Setting up a defence
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I think Chelsea show that having a strong backline is key to sustained challenges/success. They've got four MASSIVE lads at the back but they can also play, we seem to continuously identify slight, easily bullied players in key areas of the pitch, not just under Rodgers either. Lucas has grown into the DM role well but look at his build and athleticism compared to other players in a similar position at other teams.
Can has the physique to dominate midfield and Henderson puts himself about, but that's about it. Sakho and Skrtel should be more dominating, while Moreno, Lovren and Allen are easy fodder for physical sides.
We need to dispose of our stretched defense as a start, I don't think you can lay a large percentage of the blame for our woes too far away from that. The centre backs need to be tighter together, the full backs don't need to have a starting position of the half way line and then you won't see the rest of the side fall apart, trying to haplessly cover the cracks.
Whether Rodgers and/or the new staff we bring in can accomplish that is, of course, a different question. I just think he wants to attack in numbers and he's tried too hard to paper over a lack of attacking strength, with strength in numbers instead (which has partly been his fault too), but it's gone horrifically wrong.
Can has the physique to dominate midfield and Henderson puts himself about, but that's about it. Sakho and Skrtel should be more dominating, while Moreno, Lovren and Allen are easy fodder for physical sides.
We need to dispose of our stretched defense as a start, I don't think you can lay a large percentage of the blame for our woes too far away from that. The centre backs need to be tighter together, the full backs don't need to have a starting position of the half way line and then you won't see the rest of the side fall apart, trying to haplessly cover the cracks.
Whether Rodgers and/or the new staff we bring in can accomplish that is, of course, a different question. I just think he wants to attack in numbers and he's tried too hard to paper over a lack of attacking strength, with strength in numbers instead (which has partly been his fault too), but it's gone horrifically wrong.
It's not hard to do, no. And if I'm being fair, then I'd say Rodgers could do it if we tried, but Rodgers is trying to instil a hybrid counter-attacking game, with the onus on being offensive rather than defensive.
My issue with that, and with Rodgers' system more specifically is that it absolutely is possible to be a team with positive, attacking intent that take the game on and be solid defensively. Rodgers attitude that 'you can teach anyone to put 11 men behind the ball' is correct, but you can also teach anyone to go out attacking recklessly without care for defence either. There's a fucking balance that has to be found, and can be found. Adopting that attitude doesn't endow you with the status of being avant garde, it just highlights your naivety really.
His disregard for full-backs that can defend, his disregard for a disciplined defensive line, his disregard for team structure when holding onto a lead, and his evident preference for a DM to be a ball-playing DM rather than a foil for the defence behind him leads me to believe he either can't coach that area effectively, or doesn't want to. Both of which are frightening.
I think I've said this before somewhere but I would dearly love to watch how he coaches the players during the week, and what he does in training. Let me tell you, one of the most dangerous sayings ever promoted in modern-day football is 'we do everything with the ball at training'. It's a fucking myth.
Good defences, good training methods, and good defensive coaches attribute the time necessary to educating players and teams how to defend. And large parts of that are down to just getting players to know how the system works and where they should be. I remember being taught how to defend zonally from corners 15 years ago. There wasn't a fucking ball in sight. Fuck the ball off, and work on positioning and systems.
I don't blame Lovren, or Glen Johnson, or Coates, or whomever. I blame the system, and the man who should be responsible for it.
Defending's a lost art apparently, and disregarding it like we have for the last 3 odd years has gotten us exactly what we deserve.
My issue with that, and with Rodgers' system more specifically is that it absolutely is possible to be a team with positive, attacking intent that take the game on and be solid defensively. Rodgers attitude that 'you can teach anyone to put 11 men behind the ball' is correct, but you can also teach anyone to go out attacking recklessly without care for defence either. There's a fucking balance that has to be found, and can be found. Adopting that attitude doesn't endow you with the status of being avant garde, it just highlights your naivety really.
His disregard for full-backs that can defend, his disregard for a disciplined defensive line, his disregard for team structure when holding onto a lead, and his evident preference for a DM to be a ball-playing DM rather than a foil for the defence behind him leads me to believe he either can't coach that area effectively, or doesn't want to. Both of which are frightening.
I think I've said this before somewhere but I would dearly love to watch how he coaches the players during the week, and what he does in training. Let me tell you, one of the most dangerous sayings ever promoted in modern-day football is 'we do everything with the ball at training'. It's a fucking myth.
Good defences, good training methods, and good defensive coaches attribute the time necessary to educating players and teams how to defend. And large parts of that are down to just getting players to know how the system works and where they should be. I remember being taught how to defend zonally from corners 15 years ago. There wasn't a fucking ball in sight. Fuck the ball off, and work on positioning and systems.
I don't blame Lovren, or Glen Johnson, or Coates, or whomever. I blame the system, and the man who should be responsible for it.
Defending's a lost art apparently, and disregarding it like we have for the last 3 odd years has gotten us exactly what we deserve.
To be fair to BR he constantly goes on about 'finding the balance' so I don't think he's unaware of the issues. I think I'm right in saying that we did have an extended period where we conceded very few and that followed a heavy defeat so he/we can respond.
The heavy defeats at the back end of the season were symptomatic of loss of focus for a reason we can only speculate about but I think it's a grievance issue and not about setting up or systems.
The heavy defeats at the back end of the season were symptomatic of loss of focus for a reason we can only speculate about but I think it's a grievance issue and not about setting up or systems.
There's a famous story in Jonathan Wilson's Inverting the Pyramid where he talks about Sacchi's Milan, and how they used to have full training matches without the ball, to teach the team how to control space. Sacchi's argument was that space is more important than the ball. So he's have the side play a full game in training with an imaginary football. He'd tell the players where it was, and the players would move into position accordingly. That's how they perfected zonal marking.
On the eve of a 5-0 thrashing of Madrid in the European Cup, Madrid sent a scout to secretly watch their training. He want back to the Madrid camp utterly perplexed, and told them, 'They're playing a whole game with no ball!".
A bit of a side story, I know, but I'd love a manager with that sort of technical, tactical mind again.
Give me a tactically astute, solid team that's often quite boring over an attacking side with a leaky defence any day.
On the eve of a 5-0 thrashing of Madrid in the European Cup, Madrid sent a scout to secretly watch their training. He want back to the Madrid camp utterly perplexed, and told them, 'They're playing a whole game with no ball!".
A bit of a side story, I know, but I'd love a manager with that sort of technical, tactical mind again.
Give me a tactically astute, solid team that's often quite boring over an attacking side with a leaky defence any day.
Kudos, a better job, a prettier girl, large amounts of cash and fame (or infamy depending on your bias).
We always look vulnerable at corners and free kicks, headless chicken defending at the best of times, they never look like there's any organisation or a plan. He could make a start there. He could also push the centre backs 10 yards up the pitch and buy a goalkeeper who can kick a ball, preferably to a team mate.
I was reading another thread bemoaning our defenders and tactics and thinking the above prompted the thread.
In recent years we've seen very different styles and tactics prosper - on the one hand managers like Guardiola and on the other Mourinho and Simeone.
The approach the likes of Barca and Guardiola take is almost impossible to emulate - you need the cream of the crop to be successful. The tactics of Mourinho or variations of seem to be more widely used because you can adapt them to lesser players but striking a balance when you don't have a team full of world class players is not easy particularly when you're fairly rigid in your approach (like Mourinho is) - hello Rafa!
Rodgers leans too far in the direction of the Guardiola approach. His (Guardiola's) teams look horribly exposed and dreadful defensively on the rare occasions where the midfield and attack are not performing to their potential. Is it the coaching or the system?
At Liverpool, I think we need a combination of better players (duh!) and greater pragmatism (duh! - though not complete abandonment of previous ideas as Mark, for example, suggests).
Yup. Completely agree.
Barcelona under Guardiola did it the hard way, it worked because they were so fucking good (and mainly because Messi is on another planet).
Trying to take the difficult route with anything other than that squad makes life impossible. That's what Rodgers did, with the notable exception of our best season under him, and all it does is expose how poor some of the team is.
Defenders are better when they don't get stretched all about the pitch and have no protection. Attackers are better when not trying to attack a defence that's had 10 seconds or more to reorganise and reshape.
Yet we do the opposite of both and then laud it as trying to take a purist approach. With the result being our defence always looms shaky and our strikers rarely score
It's nuts.
Barcelona under Guardiola did it the hard way, it worked because they were so fucking good (and mainly because Messi is on another planet).
Trying to take the difficult route with anything other than that squad makes life impossible. That's what Rodgers did, with the notable exception of our best season under him, and all it does is expose how poor some of the team is.
Defenders are better when they don't get stretched all about the pitch and have no protection. Attackers are better when not trying to attack a defence that's had 10 seconds or more to reorganise and reshape.
Yet we do the opposite of both and then laud it as trying to take a purist approach. With the result being our defence always looms shaky and our strikers rarely score
It's nuts.
Agree with much of that but not sure about the very last bit, as we've had defensive problems throughout Rodgers' time in charge, even during Suarez' last season when we were unstoppable going forward. I can't help wondering if Rodgers' reference(s) to finding a balance were a case of him paying lip service to the concept in order to give himself some breathing-space. He *can* tighten the defence in response to pressure but may not really be convinced he should have to over the longer term. If that's the case I'll be concerned, because we shouldn't have to be doing that as a response to circumstances - we need a tight defence anyway.
You mean the game, where we left one man between them and the goal. The game we didn't need to win?
Against his mentor, maybe the tightest defensive manager of his time. The game we didn't need to win?
Did I mention we only needed a draw?
They also had Carlos Puyol and Gerard Pique and Eric Abidal.. Three world class defenders
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