Caroline Graham Hansen: Breaking down her role at Barcelona this season
When captain Alexia Putellas suffered an anterior cruciate ligament injury a day before Euro 2022 got underway, her club side Barcelona were faced with the prospect of virtually an entire campaign without being able to call on their talismanic playmaker.
At the time, that seemed like a really difficult thing to ask of them, given how important she had been during their domestic and continental campaign, but they adapted and last season demonstrated how structurally interchangeable they are as a squad.
However, not every player can be replaced simply be moving the chess pieces around, and that was particularly the case with influential winger Caroline Graham Hansen. The Norway international sustained a tendon injury in her arm during the campaign which kept her out of action between October and March, before a minor knee problem occured in April, and it was noticeable when she re-entered the fold later that month just how much Barcelona had missed her and were buoyed by her return.
Graham Hansen has always been a very interesting part of the Barcelona project, with her capable of operating in a number of roles during games, and it does look this season like she has been given some very specific instructions by head coach Jonatan Giráldez as he continually tries to find new tactical innovations that keep his team at the top of the game.
Positional rotations
One thing that Barcelona are famed for is their free-flowing style of play and the ability of their players to constantly rotate their positions during matches, and that was something that was particularly evident in the way that those in the midfield and forward areas interchanged with each other during both Lluis Cortés’ time at the helm and the early stages of Giráldez’s reign.
For an in-depth look at Jonatan Giráldez’s tactics, have a look at my breakdown of his system for Total Football Analysis here:
However, this season, the rotational focus has increased to include those on the wings, with Giráldez seemingly keen to ensure that his side uses those in the wide channels to assist what is already happening in the middle. Against Valencia and Real Sociedad in their most recent matches, it was clear just how much they had been working on how the wingers and full-backs connected when they had the ball, and that was increasingly evident on the right hand side with Graham Hansen and both Marta Torrejón and Lucy Bronze.
The key detail is the way that Graham Hansen tended not to cut inside as much as she might normally have, and instead she almost acted as a marker for Barcelona as they looked to maintain their width whilst also creating their usual interior overloads. As a result, it was the full-backs who more often than not were seen inside the field, and that suited both Torrejón and Bronze as it allowed them to access the half-spaces and to get shots away at goal, which is what both love doing.
What is important to note though is that it wasn’t a case of Graham Hansen always being on the outside and the full-back always underlapping her, with them constantly alternating during the 90 minutes and so ensuring that the unpredictability that Barcelona like to have in their play was still present in everything that they did.
It might appear to some that these types of movements just happen and aren’t coached into the players, and, given the players involved in executing them for the Spanish champions, there could well be an element of that. However, what points towards this being something that they have developed as a tactical upgrade for this season is that it was not as common to see during the 2022/23 season, both due to injuries to Putellas and Graham Hansen and the fact that Ona Batlle wasn’t at the club.
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With the former Manchester United player now on their books, Giráldez has been able to instigate it with more success than he would have had with Nuria Rábano or the currently-injured Fridolina Rolfö, and that suggests that this is something that he has wanted to see as a natural progression in his team’s play, but has needed to be patient with until he has had the right tools available to him.
Impact on central players
When it comes to why Barcelona want one of their wingers or full-backs to stay wide whenever they have the ball, the reasons are actually very simple, with it coming down to the way that it prevents opposing defensive lines from setting up in a compact shape and how that then allows those in the middle to play with the space and freedom that they are at their best in.
In short, the effect that Barcelona have when delivering balls into the middle is so great that opposing sides are forced to move out and negate that option as much as possible, otherwise they risk being under constant siege and giving Barcelona consistent chances to test their goalkeeper.
Knowing that their opponents will have that in the back of their minds is something that Barcelona have played on this season, with Graham Hansen known for her devastating accuracy when trying to find teammates in the middle, and so keeping her in the wide channels and allowing the full-backs to cut inside forces the opposition into dealing with her, whereas they might not be as tempted to if she were further inside the pitch.
As a result, both Valencia and Sociedad left constant gaps open in their ranks, and that then made it significantly easier for Barcelona to progress the ball through the thirds in their usual manner and to ensure that their key threats, such as Putellas and Aitana Bonmatí, could have plenty of opportunities to wreak their usual havoc inside the final third.
With Putellas back in form and coming off the back of a successful summer on the pitch (if not off it) with the national side, it is important that avenues are kept open for her and others to exploit, as well as enabling Patri Guijarro, who has reverted to the deep-lying distributor role that she occupied so often before Putellas’ injury, to have time to send the ball into their paths.
The way that Putellas and Bonmatí have pushed so far up the field at the start of the season does suggest that Barcelona will once again be relying on them for goals rather than on a central striker, as was the case more often than not in the last campaign.
Therefore, in order to facilitate their attacking runs and in order to ensure that they can provide that goalscoring threat, the rest of the team needs to be set up to give them routes to exploit, and that is why Graham Hansen’s positioning this season has been and will continue to be so important.
Variety of her play
However, that is not to say that the Norway star will be restricted from making the same inside runs that she normally does, and in fact she has already been offering plenty during the early stages of the campaign, with her scoring from inside the goal area against Sociedad after spotting a gap that needed to be occupied.
As those who have watched her previously will know, she is at her best when running towards the centre of the field and having the freedom to take opponents on in 1-v-1 duels, and that was what Barcelona missed a lot of last season when she had her long injury lay-off. It is worth remembering that she is an able operator when in an inside forward or attacking midfield role, which has often been something that the Norwegian national team have exploited, none more so than at Euro 2022 when she started behind Lyon star Ada Hegerberg for a run of games.
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For that reason, it is likely that fans will get to witness her offering both a wider presence and a central goalscoring threat as the season goes on, and it will be interesting to see how much this alters from game to game and if there is a preference for one over the other in some of their bigger matches.
“Graham Hansen is a dagger on the right flank — she has speed, sharp dribbling ability and technique, and is clinical in one-on-one opportunities. Vitally, she scores goals — at least 10 in each full season since she has been at Barca — and she is one of the team’s top assisters.”
Laia Cervelló Herrero, writing for The Athletic in April 2023.
In short, Barcelona’s squad is littered with star names and it can be difficult to pick out just one standout player, with each having their moments and making viable claims to be the difference-maker on the field. However, Graham Hansen is very difficult to replace when she is unavailable, with her offering something that not many others do, and that is why it is vital that she be available for as many games as possible this season as they once again go in search of major silverware both domestically and in Europe.