In the land of the Beatles, the Yellow Submarine sank, Wednesday, April 27, in the semi-final first leg of the Champions League (2-0). Surprise faller of Juventus Turin then Bayern Munich, Villarreal was too harmless at Anfield, with only one shot over the whole meeting.
An attempt, with the tip of the foot, in a delicate position, by Giovanni Lo Celso, and then that’s it (35th). Against Liverpool, the Villarreal attackers had very few balls to put in their mouths. In the 90 minutes of the game, they touched the leather only three times in the Reds box, the worst total for a team in the semi-finals of the Champions League since Inter Milan against Barcelona in 2010 (2).
A lack of offensive animation which is partly explained by the choice of Unai Emery, on this first leg, to renew the same tactical device, in 4-4-2, as against Bayern Munich in the quarter-final second leg, with a view to conceding as few goals as possible and thus maintaining their chances of qualifying for the return match at home.
1 – Villarreal attempted just one shot in this match; the joint-fewest shots (1) and shots on target (0) by any side in a UEFA Champions League semi-final since this data is available (2003-04), along with Inter vs Barcelona in 2009-10 (1 shot, 0 on target). Suffocated. pic.twitter.com/vEqekSQAZ8
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) April 27, 2022
With the tenure on the right wing of Lo Celso, central midfielder, and at the forefront of Samuel Chukwueze, usually right winger, the Spanish coach had chosen to densify the axis to close Liverpool’s options in the danger zone. The Yellow Submarine was thus prepared to endure the onslaught of Jürgen Klopp’s men, but he suffered more than against the Bavarians, with only 27% possession of the ball (against 32% against Bayern) and only 1 shot (against 4 in the quarter-final second leg).
After having contained the English assaults, they finally cracked, on a twist of fate, with an own goal of Pervis Estupinan (55th). “We held up pretty well in the first half, we were comfortable, then we got a bit overwhelmed“, assumed defender Pau Torres at the microphone of Movistar +.
And on their low ball possession time, the Villarreal players also sinned with the ball. With only 66% of successful passes and a lot of technical waste on recovery, they could not hope to worry the Reds. Seeing his team sinking, Unai Emery tried to bring in new blood, with the entries of Serge Aurier and Boulaye Dia (72nd). Entrances which allowed his players to attempt a few incursions into the Reds camp, without worrying Alisson.
With a low block, Villarreal still limited the breakage and could have left Anfield with a much greater delay to catch up with in the return match as Liverpool provided opportunities (19 shots and 2 goals disallowed). But unlike his previous performances in the first leg against Juventus Turin (1-1) and Bayern Munich (1-0), the yellow submarine finds himself in a much more unfavorable position for a possible qualification for the final.