How Ederson Allows Manchester City to Play the Pep Way

With his new goalkeeper, Ederson, Pep Guardiola has found the key to executing his tactical schemes at Manchester City. What is responsible for this historic run of goals Manchester City is on right now?

It’s a simple question without a simple answer. There’s a lot that contributes of course. Kevin DeBruyne’s Ballon d’Or level play, Leroy Sane bullying his way off the bench and on to the pitch. Sergio Aguero and Gabriel Jesus learning to play together and the two young Englishmen John Stones and Raheem Sterling developing into the stars that they were once touted as. While all of these things are true, there’s one reason you can point to above all others as to why Man City is fulfilling Pep’s vision of Premier League dominance.

One word in fact. Ederson!

Ederson Santana de Moares, the 24-year old Brazilian born shot stopper, who joined City this summer from Benfica has been a revelation between the sticks and has finally allowed Pep’s offensive ideas to come to fruition. He’s been a massive upgrade over last year’s goalkeeping debacle perpetrated by Claudio Bravo and Willy Cabellero and he’s been able to give the outfield players the confidence they need to play up to their potential.

Pep Guardiola’s offensive genius is actually part of a larger trend in the sports world. If you’re a big, multi-sport sports fan you’ve probably heard the term for it quite a bit over the last few years, “pace & space”. The idea is that over the last 100 years or so of modern sports the players have gotten bigger, stronger, faster but the field sizes have stayed pretty much the same. The way you deal with this as an innovative coach is to find a new way to attack the geometry of the field. Through pace (the speed at which you attack) and space (spreading out your players in new/ non-traditional ways) you can put traditional defenses in bad spots.

In the NBA this is best illustrated by Mike D’Antoni’s “7 seconds or less” Phoenix Suns’ teams and the rise of the corner 3-pointer. In American football, Chip Kelly’s high-speed spread attack that he popularized at the University of Oregon illustrates this perfectly. In soccer, Pep Guardiola is the poster boy for this. He has taken Johan Cruyff’s Total Football and applied it to today’s game. There are other tactical innovators out there now, Jurgen Klopp, Maurizio Sarri, Antonio Conte and others. But it is Pep who stands above the rest as the Godfather of 2000’s attacking football.

The way Pep deals with pace mostly applies to the final 1/3 of the field and forwards pressing so we’ll leave that for another day. What Ederson does for Pep, and what Bravo was advertised as being able to do, is he changes the way the game is played spatially. In simple terms, Pep’s goal is to create as much space as possible by spreading the opposing defense out to increase the amount of open spaces for his team to play in to.

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To do this Pep utilizes a Sweeper-Keeper. A goalkeeper who essentially functions as another central defender by being good with the ball at his feet and by being comfortable positioning himself aggressively far up the field while his team is in the attacking 1/3. At Barcelona he had a keeper who was very good at this style in Victor Valdes and at Bayern Munich he had arguably the best ever at this style in Manuel Neuer. When Pep took over ahead of the 2016-17 season he thought he brought in a keeper in line with these two in Claudio Bravo. He had played in a version of this system at Barcelona and had also shown these traits while tending goal for Chile. Bravo would prove not particularly adept at either of these skills in his time as a starter in the Premier League.

The size and physicality he found in the new league was something he hadn’t seen in La Liga or international competition and seemingly did a number on his psyche and overwhelmed him physically. Bravo remained fixed to his line in-goal and while he did provide a reliable outlet at times there were some very bad decisions in his distribution. His forays out of net became more and more nerve-wracking for fans as the season went along. His infamous red card, for touching the ball with his hands outside of his 18-yard box, in the Champions League fixture against his former team last year was a big indication he was out of his depth. The fact that seemingly all of his shot-stopping ability left him at points throughout the year didn’t help either.

Fast forward to this offseason where Guardiola and Manchester City director of football, Txiki Begiristain had acknowledged their mistake and brought in the young Brazilian to “compete” for the position. It wasn’t a very long or hard competition. From the early stages of City’s American preseason tour Ederson looked fearless coming out of goal, made smart passes from the back and added an extra dimension of having a massive boot he used to hit forwards breaking on the fly. Against Real Madrid in Los Angeles he hit Aguero on a dead run with a 70 yard or so pass that made City fans’ jaws drop. Oh yeah, and he made saves! He stopped the ball from going into the back of the net with no resistance… amazing!

I digress. I tend to do that when I get going on Bravo but this is about Ederson and how he allows City to execute Pep’s pace & space plans to their fullest. As I mentioned, Pep’s keepers need to be good with their feet and Ederson is. He provides a reliable outlet for defenders as City tries to build up from the back and when he gets the ball he is smart and capable of picking out the correct pass. In Pep’s build up system the two center backs head out to the wings and the holding midfielder comes back up the middle forming a diamond of Stones and Otamendi on either flank and Fernandinho straight ahead when Ederson has the ball.

This shape, and the skill within it, has allowed City to be deadly in their build up this year. The ball caroms between these four, the defense is stretched out, that creates space for the ball to get to the brilliant feet of Silva or KDB and from there up to the blazing Sterling, Sane or Walker and eventually on to the deadly Ageuro or Jesus and in to the back of the net. This has been the formula for so many of City’s historic 39 goals in all competitions so far this season and it all starts with Ederson’s skills allowing the team to use every inch of the pitch to create offense.

While City is scoring at an all-time clip, their defense has been excellent as well, allowing only 7 goals in those same games. Ederson is key to that as well and not only due to the fact that he has made some huge saves at key times throughout the season (see penalty save v Napoli this week). His aggressive positioning and play shrink the field for the opposition as they try to counter City’s intimidating attack. With midfielders and even defenders pushing extremely high up the field to put pressure on the opposition it leaves City very vulnerable to counterattacks, especially of the quick, long ball variety. This is where Ederson’s “sweeping” comes in. Taking a position at the top of his 18-yard box or higher when the ball is at the other end, Ederson is ready to pounce at a moments notice in the instance of a quick change and a long ball trying to catch City out.

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There’s not much more satisfying as a fan than nervously watching an opposing defender send a long outlet across your TV and seeing Ederson, flying in like Batman from off-screen, clear the ball, make a crunching tackle or send the ball back the other way. It’s not only such a dangerous weapon to employ from the back but incredibly demoralizing for the other team’s defense who seemingly just can’t get out from under the barrage of City’s attack at times. Most importantly, this allows Man City to effectively shrink the field for the opposition and make it that much harder to create offense.

When Pep Guardiola was brought in to replace Manuel Pelligrini last season he inherited an aging team that played solid but somewhat unattractive football. They had won the league and some trophies but weren’t considered one of the giants of Europe. Pep was brought in to implement his system and fix those things. He has the resources to upgrade the talent and the system to play beautiful football. Now the question is, is it good enough to win the big one (the Champions League) and take their spot among the best that Spain, Italy, Germany and France have to offer? It’s early days still this season but with Ederson in-goal they might just have what it takes.

For more Man City analysis and opinion check out the Cityzen Abroad Podcast.