Liverpool 2 Brighton 2 (Oct 30 2021)

[tlw content]

 

 

 

Report by

Dave Usher

 

So we’re better away from home now then. Not sure how that’s happened but Anfield isn’t a fortress at the moment and we’ve dropped six points at home already. It could have been worse as Brighton probably deserved to win this. It wasn’t smash and grab, they were the better side.

 

Graham Potter is like fucking Kryptonite to Klopp. Ever since he went there Brighton have given us real problems. If Potter had better players you wonder just what he could achieve. That said, Brighton’s squad is getting better year after year and their recruitment seems to be pretty good. There won’t be many teams who play better than them at Anfield this season.

 

And yet we couldn’t have wished for a better start. Not just because of the early goal either. We just looked right at it from the off, obviously buoyed by the win at Old Trafford last week. We were moving the ball quickly, everyone looked sharp and when we didn’t have it we were swarming all over them to win the ball back.

 

The weird thing was that as well as we were playing, and as much as Brighton seemed to be on the verge of being steamrollered, they still managed to carve out two really good openings. Alisson made a a really good save to deny March and then Bissouma hit the post. 

 

Looking back on it now, them creating those chances doesn’t concern me anywhere near as much as how they completely outplayed us afterwards. Giving up the odd chance when we’re well on top isn’t anything to worry about. It’s a true off you can accept. Getting schooled for the best part of an hour definitely is a concern though.

 

I don’t think anyone saw that coming. Not even me and I’m as big an admirer of Brighton as you’ll find. I thought this would be a tough game but I didn’t think they’d outplay us the way they did. At 2-0 I was mocking myself for thinking it was going to be tough. At that stage it was looking like a comfortable four or five goal victory and I’d have looked daft for predicting that it was going to be so tough.

 

 

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[Jimmy Hills Chin]

I hate international breaks but boy do we need this one.

[King Kenny 86]

It was JK himself talking about how Lallana used to piss him off in a nice way in that whatever pressing style or pressure they put on him in training he always had an answer.

Plus Potter being as smart as he is not a suprise they were able to play through us.

Jurgens own boy coupled with a clever manager undid us.

[terry symes]

Still unfathomable to me that Gini was allowed to leave, leaving us with midfielders that you just cannot rely on to be consistently fit and available. Ox and Keita are consistently injured, (or just not up to it, but that's another matter). Never anything serious, but a few weeks here and there meaning they're always needing to get up to speed. Thiago has struggled with injuries in the latter part of his career. Let's be honest, he's missed a fucking lot of games for us now since he's been here. Fabinho and Henderson never come through a season without missing fairly large chunks. Milner is 36. You need a consistent 2 out of the 3 playing and we will never get that without a Gini - Mr Dependable, as you put it.

 

Yes we have 8 centre mids on the books, but surely you'd rather have say 5 that you can actually rely on?

 

You'd have thought they'd have learned from the centre back situation last season but clearly not.

[dockers_strike]

Good report Dave.

 

I thought Alli might have lost sight of that first Brighton goal. He'd been having a bit of a problem with the sun in his eye for a few minutes before.

 

Agree about Joel not playing. It's an odd one considering Jurgen gave him a 45 minute run out against Preston after missing the united game.

 

Love Bobby but he was poor, easily knocked off the ball and taking too long to play it. As mentioned on the podcast, should have been replaced by Taki a lot earlier.

 

Keita just has to go now in my opinion. He's becoming a parody of the duncan ferguson song now.

 

There are far too many similarities creeping into our performances as against Brentford, Palace, Atletico and now Brighton. At 2-1 no one in the ground was surprised when Brighton equalised and you could feel the aniexty in the crowd from then on to the final whistle.

[Turkish Delight]

One thing I noticed second half is that at 2-1 we were still trying to force the play to get up the pitch for a 3rd and putting ourselves under pressure. One example I recall was Alisson collecting a ball and throwing it out quickly to Robbo (I think) who was then pressed out of possession in our half.  We needed a breather at the time.

 

Two years ago we were brilliant at seeing games out and taking the sting out of them but we seem to be playing higher risk football now aimed at scoring more goals and it's leaving us vulnerable.

 

On Konate, I thought he was awful on the second goal. His initial mistake was stepping up to play offside against a lad on their left who wasn't affecting play early in the move but my biggest issue was with his light jog back after realising he'd left us facing a 3v2 by doing that.

 

He had maybe a 50/50 chance at best of affecting play if he sprinted so it was no guarantee he's have stopped the goal but he should have at least tried. It didn't look like he could be arsed.

[CapeRed]

1 hour ago, dockers_strike said:

Good report Dave.

 

I thought Alli might have lost sight of that first Brighton goal. He'd been having a bit of a problem with the sun in his eye for a few minutes before.

 

Agree about Joel not playing. It's an odd one considering Jurgen gave him a 45 minute run out against Preston after missing the united game.

 

Love Bobby but he was poor, easily knocked off the ball and taking too long to play it. As mentioned on the podcast, should have been replaced by Taki a lot earlier.

 

Keita just has to go now in my opinion. He's becoming a parody of the duncan ferguson song now.

 

There are far too many similarities creeping into our performances as against Brentford, Palace, Atletico and now Brighton. At 2-1 no one in the ground was surprised when Brighton equalised and you could feel the aniexty in the crowd from then on to the final whistle.

You cannot afford to miss out on one on ones like Bobby did there. Appeared lost for much of the game. 

[Mikhail]

Naby being injured again after building momentum and looking like he is finally finding his feet is the least surprising thing ever. I have given up on him about two seasons ago after the umpteenth time this has happened.

 

The more midfielders we lose the less sense allowing Gini to leave makes. I get the feeling I'm gonna get more bitter about that the longer the season goes.

[m0e]

Is it wrong that I just want to give you a big hug, after reading that @dave u ?

 

[Erik T]

Konate did the same thing in the 1st half too. Surged forward (Matip style) but lost the ball and then just jogged back instead of sprinting. He needs to sort that out pronto! 

[Daisy]

In summary: we can no longer control games anymore because our midfield is disorganised and cant keep the ball as well as we used to. Who could not see this coming.

[Guest]

 

[Barnesey]

Poor as we were for an hour we would have won if Fab had played. The “Bobby” space between our CBs and midfield would have been much better patrolled.

 

And, am I right, if Mo puts the Sadio deflection in it’s a goal? You can’t score with your arm but it doesn’t invalidate a goal scored by someone else? Was that a change last year?

 

Not sure Mo could have got a touch anyway but at the time the thought crossed my mind.

[StevieMax]

On 01/11/2021 at 13:36, Paul Wright said:

It was JK himself talking about how Lallana used to piss him off in a nice way in that whatever pressing style or pressure they put on him in training he always had an answer.

Plus Potter being as smart as he is not a suprise they were able to play through us.

Jurgens own boy coupled with a clever manager undid us.

Lallana (when fit) was always a very effective & smart presser for LFC. 

Not only did Brighton manage to pass through and around the midfield at will, they also did what all away teams set out to do by taking the crowd out of the match.  You could even hear Brighton chanting "is this The Emirates?" late in the second half.