FOOTBALL English Premier League 23/24 Discussion

[Renegade]

Offside.

 

[Renegade]

1-1, disasi.

 

[Renegade]

Chelsea 2-1, bang bang.

 

[Renegade]

Offside. End to end atm.

 

[Renegade]

Handball by Jackson, surely a pen

 

[Super Freak]

Liverpool probably lucky to come away with a point.

 

[Renegade]

Chelsea probably edged it overall, Jackson had a few good chances that a better striker may have finished but he'll come good.

Enzo was excellent for Chelsea and Mac Allister was similarly good for us, just grafted all game.

Something needs to be done with TAA. Was awful on and off the ball. Doesn't track when we lose possession and is far too casual when we have the ball.

 

[Wolfie]

All i've seen so far from the opening games is VAR is still ripping the soul out of football.

 

[Brocko]

I mean you could definitely see why both teams want Caicedo

 

[The True King]

That was a bonkers game of football. Huge holes right through the middle of the pitch and both teams lacking sharpness.

Chelsea grew into it and were the better team over the 90min but Liverpool looked good in the first half, should have maybe had a penalty too.

Overall a point each is fair. Chelsea have some thinking to do about how they use their bench to better effect while Liverpool just desperately need a defensive minded midfielder - Mac Allister put in a shift but he was in a war and outnumbered all by himself.

Jackson is a player, Chelsea have one there

 

[Galah]

Chelsea probably edged it overall, Jackson had a few good chances that a better striker may have finished but he'll come good.

Enzo was excellent for Chelsea and Mac Allister was similarly good for us, just grafted all game.

Something needs to be done with TAA. Was awful on and off the ball. Doesn't track when we lose possession and is far too casual when we have the ball.

What’s up with him? He’s fallen off a cliff.

 

[Renegade]

What’s up with him? He’s fallen off a cliff.

Reality is he's never been brilliant at RB, just had Hendo covering him a lot of the time when he was in his purple patch.

Since Hendo lost his legs (and subsequently transferred), we just don't have anyone covering when he inverts. It was a risk/reward thing and there's too much risk now and not enough reward. Add to the fact that giving TAA a free license to roam has upset our entire balance - notice Robertson rarely drives forward now? Was a cornerstone of our team 2 years ago, Robbo and TAA bombing up the flanks. Now that TAA saunters about Robbo has to stay back otherwise we'll be caught massively short.

TLDR; we covered for TAA for too long and now the team balance is entirely out.

 

[Wolfie]

Not looking forward to tonights game. We have been screwed having so much disruption this close to the start of the season. No new signings and playing a top side.

If it was me i'd be focusing our attack on on United right side. Anthony has literally zero discipline defensively and Wan Bissaka if he plays is very uncomfortable on the ball if pressed. Think though we are heading for a 3 or 4 1 loss.

 

[Fitzy]

Not looking forward to tonights game. We have been screwed having so much disruption this close to the start of the season. No new signings and playing a top side.

If it was me i'd be focusing our attack on on United right side. Anthony has literally zero discipline defensively and Wan Bissaka if he plays is very uncomfortable on the ball if pressed. Think though we are heading for a 3 or 4 1 loss.

Have some faith mate

 

[The True King]

Reality is he's never been brilliant at RB, just had Hendo covering him a lot of the time when he was in his purple patch.

Since Hendo lost his legs (and subsequently transferred), we just don't have anyone covering when he inverts. It was a risk/reward thing and there's too much risk now and not enough reward. Add to the fact that giving TAA a free license to roam has upset our entire balance - notice Robertson rarely drives forward now? Was a cornerstone of our team 2 years ago, Robbo and TAA bombing up the flanks. Now that TAA saunters about Robbo has to stay back otherwise we'll be caught massively short.

TLDR; we covered for TAA for too long and now the team balance is entirely out.

This is a bit reactionary, it's one game. Fair enough he's had a patchy pre-season too but TAA is generally a slow starter.

The inverted role suits him, we saw just how effective he was to end last season when LFC went 11 games unbeaten and he was on fire. He was very impressive. He can do it better than Zinchenko and Stones, who are the best two versions of the system Klopp is trying to mimic.

I agree that it's a huge risk playing him the way he is playing, especially right now, but its about maximizing his strengths. I think fundamentally there are two issues with it.
1. Personnel - Robbo isn't suited to slotting into a back 3 and has a tendency to bomb forward. It's clearly an instruction he's being given because Klopp hasn't tried to stop it. There is no one in the LFC squad that can play LB/CB which is why they were so keen on Colwill. That would have been the solve that could have replicated what City do with Ake and Arsenal do with White. Robbo's days are numbered if LFC want to persevere with this system and that's not indictment on his quality.
2. Konate - the kid is a beast and one of a kind but he's injury prone and still makes errors. None of the back up CBs have his speed or power or can adequately cover him in that hybrid CB/RB role. Matip in pre-season showed just how rubbish the alternatives are. Konate is having to drift into wide right spaces to cover TAA (who's being instructed to get forward into midfield) and when there is no effective defensive mid, it exposes the gap between he and VVD. Saw with a few of the chances Chelsea had yesterday that LFC have no one in midfield who's willing to track runners from deep.

I think there's a few solutions. The two most likely are either buying a LB/CB hybrid type player who can make it a proper back 3 when TAA pushes forward; or committing TAA to midfield and buying a proper RB (or playing Gomez there to allow Robbo to bomb forward). I think Liverpool have shown they are exploring both, the links to Pavard and Chilwell earlier in the window suggest so anyway.

Either way they need to sort out the defensive mid first then buy the defensive option but Klopp has chosen to die on this hill of TAA being inverted.

 

[Renegade]

This is a bit reactionary, it's one game. Fair enough he's had a patchy pre-season too but TAA is generally a slow starter.

The inverted role suits him, we saw just how effective he was to end last season when LFC went 11 games unbeaten and he was on fire. He was very impressive. He can do it better than Zinchenko and Stones, who are the best two versions of the system Klopp is trying to mimic.

I agree that it's a huge risk playing him the way he is playing, especially right now, but its about maximizing his strengths.


Either way they need to sort out the defensive mid first then buy the defensive option but Klopp has chosen to die on this hill of TAA being inverted.

Hardly reactionary if you've acknowledged my concerns. What to do with TAA has been a problem for 2 seasons now if he's not providing the attacking output. When it works great - when it doesn't it's a huge liability.

Part of the reason he was so successful early on was because teams weren't sure how to play him/us. Now they know and he's exposed on a nearly weekly basis.

I'm not saying we should **** him off, he's our VC and home grown scouser, but just letting it play out as is isn't going to solve it either. Not if we want to seriously challenge. If we're happy just making up the numbers in Top 4 then sure.

Signing a DM will help but TAA still needs to improve a fair bit on his own. His passing today was shocking - that's not a lack of DM causing that.

 

[Bongo]

“We had, and we have, an incredible opinion about him. We thought to keep him, but maybe he would not (get) enough minutes like he has in Southampton." - Pep.

Of course they wont match the highest bid, they have Rodri. The situation is literally no different to when he left for Southampton. Phillips being fit makes it arguably worse for any potential minutes. City aren't going to jump in now to then sell him immediately, they've got a right winger to buy.

I think Enzo and Caicedo are both more suited to Poch's style than Kovacic ever would be. Kova also made it very clear he wanted out. They've sold a phenomenal player but I'm not sure its an error. Probably the best for all parties.

I think that Pep comment is more being gracious on his departure than endorsing him. But also Lavia like Sancho and others clearly didn't want to bide his time out of the first team. Take your point about Poch and Kovacic.

 

[The True King]

Hardly reactionary if you've acknowledged my concerns. What to do with TAA has been a problem for 2 seasons now if he's not providing the attacking output. When it works great - when it doesn't it's a huge liability.

Part of the reason he was so successful early on was because teams weren't sure how to play him/us. Now they know and he's exposed on a nearly weekly basis.

I'm not saying we should **** him off, he's our VC and home grown scouser, but just letting it play out as is isn't going to solve it either. Not if we want to seriously challenge. If we're happy just making up the numbers in Top 4 then sure.

Signing a DM will help but TAA still needs to improve a fair bit on his own. His passing today was shocking - that's not a lack of DM causing that.

I think the issue is more the system than the player.

He's only been in this new role for a handful of games, prior to that he was a proper RB and arguably one of the best in the world - wasn't really a problem until Henderson lost his legs.

He was bad today but I'm not prepared to criticize him for a role which he's only just started playing in a system that doesn't compensate for his weaknesses. Always have maintained that if this is the route Klopp wants to take with TAA than he needs to put the right players around him.

If anything your issue should be with Klopp rather than TAA himself. Call him out for bad performances by all means but its wrong to just go after him based on one game and act like its an ongoing issue when he was great when deployed in this role last season.