Borussia Dortmund: Analysing the 3-4-3 system under Lucien Favre

Build-up at the Back

With an umpteen variety of stats there to measure the effectiveness of attackers like goals, assists, key-passes, xG, xA and so on, there is hardly any stat which quantifies the hard work done by those players during the build-up of an attack.

The xG Build-up stat is an answer to just that and has been a revelation since its advent as it has managed to quantify the quality of build-up by a team, thereby crediting the players involved as well. In simple words, xG Build-up is the expected % that a particular build-up will lead to a goal.

If a certain build up has a 30% chance of becoming a goal, then the xG Build-up number is 0.30 and this number is credited to all the players involved in the build-up barring the player who gave the assist and scored the goal.

The main reason why such a stat has been introduced is to ensure that not all credit will be go to the goal-scorer or the assist maker alone and instead also recognise those players who are responsible for starting a threatening attack or those who are expert pre-assisters (the final pass before an assist).

Achraf Hakimi: 3.93
Julian Brandt: 3.58
Mats Hummels: 3.58
Marco Reus: 3.56
Jadon Sancho: 3.50

As far as the quality of build-up play under the 4-2-3-1 formation is concerned, the average xG build up produced by the top five players was 3.6 (across an average of 9 games) with the players being Hakimi, Brandt, Hummels, Reus & Sancho.

Achraf Hakimi: 8.29
Raphael Guerreiro: 8.07
Julian Brandt: 6.65
Lucas Piszczek: 6.12
Jadon Sancho: 6.12

While in the case of the 3-4-3 formtion, the average xG build up produced by the top five players is 7.03 (across an average of 10 games) with the players being Hakimi, Guerreiro, Brandt, Pisczcek and Sancho. It is clear that the quality of build-up has almost doubled under the new formation, indicating twice as many threatening build-up plays as in the previous formation.

The stat also allows you to understand a team’s preferred route of build-up, which in this case seems to bring out a clear change, with the first two names being Hakimi and Guerreiro.

Under the 4-2-3-1, Hakimi had 2 goals and 3 assists compared to 1 goal and 7 assists under the 3-4-3. On the other hand, Guerreiro had 2 goals and 0 assists in the previous system compared to 3 goals and 2 assists under the 3-4-3 formation. However, the reason why these two full-backs deserve all the praise is because of their ability to top the xG Build-up despite being regularly involved in goals and assists. It shows how important they are to Favre’s new system.

“I think it’s super, I love playing so much and really enjoy when I get to push forward and join in the attacks. That plays more to my strengths and gives me the security of having another defender behind me”, said Guerreiro when asked about his new role under Favre’s 3-4-3.