PEP GUARDIOLA'S 4-3-3 Barcelona Tikitaka 2010-11 Tested with AC MILAN 102 GOALS SCORED WON SERIE A AND ITALY CUP

[tikitakamaster]

PEP GUARDIOLA'S HISTORY TACTICS: BARCELONA 2010-2011 SEASON TIKITAKA

Hi guys,
welcome to my second emulation of Pep Guardiola's historical series.
This time I emulated Barcelona's 2010-11 season tactic. In that season Barcelona sold Ibrahimovic to AC Milan and replaced him with a different type of striker, David Villa. Since the second half of season 2008-2009, Messi started playing more as a central striker with Samuel Eto'o who agreed to swap his position with the Argentinian genius and play wide on the right flank. Eto's versatility allowed Pep to create this new False 9 attacking solution which surprised most of their opponents. But, in season 2009-2010, Barcelona sold Eto'o to Inter Milan and paid Euro 49 millions to buy Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Unfortunately, Ibrahimovic was not willing to leave his central forward position to play wider on the right side and allow Messi to play central. Ibrahimovic struggled to do so and even if Guardiola tried to convince him, Ibrahimovic always refused. Besides, when Messi was playing wider on the right and Ibrahimovic in the centre, they struggled to play together because Ibrahimovic loved to drop deeper to link the play and Messi, who liked to cut inside and play in central areas often stepped on Ibra's toes. Finally, Pep Guardiola decided to put Ibra on the bench and Messi played as F9 as he liked. In summer 2010, Ibrahimovic moved to AC Milan and Barcelona replaced him with David Villa who was a very versatile player and ready to play wide on the left, while the Barcelona Youth team star Pedro got promoted to the First Squad by Pep and played wide on the right. This forward trio Pedro-Messi-Villa with Messi as False 9 scored a lot of goals and contributed to win the Treble ( Spanish Liga, Spanish Supercup and Uefa Champions League) and to finished 2nd in Copa del Rey.
I decided to emulate this tactic in Football Manager and to test it with AC Milan, I won Serie A and Coppa Italia and lost the UEFA Champions League final against Paris Saint Germain. Of course, as always, I did not buy neither sell any players so the squad is the same at the beginning and at the end of the season.
Please see the tactic analysis, creation, stats and highlights here: 

 

Pep Guardiola's Tikitaka 2010-11.fmf