Space Creation — Using Tracking Data to Quantify Line Breaking Passes & Space Creation
Preface
Space, a term often used in the football realm with great emphasis and interest. All actions on the football pitch are made to get the better of your opponent and are centred around the ball which is enclosed inside a space. Technically , there’s always space available no matter how close your opponent is to you, however, this “critical or influential space” enclosed around the ball to an extent to the nearest opponent is an area when one can showcase their abilities, creativity and qualitative superiority both on and off the ball.
Space creation is key for control teams to dominate possession and orchestrate attacks. Players work to create separation from their markers, allowing more time on the ball and better passing angles. Effective off-the-ball movement opens up areas of the pitch that can be exploited for progression. This strategic manipulation of space disrupts the defensive shape, enabling teams to maintain control and create scoring opportunities.
The concept of space has different implications in different terminologies and a way certain person perceives it. In this article, the space is measured in terms of radius from the player on the ball as the centre to the position of the nearest opponent as the boundary of the imaginary circle of space.
It really does serve the purpose of measuring the advantage on the ball against the opponent, utilising the space as tools. An in-possession player would have would have much more control and probability to create to goal-scoring opportunity when they’re found in the critical space compared to when they receive a ball In a similar fashion, the opponent could utilise the space as tools to assert pressure on the possession team and control their actions. We see, space is essentially tools to assert control on the pitch irrespective if you have the ball or not.
The motive of measuring space and combining it with another action based metric (line breaking passes in our cases, which we’ll soon dive deep into) is simply to see the different sequences and their intentions behind these sequences and where teams look to generate space for the receiver. On the contrary, we can use it also to measure pressure by a team without the ball and their defending styles. Space, for the player on the ball and pressure, applied by an opponent are very much are inversely related.
Obviously not all teams intent to press the opponent. Often, teams without possession would sit deep, stay in a compact shape and would deny access to the critical space. That’s why it’s important to pair space creation with an action based metric line breaking passes. Here are some examples of the same below —
PS: I initially wanted this to be a simple piece on the methodology behind the statistics but I really do have the urge to pen down my thoughts and perception on this topic of which I have a huge liking for while simultaneously using numbers to further elaborate and quantify the concept.
Line Breaking Passes & Receipts in Space
Line-breaking passes: completed passes that advance the ball at least 10% closer to the opposition goal and that intersect a pair of defenders in close proximity (x-axis) or pass behind the defensive line (y-axis).
Ball receipts in space: a series of metrics that record the number of ball receipts with a defender within a range of 0–2, 2–5, 5–10 or 10 or more yards of the ball receiver.
(via Statsbomb)
Have a look at this clip below.
In this clip, the opposition block defend deep with their midfield line uninterested in engaging with Busquets. Busquets, here is very much afforded space which is ≈ 7 yards of radius. The opposition sitting compact and denying the space between the lines is negating space to progress and limiting their options
However, Busquets finds Pedri via a line-breaking pass who has space (≈6 yards of radius) between the lines. Pedri, now has multiple (or comparatively much more) options for progression and creating a goal-scoring attack, which is exactly what he does.
Pedri is found inside the critical space where he showcases his qualitative superiority to find Koke behind the opposite last line, who gets a shot at goal.
It is essential to note that the major implication of a line-breaking pass *is* to receive the ball between the lines with space and time which in turn helps the player to showcase their creativity thereby, increasing the probability for a goal-scoring chance.
Clip 2 —
A bit different example here, but the principles are similar — control and disorganise the opposition.
The opposition, here is actually trying to press and win the ball higher up. Whilst receiving, Busquets has under 1 yard of radius space with immediate pressure from his marker. The intention, here, is again progression and moving the ball for Spain while the opponent’s pressure increases chance for an error.
A quick one-touch pass from Busquets again breaks the opponent midfield line to find Ferran Torres between the lines, who immediately connects with his team mates to organise their attack here onwards.
Clip 3:
The opposition, in this instance are sittting deep + Busquets reception has triggered pressure from his marker. Busquets again places a perfectly weighted line-breaking pass to Álvaro Morata inside the box — again high chance of scoring so high up and absolutely disorganised the defensive setup of Croatia.
Unfortunately, we don’t have freeze frames for this particular instance so it's not possible to measure the distances.
We know Busquets is absolutely spectacular in these scenarios, but lets take a look at a different crop of players and put our methodology to test.
Xhaka-Wirtz combo for Space Creation
Have a look at the below clip for the sequence by Bayer Leverkusen against Borussia Mönchengladbach. Also, keep an eye for the annotations I made on the video highlighting the radius of space for the player on the ball and how it keeps increasing.
People often term this press-baiting, you may call this whatever suits your perception but most importantly, these sequences which involves the opposition to press higher and the team on the ball plays through their press using particular movements (in our case Wirtz’ movements) or some spectacular on-the ball action (Xhaka’s line breaking pass is another example in our) does involves ball circulation around the opposition block + advancing or stepping up with the ball to attract pressure (in our case Andrich’s carry to free Xhaka. Let’s take a deeper dive into this sequence.
Xhaka, with his back to goal attracts pressure from the opponent and plays a very late pass (seemed to be intentional) to Hincapié from where ball circulation starts.
Andrich with 11.79 yards of radius space decides to step up which creates a 2v1 on the pressing forward vacating Xhaka. Its interesting to see a common pattern a lot of times which is the last-line players carry to line-breaking pass — another way to filter teams’ buildup
Xhaka, with the Leverkusen™ diagonal line-breaking pass to find Wirtz in ≈ 8.268 yards of radius space. Just in this particular pass, the ball went from a high pressure zone with ≈ 4.99 yards of radius space from Xhaka to more than double space and negligible pressure for Wirtz between the lines.
Have a look at those diagonal line-breaking passes from Xhaka to Wirtz below. I also tried to highlight the space avalable for the recipient whilst receiving. Those diagonal line-breaking passes in the middle third pose serious threat to the opposition’s press by tackling or exposing the ball-sidedness of the midfield/forward lines.
Last Example —
Really great technique of disguised pass in this sequence. Bayern win the aerial ball, Xhaka gets on the second ball with his body facing towards his left and delivers the Leverkusen™ diagonal line breaking pass to his right. Wirtz receives with ≈ 4 yards of radius space in the final third which is enough for him to showcase his creativity and brilliance to create a goal-scoring opportunity.
These perfectly weighted line-breaking passes in the middle third to final third guarantee penetration. Also, in this particular passes another important element of play is how Xhaka’s action slows down the momentum and then suddenly shifts by that slick diagonal — another great element of game common between players like him, Busquets and etc.
Net Space Created & Received Metric
Space creation largely involves the passer with very little space playing into a receiver with comparatively more space to attack. Hence, I tried to quantify this by using a simple net space created metric.
I tried to subtract the space for the recipient from the space for the passer for Bayer Leverkusen 2023/24 season and so here are the results —
Both the #6 and Xhaka in particular leading the rankings which is most likely down to the large volume of passes they play. I didn’t sorted them by per 90 stats because I feel space created per pass holds more value. I personally wanted to look at the efficiency especially for midfileders and I am really satisfied by the results. Xhaka really does attempts the most as well as creates the most space for his team mates.
Since we are rewarding the passer for space creation, its also makes sense to attribute it to the receiver. Below are the top results for players who receive with the most net space value passes.
Attributing the receiver for a net positive space created from the pass does immply and rewards their off ball movements, reception ability and positional discipline. Frimpong at the top is interestingly because of the the long switches he often receives from Xhaka & Palacios finding him in a net positive net space. Also, Wirtz & Hofmann are at the bottom just above Boniface even when they receives the most of such passes is another interesting look, especially Wirtz — could be bacause of operating between the lines and often being utilised as a wall-pass to attract pressure.
Lastly, this is just being tested on a squad and would be interesting to see and compare different players across different teams and analyse their attacking structures utilising this and other metrics especially, position-based (like xT, PV, VAEP) or action based (like I utilised line-breaking passes).
Potential Downsides
Not considering opponents beyond a certain radius
Well, I initially thought of using a voronoi polygon to calculate area for a particular space but the areas of polygon in very different cases would be almost same and it would be hard to differentiate between critical cases of large space receptions in our case.
Like mentioned in the beginning, quantifying spatial control in our model is dictated heavily by the opponent’s pressure, which is something I believe is true in actual game.
Not using location of the pitch as a factor
Amount of space is not comparable across the pitch. X space would not have same potential across all areas and locations on the pitch. Distance and angle to goal does comes into play and this metric standalone doesn't tackles the situation. At best, pairing our model with an action based metric does aids the process of analysing patterns and significant events to highlight. I also think that, space in itself a quantifiable element which changes due to positions of players on the pitch.
Further Possible Explorations/Modifications
Combining metrics like xT, PV, VAEP
I tried to combine xT with our model, but it was a simple product of xT with the radius of space which didn't sit right with me even though I got decent results. Simply because, xT is a probabilistic model and my formula somewhere down the line would show invalid results. But I’m sure there has to be some way which would quantify the threat from a particular area of space which could be of great research if you're someone whose interested. We can still use metrics like these in combination with our model to get desired results.
Pass maps highlighting spatial characteristics
Pass maps can be used to highlight spatial characteristics by visualizing how players create and utilize space on the ball. They show the frequency, direction, and completion of passes, revealing how players move into open areas and exploit gaps in the opposition’s structure. By tracking pass clusters and movement patterns, these maps highlight zones where players have the most time and space to control the ball, as well as how well a team stretches or compresses the pitch.
Analysing teams’ press and buildup patterns
Teams use space in pressing by closing down opponents quickly, reducing their time on the ball and forcing them into tight areas where they can be trapped. High-pressing teams target specific zones to block passing options and disrupt the buildup. In contrast, during buildup, teams seek to stretch the pitch, creating space between the opposition’s lines. By moving players wide or dropping deeper, they open up central spaces or passing lanes to progress the ball and bypass the press. This manipulation of space in both phases determines how effectively a team controls the game.
There’s so much more! I would love to see other examples of work on this subject which they can elaborate on using this model.
Conclusion & Personal Thoughts
Statsbomb released this data around 2 months ago. Since then I’ve been trying to get my head around and make something interesting and now I really feel I have something valuable to share. Like I mentioned earlier, this topic in itself is of great interest to me. Players like Busquets, Xhaka, Parejo, Thiago, Rodri and other pivots who operate in tight spaces against the forward line and create space and opportunities with their delicate passes are a joy to watch. I intended to use this article to articulate my thoughts and perceptions around the topic of space. In anyway, you as a reader have arguments and criticisms of anything written here, I would appreciate you taking the time and approach me X/Twitter , my LinkedIn or or my mail.
More than creating and writing on football pieces, I enjoy interacting with people and have conversations about the pieces and their perceptions of the same. So I would really appreciate reaching out!
