How Heynckes Worked Against Dortmund's Pressing: Limiting Effectiveness then Taking Advantage

Pressing, the latest tactical trend in football, is becoming increasingly popular following the success of teams such as Borussia Dortmund, Bayern Munich and Barcelona. The idea of counterpressing, is that as soon as you lose the ball in attack, the forwards work mercilessly to retain possession for a short period of time (Barcelona: 5 seconds). This allows the team to put great amounts of pressure upon a team's defence, and as we saw in the opening 30 minutes of the Champions League Final, stops them from getting a foot in the game.

In said final however, we saw how Jupp Heynckes' Bayern Munich dealt with the intense pressing of Die Schwarzgelben which lead the BundesLIGA champions to redeeming themselves after last year's final.