No, hindsight doesn't describe it. Lots of us knew that it was stupid as soon as we looked at the team.
Liverpool v Everton Match Thread
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No, hindsight doesn't describe it. Lots of us knew that it was stupid as soon as we looked at the team.
That is a tactic. That's what he relies on. Keep it tight, try to restrict their chances, try to win set pieces to score from. Try not to get fucked, and if you can, score. It's shit but it works. It worked.
They had a game plan which was to ride their luck and hope they got something from a set piece.
It worked. But it's not the sort of football that is sustainable long term and whilst it may build confidence, for me, that's false confidence because they actually didn't play well. Their major problem will come when Allardyce is given money to spend and shape the side in his own image.
As for us, I just can't have this "we needed Firmino and Coutinho" revisionism. No we didn't. We needed Mane, arguably our best player, to square a ball across the box and we win the game 4/5-0 after they come out. We also needed Lovren to defend better in the lead up to the penalty and then not to be conned by DLC, like he were an inexperienced player. I'd have expect Gomez to give away a penalty like that, not an experienced pro.
If we had created 100 chances and drew 1-1, would people have been crying out for Phil/Bobby then too? Ultimately, we played well and had 2 very presentable opportunities to kill the game. We didn't take them. Had we had Phil, and Bobby, maybe we would have created 4 big opportunities. Maybe we would have taken them, maybe we wouldn't have. Or maybe Phil would have got wiped out by a Sigursson tackle in the first minute. All speculation.
What is evident, is we should have won the game 1,2,4-0. Or managed the last 20mins better if we felt we weren't going to score against their back 9, and forced them to come out and play.
Getting caught on the counter against their only 2 attacking players is either down to failure of structure (Klopp), or failure of individuals (Players; could point half a finger at Klopp here too).
Looking at the set up, we were in good shape. It was effectively a 5 v 2 (GK incl):
Lovren can just about see DLC and can see the ball. He's in line with him and is a good position. Joe Gomez is in decent recovery position too. The issue here is when DLC makes a double movement and peels behind Lovren who doesn't match his movement.
Right now, he has no idea where DLC is. And the ball is on it's way.
He then gets caught under the ball, as it's a world class pass from Rooney (who understands what DLC has done) and so clips it into an area that will tempt Lovren to head it, but it will be strong enough to beat him and curl into DLC's path. I'm not sure many players could play such a pass. This goal could have been prevented if Lovren was 2 steps further right basically in line with DLC.
Lovren takes the bait and tries to head the ball. Realising he can't, and he has no idea where DLC is, he's beginning to panic. And literally does a 360 spin in the air.
Now they're in the box, and it's still a 3 v 1, Gomez is back covering, but as Lovren is still somewhat in a state of panic, he comes across too quickly and DLC steps across his path to the ball and invites contact. (Suarez was great at this).
See him trying to step across Kompany here:
No pen given.
It's a clever trick for a striker to do. Lovren obliges almost instinctively (if someone steps across your path in the street, a reflex reactions will be to raise your hands). The striker goes down. It looks a pen from the refs POV, no doubt about that. You can see why it was given. Clever play from DLC. But was it actually penalty? Probably not. Certainly not for me. DLC conned the referee into thinking Lovren pushed him, when really he had one arm on his back and one arm on his shoulder to prevent DLC from stepping across him. It's not really the way I want English football to going towards; with strikers trying to be "clever" in the boxinstead of trying to actually score goal. But equally, I'm not surprised that the reaction has been negative towards Lovren. He's a clumsy defender who should have be a squad player at best.
Ironically, when jolly ole foreigner Niasse actually had the (English) defender step across him and initiate contact, and he went down easily against Palace, most observers, including those "pundits" on MOTD called it a disgraceful dive against the beloved ex-England manager Roy Hodgson. The FA acted swiftly.
But a young english CF going down easily, from a defender trying to him from stepping across him, and these same pundits will call it a blatant penalty. Not once, throwing out the idea that it could be a clumsy, but it also could be a dive too. Again, I'm not really surprised given the context (and Lovren's chequered past of brainless defending).
In this case, however, the big mistake Klopp needs to worry about is Lovren's defending in the lead up to the challenge, more so than the challenge itself.
It's something he's been capable of before. I remember his poor positioning for Aguero's goal:
Again, poor body shape and positioning. The striker should never be able to see your number like that without you dropping off a bit and being able to see him.
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This sums it up.
I'd say we created two golden chances with the players we had on the pitch. Actually, I wouldn't even class Salah's goal as a golden chance, it was a bit of magic out of nowhere. So we created one golden chance, that we fucked up, which given our profligacy in front of goal in recent years, isn't so unexpected.
If you saw that lineup, and then watched the game, and were still happy with, for example, Solanke and Ox ahead of Coutinho and Firmino, then I don't know what to say.
Solanke may be a good prospect (I haven't seen enough of him to judge), and Ox may be a decent player, but they're not those two players. Who's more likely to pick a defence, or create some magic out of nothing, Coutinho and Firmino, or Solanke and Ox. The team that Klopp put out created one clear goal scoring chance and a couple of half chances. That was not good enough.
I like this bit as well.
"He claimed he had retired when he quit Crystal Palace last season after pocketing a huge windfall for keeping them in the Premier League, but we all knew he would be back when the waft of a few more quid came his way.
What the actual fuck?
He still doesn’t have a good enough squad to rest players like Coutinho.
And while I’m not Firmino’s biggest fan, does anyone think Solanke was a viable replacement? He’s started one game for us and scored a grand total of no league goals ever in his entire life
Hilarious
Do you think Solanke and Ox are the same standard as Firmino and Coutinho? What a fucking daft point.
What did you expect from him? A salient one?
Either you like it or not Beavis, we need to rest Coutinho if he is going to last over the Xmas program. But hey, you clearly doesn't have a Clue, so I'll leave it there.
Who said that? The point is that from having some juniors to fill up the bench last season, when you had a og at Klopp, he now has established Internationals to fill voids With. And you still moan... and moan.... and moan...
I clearly doesn’t have a Clue
You’re so wise
You’re so wise
Dominic Solanke, an ‘established International’ who has never scored a Premier League goal. Ever.
Christ, you’re almost beyond parody
After all these years you had to be right at some point.... Bravo Old Man.
We did 6 changes. And the front six was:
Henderson- Experienced international
Alex Ox - Experienced international
Milner- Retired international
Mane- National team Captain
Salah- National team Captain
Solanke - Voted best player in the summer U-20 World Cup.
Hardly a line up of Juniors.
Are you available for children’s parties?
What's the problem? Even kids see through your bullshit now??
The issue, as has been done to death, is not that we replaced Coutinho and Firmino with players of equal quality, we replaced them with Ox who is nowhere near Coutinho's level and hasn't set the world alight yet, and Solanke - an untested, young player. The fact that you credit Solanke as an established international is neither here nor there. Anyone can get a game for England these days, I'm half expecting a call up myself. It's not like rotating Mane with Salah. We swapped two of our best players with two not great ones. For one of the biggest games of the season. In a game where we needed some extra flair and quality.
Ox was good, our best midfielder that day. Solanke not so but he was playing in the middle of 5-6 defenders most of the time and he is no Firmino.
I think everything that has to be said has been said and I am just glad we have a game coming up tomorrow so we can all move on. Though i suspect anything less than a win and this thread could explode again.
We had more than enough chances to win the game, and Everton had fuck all beyond that shite penalty they got.
I highly doubt Allardyce got his tactics spot on, cause we should have been 2 or 3-0 up at half time.
There is also the Gomez header, Salah header and Lovren who could have just tucked the ball in from one yard out if not for Kenny clearing it.
In hindsight, we should have rested only one of Firmino and Coutinho. I think Klopp is probably thinking that himself, if he thinks about this game at all now.
But the team was more than good enough to win, as the stats from the game show, and we would have won had it not been for that cunt of a referee or the absurd luck of the Blueshite.
Resting only one of the two Brazililans might have changed the outcome of the game, but who knows. And at this point who cares. It doesnt matter anymore.
Roll on WBA, and a win please.
I highly doubt Allardyce got his tactics spot on, cause we should have been 2 or 3-0 up at half time.
There is also the Gomez header, Salah header and Lovren who could have just tucked the ball in from one yard out if not for Kenny clearing it.
In hindsight, we should have rested only one of Firmino and Coutinho. I think Klopp is probably thinking that himself, if he thinks about this game at all now.
But the team was more than good enough to win, as the stats from the game show, and we would have won had it not been for that cunt of a referee or the absurd luck of the Blueshite.
Resting only one of the two Brazililans might have changed the outcome of the game, but who knows. And at this point who cares. It doesnt matter anymore.
Roll on WBA, and a win please.
It’s not often we get to play two games one after the other featuring managers who I fucking despise above almost all others (apart from Wenger, Mourinho and Guardiola)
Soz, I really think it was worth spunking £40m on AOC, when we can barely muster up two fit centre halves.
I didn't moan about squad depth being Klopp's fault anyway last season. I probably mentioned that we didn't buy a striker, because it was a valid point and we then went and bought two this sunmer, so it was an obvious concern. And I'm fucked if I can remember moaning about kids being on the bench. I championed the likes of TAA and Woodburn, I also backed Origi a lot.
So quit with the fucking whining, CDNW, "you're not a real fan" bullshit.
You’re too nice. Some of it was fucking Klopp’s fault.
Our squad still isn’t good enough. Quite obviously
I didn't want Ox either. Absolutely not. I thought prize and player was wrong. But even I can't deny that it adds to the depth in the squad that allow to rest players every now and then. Alternatives With Lallana out wasn't too many. He could have thrown in Woodburn or Grujic, which I think could have done great agaisnt this shower of shit Everton team. But there is allways a risk for not winning every game, and then we need to blame someone. Point fingers and cry..... Which is the real bullshit.
They had a game plan which was to ride their luck and hope they got something from a set piece.
It worked. But it's not the sort of football that is sustainable long term and whilst it may build confidence, for me, that's false confidence because they actually didn't play well. Their major problem will come when Allardyce is given money to spend and shape the side in his own image.
As for us, I just can't have this "we needed Firmino and Coutinho" revisionism. No we didn't. We needed Mane, arguably our best player, to square a ball across the box and we win the game 4/5-0 after they come out. We also needed Lovren to defend better in the lead up to the penalty and then not to be conned by DLC, like he were an inexperienced player. I'd have expect Gomez to give away a penalty like that, not an experienced pro.
If we had created 100 chances and drew 1-1, would people have been crying out for Phil/Bobby then too? Ultimately, we played well and had 2 very presentable opportunities to kill the game. We didn't take them. Had we had Phil, and Bobby, maybe we would have created 4 big opportunities. Maybe we would have taken them, maybe we wouldn't have. Or maybe Phil would have got wiped out by a Sigursson tackle in the first minute. All speculation.
What is evident, is we should have won the game 1,2,4-0. Or managed the last 20mins better if we felt we weren't going to score against their back 9, and forced them to come out and play.
Getting caught on the counter against their only 2 attacking players is either down to failure of structure (Klopp), or failure of individuals (Players; could point half a finger at Klopp here too).
Looking at the set up, we were in good shape. It was effectively a 5 v 2 (GK incl):
Lovren can just about see DLC and can see the ball. He's in line with him and is a good position. Joe Gomez is in decent recovery position too. The issue here is when DLC makes a double movement and peels behind Lovren who doesn't match his movement.
Right now, he has no idea where DLC is. And the ball is on it's way.
He then gets caught under the ball, as it's a world class pass from Rooney (who understands what DLC has done) and so clips it into an area that will tempt Lovren to head it, but it will be strong enough to beat him and curl into DLC's path. I'm not sure many players could play such a pass. This goal could have been prevented if Lovren was 2 steps further right basically in line with DLC.
Lovren takes the bait and tries to head the ball. Realising he can't, and he has no idea where DLC is, he's beginning to panic. And literally does a 360 spin in the air.
Now they're in the box, and it's still a 3 v 1, Gomez is back covering, but as Lovren is still somewhat in a state of panic, he comes across too quickly and DLC steps across his path to the ball and invites contact. (Suarez was great at this).
See him trying to step across Kompany here:
No pen given.
It's a clever trick for a striker to do. Lovren obliges almost instinctively (if someone steps across your path in the street, a reflex reactions will be to raise your hands). The striker goes down. It looks a pen from the refs POV, no doubt about that. You can see why it was given. Clever play from DLC. But was it actually penalty? Probably not. Certainly not for me. DLC conned the referee into thinking Lovren pushed him, when really he had one arm on his back and one arm on his shoulder to prevent DLC from stepping across him. It's not really the way I want English football to going towards; with strikers trying to be "clever" in the boxinstead of trying to actually score goal. But equally, I'm not surprised that the reaction has been negative towards Lovren. He's a clumsy defender who should have be a squad player at best.
Ironically, when jolly ole foreigner Niasse actually had the (English) defender step across him and initiate contact, and he went down easily against Palace, most observers, including those "pundits" on MOTD called it a disgraceful dive against the beloved ex-England manager Roy Hodgson. The FA acted swiftly.
But a young english CF going down easily, from a defender trying to him from stepping across him, and these same pundits will call it a blatant penalty. Not once, throwing out the idea that it could be a clumsy, but it also could be a dive too. Again, I'm not really surprised given the context (and Lovren's chequered past of brainless defending).
In this case, however, the big mistake Klopp needs to worry about is Lovren's defending in the lead up to the challenge, more so than the challenge itself.
It's something he's been capable of before. I remember his poor positioning for Aguero's goal:
Again, poor body shape and positioning. The striker should never be able to see your number like that without you dropping off a bit and being able to see him.
Very good analysis.
That's the dumbest thing I have ever seen you post.
You know what I mean, don't be so flippant.
You can't be surprised that a manager turns up hoping his defence does enough whilst at the same time relying on long ball tactics.
He did what he set out to do. His defence did enough to limit us to 3 shots on target, and he managed to steal a goal at the other end.
Was it a masterclass? Fuck no. But at the end of the day it worked.
Counter it then please.
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