconventional tactics won them the game

By Dougie Wright (@dougie_analysis)

Scotland set up in a nominally 4-1-4-1 formation with Scott Brown sitting deep while full backs Andy Robertson and Kieran Tierney ploughed on alongside the midfield. This overload in the midfield worked well at limiting the Slovenes attempts to move the ball forward. This is emphasized by Scotland getting the ball into the Slovenian final third 125 times, while only letting Slovenia into the Scottish final third 69 times.

So Scotland dominated the territory, but how did they do with it?

In the two 3-0 defeats to Slovakia and England towards the end of 2016, while Scotland matched their opponents in the sheer number of chances, the quality of the opportunities created was poor while the ones conceded were costly.

Thankfully, Hampden was not subjected to more of that on Sunday night. Of Scotland’s 15 shots, 14 were either in the box, or just outside:

Perhaps more impressively, they afforded Slovenia just two half chances to score.

So how was this achieved?

Before the game, Scotland had the problem of being rather lopsided. While Kieran Tierney and Andy Robertson have excelled as left backs for Celtic and Hull City respectively, Scotland just don’t have the same standard of player on the right (especially with Callum Pateron’s long term injury). Ultimately, Scotland had to choose between two of their strongest players, but also faced a serious lack of quality in one side of the pitch compared to the other.

In a study of all civil and international wars since the 19th century, it was found that armies which employed unconventional tactics won far more often than those who stuck to what their opponent expected. Ok, it might be a bit of a stretch applying this logic to a World Cup qualifier between Scotland and Slovenia, but it’s worth thinking about.

So much of modern day football is based on scouting and video analysis. As Scotland had never done this before, Slovenia had no way of preparing for a two-pronged attack down the wings. While they may have bargained for facing Robertson or Tierney, it was a completely different scenario when both were playing, and on different sides of the pitch.

The two youngsters put on a great performance, allowing Scotland to stretch the play in attack. One statistic that particularly struck me was the Kieran Tierney, playing on his weaker side, won the ball back eight times for his team, more than any other Scotland player. Meanwhile Andy Robertson only lost possession once, the fewest of any Scotland player.

In the centre of midfield, Stuart Armstrong and James Morrison are hardly defensive footballers. Therefore, in addition to Forrest and Snodgrass playing in the corridors between the wing and the centre, plus Leigh Griffiths up top, Scotland effectively had a battering ram of seven attackers to throw at the Slovenian defence.

This choked off the supply to the opposition front men with centre forward Roman Bezjak only managing a meagre thirteen touches before getting hooked on the hour mark.

Despite this domination, there are a couple of points worth bearing in mind. Firstly, in Scotland’s last four competitive matches, their conversion rate is around one goal for every twenty-four shots. Going forward, the national team needs to examine whether this is due to the type of chances it’s set up to produce, or the quality of the finishing.

Secondly, of Scotland’s fifteen chances, twelve came in the game’s opening 40 minutes. It may have been a deliberate tactic to attack heavily early, then withdraw for the second half, but the fact that it took a deflected goal in the 88th minute to win the game illustrates the risks you take when you run out of steam too early on.

Nevertheless, supporting Scotland over the past few months has been a particularly horrible experience. It was great to get a win again.

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