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Improvement - 2015 vs 2016

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DHSC said:
We are not going to get top 4 next season. There is no way that Man City, Man Utd and Arsenal dont strengthen.
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Arsenal & potentially Utd will be in Europa league next year. Thursday / Sunday is not a combination that has worked for anyone yet.
 
choperman.v01 said:
White Klopp deserves credit for our improvement, he also needs to share the responsibility for the squad being what it is this season, i.e. short in numbers and cover. Let's look at the senior squad at the start of the season (excluding keepers and after he banished Sakho):

CB: Matip, Lovren, Klavan, [ Gomez ]
FB: Clyne, Milner, Moreno
CM: Henderson, Can, Lucas
CM: Lallana, Wijnaldum, Grujic
WF: Mane, Coutinho
CF: Firmino, Origi, [ Sturridge ], [ Ings ]

Gomez and Ings were coming back from ACL injuries so their contributions were likely to be suspect earlier on in the season anyway. With Sturridge's injury history in the seasons prior, it was always going to be rather risky to count on him as a solid contributor.

So with us playing predominantly 4-3-3, the squad was basically staffed to cater for, in general, at most one injury per position. In the case of wide forwards, we didn't really have any backups unless we took someone from another line and pushed him out of position. We knew all along that Mane was going to miss out on the games in January. The whole Matip issue was confusing and suggests carelessness and/or incompetence somewhere in the organization that didn't spot the potential tripwire. And yet we didn't plan for any of that.

For all our lamentation that we were unlucky with injuries, we've also glossed over the fact that we were very lucky that between Clyne and Milner, they missed only three league games combined. I think it's safe to say we probably won't have finished 4th if either of them, flawed as they are in certain aspects of their game, had missed a few more games each.

So yes, there was good improvement in some areas, but we really need to learn lessons from this season both on and off the pitch.
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That's a fair point. I didn't understand why we didn't buy anyone at all in January. Also people say we were terribly unlucky with injuries – I don't think so. So Coutinho missed roughly a month and Mane's season ended a month and a half early – that's very much within the norm. Sturridge doesn't count – his injury issues were well-known, same for Hendo. Truly unlucky would have been a key player sustaining a long-term injury, like an ACL or a broken foot – and even that's an possibility big clubs need to be prepared for.
 
choperman.v01 said:
White Klopp deserves credit for our improvement, he also needs to share the responsibility for the squad being what it is this season, i.e. short in numbers and cover. Let's look at the senior squad at the start of the season (excluding keepers and after he banished Sakho):

CB: Matip, Lovren, Klavan, [ Gomez ]
FB: Clyne, Milner, Moreno
CM: Henderson, Can, Lucas
CM: Lallana, Wijnaldum, Grujic
WF: Mane, Coutinho
CF: Firmino, Origi, [ Sturridge ], [ Ings ]

Gomez and Ings were coming back from ACL injuries so their contributions were likely to be suspect earlier on in the season anyway. With Sturridge's injury history in the seasons prior, it was always going to be rather risky to count on him as a solid contributor.

So with us playing predominantly 4-3-3, the squad was basically staffed to cater for, in general, at most one injury per position. In the case of wide forwards, we didn't really have any backups unless we took someone from another line and pushed him out of position. We knew all along that Mane was going to miss out on the games in January. The whole Matip issue was confusing and suggests carelessness and/or incompetence somewhere in the organization that didn't spot the potential tripwire. And yet we didn't plan for any of that.

For all our lamentation that we were unlucky with injuries, we've also glossed over the fact that we were very lucky that between Clyne and Milner, they missed only three league games combined. I think it's safe to say we probably won't have finished 4th if either of them, flawed as they are in certain aspects of their game, had missed a few more games each.

So yes, there was good improvement in some areas, but we really need to learn lessons from this season both on and off the pitch.
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Valid points, but these points has already been adressed by Klopp as lessons to be learned.

Klopp also stands out as the one that will not try any short term solution to fix long term issues. He will work with what he has. Might seem stubborn, but I like the idea.

People are on and on about the januar window. The propblem didn't occur in the Januar window. The problem was that we came into the xmas program a little shortstacked for options. Sturridge started the season but was out for the important period. Ings was kept despite good offers for him, and was gone early on. If we had sold those two in the summer for a good 50 Mill combined (maybe even more) and replaced them with 2 x 30 mill strikers it would have looked different. Then those two strikers would have been well accomodated to contribute before and after January which would have given us plenty options forward for rotation, resting in the xmas program etc. Same for midfield were Grujic was brought in as an alternative, but couldn't play and left us with few options as Stewart never really cut it and Can had his problems.

When the team needed some fresh legs that knew Klopps philosophy and had worked with the team, we ran out of steam and it was messed up. Could we have rectified it in January? i don't think one expensive signing which was not a real target for us anyway would have solved much. I would rather have those Money available now.
 
Insignificance said:
Valid points, but these points has already been adressed by Klopp as lessons to be learned.

Klopp also stands out as the one that will not try any short term solution to fix long term issues. He will work with what he has. Might seem stubborn, but I like the idea.
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Like playing James Milner at LB.
 
We got into the CL on the cheap. The lads are right - all injuries were in the norm of expecations, we just had feck all cover. January's decision was surprising, but given those decisions are made in November/December, when we were flying you can understand it.

First LCFC and now Chelsea win the legaue with no European football. You've got to think we'll have more injuries and fatigue next year, and we'll need 6-7 new players to remain in the hunt. We've barely made the CL having had NO other competition since January. I could see us regressing back to 8th easy with two competitions if we don't have a few options for most positions. Look at LCFC this year. I know we think we're all better than them with our European pedigree, but you can see what happens to a squad who's not used to fighting on multiple fronts.
 
rurikbird said:
That's a fair point. I didn't understand why we didn't buy anyone at all in January. Also people say we were terribly unlucky with injuries – I don't think so. So Coutinho missed roughly a month and Mane's season ended a month and a half early – that's very much within the norm. Sturridge doesn't count – his injury issues were well-known, same for Hendo. Truly unlucky would have been a key player sustaining a long-term injury, like an ACL or a broken foot – and even that's an possibility big clubs need to be prepared for.
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Well, I agree with most of that. But, our preffered CB pairing only played 17 league games together.
Lovren and Matip played 17 games, 12 conceded goals, 1 loss and 8 clean sheets.

Now, its not unreasonable to suggest our points tally would be higher had they played more games together.
The likes of Chelsea and Spurs played their preferred CBs for most parts of the season.
 
Hansern said:
Well, I agree with most of that. But, our preffered CB pairing only played 17 league games together.
Lovren and Matip played 17 games, 12 conceded goals, 1 loss and 8 clean sheets.

Now, its not unreasonable to suggest our points tally would be higher had they played more games together.
The likes of Chelsea and Spurs played their preferred CBs for most parts of the season.
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Agreed, we were unlucky there, especially as Matip didn't have significant injury issues before in his career and neither did Lovren. There were a lot of small injuries or games missed due to illness between the two of them and we definitely suffered for it.
 
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