The struggle continues
If any of us thought the cup would offer some relief from our poor league form, we were in for a disappointment, as we played out a frustrating 2-2 draw with Wolves second XI.
A few eyebrows were raised when the team sheet was released, I think most of us expected to see at least a couple of youngsters in the lineup but Klopp went full strength, picking the strongest side available to him. In hindsight, we should have just played the kids.
There’s just no dressing it up. This was a Wolves team that made NINE changes to their team that currently sits second bottom of the PL. Yet despite that fact we were playing at home with a full strength team, while they handed debuts to a few players and played with a smattering of kids, we barely laid a glove on them. Even our goals were somewhat fortuitous (although you could say the same for Wolves) as the first came from nowhere as the Wolves player inexplicably hooked the ball into the centre of the pitch, putting Trent through with acres of space in front of him. The world class pass to Nunez and excellent finish that followed was one of the few positives to take from last night.
Apart from that we were extremely poor first half, from Alisson gifting them their first with a completely unforced error, to the familiar problems we’ve seen all season of being so easy to counter attack against and literally creating nothing.
Second half we started well and when Salah scored I thought we might kick on and win comfortably. Foolish I know. Wolves looked dangerous every time they went forward and ultimately got their reward with a fairly comical equaliser, the ball bouncing off Konate and squirming through the legs of Alisson who had a night to forget.
The same problems that have plagued us all season continued. I saw someone mention on the match thread that if our midfield aren’t tackling, intercepting OR creating, it begs the question what they are actually doing. I saw a stat which said we only managed 7 tackles in midfield all game, 6 of which were made by Thiago. He’s meant to be our playmaker for god sake, did Fabinho and Hendo just have a night off? Their entire midfield role is meant to be about tackling and disrupting the opposition and if they can’t do it against a second string Wolves team, it really is worrying times.
Desperately scratching around for positives, we saw Gakpo make a solid if unspectacular debut but I saw enough from him to believe once he settles in, he’ll make an impact for us this season. Nunez took his goal brilliantly, which will hopefully help his confidence but apart from that, I’m really struggling for positivity at the moment.
Brighton up next then and I won’t lie, I’m not at all confident going into that game. Never in my life as a Liverpool fan did I expect to be casting envious glances at Brighton and Hove Albion’s midfield but that’s where we’re at. I’m sure every Liverpool fan in the word would bite your hand off for a midfield containing Moises Caicedo and Alexis Mac Allister right now and in truth, I’m fearful of what their midfield will do to ours at the weekend.
Moving forward, if we really aren’t going to try and sign a midfielder this season then we really need to change formation. We’re top heavy in attack and leaky everywhere else. So whether that means we switch to a 4-2-3-1 and just get our two holding midfielders to sit in and try and offer the defence some protection, or perhaps crowd the midfield with a narrow midfield diamond in a 4-4-2, I don’t know but we can’t just carry on as we are. As Einstein said, the definition of madness is to keep repeating the same thing and expect different results. The return of Keita should in theory bring a little more legs in midfield and pressing intensity but if we’re betting on Keita to save our season, it really is desperate times.
Another ranticle then, writing the post match articles has been tough this season and I suspect there will be a few more difficult ones before the season is over but safe to say 2023 has not got off to a good start. We’re starting to approach crunch time for the season though. If we can’t find some form from somewhere soon, the season is going to be a write off.
On the plus side, we’ve got a money spinning replay at Molineux to look forward to, so that will hopefully keep John Henry out the poor house for another couple of weeks at least 😉
Walk on!!
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