Five games in, Atalanta defend halfway

Maurizio Sarri said after Bologna that a team either goes into pressure together or waits, and that his was stuck in between. The numbers say the same. Atalanta let opponents play 19.3 passes for every defensive action (PPDA: passes in the opponent's own 60% of the pitch per Atalanta tackle, interception or foul there), 18th of 20; last season it was 10.3, 7th. When the opponent builds from its own box, Atalanta are set in a high block only 35% of the time (league 46%). Cagliari was the exception: the highest block, 18 high regains, 5 shots against, and still 1-2, to a restart and a penalty.

Not pressing and not waiting: a mid block that rarely engages

When the opponent has the ball in open play, Atalanta are in a mid block 67% of the time, 2nd most in Serie A, and in a low block only 23%. That is not a team that waits. But inside that mid block they engage less than almost anyone: in every third of the pitch the opponent plays more passes per Atalanta defensive action than the league average, and far more than Atalanta allowed last season.

HOW HIGH, AND HOW HARD: THE 20 SERIE A TEAMS, 2026/27

Each crest is one team's first five games. Horizontal: the share of the opponent's open-play touches in the first quarter of the pitch (its own box and just beyond) with the team set in a high block. Vertical: PPDA, most aggressive at the top. Dashed lines are league averages.

OPPONENT PASSES PER ATALANTA DEFENSIVE ACTION, BY THIRD

In the opponent's third · the high press · Atalanta 19th of 20

Middle third · where the mid block sits · Atalanta 16th of 20

Atalanta's own third · close to goal · Atalanta 18th of 20

Opponent open-play passes in that third for each Atalanta tackle, interception or foul in the same area. Shorter bar = more aggressive. In the opponent's third Atalanta allow 33.3 passes per action, against 13.5 a year ago.

THE READ

"Halfway" is measurable: Atalanta stand in the mid block, not in a low one, but from that position they rarely go and win the ball. It is not a territory problem so much as an engagement problem, and it is new: last season Atalanta sat 7th in the league for PPDA and just above average in every third.

Five games is a small sample and three of them were against Roma, Juventus and Bologna, but the gap to last season is large enough that the schedule alone does not explain it.

The first three games were the passive ones; Cagliari was the version he asked for

Before Juventus, Sarri said the defensive phase in the first games had been too low and too passive. Against Sassuolo, Bologna and Roma, Atalanta's PPDA ran from 18.2 to 26.8 and they were set high against the opponent's build-up 20-30% of the time. Against Cagliari it was 47%, the defensive actions came 11 m higher than in those three games, and Cagliari had 5 shots. His worry after Bologna also holds up: Atalanta had conceded once in two games, but from 38 shots and 3.4 non-penalty xG against.

Green is Atalanta's best game on that measure, red the worst. Defending height is the average distance from Atalanta's own goal of their tackles, interceptions, recoveries and fouls. A high regain is winning the ball in the opponent's 40% of the pitch. xG leaves penalties out.

WHERE ATALANTA DEFENDED, ONE MATCH AT A TIME

Atalanta 1-2 Cagliari, 12 Sep. The one he called his kind of game. High block against the build-up 47% of the time, defending height 46 m, 18 high regains (the green dots), and Cagliari reduced to 5 shots and 0.42 non-penalty xG. Atalanta had 22 shots. Lost 1-2 all the same, see section 04.

The press won the ball high; almost none of it became a chance

Atalanta won the ball in the opponent's 40% of the pitch 42 times in five games, 8.4 per match, close to the league's 9.0. Two of those regains produced a shot within ten seconds (5%, 17th of 20; league 14%), and none a goal. Against Cagliari the press worked better than in any other game, 18 high regains, and those turned into 1 shot.

AFTER A HIGH REGAIN, WITHIN TEN SECONDS

Shot within 10 s

Into the box within 10 s

Share of high regains (ball won in the opponent's 40% of the pitch) followed by a shot, or by a completed pass or carry into the box, within ten seconds. Atalanta's first pass after a high regain goes backwards less often than the league's (29% against 40%), so this is not a team recycling the ball after winning it; the attack simply stops before the box. Five games: a pattern, not yet a verdict.

DOES WINNING IT HIGH PAY? SERIE A 2025/26, EACH TEAM AGAINST ITSELF

xG created (non-penalty)

xG conceded (non-penalty)

Points per game

Every 2025/26 team's 38 games split into thirds by its own number of high regains, so each team is compared with itself. The opponents were of the same strength on average in all three groups. Winning it high moved the chance balance by 0.33 xG a game; points did not follow in that season (1.38 against 1.35).

In Serie A the high press buys chances: last season a team's own high-regain games were about a third of a goal better in xG balance than its low-regain games. What it does not do on its own is convert them, and that is exactly Atalanta's Cagliari game: 22 shots, 1.37 xG created, 0.42 conceded, and a defeat.

Sarri said after Cagliari that you can press up to the byline as long as the team stays lucid. The regains show the first half of that is already there on a good day. The part missing is what happens in the ten seconds after.

The block drops in the last fifteen minutes, and three of the seven goals came there

Until the 75th minute Atalanta spend 19-23% of the opponent's possession in a low block. In the last fifteen it jumps to 33%, and that block brings the most shots against (21) and 3 of the 7 goals conceded (43%, league 25%). Every Serie A team drops deeper late, but gradually through the second half; Atalanta hold and then drop. At Roma, where Sarri said the team no longer had the strength to push up, the last fifteen minutes were 49% low block and 11 shots against.

BY FIFTEEN-MINUTE BLOCK

Five games together. The low-block line stays near the league's until the 75th minute and then crosses above it; the shots follow.

THE SEVEN GOALS ATALANTA CONCEDED

From an indirect free kick in their own half. Seven Cagliari passes in 17 seconds, then José Pedro's pass up the side found Adopo in Atalanta's left channel, 33 m from goal. He carried it 25 m into the box unchallenged and squared for Mendy. No Atalanta defensive action in the whole move, the pattern Sarri described after the game: the wide defender goes, the other three are late. Section 05 plays it back.

Sarri's late-game point is right in the shots and in the block. It is less true of the goals themselves: 4 of the 7 goals conceded came from a corner, a throw-in or a free kick, including two of the three late ones. Only three came from open play, and all three share one feature: the ball got behind or beside the back line with no Atalanta defensive action in the move (Cagliari 18', Juventus 27', Roma 92').

So the open-play goals fit the step-out problem Sarri described after Cagliari. Set pieces are a separate thread, and so far they have cost more goals.

The step-out, played back: Kolasinac goes, the other three stay

After Cagliari, Sarri said that on the goals the wide defender stepped out and the other three were late stepping up. This is Cagliari's first goal again with all 22 players, from the switch of play to Mendy's finish. Next to it, the same wing two minutes earlier, when the line did go together.

Atalanta defend the goal at the top. Heights are metres from Atalanta's goal line; the orange line joins the back four from left to right. Movement between seconds is smoothed.

The difference between the two clips is not Kolasinac. In both he goes out to José Pedro on the touchline, about 5 m ahead of the others. At 16' the other three close that distance in six seconds and the line ends flat at 48 m. At 18' they hold and then drop as the ball is played, and the channel between left-back and left centre-back grows from 11 m to 16 m by the time Adopo receives it.

That is Sarri's own diagnosis in two clips: the step-out is not the error, the line not following it is.

Venezia next: a short build-up that invites the press, and a press of their own

After the international break Atalanta host Venezia on 12 October, then Pafos in the Conference League on the 15th. Venezia have no points from five games and have conceded 13. They are also the team in Serie A that most insists on playing out from the back, and one of the most aggressive pressing sides, so the principle applies in both directions.

Venezia at home, 12 October

Venezia play 78% of their goal kicks short, more than any team in the league (league 59%, Atalanta 36%). Half of those short goal kicks (14 of 28) ended with the ball lost before it left their own third, against 39% in the league. Under a high block they still complete 79% of their passes in their own third (league 77%), and their losses near their own goal have led to only 3 shots in five games. Most of what they concede comes against settled attacks (8 of 12 goals). Without the ball they press: PPDA 8.5, 2nd in Serie A.

Goal kicks played short

Short goal kicks lost in own third

Own-third pass completion under a high block

Balls lost in own 40% per game

Serie A 2026/27, five games each. A goal kick is short under 30 m. "Lost in own third" means the goal-kick possession ended before the ball got out of Venezia's own third (Venezia 14 of 28, Atalanta 6 of 20). The sample is five matches and 28 short goal kicks, so these are tendencies.