Napoli vs. Dnipro: A Tactical Preview

If football matches are predicated by the management of space, then Napoli's Europa League semi-final first-leg clash with Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk on Thursday (kick-off: 20:05 BST) at the Stadio San Paolo will be a fascinating battle between one team wishing to play expansively and another seeking to congest.

Napoli have been mercurial of late. Their generally positive form has been punctuated by blips, such as their 4-2 loss away to Empoli. Such defeats have kept them in check, bringing them back down to earth whenever they have threatened to get carried away.

Their thrashing of Wolfsburg in the last round of the Europa League has led to Napoli being cast as favourites to win the continent's secondary club competition, but Rafa Benitez isn't about to lose sight of the immediate task at hand, saying of Dnipro, per Football Italia:

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They defend and counter-attack very well, we'll need to play a serious game with a lot of concentration and we'll try to impose our style. They're maybe a lesser known team, but they have players who are at the highest level in a technical sense.

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Clearly, Benitez has done his homework. Dnipro are currently sandwiched by Dynamo Kiev and Shakhtar Donetsk, sitting second in the Ukrainian Premier League with four games left to play. That they have managed to compete with the traditional giants of Ukrainian football is an important indicator of their quality.

Any doubts about the legitimacy of such competition can be discarded when considering that Dynamo made it to the quarter-finals of this season's Europa League, thrashing Everton along the way, while Shakhtar qualified for the second round of the Champions League.

Dnipro's competitiveness is built upon stable defensive foundations. The goal they conceded in a recent Ukrainian Cup defeat to Shakhtar was the only one put past them in their last eight matches. That defeat was one of just two losses the club from Dnipropetrovsk have incurred in their last 23 games in all competitions. During that stretch, they have kept 15 clean sheets.

The likelihood is that Dnipro will lineup in something resembling a 4-4-1-1, with captain Ruslan Rotan operating behind centre-forward Nikola Kalinic in a playmaking role. Although the formation appears fairly simplistic, it is very difficult to penetrate.

Against Ajax away in their round of 16 second leg, Dnipro set up in this shape, but Kalinic and Roman Bezus—who operated then in the role Rotan will likely assume against Napoli—dropped deep to heap extra pressure on Ajax's midfield.

That, along with the intense pressing of Georgian central midfielder Jaba Kankava, created problems for the likes of Daley Sinkgraven and Riechedly Bazoer. Rushed by the lack of space around them, the young Dutchmen were simply unable to get a hold of the game. Their distribution was wayward and Ajax's passing game suffered drastically as a result.

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Dnipro lost that game 2-1 after extra time, but the result put them through on away goals. It also ensured they made the quarter-finals of European competition for the first time in their history.

Napoli will not line up in the same way as Ajax did, however. Benitez's preference is a 4-2-3-1, as opposed to Frank de Boer's 4-3-3. There is a similar emphasis placed on attacking full-backs and wingers, but the key contrast is that Benitez uses an advanced playmaker, usually Marek Hamsik, while settling for a two-man central midfield.

Despite the difference, the important task for Benitez and Napoli is not getting lulled in by their deep-lying opposition, and if anything, they may find Dnipro's system even more perilous than Ajax did.

A two-man midfield such as Napoli's will be even more susceptible to the overloads Dnipro created against Ajax, while Napoli's attack-minded full-backs, Christian Maggio and Faouzi Ghoulam, will be just as open to counter-attacks down the flanks.

Dnipro will form a deep defensive block when out of possession but will manoeuvre the ball forward with speed and intelligence when transitioning into attack. Here Maggio and Ghoulam will have to be extremely alert to twin threats of distinctly separate natures.

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Maggio will likely be up against Yevhen Konoplyanka—Dnipro's most influential player and one of the finest technicians in Eastern Europe. His inward runs and precision passes will be of serious concern, especially taking into account the space he will find due to Maggio's adventurous inclinations and the lack of a defensive midfielder on Napoli's right-hand side.

On the left, the Partenopei will be slightly better covered thanks to the presence of Gokhan Inler in a more defensive midfield role, but the pace of Valeriy Luchkevych will still be a real weapon for Dnipro to use driving into the space behind Ghoulam.

If, as Benitez's comments have suggested, Napoli plan to impose themselves upon Dnipro, they may well play right into their visitors' hands; an overly assertive stance will only allow more outlets for the Ukrainians to take advantage of on the counter-attack.

While Napoli are clear favourites, they will be facing up to a well-oiled machine in Dnipro. Myron Markevych's men may not have been this far in continental competition before, but their system is not reliant on oddsmakers or tradition. All they care for is space.