Defending a free-kick on the edge: how a wall is built and what it gives away

What the wall is for

The wall exists to remove the near side of the goal from consideration, which allows the goalkeeper to position himself to defend the far side. A keeper standing centrally would be able to reach neither corner in time, so the wall is what makes any position defensible at all. This means the keeper decides where the wall stands, because he is the one who has to defend whatever the wall does not.

A wall positioned by the defenders themselves is usually too far toward the middle, since players instinctively cover the ball rather than the goal. The instruction is given from behind, and the alignment is checked against the keeper's own position rather than against the ball.

How many players and what each of them costs

Adding a player to the wall widens the region covered and removes a defender from the area where a rebound or a second phase will occur. A four-player wall against a central free-kick may leave the defence outnumbered in the box, which converts a saved shot into a chance. The number therefore depends on the distance and the angle, since a wide free-kick threatens a cross more than a shot and requires fewer bodies.

The players chosen for the wall are also removed from marking duties, which is why the tallest defenders are frequently the wrong ones to use. This is a resource allocation problem before it is a technical one, and sides that always build the same wall are ignoring the trade.

The player on the ground behind the wall

A wall that jumps opens a gap underneath it, and a ball driven low along the ground travels through the space every jumping player has just vacated. Placing a player on the ground behind the wall closes that route, at the cost of exposing him to a struck ball at close range. The alternative is to instruct the wall not to jump, which is difficult to enforce because jumping is the instinctive response to an approaching ball.

Some sides ask the end player to remain grounded rather than using a separate body, which preserves numbers at a small cost in coverage. Each of these arrangements is a response to a specific technique, and none of them defends every route to goal simultaneously.

What the attacking side is looking for

A taker examines the wall for a gap, a short player at one end, or a keeper positioned to defend a corner he does not intend to use. The bent shot over the wall requires height and dip and is the most practised technique, which is why walls are built to force it. The driven shot with less curve travels faster and is aimed at the region the keeper cannot reach even when he is positioned correctly.

A pass to a runner arriving beyond the wall attacks the fact that every player in the wall is facing the ball and cannot track movement behind them. The wall therefore has to be dismantled by someone, and defences assign that instruction to the keeper because he alone can see the whole situation.

The moment the wall breaks up

A wall is only useful until the ball is struck, and players who hold position afterwards are spectators in the phase that follows. The instruction to break and turn has to be automatic, since a rebound or a blocked shot produces a chaotic second phase within a second. Attacking sides exploit the delay by positioning a player to attack any deflection, which converts a well-defended free-kick into an ordinary chance.

The defenders who were marking during the free-kick have the same problem in reverse, because their attention has been on the ball rather than on runners. Most goals from this situation arrive in the seconds after the shot rather than from the shot itself, which is where defensive organisation actually decides matters.