Our midfield

[TheHowieLama]

I am going out on a limb and saying next season we will not be going:

 

New signing

New signing

New signing

Thiago

Fabinho

Henderson

Jones

Elliott

Bajcetic

[Jairzinho]

Would snap your hand off for a midfielder of the quality of mid table Serie A. 

[Lee909]

 

 

 

3 hours ago, Carvalho Diablo said:

Talking to Pistonbroke after tonight's game and he said that our midfield is like a bloke on life support and everybody's just waiting for the doctor to stroll in and pull the plug on the cunt. Put him out of his misery.

 

A fine analogy.

 

[3 Stacks]

1 hour ago, Jairzinho said:

Would snap your hand off for a midfielder of the quality of mid table Serie A. 

But seriously, why do we absolutely need someone like Amrabat who, I presume, most people like because they saw him run around a lot at the World Cup? If someone rated him in Serie A, fair enough, I wouldn't know.

 

This is a bit devils advocate here, because obviously we need to buy some midfielders, but the whole "the midfield is slow, unathletic, can't run and we need pace" thing is becoming a red herring. 

 

Klopp dominated German football where the players he had in the middle of the pitch were Sahin, Kehl, Bender, Gundogan, Gotze. Literally none of these were fast. Most of these were in fact very slow and weren't "runners". He then had Subotic and Hummels at the back, slow centre backs. Somehow that team revolutionized pressing football.

 

And then, you just look around the league. United are back being decent with a midfield two of 30 year old's, including a number 10 that had a heart attack and plays in the double pivot. Arsenal have Xhaka and Odegaard in there. Are they quick and athletic? Are Rodri and the two 30 year olds Gundogan and De Bruyne meant to be fast and ferocious and ball winning? 

 

There are probably answers to our issues that don't involve buying a bunch of blood and thunder super athletes to play midfield. It would be good to have that profile, because it's good to have different profiles, but is it meant to be the real reason we literally can't defend whatsoever now?

[Fallen Angel]

Considered opinion has our strongest starting midfield as: Henderson- Fab - Thiago

 

On current form, how many of those 3 will you be happy to see starting regularly next season?

 

It’s over, clearly. 
 

This leaves 2 issues to be resolved:

 

The immediate one of improvement right now,  which, without (unlikely) Jan additions, leaves formation switches. 4 - 2 - 3 - 1 or 3 - 5 - 2 both have potential to afford more protection of the defense and possibly increased potency in attack. (Also would catch opposition unawares as we have played the exact same way for an eternity.) 

 

Long term, the midfield needs a complete rebuild. With Ox and Keita both walking in summer, we need at least 2. And with Henderson walking pretty much every second he’s on the pitch, I’d get rid. (Fab too if an offer came in) and possibly Elliott.
 

I’d then target 2 major quality signings; a midfielder (obviously) and a right back, switching Trent into the midfield. An additional under-the-radar midfielder should be targeted. 

 

Defensively, one of Gomez or Matip need to be replaced. Gomez if quality is the main criteria for getting rid, Matip if age is. Replace with a young, hungry centre half. 
 

That’s 2 for 2 in the back (Trent switching to mid) and 3 for 3 in midfield (including TTA). 

 

[Bobby Hundreds]

I think last night was the nail in the coffin for me on the thought Thiago, Fabino and Henderson as the first choice midfield. 

[Bobby Hundreds]

5 hours ago, 3 Stacks said:

I'd love for someone to ask Klopp why Man United's midfield two of Casemiro and Eriksen works relatively well, in his opinion. Or why Arsenal's works and we can't figure it out. Would be interesting. 

Their defence sits deeper the two midfielders mostly hold their line protecting the back four and they stretch the pitch there's places to pass the ball too and through. 

[Jairzinho]

6 hours ago, 3 Stacks said:

But seriously, why do we absolutely need someone like Amrabat who, I presume, most people like because they saw him run around a lot at the World Cup? If someone rated him in Serie A, fair enough, I wouldn't know.

 

This is a bit devils advocate here, because obviously we need to buy some midfielders, but the whole "the midfield is slow, unathletic, can't run and we need pace" thing is becoming a red herring. 

 

Klopp dominated German football where the players he had in the middle of the pitch were Sahin, Kehl, Bender, Gundogan, Gotze. Literally none of these were fast. Most of these were in fact very slow and weren't "runners". He then had Subotic and Hummels at the back, slow centre backs. Somehow that team revolutionized pressing football.

 

And then, you just look around the league. United are back being decent with a midfield two of 30 year old's, including a number 10 that had a heart attack and plays in the double pivot. Arsenal have Xhaka and Odegaard in there. Are they quick and athletic? Are Rodri and the two 30 year olds Gundogan and De Bruyne meant to be fast and ferocious and ball winning? 

 

There are probably answers to our issues that don't involve buying a bunch of blood and thunder super athletes to play midfield. It would be good to have that profile, because it's good to have different profiles, but is it meant to be the real reason we literally can't defend whatsoever now?

 

I probably watch Serie A more than any other league. He's been decent for a couple of years, very good on loan at Verona. 

 

But I tend to agree with you, this seems a deeper problem than simply the speed at which the midfield can run. It's almost certainly a mixture of lots of things. Loss of confidence, age profile of squad (or at least the established players), "staleness" of tactics, overall underinvestment and tunnel vision of our recruitment policy (Player A is "value" so we buy them even if our necessity in the squad overall is for another position) possible waning of a manager's (any) hold over a squad. 

 

 

 

 

[Colonel Bumcunt]

1 minute ago, MegadriveMan said:

Carvalho and Elliott have looked way out of their depth whenever they've played recently.

 

I don't think either really fits in to a position in our team currently.

 

They could both do with being loaned out.

They could both do with being makeweights in a player exchange for Caceido.

[Colonel Bumcunt]

10 hours ago, MegadriveMan said:

 

Il be amazed if we get him (Bellingham) now. 

He's not going to turn down offers from City and Real Madrid to play Europa football!

 

I disagree, I think footballers see us as last years CL runners up with an exciting set of young attackers, and two full backs providing assists.  

 

The rest of the team is up for grabs, and I include the keeper in that.  

[chrisbonnie]

3 minutes ago, Colonel Bumcunt said:

 

I disagree, I think footballers see us as last years CL runners up with an exciting set of young attackers, and two full backs providing assists.  

 

The rest of the team is up for grabs, and I include the keeper in that.  

 

You think alisson isn't up to it? 

[Colonel Bumcunt]

6 hours ago, 3 Stacks said:

But seriously, why do we absolutely need someone like Amrabat who, I presume, most people like because they saw him run around a lot at the World Cup? If someone rated him in Serie A, fair enough, I wouldn't know.

 

This is a bit devils advocate here, because obviously we need to buy some midfielders, but the whole "the midfield is slow, unathletic, can't run and we need pace" thing is becoming a red herring. 

 

Klopp dominated German football where the players he had in the middle of the pitch were Sahin, Kehl, Bender, Gundogan, Gotze. Literally none of these were fast. Most of these were in fact very slow and weren't "runners". He then had Subotic and Hummels at the back, slow centre backs. Somehow that team revolutionized pressing football.

 

And then, you just look around the league. United are back being decent with a midfield two of 30 year old's, including a number 10 that had a heart attack and plays in the double pivot. Arsenal have Xhaka and Odegaard in there. Are they quick and athletic? Are Rodri and the two 30 year olds Gundogan and De Bruyne meant to be fast and ferocious and ball winning? 

 

There are probably answers to our issues that don't involve buying a bunch of blood and thunder super athletes to play midfield. It would be good to have that profile, because it's good to have different profiles, but is it meant to be the real reason we literally can't defend whatsoever now?

Arsenal's upturn in fortunes are mainly because Partey isn't perma-crocked anymore, and Martinelli and Odegaard decided to be world class attackers all of a sudden, and Saliba and Gabriel matured at the back.  A lot went right all of a sudden in terms of player development, but Partey is integral to it working.  

 

City actually have a bit of a dysfunctional team right now, albeit with a monster up front to cover it up.  They aren't brilliant. 

 

United look competent, solid, but have great creativity in Fernandes through the middle, and strikers in form, nothing spectacular, it all looks relatively good compared with our demise and City's.  

 

Newcastle too.  Solid midfield and defence with Joelinton and Guimaeres providing physicality and creativity in the middle.  

 

 

[gkmacca]

I don't really buy into the now almost obligatory narrative that Fab has suddenly undergone a dramatic decline. It suggests that DMs have a quasi-magical power to completely control the discipline of a team. They don't. When the whole team fails to press, fails to move, fails to show any kind of coherent discipline, you may as well not have a DM because absolutely anyone will look utterly lost and powerless in that position. In fact, in that context, it's not even a position - it's just some bloke running around spaces.

 

The movement, and confidence in showing for the ball, is clearly a huge issue. Matip and Alisson didn't hesistate to play the ball yesterday because of brain farts - they hesitated because their first target wasn't seriously making themselves available to receive the ball. Players having to check and make a second choice before playing the ball was evident all through the game, and it has been all season. You can see the fear creeping  through that team from about 15 minutes into each game.

 

I'm sceptical of anyone who is absolutely certain they know why the team has become so poor so quickly. We all know the multiple possible explanations, but it's misguided or cynical - not to mention astonishingly arrogant - to select whatever combination and then insist that is clearly the definitive answer. 

 

Buying new midfielders is obviously part of any possible solution, but it's only part of it. The coaching is surely at least as important, because even if the players lift their games individually, there's still a systemic problem to address. We only see snippets of the current training set-up - mainly those endless rondoes - but hopefully more will be done to bind together the defence, midfield and attack, because those three elements currently have no real connection, and nothing, and nobody, will work well until they do.

[Scott_M]

Is it acceptable to say Klopp needs to give his head a wobble? This is the issue it's been since Fulham in August and it's not getting any better, in fact, it looks to be getting worse. 

 

While we obviously need new players in midfield, something else is up. These players won 28/36 games at the start of 2022 and almost won the lot. They clearly aren't bad player or not good enough.

 

This is Wolves’ equaliser last night. Hendo bombs on when Nunez doesn’t have the ball under control, the ball goes right where Hendo was and they score. Fabinho and Thiago are nowhere to be seen. 
 

 

These are vastly experienced international footballers who have won it all. I fundamentally don’t believe all 3 of them are just going rogue leaving our midfield (and defence) looking like a sieve. 

[Red74]

I vote for 2.5 years more of this 

 

 

[Colonel Bumcunt]

2 hours ago, chrisbonnie said:

 

You think alisson isn't up to it? 

I've long thought that almost every good first chance the opposition has ends up in our net.  

[chrisbonnie]

3 minutes ago, Colonel Bumcunt said:

I've long thought that almost every good first chance the opposition has ends up in our net.  

I think you're crazy. 

 

I honestly couldn't think of a better keep in world football. 

 

But each to their own

[Joey8FrogsLegs]

12 hours ago, 3 Stacks said:

If there's a midfielder who singlehandedly can make us stop conceding the amount of chances a relegation zone team does, he might be the best midfielder of all time.

I dont think anybody is talking about one player singlehandedly solving the issue completely. But it seems a lot of us think one midfielder with the right qualities would make a big difference. I’m one of them. That doesnt mean we need only one.

[3 Stacks]

2 hours ago, Colonel Bumcunt said:

Arsenal's upturn in fortunes are mainly because Partey isn't perma-crocked anymore, and Martinelli and Odegaard decided to be world class attackers all of a sudden, and Saliba and Gabriel matured at the back.  A lot went right all of a sudden in terms of player development, but Partey is integral to it working.  

 

City actually have a bit of a dysfunctional team right now, albeit with a monster up front to cover it up.  They aren't brilliant. 

 

United look competent, solid, but have great creativity in Fernandes through the middle, and strikers in form, nothing spectacular, it all looks relatively good compared with our demise and City's.  

 

Newcastle too.  Solid midfield and defence with Joelinton and Guimaeres providing physicality and creativity in the middle.  

 

 

If you look at that graph that the Athletic had in one of their articles for big chances against, Arsenal and Man United have conceded the least and second least. With the midfield setups I cited above. So presumably, there is a way to set a team up without superfreak speed demons in the middle that can make you defensively solid, and then in Arsenal's case more than Man United's, also allow for decent chance creation. Basically, the point is that we really, really shouldn't be this bad and this isn't totally about just signing a bunch of midfielders. 

[an tha]

Big chances against graph:

 

 

Very much related to this IMO....

 

[VERBAL DIARRHEA]

Our midfield? It’s done. Orange Juice it. Rip it up and start again. The end.

[LFC 6 Times]

I’d give Bajcetic and Chamberlain a run in midfield. Both can run and press.

[Carvalho Diablo]

1 hour ago, an tha said:

 

 

And I believe that's called dropping off a fucking cliff.

[manwiththestick]

It's scary how easy we are to score against, even game seems like we are hanging on for considerable portions of the game.

 

I don't know the answer but my view is Henderson is done as a starter I'm a team that wants to win things and I'm a big fan of his. Thiago cannot play as a mainstay midfielder, one game a week fine  one and a half games a week okay, any more not a chance.

 

Fabinho I'm not sure, has he fallen off a cliff irredeemably or is he not being helped by whichever two are playing with him? I'm leaning more to the latter.

 

I'm hoping that Klopp and his team know the answer, they're certainly paid handsomely to do so and I have faith they will work this out, what I don't like is them sticking to the same principles when it's clear to us all there is a gaping hole in midfield and any team coming up against us knows with almost certainty that if they keep tight at the back they will get a handful of gilt edged chances against us. Our previous games are all the team talk these teams need at the moment and that is not on.

 

Tighten up, be hard to beat and build on something or we risk the season effectively being over in the next few weeks. I shudder to think what Madrid could do to us.

[Bobby Hundreds]

We've completely lost our fear factor too, everyside even the shittest ones think we are a pushover. It's not good enough.