Nott'm Forest (H) - Sat 14th Sep 2024 (3:00pm)

[El Rojo]

4 hours ago, stringvest said:

 No point if the midfield can’t make the chances

Which makes the failure to have a second choice for Zubamendi lined up all the more infuriating.

[stringvest]

4 hours ago, TheHowieLama said:

 

Are you saying that half the time we will be below average?

That’s not what I’m saying at all.  

[stringvest]

5 minutes ago, El Rojo said:

Which makes the failure to have a second choice for Zubamendi lined up all the more infuriating.

agreed

[El Rojo]

Just now, stringvest said:

agreed

Anything to be said for bringing Jordan Henderson back in on a six month deal in January?

[stringvest]

4 hours ago, Turkish Delight said:

 

Outside of that weird couple of months in coivd only Palace have played like that against us in the league and won at Anfield in the last 7 years. About ten teams a season have tried it.

 

Under Klopp we tried to get width into the game against those sort of teams with either full backs or midfielders providing overlapping runs for the wingers. It meant we could be open on the counter but we still created chances in open play and usually outscored the opposition.

 

We didn't do that at any point yesterday because we don't want to risk losing the ball with players out of position. It forced the game into the congested middle of the pitch.  We'll get many more games like yesterday unless we adapt how we play against teams who line up like Forest.

I think that’s a bit of reinvention.  In more games than I choose to mention, we did precisely the opposite - we were narrow, we made it easy to defend against us because of it.  A lot of frustration last season was because Diaz would constantly cut inside, and Robertson, when did make a run, wasn’t used.  It was the same on the other flank for a different reason, namely TAA’s tendency to drift into central areas when moving up the pitch, reducing the options available to Salah. 

[stringvest]

4 minutes ago, El Rojo said:

Anything to be said for bringing Jordan Henderson back in on a six month deal in January?

:) I’d have plenty to say on that proposal. 

[Mook]

This malingering cunt was at the game yesterday so I'm putting the blame squarely on his shoulders (which will no doubt result in an injury).

 

[stringvest]

4 minutes ago, Mook said:

This malingering cunt was at the game yesterday so I'm putting the blame squarely on his shoulders (which will no doubt result in an injury).

 

oh how I miss him. A fit version of him was precisely what we needed yesterday.  

[an tha]

16 minutes ago, El Rojo said:

Anything to be said for bringing Jordan Henderson back in on a six month deal in January?

I suppose liverworld might be busy if they have a jan sale so yeah he could maybe do a job there.

[Barrington Womble]

9 hours ago, 3 Stacks said:

The difference with Klopp was that generally, the counter press was there in 9 out of 10 games. Teams could find ways to break it and we could be open, but we would also create loads of chances from it, especially against the worst teams. Yesterday, there was zero counter press.

They didn't play through the midfield, they hit it long and just pushed the back 4 10 or 20 yards up the pitch. In that situation, and it was true on Saturday, we won the ball back quickly, just 50 yards from goal. But previously we were happy to hit long balls from our centre backs, into wide players would be the width of the pitch and we'd be back on the edge of the box, constantly building pressure and stretching the opposition. That wasn't there on Saturday. We'd start again, passing slowly through the middle of the pitch. 

[Pidge]

9 hours ago, Mook said:

This malingering cunt was at the game yesterday so I'm putting the blame squarely on his shoulders (which will no doubt result in an injury).

 

Looks like he's lost a bit of weight since he retired two years ago.

[Bobby Hundreds]

I'm still a bit stunned by how utterly shit the players were Saturday.

[Reckoner]

9 hours ago, stringvest said:

oh how I miss him. A fit version of him was precisely what we needed yesterday.  

Bring him home.

[VladimirIlyich]

10 hours ago, stringvest said:

oh how I miss him. A fit version of him was precisely what we needed yesterday.  

Its not surprising given how old people have razor sharp long term memories but very poor short term ones.

[Carra_is_legend]

Among all the shiteness in that game, I thought Trent was proper shite when he moved to midfield.

[Carra_is_legend]

18 hours ago, Smell The Glove said:

We are incredibly light in midfield. Yesterday we had Endo and Jones on the bench, one who was never getting on in a game like yesterday and one just back from injury.

 

Bitters have:

 

de Bruyne

Kovacic

Gundogan

Nunes

Rodri

Bobb

Grealish/Foden/Silva/Doku/Savinho

 

Arsenal have: 

 

Partey

Odegaard

Jorginho

Merino

Rice

Havertz

 

We have:

 

Dom

Mac

Grav

Jones (injury prone)

Endo (who is not rated by Slot)

 

And we are expected to somehow challenge!

[an tha]

12 minutes ago, Carra_is_legend said:

 

Bitters have:

 

de Bruyne

Kovacic

Gundogan

Nunes

Rodri

Bobb

Grealish/Foden/Silva/Doku/Savinho

 

Arsenal have: 

 

Partey

Odegaard

Jorginho

Merino

Rice

Havertz

 

We have:

 

Dom

Mac

Grav

Jones (injury prone)

Endo (who is not rated by Slot)

 

And we are expected to somehow challenge!

I am stunned the bitters are bottom of the league with that kind of quality!

[joe_fishfish]

double post

[joe_fishfish]

12 hours ago, 3 Stacks said:

The difference with Klopp was that generally, the counter press was there in 9 out of 10 games. Teams could find ways to break it and we could be open, but we would also create loads of chances from it, especially against the worst teams. Yesterday, there was zero counter press.

Yes. The counterpress is absolutely huge in breaking down in disciplined deep defences. The only match I saw us play under Klopp where we counterpressed mercilessly and got nothing for it was away to Atletico Madrid, who take defensive shithousery to a new level.

 

If we don't counterpress, and we don't score from set pieces, and we stay narrow, and we don't have elite creative players (we're talking Messi level), or elite physical freaks (Haaland), I don't see how we break these teams down. I hope Slot has something up his sleeve.

[Smell The Glove]

3 minutes ago, joe_fishfish said:

Yes. The counterpress is absolutely huge in breaking down in disciplined deep defences. The only match I saw us play under Klopp where we counterpressed mercilessly and got nothing for it was away to Atletico Madrid, who take defensive shithousery to a new level.

 

If we don't counterpress, and we don't score from set pieces, and we stay narrow, and we don't have elite creative players (we're talking Messi level), or elite physical freaks (Haaland), I don't see how we break these teams down. I hope Slot has something up his sleeve.

The counter press is not really effective against teams that defend deep and have a player like Wood up top. They are not playing disciplined defence and not moving from their shape to then get caught playing out from the back out of position, they are playing over midfield to Wood, and hope he can hold up for the pacey wingers. Loads of teams are going to gives us 3/4 of the pitch and the ball and we have to find a way to get around that. I hate referencing the cheats but they were beginning to find it difficult to move teams out of shape with their boring gazillion passes so bought Doku who beats a man and draws another out to disrupt it.

[Pete]

Fucking 3PM Kick offs.  We want 12:30 or 16:30!

[VladimirIlyich]

1 hour ago, Carra_is_legend said:

Among all the shiteness in that game, I thought Trent was proper shite when he moved to midfield.

I wish we'd give up on it and just tell him he's a right back or a substitute. Nobody should be bigger than the whole team.

[Carra_is_legend]

1 hour ago, VladimirIlyich said:

I wish we'd give up on it and just tell him he's a right back or a substitute. Nobody should be bigger than the whole team.

100% agree.

 

To me, it looks like his ego button is switched on when he in midfield. On Saturday we needed him out wide and putting crosses in to stretch the game which was already fucking narrow. 

 

Trent is one of the big tests for Slot, he needs to make his mind up on the position for him sooner. 

[3 Stacks]

3 hours ago, joe_fishfish said:

Yes. The counterpress is absolutely huge in breaking down in disciplined deep defences. The only match I saw us play under Klopp where we counterpressed mercilessly and got nothing for it was away to Atletico Madrid, who take defensive shithousery to a new level.

 

If we don't counterpress, and we don't score from set pieces, and we stay narrow, and we don't have elite creative players (we're talking Messi level), or elite physical freaks (Haaland), I don't see how we break these teams down. I hope Slot has something up his sleeve.

Yeah, and that's true for every team. When people talk about breaking down teams that defend deep, the answers are actually very simple, you basically laid them out. Actually having those elements is rare, though.

[gkmacca]

3 hours ago, joe_fishfish said:

Yes. The counterpress is absolutely huge in breaking down in disciplined deep defences. The only match I saw us play under Klopp where we counterpressed mercilessly and got nothing for it was away to Atletico Madrid, who take defensive shithousery to a new level.

 

If we don't counterpress, and we don't score from set pieces, and we stay narrow, and we don't have elite creative players (we're talking Messi level), or elite physical freaks (Haaland), I don't see how we break these teams down. I hope Slot has something up his sleeve.

 

Yes, very true. I guess the one other thing a team can do is to do unpredictable things. The opposition turns up having been coached obsessively as to what to expect and how to frustrate it. So one should never underestimate the potential benefits of not doing the predictable thing (we pretty much won the league one year because we signed Ronny Rosenthal, who was very fast and had no idea what the hell he was going to do). Mo, for all his ability, has to be one of the most predictable right-sided, left-footed attackers in ages - if he doesn't get space, and is kept very much on the right, we all know what he'll try to do. Trent, similarly, gets obsessed in these situations with long looping balls into the area, even though we clearly don't have players to attack those balls except from dead ball situations. Diaz is one of the few who can be slightly unpredictable. given that he doesn't always know himself what he's going to do, but that's pretty much it.