FC Porto 3-0 Marítimo tactical breakdown

Starting elevens

After Sporting's dream start to the season with yet another wonderful result and performance and Benfica's hard-fought win against Gil Vicente a few minutes earlier, it was up to FC Porto to show just what they were capable of. To maintain their three-point lead ahead of Benfica, the Dragons had to win Paulo Fonseca's first match in his new stadium, in order to keep the momentum going.

Unlike the expectations of this reporter, the matched turned out to be an absolutely one-sided event, with Marítimo never looking like they were capable of threatening the home team, despite the sheer speed from the three forwards - Sami, Derley and Artur. Their pace, which had proved so devastating against Benfica, was never on display at the Dragão.

This is why, instead of chronicling the incidents of the match, we will be taking a somewhat closer look at the differences and similarities between Paulo Fonseca's team and his predecessor Vítor Pereira's.

• 1. Attacking organisation

This perhaps complex-sounding phrase just refers to the moment when a team are attacking when the other team are arranged in their intended defensive shape, the phase of play where FC Porto spend most of their time. There are plenty of similarities in this category, namely with Otamendi taking charge of the first build-up stage. However, not only has his involvement been enhanced, but there is also much more cooperation from all midfielders. But we'll get to that later on.

On the wings, things have also changed a bit. Even though there hasn't been a significant change in personnel (Danilo and Alex Sandro remain the full-backs and Varela should reclaim his position as soon as he's fit), the inclusion of Licá has given a different array of solutions to the team. In the initial build-up phase, Licá tends to drift inward, opening up space for Alex Sandro, but, as the play evolves, he often gets wider, proving hard to mark - he can try to get to the goal line or drift inside to use his right foot (you can watch his assist from last night here and his goal here).

With Vítor Pereira, the task of starting out attacks usually befell upon João Moutinho, who would drop back alongside Fernando and work his magic from there. With Paulo Fonseca, Lucho González's initial positioning is significantly higher up the field, but he often drops back at the same time Defour advances, causing defensive uncertainties.

Furthermore, Josué, starting out from the right, plays much narrower than a usual winger tends to do, forming a square in midfield - Fernando alongside Defour in a first line, Josué alongside Lucho González higher up. This organisation often resembles the shape Fonseca imposed on his previous team, Paços de Ferreira.

Also, the chance-creation setup seems rather different from last season. Even though the pressing (more on that later) and ball circulation remain similar (at least as far as the results they produce), there now seems to be a more objective intention to instill the team with greater urgency upon attacks, rather than biding their time for an opportunity to come up.

The dynamics with which that takes place is quite interesting, since it seems mandatory that there is always someone playing in the hole (i.e. on the edge of the penalty box or in the vicinity) at all times - either for an assist or for a shot. Nevertheless, the wings are now much more of an option than last year, either with crosses or penetrations.

• 2. Defensive transition

This is the few seconds when the team with the ball gives it away for some reason - and how they react to it, before they manage to get into the shape intended by their manager for the defensive phase. Different coaches ask different things from their charges, from pressing immediately to dropping back straight away and forming two banks of four, for instance.

Paulo Fonseca has picked off where his predecessor left off and, if anything, has upped the tempo and intensity with which the team try to get the ball back the second they lose it. Perhaps knowing that a staggering amount of opportunities created stem from balls won back in the opponents' midfield, FC Porto coach has imposed the imperativeness to get the ball back as soon as possible. While it didn't work as well against Setúbal the week before, matches against Guimarães and Marítimo lead us to believe that that is the master plan.

• 3. Defensive organisation

Because FC Porto have dominated most of their latest opponents, it's still hard to extricate all the differences. However, this is the game phase where the Dragons seem least comfortable. Whenever the attempt to win the ball back in the immediate seconds after giving it away fails, Fonseca's men often look poorly positioned and in numerical inferiority (not unlike Jorge Jesus' Benfica, at times). While this may not be a problem against domestic competition, stay tuned for possible problems FC Porto may encounter when facing tougher opposition - the Champions League immediately springs to mind.

• 4. Attacking transition

This is perhaps one of the areas in which FC Porto have changed the most. Much more direct and voracious, the team immediately try to look for their opponents' weak spot and proceeds to exploiting it whenever possible. Last night, Licá's goal constitued a perfect example of the Portuguese champions can also be effective on the counter-attack, especially now that they can count on a goal-scoring winger to finish off moves. If one looks at the whole play, one will be able to see how quickly FC Porto pounced on Marítimo's blind side (the side where the ball is not), causing an imbalance in Marítimo's defence (credits must go to Ricardo Pereira for noticing this during the match).

All in all, it seems a tremendously dynamic system of play, one which may not be certain to yield the same results when the going starts to get tough(er). However it turns out, it should be quite interesting to watch how it all pans out.

A tale of two forwards

Starting elevens

Despite the final result, tonight's match had plenty of reasons to keep us interested. In fact, seldom has a match provided such a clear contrast between two opposing styles of approaching football.

Newcastle manager Alan Pardew remained true to himself and rotated most of his team, even including his third-choice goalkeeper, but keeping his back four intact. The English eleven was significantly different from the one that played Everton last Monday. As for Marítimo, Pedro Martins played the same men with the exception of Luís Olim instead of Ruben Ferreira.

This was in fact a match that provided a perfect example of two very different football philosophies. On one hand, the Magpies played their usual 4x4x2, with Vuckic playing just off Shola Ameobi, and went for what could be described as typical British style: long balls toward the big man, who tried to flick it down to a smaller, quicker forward. The team from Madeira, on the other hand, favoured a typically Portuguese 4x3x3, more dynamic and with greater movement.

Nevertheless, the central forwards of the two teams (since Danilo Dias can hardly be described as a striker) constitute the most paradigmatic examples of each team, summarised their approach to perfection.

• Newcastle

As mentioned earlier, Newcastle chose long, direct balls towards Ameobi as their favourite route. Without Demba Ba, Papis Cissé, but most importantly Yohann Cabayé and Hatem Ben Arfa, Pardew's men were not eager to keep the ball on the ground and did not hesitate to hoof the ball forward and wait for the outcome. With Vuckic far from his best form, Ameobi's flick-ons were not particularly useful, especially because both Obertan and Amalfitano were static and miles away from the right place to pick up second balls.

As for Gosling and Bigirimana, they often found themselves trying to pick up the slack and provide an outlet to follow up Ameobi's efforts, which in turn gave Marítimo all the more room to maneuver. With both wingers out of the game and both central-midfielderes trying to shorten the distance up front, Newcastle's back four was often left exposed, allowing Marítimo forwards to run riot for most of the first half.

Bigirimana, in particular, often seemed unsure about what to do defensively during the first half. As he became apparently more and more frustrated by the Portuguese team's patient build-up play, he tried to pressure one of the centre-backs, only to realise moments later that Gosling was surrounded by opposing midfielders. The situation was made worse because there was no definitive response about who should be marking Marítimo's restless forward Danilo.

Bigirimana and Gosling often left the Newcastle defence exposed.

The second half was clearly better for the Magpies, who took control of the match, namely after Sammy Ameobi replaced Vuckic and Marítimo centre-backs started tiring out. In fact, while Newcastle found it hard to take the match up to their rival's penalty box in the first half, it was much easier for them, since both Roberge and João Guilherme started losing the right positioning more and more often. Newcastle went decidedly for route one and may count themselves unlucky for not scoring in the second half.

In conclusion, their defence was shaky and far too vulnerable to quick play behind their back, but they countered with a sort of football that Marítimo are just not used to. Ameobi proved that he can still be useful, either for less important matches (to take the strain off Papis Cissé and Demba Ba) or as a plan B.

• Marítimo

This was typical Portuguese football. Lots of clever movement, wingers drifting inside to allow the midfielders and the full-back to exploit the flanks, numerous opportunities during the first stages of the match and an almost certain defeat as the outcome, after suffering immensely at the hands of powerful forwards.

Despite hailing from Brazil, Danilo Dias epitomises the Portuguese forward. Adept at dropping off to open up spaces for his team-mates and (let's be honest) to avoid the physical confrontation with aggressive, intense centre-backs, he is the player that makes the whole team tick. By dropping back, he often serves as an extra player in midfield to provide the out-ball, misleading the opposing centre-backs into thinking they have no one to mark, only to find out seconds later they are being swarmed by Heldon or Sami.

Marítimo had an excellent first half, patiently bringing the ball out from the back and waiting for the right time to find the chink in Newcastle's armour - they had in fact 3 clear-cut scoring chances in the first 12 minutes, all of them from the left flank, thanks in part to Obertan's alienation from his defensive duties.

As for the defence, the team from the island of Madeira were almost irreproachable for the first 30 minutes, ensuring their distance from the rest of team was always adequate and providing excellent coverage for the aerial duels with Ameobi. Both wingers helped out defensively to form a 4x1x4x1 in the defensive phase, which contributed to a very good first 30 minutes. However, this game provided enough proof that a) players from the Portuguese league are not used to such physical battles, since there are no forwards in the mould of Ameobi, and b) by whistling at every residual contact in favour of defenders, the Portuguese refereeing is not helping Portuguese teams, who find it very hard to keep the same intensity level as English teams throughout the match. The best example is Roberge and João Guilherme's growing inability, as the game wore on, to contain Newcastle's forwards.

In conclusion, Marítimo showed they can hang up there with the big(ger) guns, but they will definitely need to work on keeping up their stamina throughout the entire match and capitalising on the chances they create. Otherwise, this will be an all too familiar tale for Portuguese teams.