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Defensive headaches

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ILD

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We have six days to work on our defensive set up for Spurs. Rogers needs to prove he can build a defence. These little positional errors are very frustrating. We'll continue to conceded if we don't address it.

Too much space between centre halves and FB's. Carragher and Neville hammered this home on MNF.
 
We won't fix it by Spurs but we have six days to work on it. I hope Rogers is trying to address it.
 
He's spent the bones of 40 million on two center halves in two years with 2 experienced internationals as back up or whatever.
It's becoming a huge worry.
The lack of a top defensive midfielder hasn't helped either.
 
Shouldn't be 'as' bad vs Spurs as they don't have the class of players that City do to hurt us. But the defence is a joke and has been for a long time, it's got to be sorted out. We're not getting outdone by some teams with awesome tactics and marvellous skills, we're getting done over and over again by not doing the basics and losing concentration.
 
We have to incorporate a new lead CB and two new first choice full backs. Takes time. Especially with Ming behind them.
 
We won't fix it by Spurs but we have six days to work on it. I hope Rogers is trying to address it.


He's been unable to address in two years so it seems a little optimistic to expect any significant changes by Sunday.

We need the entire team to be well up for it, cohesive and most importantly more measured in the final third because if Spurs play to their potential, we will give them chances to score.
 
i'm sort of tired of it to be honest , there doesn't seem much point analysing it anymore.
 
We have six days to work on our defensive set up for Spurs. Rogers needs to prove he can build a defence. .

Swansea's defence really wasn't that bad when he was there. I think it's a myth he doesn't know about the defence. He's changed the personnel, which is a sign he knows what's wrong, and he's working on improving the unit. It won't suddenly mature, though, this is going to take months.
 
Skrtel and Johnson (not particularly tonight) are all over the place defensively and don't really seem capable of sorting it out. Get Sakho and Manquillo and see if we look any more stable.
 
Is it the coaching or is it the players? I can't believe at this level we're that naive on the defence coaching front and just don't really bother with it. I think it's more down to a lot of them not being all that good.
 
For the second goal Lovren and Moreno pushed up. Johnson and Skrtel stood still.
Just follow Lovrens lead.
There is no need to hit the panikk button yet mind. 2 out of the back for had 180 mins of game time between them and for 40 mins it worked a treat. The defence need some time to settle.


Defensive errors need to be adressed though.
 
Just to reiterate I don't expect the defence to be 'fixed' by Spurs. The players obv will need time to play together, form an understanding and build trust. I just hope we are working on this for the next six days and there is a longterm plan to rectify it.
 
For the second goal Lovren and Moreno pushed up. Johnson and Skrtel stood still.
Just follow Lovrens lead.
There is no need to hit the panikk button yet mind. 2 out of the back for had 180 mins of game time between them and for 40 mins it worked a treat. The defence need some time to settle.


Defensive errors need to be adressed though.
Lovren didn't push up to play an offside trap,he got sucked to jovetic when clearly Nasri was in the more dangerous position,then the flick came and he was in no mans land for rest of move.so he should have held his line with skrtel on that occasion
 
People keep mentioning Clarke but we were crap at the back in his last season. He just wasn't blamed for it.

Were we that bad? I seem to remember only the top two being better defensively that us. Maybe that was the season before.
 
Too much space between centre halves and FB's. Carragher and Neville hammered this home on MNF.

Not having the chance to watch MNF - where Carragher & Neville talking about the FB's being too advanced up the pitch in terms of distance?
 
Not having the chance to watch MNF - where Carragher & Neville talking about the FB's being too advanced up the pitch in terms of distance?


Carragher is overly biased against attacking fullbacks though, isn't he?
 
An awful awful lot of this is down to the fact we don't play a recognised defensive midfielder. We had one of the best defences in the league for years with Hamman/Lucas/Alonso patrolling there. Since Gerrard has gone into that role over the last 2 season, we've shipped more goals (maybe Spurs are the only exeception) than any other side in the Top 8.

Gerrard simply does not play the defensive midfield role well. He's a massive part in all of this.
 
I thought you didn't believe in the Defensive midfielder role. Or am I over-simplifying things....??
 
An awful awful lot of this is down to the fact we don't play a recognised defensive midfielder. We had one of the best defences in the league for years with Hamman/Lucas/Alonso patrolling there. Since Gerrard has gone into that role over the last 2 season, we've shipped more goals (maybe Spurs are the only exeception) than any other side in the Top 8.

Gerrard simply does not play the defensive midfield role well. He's a massive part in all of this.

This is right.
 
I thought you didn't believe in the Defensive midfielder role. Or am I over-simplifying things....??


Not sure where you got that from mate. I'm a massive fan of DM's, always have been. Good ones though.
 
An awful awful lot of this is down to the fact we don't play a recognised defensive midfielder. We had one of the best defences in the league for years with Hamman/Lucas/Alonso patrolling there. Since Gerrard has gone into that role over the last 2 season, we've shipped more goals (maybe Spurs are the only exeception) than any other side in the Top 8.

Gerrard simply does not play the defensive midfield role well. He's a massive part in all of this.
I remember your post after the Southampton game where you suggested, I believe, that maybe our defensive coaching was not up to scratch - that Lovren was doing the right thing, but that Skrtel and Johnson were not on the same wavelength. Sounded like we need a good defensive coach as much as anything.
 
I don't understand the idea of a defensive coach unless it's just for set pieces.

If the ball is in play isn't the whole team functioning as a unit/system?
 
Maybe. But the defenders have a specific role, and if they can do it well as a unit, then the team works better. You don't play offside as an eleven - but that's open play.
 
I think people are over complicating alot of the issues. For years we were well protected because we had a team that defended as a team. When we lose possession on the edge of the opponents box, we look vulnerable straight away because we're constantly trying to get in position, as we play so advanced. When we have the ball and we are on the ascendency, we have a completely different defensive unit to when we don't have the ball, which isn't out of the norm but in our case, it's asking too much. We lose possession and the fullbacks are 20+ yards advanced from the centre backs, the centre backs are wide of each other, with Gerrard either ahead of them or wandering into a too far advanced position. We play either a diamond or with high advanced wide forwards, which generally gives the fullbacks the length of the pitch to cover and protect. The right side isn't too bad because you have Henderson who naturally covers this side, but the left - whoever plays there is on a hiding to nothing.

Like I said previously, play a direct pass into our defensive zone early and we're screwed, we don't have the capacity to reshape and that's why you have people getting sucked to players, a line that lacks cohesion and players looking like they're lapsing in concentration. All of this if altered would obviously have a knock on effect on our forward play, because we're able to get so many bodies forward, but it's such and obvious, gaping flaw, it needs sorting. Teams are going to expose it more and more and more. It's Rodgers Achilles heal and until we address it in some way, then players are going to continue to look inept at controlling it.

The problem we have is that Rodgers wants us to adjust to life without Suarez and not look like we're struggling for goals, good luck to him sorting out both of those problems because one will inadvertently have an effect on the other.
 
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