Over the past few years, Italian coach Roberto De Zerbi has become a wanted man for many of the top clubs in Europe.
After his successful two-year stint in the Premier League at Brighton, the 46-year-old was linked to many big jobs at the likes of Barcelona, Manchester United, Liverpool, and Bayern Munich.
With Ruben Amorim now out at United, and the Red Devils on the hunt for another permanent boss, the Italian's name has resurfaced as a realistic option to lead the 20-time English champions
AllSportsPeople explains just how current Marseille boss De Zerbi goes about setting up his side, and what makes his setup so difficult to play against.
MORE: Why Manchester United are known as the Red Devils
Roberto De Zerbi coaching career, record, clubs managed
De Zerbi enjoyed a 15-year playing career, starting in the youth setup of AC Milan. He never played for the Rossoneri's first team, being sent out on loan to Monza, Padova, Como, and other clubs until his release in 2001. He played for Foggia, Arezzo, and Catania before joining Napoli where he spent four years as a squad player. After finishing his playing days at Romanian club CFR Cluj and a return to Italy with Trento, he retired in 2013.
After his first coaching job presented itself at Serie D side Darfo Boario in 2013, De Zerbi joined his old club Foggia in Serie C for two seasons. His first top-flight job came with Palermo, who he signed with in 2016 but quickly departed after seven straight league defeats, lasting just shy of three months.
After further stints at Benevento and Sassuolo, reaching the UEFA Conference League playoff round with the latter, he returned to Eastern Europe with Ukrainian giants Shakhtar Donetsk in May of 2021, winning the Ukrainian Super Cup at the start of the next season and leading the league until he departed in July of 2022 after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
De Zerbi then joined Premier League club Brighton, in what was a breakout spell in terms of his wider reputation. He defeated Chelsea and his immediate Brighton predecessor Graham Potter 4-1 in October 2022 en route to a fabulous first season when the Seagulls finished sixth in the Premier League and reached the FA Cup semifinals.
De Zerbi's progressive tactical approach at Brighton earned huge plaudits around England. While they fell to 11th the following campaign, there was still overall positive buzz around the Italian's influence on the English game. He departed at the end of the 2023/24 season, with links to many top European jobs abuzz, before joining Marseille on a three-year contract.
Roberto De Zerbi tactics, style of play
From his Shakhtar and Brighton days to his current position at Marseille, Roberto De Zerbi has been hailed as being at the forefront of the modern tactical revolution.
The Italian's calling-card was his development of the concept of possessional transition. De Zerbi realised that the most dangerous moments in attacking football were fast breaks, but pressing the opponent to create transition opportunities is risky, especially with a small-budget squad of players against a more expensive opponent.
Thus, instead of pressing while out of possession to create turnovers in dangerous areas, thus leaving himself exposed at the back, De Zerbi figured out how to create counter-attacks while in possession.
De Zerbi's trademark is his ability to deploy a build-from-the-back scenario that baits the opposition into pressing his side on the ball, thus opening up the opponent and allowing his team to essentially counter-attack from in possession.
Preferring a 4-2-3-1 formation but often utilising a 3-4-3, De Zerbi has mastered the concept of springing traps for the opposition while on the ball instead of while defending. Using square passes along the back, De Zerbi uses triangle passing to draw the opposition press and then pass around them, bypassing lines of pressure with pace and precision.
Starting with the goalkeeper, who often steps up in possession, his teams pass the ball around in predetermined and calculated manners until the opponent is baited into pressuring the ball. Once the pressure arrives, there are midfielders dropping deep and full-backs positioned out wide, which can give the pressured player options to bypass the play. By baiting opposition forwards and midfielders to press the ball, they disrupt opposition marking plans to open up passing options.
De Zerbi's tactics rely heavily on off-ball movement of those around the individual in possession, giving the pressured player multiple passing options. These have to be heavily drilled during training, as pressured ball carriers must be able to react quickly under pressure to release the ball into areas they know a teammate will be waiting.
A key part of baiting the pressure in De Zerbi's tactical setup is receiving a pass by stopping it dead and facing forward. By doing this, a player both invites pressure and refuses to commit to one direction of play until the last possible moment, leaving passing options open and resisting the temptation to telegraph their final decision.
Most times, the initial buildup phase concentrates on the centre of the pitch to avoid triggering opponent pressures out wide. This also allows full-backs and wingers to push higher up the pitch, pinning back opponent wide players and providing long-ball options once the initial pressure is broken.
While De Zerbi largely used a 4-2-3-1 formation at Brighton, he has transitioned to a 3-4-3 at Marseille. The Italian realised that by using the goalkeeper more to begin possession, he can maintain the numerical four-man back line to bait pressure and trigger build-up, while pushing the wing-backs even higher up the pitch without losing shape. This creates more opportunities for passing through pressure and to deliver long balls if the initial plan fails.
Would Roberto De Zerbi be a good hire for Man United?
There is plenty of sense in hiring Roberto De Zerbi at a big club like Manchester United with title-winning aspirations.
As a successful manager in the Premier League, the Italian knows the English top flight well and would not need to learn how to win matches in the most visible league in the world. Between his two seasons at Brighton and now two years in charge of Marseille, he has the experience and the knowledge to navigate a big club and be successful at the highest level.
However, there are significant pitfalls that could come with such a hire.
First, De Zerbi has never won a major trophy in his managerial career. While he has reached the goals, or even overachieved at the clubs he has been at, there has never been that moment of true triumph to fall back on.
Additionally, there are arguments that his tactics were quickly adjusted for and are no longer revolutionary. While De Zerbi's time at Brighton was enormously influential on the modern game, the lightning-quick evolution of today's data-driven meta has seen many teams move away from a traditional counter-press and lean into a more direct style of play. When he first broke onto the scene at Brighton, his tactics worked brilliantly against caught-out opponents who were not expecting to be baited in such a way, but once football figured out what De Zerbi was doing, it wasn't hard to game plan against.
Against these type of opponents, De Zerbi may struggle, as teams are not as motivated to break their shape to press an opponent high as they may have been three or four years ago when high pressing was almost universal across Europe. This was largely the concern when De Zerbi left Brighton — it was expected he would take one of the many openings at a true European giant, making his eventual hire at Marseille a bit of a disappointment. In the end, the biggest clubs were left unconvinced.
Ultimately, De Zerbi's approach is not about being press-resistant, but instead using opposition pressure to their advantage. This works fantastically at clubs where resources are not endless in a modern tactical epoch that sees almost every team press to some extent. However, at a club where the resources are deeper and expectations higher, the risks posed by this approach would not be acceptable, and it may not be as desirable for top players to play within.