Is Trent Really Worth It?

[Captain Turdseye]

8 minutes ago, TD_LFC said:

 

How do you reconcile our shit defender only being in midfield when we have the ball and at RB when we're defending.

 

Would be an odd way of protecting a shit defender, no?

Well if he’s capable of being everything, everywhere, all at once, what the fuck were we doing restricting him to a mere world class attacking full back for the last few years?

 

I remember early in the season, Trent had this role of coming inside, which was fuck all like this hybrid number six thing. It seemed exciting at first but it didn’t last. Only Jurgen Klopp knows why, but I suspect it’s ‘cause we were shit. It’s not information that can be found online but we can carry on this conversation later on when a book comes out (possibly re-released from 1930) or we have a decent Tifo video to explain things properly. 

[3 Stacks]

Tyler Adams played some right back at Leipzig. If we wanted another option, we could do a thing where we get a player who can interchange with him.

[Captain Turdseye]

15 minutes ago, 3 Stacks said:

Tyler Adams played some right back at Leipzig. If we wanted another option, we could do a thing where we get a player who can interchange with him.

[TD_LFC]

10 minutes ago, 3 Stacks said:

Tyler Adams played right back at Leipzig. If we wanted another option, we could do a thing where we get a player who can interchange with him.

 

Rather develop other ways of playing it than trying to find a backup that would never be as good.

 

All of it depends on how we transition the team going forward and what type of players we target over the next few years. 

 

Maybe we'll really piss people off and go double inverted fullbacks, split centre backs and Bajcetic flitting between the #6 and middle CB role.

 

 

[Jose Jones]

25 minutes ago, Captain Turdseye said:

Well if he’s capable of being everything, everywhere, all at once, what the fuck were we doing restricting him to a mere world class attacking full back for the last few years?

 

I remember early in the season, Trent had this role of coming inside, which was fuck all like this hybrid number six thing. It seemed exciting at first but it didn’t last. Only Jurgen Klopp knows why, but I suspect it’s ‘cause we were shit. It’s not information that can be found online but we can carry on this conversation later on when a book comes out (possibly re-released from 1930) or we have a decent Tifo video to explain things properly. 

Wasn’t it the 21-22 season that Trent started to do that underlapping thing?

For people who would move Trent into midfield what position are you thinking?

Just plug him into Hendo’s position? At the 6? 
Or more the Thiago midfield role, slightly deeper with the other “8” bombing on a bit more?

[Captain Turdseye]

7 minutes ago, Jose Jones said:

Wasn’t it the 21-22 season that Trent started to do that underlapping thing?

I think he’s always underlapped and overlapped with Mo, and he’s always got forward. I might be misremembering but in my mind he only started consistently deliberately drifting into the #8 inside half space/KDB kind of areas early this season. 
 

Totally different from this hybrid #6 he’s playing that everyone’s calling a hybrid #6 even though it’s apparently not a hybrid #6

 

As for your second question, I genuinely don’t know. It’s all dependent on who comes in this summer and if Trent is still our nominal right back. The Pavard links are interesting. 

[Jose Jones]

5 minutes ago, Captain Turdseye said:

I think he’s always underlapped and overlapped with Mo, and he’s always got forward. I might be misremembering but in my mind he only started consistently deliberately drifting into the #8 inside half space/KDB kind of areas early this season. 
 

Totally different from this hybrid #6 he’s playing that everyone’s calling a hybrid #6 even though it’s apparently not a hybrid #6

 

As for your second question, I genuinely don’t know. It’s all dependent on who comes in this summer and if Trent is still our nominal right back. The Pavard links are interesting. 

Yeah agreed totally different to the hybrid 6 position, but I really thought the major #8 drifting thing was last season.

I mean this season does feel like it lasted for fucking ages, so I might be wrong.

[Captain Turdseye]

3 minutes ago, Jose Jones said:

Yeah agreed totally different to the hybrid 6 position, but I really thought the major #8 drifting thing was last season.

I mean this season does feel like it lasted for fucking ages, so I might be wrong.

As might I, mate. You could be right. It’s been a wild few years.
 

I only wish I’d immersed myself in obscure, cutting edge, really important statistical data so I could have understood everything just that little bit more, like some of these boys. If I’d done that I’d have been able to point out the exact date Trent’s average position moved ten yards inside. 

[TD_LFC]

If only you'd been here a few pages earlier you'd have seen people discussing how not cutting edge it was, which made it all the more surprising that some were so mystified by players moving between positions during games.

 

For years we've played with a hybrid 11 and a hybrid 7, a hybrid 3, an 8 who's sometimes a hybrid 10 but also a hybrid 2 when the hybrid 2 becomes the hybrid 7.

 

Complicated business...

[VERBAL DIARRHEA]

12 minutes ago, TD_LFC said:

If only you'd been here a few pages earlier you'd have seen people discussing how not cutting edge it was, which made it all the more surprising that some were so mystified by players moving between positions during games.

 

For years we've played with a hybrid 11 and a hybrid 7, a hybrid 3, an 8 who's sometimes a hybrid 10 but also a hybrid 2 when the hybrid 2 becomes the hybrid 7.

 

Complicated business...

 

[Captain Turdseye]

9 minutes ago, TD_LFC said:

If only you'd been here a few pages earlier you'd have seen people discussing how not cutting edge it was, which made it all the more surprising that some were so mystified by players moving between positions during games.

 

For years we've played with a hybrid 11 and a hybrid 7, a hybrid 3, an 8 who's sometimes a hybrid 10 but also a hybrid 2 when the hybrid 2 becomes the hybrid 7.

 

Complicated business...

That’s NUMBERWANG. 
 

I was here a few pages ago. I was replying to you because I wanted to stimulate a discussion in this thread that I started. But then you disappeared up your own hoop with the insinuation that people don’t understand footy at your intellectual level and a bit of talk about how this has all been done before in the 1930’s

[3 Stacks]

59 minutes ago, Captain Turdseye said:

Yeah, I had you in mind with that suggestion.

[TD_LFC]

3 minutes ago, Captain Turdseye said:

That’s NUMBERWANG. 
 

I was here a few pages ago. I was replying to you because I wanted to stimulate a discussion in this thread that I started. But then you disappeared up your own hoop with the insinuation that people don’t understand footy at your intellectual level and a bit of talk about how this has all been done before in the 1930’s

 

Think you missed the point then, because the point wasn't it was done in the 1920's, and so has been resurrected, it's that it's been used all through football as far back as the 1920's so while Guardiola is being credited with some grand tactical leap it's just variations on a theme that lots and lots of managers throughout time have used.

 

What I don't get with the insistence on suddenly calling Trent's role a hybrid role is what differentiates it from other roles.

 

We didn't call his previous role hybrid, we don't call Robertson's role hybrid, we don't call lots of other roles where players play in different areas in and out of possession hybrid.

 

The only reason I can see for calling this trent role that is to try and pigeonhole it so we can mark it out as different and unworkable.

[Captain Turdseye]

17 minutes ago, TD_LFC said:

 

Think you missed the point then, because the point wasn't it was done in the 1920's, and so has been resurrected, it's that it's been used all through football as far back as the 1920's so while Guardiola is being credited with some grand tactical leap it's just variations on a theme that lots and lots of managers throughout time have used.

How many of those managers varied the theme because they had to reposition a right back that was an undroppable local hero who looked like he wanted to be anywhere else but defending in his own half?

 

Guardiola might be being undeservingly credited with a tactical leap, but what we’ve done is clearly reactionary to that. 
 

I don’t think Trent has a divine right to walk into our midfield and his deliveries into are box are the only thing that he has going for him at this moment, from the hybrid position. 
 

Which brings me back to the start of the thread. Is that enough to build a team around?

[TD_LFC]

You're building the team around the principle of a box midfield, there are a number of ways of achieving that for which we've tried two.

[Paul]

12 hours ago, TD_LFC said:

 

Plenty of posts on here explaining why that is bollocks, we've played variations of this formation without Trent moving into position and there's plenty of evidence both in the PL and across Europe of teams adopting the same system and approaching it in a number of different ways.

 

This system isn't built around Trent, it's built around creating a midfield set up that allows you to overload that position based on a system that has been used for a century.

 

 

 

How come that says it’s quoting me? I didn’t write that. 

[Paul]

One point I want to add about what I said about Trent above is that I definitely believe we should build the team around his talent. However, I’m open minded or even ambivalent about his specific role.
 

I’d prefer him to be in a position that isn’t subject to the vagaries of tactical jousting to quite the degree that has been the case previously. I can’t think of a single other player who’s expected to carry out two roles - previously regarded as incompatible - to a world class standard at the same time.
 

He’s expected to be world class in creating goals even as he is also expected to be able to defend to a world class level against the best sides who are targeting the fact that we’re asking him to do two usually incompatible things at once. It is not a deficiency of talent that makes it almost impossible to be in two places at once at all times against the best opponents. 
 

The right back role in some senses was already building the team around him as the entire midfield set up was designed to mitigate against the dangers of what we asked him to do positionally. However, once we let him down by taking away or weakening that set up, his impact deteriorated and the positional risks were frequently exposed. Obviously that got into his head too, which is not a surprise for a player of his age. 
 

I suspect that the new role he’s got will be similarly exposed if we don’t as a team maintain our end of the bargain; ie, have brilliant one on one right-sided centre halves with pace to cover those gaps and a squad-wide commitment to - and energy for - intense pressing that never wavers. 
 

So, I think I would most prefer him to be simply played in midfield. However, that isn’t going to happen, in my view, as Klopp is engaged in a tactical war in the best league in the world against the best managers and players in the world that requires risk taking at an extraordinary level if you want to win. Against cheats. 

[TD_LFC]

52 minutes ago, Paul said:

How come that says it’s quoting me? I didn’t write that. 

Not a clue, either gremlins or I've done something when quoting.

[Barrington Womble]

49 minutes ago, Paul said:

One point I want to add about what I said about Trent above is that I definitely believe we should build the team around his talent. However, I’m open minded or even ambivalent about his specific role.
 

I’d prefer him to be in a position that isn’t subject to the vagaries of tactical jousting to quite the degree that has been the case previously. I can’t think of a single other player who’s expected to carry out two roles - previously regarded as incompatible - to a world class standard at the same time.
 

He’s expected to be world class in creating goals even as he is also expected to be able to defend to a world class level against the best sides who are targeting the fact that we’re asking him to do two usually incompatible things at once. It is not a deficiency of talent that makes it almost impossible to be in two places at once at all times against the best opponents. 
 

The right back role in some senses was already building the team around him as the entire midfield set up was designed to mitigate against the dangers of what we asked him to do positionally. However, once we let him down by taking away or weakening that set up, his impact deteriorated and the positional risks were frequently exposed. Obviously that got into his head too, which is not a surprise for a player of his age. 
 

I suspect that the new role he’s got will be similarly exposed if we don’t as a team maintain our end of the bargain; ie, have brilliant one on one right-sided centre halves with pace to cover those gaps and a squad-wide commitment to - and energy for - intense pressing that never wavers. 
 

So, I think I would most prefer him to be simply played in midfield. However, that isn’t going to happen, in my view, as Klopp is engaged in a tactical war in the best league in the world against the best managers and players in the world that requires risk taking at an extraordinary level if you want to win. Against cheats. 

 

Personally I think players like stones, zincenko and estupinan have been playing hybrid type roles all season. I think we notice it more becaus 1 its us and 2 trent is so fucking good he is making goal contributions from there nearly every game, which the others are not. 

 

Also I think klopp has spent his time here with players cheating all over the pitch. The full backs were really more wingers than full backs. Mo would normally play as a right forward, but would always be staying inside more than out. Bobby would spend many games deeper than both of our 8s, sometimes Henderson at 8 would cover Trent and almost play right back with the ball, yet other times it was fab. I just don't think we're used to seeing players from full back where we see Trent. We've spent years accepting there are attacking full backs, wing backs, defensive full backs, as long as these lads stayed on the right we didn't really care. Trent just just running in a different direction. The idea of a false 9 was seen as mental not much more than a decade ago, but yet loads and loads of teams have played it consistently over the last number of years. I'm sure this is no different and we'll cheat around the pitch to get the best out of the players we have, while trying to be as unpredictable as we can to defend against. 

[The Guest]

The problems with Trent don’t come from his positioning and never really have.  I think the midfield covering him is massively overstated.  He hardly makes the opposition byline once a game and hasn’t for years.  When playing right back he spends most of his time in a area where he can make it back without needing the cover and the odd times he’s caught out positionally by going too far I think most people accept it.

 

The problems have and will continue to be when he’s in position at right back.  He gets walked past, let’s far too many crosses come into the box, other players go over to compensate his expected shit defending leaving gaps elsewhere, he shits himself when the ball comes into the box in the air, instead of staying with his man he goes to try to cut out passes from the full back up to 30 yards away from him, he completely stops when the ball or the player go past him far too often and I could probably go on.

 

Sometimes he will charge back and make a goal saving tackle and sometimes he won’t do any of the above for large spells of games but then it comes and suddenly he’s at it again.  It might be half an hour of it or just 5 mins and against the worse teams it doesn’t matter as much.  When you’re playing the top sides though you can’t afford it.

 

It’s a slightly similar situation the Mancs are finding themselves in.  In Fernandez they’ve got a player who can score brilliant goals and create all sorts of chances.  His stats speak for themselves.  If you watch him enough though you can see he gives the ball away constantly.  You can get away with it a lot of the time against the poor sides and I imagine there’s a lot of their fans saying build the side around him etc.  The reality is they won’t win either of the two big trophies while he’s starting because against the good sides you can’t give the ball away like that.

[Barrington Womble]

8 minutes ago, The Guest said:

The problems with Trent don’t come from his positioning and never really have.  I think the midfield covering him is massively overstated.  He hardly makes the opposition byline once a game and hasn’t for years.  When playing right back he spends most of his time in a area where he can make it back without needing the cover and the odd times he’s caught out positionally by going too far I think most people accept it.

 

The problems have and will continue to be when he’s in position at right back.  He gets walked past, let’s far too many crosses come into the box, other players go over to compensate his expected shit defending leaving gaps elsewhere, he shits himself when the ball comes into the box in the air, instead of staying with his man he goes to try to cut out passes from the full back up to 30 yards away from him, he completely stops when the ball or the player go past him far too often and I could probably go on.

 

Sometimes he will charge back and make a goal saving tackle and sometimes he won’t do any of the above for large spells of games but then it comes and suddenly he’s at it again.  It might be half an hour of it or just 5 mins and against the worse teams it doesn’t matter as much.  When you’re playing the top sides though you can’t afford it.

 

It’s a slightly similar situation the Mancs are finding themselves in.  In Fernandez they’ve got a player who can score brilliant goals and create all sorts of chances.  His stats speak for themselves.  If you watch him enough though you can see he gives the ball away constantly.  You can get away with it a lot of the time against the poor sides and I imagine there’s a lot of their fans saying build the side around him etc.  The reality is they won’t win either of the two big trophies while he’s starting because against the good sides you can’t give the ball away like that.

 

I can't agree with barely a word of that.. take for example of your criticism of him not getting to the byline. He gets there all the time and even does it in this new role, his assist for gakpo in the last game was actually from just that. But there's countless examples. 

 

The defending you talk about, it's like he's fucked your bird or something, so bitter and twisted. He's not good in the air. He's not terrible either for someone 5ft 9in and most full backs aren't great in the air, it's why they're not centre backs. Most of his other defending is fine, but it was clear this season he lost his appetite for being both ends of the pitch at the same time, but that's only obvious - as a team we became easy to play through, so every single time we lost the ball, he had to get back, where as previously we normally just won the ball back. 

 

And as for your Fernandez comparison. Well clearly it's not the "similar" situation you claim. Because your conclusion to what Fernandez does is they'll never win the big two with him. Well clearly that's not a problem Trent has is it? United won't win the big 2 because most of their players are fucking shit. 

[VladimirIlyich]

We work with what we have and play to their strengths due to not following the same corrupt model as City. This means there are imperfections and Trent at RB in defensive mode is one of them. Not buying anybody in midfield,probably likely due to the wage budget being used up on what we had,meant Trent was staying where he was as the data and opinions were his RB role was most effective at the club. The hybrid role was a trial that may or may not be repeated. Interestingly it appeared to be used after our injury crisis to key players eased so there may be something to that? Who knows outside the club? With Europa League being our only European football I believe the budget is going to mean a Europa league budget rather than a CL one. I am ok with this myself as this is how our club is run and it's simply how it is. 

[Barrington Womble]

15 minutes ago, VladimirIlyich said:

We work with what we have and play to their strengths due to not following the same corrupt model as City. This means there are imperfections and Trent at RB in defensive mode is one of them. Not buying anybody in midfield,probably likely due to the wage budget being used up on what we had,meant Trent was staying where he was as the data and opinions were his RB role was most effective at the club. The hybrid role was a trial that may or may not be repeated. Interestingly it appeared to be used after our injury crisis to key players eased so there may be something to that? Who knows outside the club? With Europa League being our only European football I believe the budget is going to mean a Europa league budget rather than a CL one. I am ok with this myself as this is how our club is run and it's simply how it is. 

Klopp mentioned after the loss at city they decided to bring the summer plans forward and start working on them right away, so I think that's what we saw, a glorified pre-season almost. The thing I find interesting is it was as thiago was coming back and it seemed we decided instead of waiting on him, to go with this this, play Jones left side and use Trent as the player who's picking the ball deep and processing it. I think it hints towards thiago not being a starter for next season. I don't know if it means Jones will, but it feels for me we were building a midfield shape without thiago. 

[The Guest]

1 hour ago, Barrington Womble said:

 

I can't agree with barely a word of that.. take for example of your criticism of him not getting to the byline. He gets there all the time and even does it in this new role, his assist for gakpo in the last game was actually from just that. But there's countless examples. 

 

The defending you talk about, it's like he's fucked your bird or something, so bitter and twisted. He's not good in the air. He's not terrible either for someone 5ft 9in and most full backs aren't great in the air, it's why they're not centre backs. Most of his other defending is fine, but it was clear this season he lost his appetite for being both ends of the pitch at the same time, but that's only obvious - as a team we became easy to play through, so every single time we lost the ball, he had to get back, where as previously we normally just won the ball back. 

 

And as for your Fernandez comparison. Well clearly it's not the "similar" situation you claim. Because your conclusion to what Fernandez does is they'll never win the big two with him. Well clearly that's not a problem Trent has is it? United won't win the big 2 because most of their players are fucking shit. 

You’re imagining stuff that’s not happening.  I sit there and literally count the amount of times he goes to the byline every game because it’s so few if any as we struggled to create anything and Mo just runs into 3 players.  I wouldn’t expect him or want him to do it in the midfield role.  It’s like a syndrome people have that they can’t seem to see it and then they just make things up because they haven’t spotted it themselves and just assume he’s doing it.  The odd time he does do it we actually create chances and goals as I mentioned before but he’s not doing it more than once or twice a game and sometimes not for weeks on end.

 

In terms of winning the big two I’m talking about going forward.  To have an integral player who has a Sunday league level flaw to his game means you aren’t going to beat the big team in latter stages of cups or be consistent enough in the league.  We got away with it playing against Spurs in a final and in the league in a season where the pressure was off after winning 18 games on the run or whatever it was but we were a different side then anyway that is near enough impossible to recreate on the budget we are.

[Jose Jones]

Haha, got away with it after winning 18 games in a row!