lebron

Just reading through the thread now. Condolences to @BeefStroganoff @bossy and @suzy. Sorry for your loss.

Wow! Did not expect that after seeing the weather and being straight after a break. Bar the opening 10 mins that was a thoroughly enjoyable performance. Thought we were completely dominant after the break. Great to see both our strikers get a brace each. Hopefully Curtis is back sharpish, him and Macca owned the midfield.

First hamstring injury in his career according to Transfermarkt... That's not very common for an attacker that relies (or at least relied) so heavily on his speed as Mo. Speaks volumes to his professionalism and training regime. Unfortunately it also means that the step he's already lost in his game probably becomes even more apparent. Let's pray that his superhuman powers of recovery and fitness gets him back at close to full force in the not so distant future. I'm happy with our squad/attacking options, but I'm a bit fearful that this might be the beginning of the end. Hamstring injuries are an absolute bitch when it comes to trusting your speed to get back to what it was pre-injury, even in 2024.

I’ve seen most of the other top teams play this year, and Spurs is probably the 3rd best in terms of performance so far. I actually think the may sneak 3rd. Hopefully Villa can get 4th, and we pip City to the title.

I actually don’t want to see them together. For me, they are both 6s with the other players we have available for the front 5. If Endo plays, we can afford to have more attack-minded players than Macca in the 8 (Curtis/Szobo), and if Macca plays the 6, Endo shouldn’t start. For now I’m preferring Mac Allister over Endo (especially at home), even if Endo has been a pleasant surprise. It’s great to have to relatively different options in the role. They are well suited to different types of games.

As a trio any combination of our 5 forwards are a step too far from our previous front 3 for my liking (nearly every trio in the history of the game would struggle to better the golden years of Mane-Firmino-Salah to be fair), but we've seen this story before in the league. Agree that 5 subs helps, but looking back at the best Utd and Arsenal sides in the 90s/00s, they always had impact players that could change the game. Even if I wouldn't call any of Sheringham, Solskjaer, Cole or Yorke (he was probably the closest when there) world class, they changed games and/or scored goals in crucial moments/late in games for the Mancs. Not sure if enough is made of the importance of wearing sides down when playing against low-block sides in the league either. Unless you score quickly or you are really clinical, teams are so well drilled tactically now that there aren't really any big gaps to exploit unless the opponent plays a really expansive (Brighton/Us/City/Spurs/Arsenal) brand of football. We seem to struggle much more with the quick starts than we used to (Arsenal and CIty rely even more on this now), but thankfully we have such an array of options that we often get the job done even if we seem a bit more passive for periods of the game. I

Waiting in suspense for @dave u to completely change his tune on assists as “his boy” continues racking them up…

Despite what his biggest supporters seem to think, his technique and “feel” really isn’t up to scratch. They can keep calling on his Benfica goals for evidence. I actually don’t think his goal catalogue from Portugal is that impressive, a lot of poor goalkeeping in those comps. His left-footed effort today was very good, and he can definitely strike a ball when given the time and space to do it. He’s just not doing it consistently well, which is what very good and great finishers do. I still prefer him as a sub, and especially in games that are open or/and are opening up, as he thrives in space and on the counter. Thought he was great in the last 20 mins today, after the subs initially seemed to make us lose the rhtyhm we had built up.

I’d rather have my midfielders attempting to be brave on the ball and trying to thread the needle (and missing those passes from time to time = sloppy passing), than having them just playing it safe, sideways and backways all the time. We have the pace at the back to cope with those instances of sloppy passing, as well as the best 1v1 keeper ever. Over the course of 90 minutes (and a season), we gain much more from that approach. Problem is us supporters will groan and moan at those misplaced passes, and point out what horrendous mistakes they are, when we’ve probably gained 4 more chances at the other end due to this way of playing. With taking greater risks comes more chances both ways. Sorry, a real pet peeve of mine, not aimed at you personally. Edit: Probably shouldn’t even have quoted you, as you are one of the few giving him praise!

He’s definitely had better games, and at very least games where he’s been more influential. I just think he gives us something different with his passing. As with our previous number 6 I wish he had a bit more recovery pace, but he’s not afraid of receiving the ball under pressure, normally turns really well with it and plays mostly quick, progressive passes. He struggled tonight with finding quick outlets in front of him. i’m not blaming that solely on him though. With Harvey parked on the wing (our only real “between the lines” player), he didn’t really have many options to release those early passes. Thought he started the 2nd half better (as did Harvey when he started to get into those “half-spaces”), and finished strongly. Glad to converse!

Fulham are a pretty good team, they are well drilled, and have got some pace (Robinson) and nouse (Willian) on their left hand side. We’ve been the far better side (despite the commentators trying to portrait it as us having been outplayed), but as often is the case in these sort of matches, it takes time and skill to break down the low block sort of teams we usually come up against. Curtis and Bradley have been very good, Jota and Diaz lively in spurts, the others need to step it up. Starting to doubt Harveys impact in matches where the ref lets the other team be as physical as they like without penalising, he’s struggling mightily in wet conditions as well it seems. Some attacking changes in the 2nd half (60 mins probably) will probably get us over the edge, but we’ll probably need a full team in the 2nd leg (contrary to the wishes of most of us).

I’ll bite on the Reins discussion as well… The main reason he seemed worse towards the end was that the team crumbled in front of him. Instead of having literally the best midfield in front of a slow and flawed CB duo, we now had zero control in the engine room. This meant our defenders (Carragher being the main culprit) regularly gifting opposition 1v1s with Reina. I’ll concede he performed better on those in the early part of his career, but comparing him to Mignolet (who was as ill-fitted for modern, progressive football as possible), does him great disservice.

Looking forward to this, I think we will give them a good hiding actually. They are dead on their feet, and this is not the game where they will save their season. Will be my first game at Anfield since 2014 (WBA at home). Hoping the weather isn’t too bad. Caught the fireworks at Albert Dock earlier, and it was more than a bit windy!

Arsenal were better first 30 mins and last 15. We were better inbetween. We should have had a pen. We (Trent) should also have scored. In isolation a point wasn't a disaster here. People are up in arms because of the dropped points at Luton and last weekend. Utd saw that game as their cup final and defended for their lives. Had we gotten the 1st goal they would have panicked and folded (look at today's game against West Ham for evidence). I thought we pressed very well most of the game and I was confident of a win with 30 mins to go. The ref then decided that no more football was to be played, and singlehandedly destroyed the game from there on. Arsenal looked fresher than us (not surprisingly given their midweek break) last 15 mins. The subs didn't really work this time around, but Klopp has handled them really well so far this season, so he's due a day off. As an aside: We haven't really had clinical finishers since Fowler, even Torres and Suarez at their peak were prone to a miss. Salah, Mane and Firmino regularly missed obvious chances even in their pomp. The all-round play of all players mentioned (Fowler excepted) was of a such quality that we (at least I) gladly overlooked deficiencies in front of goal. The system(s) Klopp has played since his arrival has/have produced so many chances for the forwards that we've had plenty goal output even if our attackers have squandered plenty of them. The problem now is that we're not really getting as many chances, because our attacks break down before we get to the shooting part of them. Our pressing put us in 4-5 GREAT positions today, but we either f**ked up the pass or made the wrong decision. This makes the ONE time Trent missed today (should be one of our best finishers) particularly visible. I was pretty pleased with today's effort, both from the players and the crowd. Arsenal are no mugs, but they'll suffer injuries and trouble along the way. just like we have. I still think it's City's title to lose (especially with de Bruyne coming back), but us and Arsenal will follow them pretty closely in the coming months. I actually think Spurs might have a shot of breaking into the mix as well. Anyway, onwards and upwards. Let's win at Burnley.

See, I think the slow, aimless passing is due to the lack of players being able to find pockets of space to turn in between the opposition defence and midfield. Nunez just isn’t good enough in that aspect of the game, which we need when facing deep-lying defences. I don’t think he ever will be. For him to be effective, we need to be facing teams that open up a bit more. The game to start him is next week vs Arsenal, I think he will look a lot better then. Today (and last week) cried out for a Firmino type player getting us some possession between their defence and midfield. I think the re-positioning of Salah was done to help with that, but with him having (another) off day, we were still pretty ineffective. Mac Allister has gotten a lot of criticism for his unsuitability to the the no 6 role, but when Matip is not playing, he is the only one consistently finding players with passes between the lines. Hopefully he will be back against Arsenal.

Back to being the most boring fixture on the calendar. Too much nerve and negativity from us. Not that easy to look fluid when facing Stoke on steroids, time-wasting negative bastards enabled by Olivers refereeing though. My main gripe is we just gave them too much respect, and weren’t willing to take any chances in midfield. Second on the list is our stubborn-headedness with the infuriating outswinging corners that more often than not end up around the penalty spot. Why not swing them in, pack the box and just play a little gritty around the keeper? If we have a set piece coach, he should be fired. We wont win the PL if we don’t bring another forward in though. We desperately need someone in the middle to connect our play. Darwin does absolutely nothing in our build-up play, its like playing with 10 men when we have the ball. Gakpo showed some promise last year, but seems to have been told to play deeper. On the positive side, we didn’t lose any ground to City. Win against Arsenal (who will give us and Darwin a bit of space), and everything about this game will be forgiven (and possibly forgotten).

I’m actually more concerned with his inability to contribute to our attacking play MORE than his inability to finish, which takes some doing.

Oliver wont hesitate to give a second yellow to either Endo or Nunez. I would take both off at half-time, and put Jones and Gakpo on. We look too frightened to lose the ball in transition to really express ourselves. Hopefully Klopp encourages them to go at this rotten United team a bit more.

Get Darwin off. That is all…

Ederson cleans out Mateta on the edge of the box, gets away with a yellow. If that’s not denying an obvious goalscoring opportunity I don’t know what is…

I don’t think we’re far apart in our views on Nunez then. I just think your last sentence here is the main issue (especially against weaker opposition that tend to play compact, low-block football), and Nunez is a big factor in that. We would have had similar issues if Haaland played for us, but he’s so physically imposing that he would possibly have freed up a bit more space for our other players to take advantage of (pure speculation). I guess it’s the Firmino factor playing into it for me. Hard to go from a player whose biggest qualities were neat touches, interplay and pressing to basically the opposite. I love Nunez for his workrate (even if it should be a given at this level, it isn’t - ask any Utd supporter today about their forwards…), and his movement. His touch might have improved, but that and his ability to get in front of a defender to keep the ball will still have to improve lots for us not to get countered on repeatedly. Salah was even worse for this yesterday, but he’s normally good at it so will get the benefit of the doubt from most supporters. I wholeheartedly disagree with those saying finishing is mostly down to luck and not technique/ability though. That’s doing an huge disservice to those possessing that particular skill. We’ve not been blessed with too many of them lately, which might influence the opinion of our fans perhaps. With some players (Gerrard, Barnes for us, Henry, De Bruyne for our rivals) you just know they won’t miss from 10-18 yards out. They’re experts at creating angles as well as having the required technique to strike the ball properly. Anyway, I think most on here and in the ground really take to Nunez, which can only help him in terms of confidence and self-belief.

I actually agree with most of what you’ve written there (if my post of describing him as raw was the one you were alluding to), apart from the bolded part. He’s pretty much helpless when facing defences that play a low block and park their CMs close to their defensive line. He’s just not good enough with the ball in the half-spaces to be effective in our build-up-play in those instances. Normally Salah is a good outlet if we want to bypass the midfield, but today the ball just bounced back against us every time we tried the quick ball forward. I enjoyed our comeback today immensely, but we can’t have him missing this many chances if he’s to be our first choice in the centre when facing this type of side. Is raw not the same as unfinished in English? I think that describes him pretty well. Agree that he might be a bit of a purple patch striker. As you say, hopefully the goals start flowing in at the right time.

I said before he arrived that he looked very raw both technically and tacticallly, and even if Klopp obviously has been able to correct some of the pressing problems from last season, he remains incredibly frustrating to watch with the ball at his feet. I call bullshit on Dave’s yips finishing comparison too, his lack of technique (and balance?) is as evident in his finishing as in his build up play. I’d actually argue that the times he does strike the ball cleanly are more of a coincidence than him mishitting it. I will of course continue to support him, as his movement and enthusiasm make up for a lot of the above-mentioned flaws. Here’s hoping he magically discovers better technique.

Your commentary on Darwin is about as unbiased as my takes on Firmino, if this was hand-written there would be saliva all over the paper! A great read nonetheless! We are all susceptible to favouritism, it's one of the few good things left about this sport that you can get completely immersed with a player, their movement, skill, pace, power (whatever floats your boat). I doubt he'll ever be my favourite, but he's steadily improving in the team aspects of the game, both his pressing and interplay (the goal being the most obvious example) looks a lot better now. I still think there's plenty to improve on that should be coachable both technically and tactically now that his English has presumably gotten better, which bodes very well for the coming months and years. I'm reserving a bit of judgement on van Dijk when he's faced with one-on-ones where he needs a sudden change of direction, but his speed is nearly there, and he looks a lot more assured when going into duels on the ground and in the air. In terms of where he is compared to his peak, I'd say he's between 90-95%, which still makes him the best CB in the league by a distance. Last year was more like 60-70%, so something must have clicked, either mentally or physically (or maybe both). I don't think we'll see a season like his (18-19) from a CB ever again though. F***ing Pickford...

Yeah, it's always as if the structure/groundwork at Ajax presented him with ready-made players that he (somewhat impressively) got good results from as a few of them peaked at the same time - playing Ajax football that most of them were bred to play. Might not be quite as easy implementing the same tactics with a group of players that are massively overrated and with overinflated egos.