Advocaat has maintained Guus Hiddink's approach, believing that, with a relatively weak defence, trying to outscore opponents is a more sure way to make progress. Anyukov and Zhirkov, on paper the full-backs, functioned more as out-and-out wingers. This is fine, as long as you keep cover for your ponderous centre halves. Russia failed to provide that, as Shirokov strayed out of position far too often to support the already gung ho Russians in their exciting attacks.
Shirokov (black) in a good position to protect his defence
Shirokov just a couple of seconds later, having joined the attack. This has left Berezutsky and Ignashevich open:
Of course, Russia were then enjoying a period of sustained pressure, so maybe it is normal to throw numbers forward then. However, even in the first half Shirokov, who has his uses, but is a fairly limited player, joined the attacks almost incessantly:
An almost extraordinary number of players have joined this attack: not only Dzagoev (yellow), who is of course supposed to be there, but also Shirokov (black), Zyrianov (green), and Semshov (red). This means that the entire Russian midfield has moved up, which is, at this level, tactical suicide. Slovakia didn't profit because they didn't look to profit: 1-0 up in Russia, they defended tooth and nail to keep their advantage.
Another example: look how many players are in the Slovakia penalty area. Zyrianov and Semshov are both there, joined by Pogrebnyak, Dzagoev, and Zhirkov (extreme left). Arshavin is waiting just outside the area, and Anyukov (top right) is there as well:
However, except for a good period at the beginning of the second half, Russia suffered from the Arsenal syndrome: trying to pass the ball into the net, looking for the perfect goal, threading passes through the eye of the needle, when there are better options available. The Arsenal syndrome of course also includes a sense of playing too narrow, even with ultra-attacking full-backs. Dzagoev and Arshavin both came inside to make room for Anyukov and Zhirkov respectively, but even they came inside more and more as the game progressed. The introduction of Bystrov (pink) helped ease this problem: he generally stayed wide, gave Russia another option and was generally dangerous and sharp on the ball:
In the end, though, Russia simply didn't have a high enough ball circulation to pull Slovakia's two banks of 4 defenders and 5 midfielders apart, and they were too slow to play the ball to the flanks to force Slovakia's defenders to make a choice. Until the introduction, Slovakia's defence just stayed narrow, since Dzagoev and Arshavin came inside. Stoch and Jendrisek were disciplined on their flanks to contain Anyukov and Zhirkov reasonably well. The Slovakian midfield put in an excellent shift and worked hard to restrict space to Russia's more creative outlets:
Jendrisek (1), Krhin (2), Stoch (3), Strba (4), and Hamsik (5, who was excellent and was box-to-box for almost the entirety of the game) keeping a good line
Russia's gung ho approach was refreshing and fun to watch, and Advocaat can count himself a bit unlucky not to get anything out of this game. A mistake by Akinfeev led to Stoch's fantastic goal, and after that, Slovakia restricted the Russian waves of attack well. However, gung ho means nothing without a system, and just throwing players forward in hopes that someone will get on the end of an attack is not going to work every time. And against (even) better opponents, with all due respect to Slovakia, the Russian midfield's lack of defensive discipline will inevitably lead to larger problems at the back.
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