All Bark, No Bite
Football without forwards.
So after three consecutive wins in the Premier League, Liverpool returned to losing ways on Sunday afternoon, suffering a 3-2 defeat at the hands of Manchester United.
It was a weird game, and one that I’d argue was almost as good as lost before a ball had even been kicked. Once Arne Slot announced his team, it was clear that Liverpool were going to encounter problems.
Ahead of the clash, Alexander Isak and Mohamed Salah both picked up injuries, with Hugo Ekitike already sidelined having ruptured his Achilles tendon against Paris Saint-Germain just two weeks ago.
As a result, Slot selected a makeshift front line that consisted of Cody Gakpo, Jeremie Frimpong — who’s a wing-back — and a gang of midfielders. Before the referee had even blown his whistle, it was obvious that Liverpool were going to struggle to pose a threat.
In practice, despite the whole thing being extremely miserable, it was an interesting experiment to witness. The Reds had a relatively typical back four and midfield department in place, but the entire recipe changed because of what happened in the final third.
I liken players to ingredients quite a lot on this Substack. The head coach is the chef, and it’s his job to create an appetising dish. Some ingredients have the power to make other ingredients pop. And it’s the same in football.
What I witnessed at Old Trafford was a collective grind because of one faltering department. A missing ingredient, if you want. It was like watching a car with three wheels. Instead of going forward, the visitors just ended up driving round in circles.
Liverpool found themselves advancing towards goal quite nicely on certain occasions, only to stop before circulating possession and allowing United to gather 11 men behind the ball.
Everything happened in front of Michael Carrick’s men. Liverpool proved to be easy to defend against as a consequence of no players running in behind, and no players — perhaps other than Gakpo — willing to finish the move by attempting to score.
The toothless nature of the side essentially fostered their downfall in the first half in particular, because the Reds could dominate possession, but couldn’t quite put the cherry on top of the cake. Couldn’t seal the deal. All bark, no bite.
So they often ended up keeping the ball for a bit too long. Prolonged passing sequences. And then one of Slot’s players would force a killer ball as a means of introducing some form of punch.
The killer ball would get intercepted or miscontrolled, and United would break into space. Space that had only emerged because Liverpool had committed so many bodies forward in their desperate attempts to score. The below clip is a perfect example.
It was very similar to watching the Reds against Arsenal at the Emirates just a few months ago, when Slot fielded exactly the same front line — interesting, right? — because of injuries to Isak and Ekitike at the time, while Salah represented Egypt.
It’s not a coincidence that Liverpool looked blunt in both of those games, but not so bad at keeping the ball. That’s what a squad issue looks like. Not enough offensive depth, no product. A half-finished rebuild. And all of your finishers injured at once.
Slot is responsible for lots of things. If you want him sacked, cool. If you think he’s Liverpool’s biggest problem, cool. If you think he’s the main reason we’re in this mess, cool.
But purely when it comes to Sunday’s performance in isolation, I can’t help thinking that it looked like another case of the head chef struggling without key ingredients. Whether that’s good enough remains open for debate.
We can’t just group every single bad result under the same cheap umbrella. We need to understand the why behind each and every setback. Pay close attention to dangerous recurring themes, of course. But there’s a big difference between getting tactically outclassed, and being tactically handcuffed.
Three matches to go. Get me out of this place.
We had the midfielders and they had the forwards. Felt that’s pretty much how the game played out. We had midfielders everywhere. Even Gakpo played in midfield once a upon a time. Give this man some pacy wingers and a fully fit Isak and let him cook.
This was a mirror image of our problems in the 20-21 season. Back then, our attack looked toothless because all our defenders were out, and everyone wondered why. Now our defense looked haphazard because we had no forwards. The reality is, attacking and defending our two sides of the same coin.