Marko Rog is a central midfielder who has a lot of ups and downs in his career. Cagliari loaned Marko Rog some days ago and Rolando Maran took a midfielder and can build his game to him. This tactical analysis will show his style of play and how he can help his new team with his abilities is interesting.
He is a player who has to find a balance in his performances and that is the reason why Napoli loans him for a consecutive season. The past season, Marko Rog played in La Liga with Sevilla’s shirt and this season will play for Cagliari. He has to prove why Napoli spent about 14 million euros in the summer of 2017 and also that he can take another opportunity. Cagliari gives him the opportunity to give answers to his team and show his tactics in the pitch.
Marko Rog was also on Dortmund’s radar and the German team has sent a lot of staff members to watch him while he was playing in Dinamo Zagreb. The scout reports and the analysis of his abilities were positive and sent to Thomas Tuchel but the Croatian midfielder thought that Napoli was the better destination for him.
Passing accuracy
Rog is a midfielder who passes well and can create spaces and dangerous situations in the opposite team. He is a box-to-box midfielder and can provide assists or key passes and has the ability to read his teammate’s game and what are they thinking. In the past two seasons, he had an average of 88.89% passing accuracy and 84.82% in forwarding passes. Also, he has 90.98% accuracy in the last third passes and that’s why we said before that he can make key passes or create dangerous situations to the opposite team.
We need also to refer to his back passes and his 93.81% accuracy. That is very important for a midfielder and means that 9 of 10 passes that he makes to his teammates at the back are right and the opponent cannot steal them and create chances or counter attacks. Finally, he is not so good in long passes and as a midfielder, he mostly likes to play close to his teammates. He can make long passes but that is not one of his assets. The most usual long passes that he makes are about to 15-16 meters.
One vs one ability
Marko Rog is a player who likes to create spaces and chances. He is a central midfielder with offensive tactics, dribbling skills but he doesn’t score often. He prefers to make personal attempts and his favourite situations are when is he going one vs one with his opponents. Sometimes, also, he likes to go one vs two and tries to dribble them.
He is also a player who takes some risks in his game and makes dribbles in the midfield area. He is self-confident and sometimes he makes gorgeous dribbles and that can raise the crowd. Of course, that style of playing is dangerous because he can lose the ball and the opponent team can create a counter-attack from the midfield, where he has left blank.
Protecting the ball
If you watch the games of Marko Rog and make an analysis of his style of playing, you can also notice that he is a player who can use his body to protect the ball. As we told you before, he takes risks because he is self-confident and there are some times that he keeps the ball to his feet more than he has to. That helps his teammates to make a movement and give him the chance to pass them the ball and with that way, they can create spaces in the pitch and create overlaps.
Marking and defensive skills
Looking in the defensive stats of Marko Rog, you can notice that he is not the best defender. He is playing as a central midfielder but one of his weaknesses is his defensive skills and that is a reason why he didn’t manage to stay in Napoli’s squad for a consecutive year.
He is a soft player and he doesn’t win often the aerial duels (42%). Also, he makes just three fouls per match and blocks less than one shot. In the other way, he is good on stealing the ball when a player tries to dribble him (56.69% defensive duels won).
We also need to mention the ability of Marko Rog stealing the ball and creating counter-attacks and making key passes in the final third. He is a clever player who likes to mark only on the opposite side of the pitch, stealing the ball and creating overlays.
Conclusion
Cagliari is a team that mostly plays defensively and needs some players who are more offensive. Marko Rog is one of them and can help the build-up of the team and help them have possession of the ball in some matches with teams rival as Cagliari. Having a midfielder with the passing ability and accuracy of Rog is so important for teams like Cagliari and the Croatian can help the Sardinians improve their game.
The coach of Cagliari, Rolando Maran, has a talented and skilful player on his hands but he has to help him hide his weaknesses. That can happen with a good defensive midfielder who will run and mark the opponents or using 4-3-3 tactics and has a defensive midfielder and another central midfielder to help Marko Rog when the team defends.
If you love tactical analysis, then you’ll love the digital magazines from totalfootballanalysis.com – a guaranteed 100+ pages of pure tactical analysis covering topics from the Premier League, Serie A, La Liga, Bundesliga and many, many more. Buy your copy of the July issue for just ₤4.99 here, or even better sign up for a ₤50 annual membership (12 monthly issues plus the annual review) right here.
