You are all fucking crazy... The defenders we have is good enough. They line of Johnson - Skrtel - Agger - Enrique is filled with TOP internationals (besides) enrique and has enough talent to be a monster back 4 which is capable of attack as well.
So why do they look indidually poor?
When we have the ball:
When our goalie has the ball, he will look for a defender to start of with the ball at the back (hence it is fucking stupid to suggest that our defenders don't need to be comfortable on the ball). We then start to string passes together deep inside our own half. And they are short passes with high risk. This allows the opposition team to establish their front press line deep inside our half, with the midfield also established inside our half. Example here is the Arsenal game, were we struggled to get through their midfield press level, which was appr 35-40 meters from our goalline. We invited them to press this high, and we mispassed the ball repeatedly. This results in that the opposition can start their attacks from within our half time and time again. Good teams will utilize this to play out the ddefence. There si no protection ahead of them when we loose the ball, and there is no room behind them either. Even when we play higher up in the field, we often go for the sideway, backway pass, rolling the ball between us which is high risk as misppasses will expose the defence to constant 1 on 1 on even 2 on 1 situations.
Furthermore the fullbacks are given freedom to roam if we attack. they are hyperoffensive, which of course makes the spaces to defend much bigger. People have talked about Sami, and all respect to him. But the defensive organization as a team was much bigger, Carra and Finnan was very much defensive fullbacks, and the team took lot less risk on the ball. We could play Sami to his strengths.
When we chase the ball:
To be fair the defensive work of our midfield has been a joke the whole season. This gives the CDs both strikers and midfielders to mark. I don't know how many goals against have come from midfielders, but I bet you it aint few. Against City is an example. When Agger is left alone inside the box, people are complaining he looses his man. I don't know what people expect in those situations. When Johnosn let his man ion the inside the domino effect was started, and the "loosing his man" just show people don't understand football. We play high risk, and we leave acres open for attackers to drag the CDs out of position for midfielders to fill the void spaces left open. None of our midfielders follow them. This creates constant pressure on the CDs allready occupied with looking after spaces where the fullback is missing. it is suicidal defending as a team, and it is naive to allow the fullbacks to attack like they do without a proper CM taking responsibility defensively. And seeing that Coutinho is already here, and Ben Harfa rumoured to be on our radar, this is something we have to get used to.
We will not sharpen the defensive structure with Cahill, or Luiz or who the hell people believe will fit better. Look at Chelsea under Villas Boas. Fullbacks pressing to high, leaving huge gaps for CDs to try to cover. Kamikaze defending built on a philosophy that we will never loose the ball.
We are lucky to have who we got, incl carragher. They solve the job better than anyone else would have done given their scope of work.
