Breaking cockney hearts

What an absolutely crazy game of football. We had a dream start, Trent showing the advantages of him playing in midfield with a pinpoint cross, well finished by Jones. I was pleased for Curtis, I’ve been critical of him at times but after his brilliant assist against Leeds, he took his goal well yesterday. He’s had a number of false dawns but hopefully his injury woes are behind him now and he can kick on with his career.

That was just the start however, as Gakpo got in behind the Spurs defence to cut back for Diaz to score with what was a much harder finish than it looked. It was great to see Diaz get back on the scoresheet and get an hour under his belt. I’m sure like the rest of us he can’t wait to see the back of this season and I’m tipping him to have a massive impact next season. He’s a joy to watch.

We weren’t done though, as a whirlwind opening 15 minutes culminated in a rash challenge on Gakpo by Romero to concede a penalty and after missing his previous two, Salah stepped up to convert. 3-0 after 15 minutes, game over. Or so we thought…

It’s difficult to say what happened next. Complacency maybe? Whatever it was, we lost our heads. Two very poor touches from Robbo presented Spurs with good opportunities, one of which was brilliantly cleared off the line by Virgil and we continued to ride our luck as Spurs hit the woodwork three times. When they actually scored however, it was all too familiar and brings us once again back to the system.

We lose the ball in Spurs half and one straight pass down our right hand side and Spurs were in. It was compounded by Van Dijk’s slip, however once he had slipped, Spurs players were lined up in the box to finish and a simple cross to an unmarked Kane and it was 3-1.

Second half we were all over the place. Spurs second was another simple ball over the top down our right side again and Son was in, with Trent and Konate left looking at each other. Konate is very important to this system but he had an absolute nightmare in the second half, he was panicked and could easily have given away a penalty and got himself sent off. I don’t really blame him though. He’s trying to play two positions at once, it’s a lot of work both physically and mentally for him over the course of 90 minutes and his head went yesterday and he couldn’t get it back.

I’ve tried to give this system the benefit of the doubt but it’s so obviously flawed. We’ve been winning so it’s gone under the radar a bit but in the 5 games we’ve utilised this system, we’ve conceded 10 goals. At that average rate, over the course of a PL season, we’d concede 76 goals. Just let that sink in for a minute. In 13/14 when we came so close to winning the league, our undoing was conceding 50 goals. You can’t expect to concede that number of goals and win titles, it just doesn’t happen and we’d be on course to concede 50% more than that over the course of a season at our current rate of conceding.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. You can’t just play without a RB. I’ve enjoyed watching Trent in midfield, Klopp said he drifts in as part of a double pivot but he doesn’t really, he’s popping up all over the pitch. Now personally I think Trent has the skill set to be a De Bruyne type presence in our midfield but we need to decide what kind of players were going to surround him with and that brings us back to what our identity is moving forward. At the moment we’re caught between being a pressing team and a possession team, while mastering neither. In recent seasons we’ve tried to move towards a more technical midfield with Thiago and Elliot but when Thiago isn’t playing, it gets badly exposed and even when he is playing it isn’t perfect.

I said before the game yesterday that I didn’t think we’d be defensively stable with Elliot in there and unfortunately it proved to be the case. In the opening minutes, Elliot accidentally trod on Hojberg’s foot and when he went over to apologise, I was taken aback by the size difference between them and looking at Elliot in the middle of the pitch, he looked as though he was playing against a team of giants. There’s no lack of endeavour from him but it was a complete physical mismatch and he was being bullied. Hendo then comes on and we lose something from a technical standpoint. I mentioned on the match thread after one of Hendo’s woeful crosses, we seem to either have a player on our right side that can cross, or a player that can defend. Never both so what’s the answer? Personally I think if Trent is going to play midfield then we need to put runners around him that can physically match up to the opposition and will get up and down the pitch. Oh and for the love of god, sign a proper RB.

Anyway, back to the match. Klopp railed against Tierney the referee (again) after the game but I actually thought the big decisions went our way. The aforementioned penalty claim against Konate was one but the major one we got away with was the high boot from Jota, which left Skipp in a bloody heap on the floor and needing stitches. There was no malice in it but it was a red card and the fact he scored the winner will only have compounded Spurs misery.

For Spurs equaliser, a trademark unnecessary free kick and yellow card for Milner led to some acrobatic, unorthodox to say the least, defending from Darwin at the far post that allowed Richarlison to head in the equaliser. I actually thought he was fractionally offside, although it was as tight as Klopp’s hamstring this morning. Their celebrations were short lived however as seconds later, Lucas Moura played a suicidal back pass that put Jota in and I think at that point, Diogo was the only person in the stadium with any composure left and he coolly slotted home to being a crazy game to a close.

The fans certainly got their money’s worth from an entertainment perspective but we did our best to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. From being 3-0 up after 15 minutes, we didn’t have another shot on target until the winning goal. There’s a lot to enjoy about our current system when we’re on the ball but there’s so much wrong with it that I could turn these post match articles into a series of books.

Anyway the result is all that really matters and we got there in the end to move up to 5th. Fulham up next midweek then and the chance to put right our display on the opening game of the season where we were outfought and outrun by Fulham, which unfortunately set the tone for how the rest of the season was going to go. We’ve left our resurgence too late for top four I suspect but we’ve got ourselves up to 5th and now it’s a case of holding onto that and anything more is a bonus.

It’s been a crazy season but one thing you could never accuse Liverpool of is being dull. Walk on!