Liverpool’s season so far has been great. As I suggested in a pre-season blog, having Suarez out of the team wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, if LFC then started to play as a team – and they did!! And when Suarez came back, he joined a team in great harmony where the LFC game wasn’t only locked around the individual skills of the Uruguayan superstar. Great credit to the team, Suarez and great, great credit to the brilliant Brendan Rodgers!!! What a great manager LFC has. Great tactical skills, great transfers, great understanding of the soul of the club and great atmosphere around the team. My only concern is that BR is almost TOO skillfull tactical. He’s very aware of the opposition. But Liverpool plays like a great club again and doesn’t have to change their line up every game just to fit the line up of the opposing team. A tactical substitution is of course a fine move from time to time, but when a team is in fine balance, you don’t have to change much. Stability is of the essence! Don’t change a winning team.
What we saw in the Merseyside derby, was a crazy all out attack game with Liverpool almost playing a 4-2-4 formation at the end of the game. The LFC starting line up however wasn’t all that attacking. In fact, it was a bit cautious with Jordan Henderson on the attacking wing position instead of Daniel Sturridge. We don’t need to let ourselves be so dependent of the opposition.
Regarding the formation, I actually loved the 3-5-2, not because I miss the 80s, but because more than any other club in the Premier League, Liverpool has the players to play this formation (among other things, it requires great attacking wing backs, and Johnson and Enrique are almost borned to play this position). But I also felt it was very reasonable to go back to the 4-3-3 after the Arsenal game, where the obvious lack of width in the 3-5-2 formation was exposed. It’s important though that the core of the team is stabil. And the Suarez/Sturridge duo has been one of Premier League’s most exciting elements this season. Sturridge is more of s striker than a winger and he has perhaps looked a bit tired in some recent games, but that still doesn’t make it a good idea to leave him on the bench. Because, as I have stated again and again in my previous blogs: Luis Suarez is a great striker and he plays to his best when he has a fellow striker to play with. Whether it has been Forlan or Cavani on the Uruguayan national team or Dirk Kuyt (in the early days), Luis Suarez is not a “target man” kind of striker and he needs attacking companions to flourish the most. He is an outstanding world class striker and is of course brilliant also when he’s “alone” on top – we saw that more often last season, but LFC has benefited from the fact that he now has fellow attackers with great creativity and technical abilities – Coutinho and Sturridge. These guys are a lethal front trio in the 4-3-3 where they can swap positions and if their understanding of each other grows even stronger, Liverpool can have an almost Barcelona-like attack: fast, fluent, very creative and unpredictable. But we need all three of them on the pitch as much as possible. We need a stability in terms of who’s playing, not necessarily in terms of which formation. As long as we are winning, I see no problem in going back and forth from 4-3-3 to 3-5-2, as long as the front trio is the same. 3-5-2 allows Philippe Coutinho to play his favourite position as an attacking midfielder more central in the pitch, but 4-3-3 is more safe defensively because of the width in the formation.
So my point is this: let us rather change the formation from time to time than the starting line up. Of course there are obvious differences from 3-5-2 to 4-3-3, perhaps most notable the 3-5-2 requires 3 central defenders and not just 2. So of course the changing of formation will change the line up, but (even though I think Raheem Sterling is a great talent) in my mind there is no doubt: Coutinho, Suarez and Sturridge have to start in each important game if they are fit. Because of Coutinho’s injury in the beginning of this season, this outstanding trio has only played a couple of games from start together this season. And I hope we have yet to see the best of the trio.
Defensively Lucas finally gets the appreciation he deserves. There has been more uncertainty of who should be the backbone in the defense – “the new Carra”. All of a sudden we have a lot of top central defenders: Agger, Skrtel, Toure and Sakho (and also Coates and Ilori). I’m not sure if all Liverpool fans are aware of the qualities of Mamadou Sakho. HE REALLY WAS A MARQUEE SIGNING! A year ago it would have been unthinkable that LFC could land this guy – great job Brendan!! The football world has for some years considered him of the biggest talents in the sport. And when he gets more experience and adds a surden calmness to his game, plays more safely and stop taking chances, he will be the perfect man in the central defence for Liverpool. Because there is NO doubt about this man’s fantastic physical and defense technical abilities.
Toure and Skrtel has done great this season and when vice-captain Agger is in topform he’s the right choice for most central defenses (even Barcelona thinks that, but he turned them down to play for Liverpool). So Brendan has a lot to think about when it comes to the starting line up in the defense, but I don’t think he should ever play without the Suarez/Sturridge/Coutinho in the attack – not even against the top teams, because they need to play as much together as possible.
We need stability in the starting line up, not necessarily when it comes to formations. It may sound contradictory, but I believe it’s mostly important that the the players are in topform, because they have showed they are capable of playing both formations.
And the players have been outstanding so far this season, and now I have shared my concerns. To this I have to add: I think Brendan Rodgers has been world class. His wonderful and attacking style of football has begun to work and you have the feeling, that the team can grow much more on this solid foundation. I would not want any other manager right now to be in charge of Liverpool! Bravo Brendan!
woldemort1 