Cognitive Dissonance at the top of the club

Its obvious that no-one at the club can be satisfied with how things are going for us at the moment.

We have gone from a team that went on a run of playing some amazing free-flowing football for the second half of last season to one that is stuttering and heading in the wrong direction, unable to produce a run of good form in this season. Fingers are being pointed to any number of different things from tactics to coaching to luck and even, I'm sad to say, at Kenny himself.

Any of those things might be true but there's one major factor which is different between this season and last season and that's the players we have brought in.

I firmly believe that the major difference between Kenny and Rafa's signings are not ones of quality but those of tactical flexibility. Look at when Rafa signed Lucas for example; he is a player that can obviously play Defensive Midfield but also box to box as a central midfielder and also as a Central Attacking Mid as well as any position in the back line. The same applies to most of Rafa's signings, they were tactically intelligent when switching positions.

This meant that Kenny was able to have a stable back line with Lucas and Spearing in front to shield them and pass the ball to Suarez, Kuyt, Maxi and Meireles, all of whom could easily switch positions and thereby be extremely difficult to mark whilst creating chances. In some of those games we ran rings round the opposition.

Switch to this season and what have we got?

Enrique - plays a good defensive game but is limited in attack and doesnt have the game intelligence to play another position.
Downing - Can peform well when his role is limited (especially against Championship players) but has failed to demonstrate the tactical flexibility to play in differenet positions or link-up play with either fullback
Henderson - Looks good in a Central position but looks lost when he's not there (he is at least still young and may develop his game in this respect)
Carroll - again fantastic in teh right circumstances with the right deliveries but struggling to adjuwst his game to fit in with the rest of the team (agin he is still young and can still come good).


So why have we lost this flexibility?

Its obvious that the appointment of Damien Commolli and a new statistics based 'moneyball' approach has been central to recruiting the players we have and I think the experiment is currently not succeeding. Some people constantly decry statistics and say you cant use them in football because the game is too fluid. Personally I think this is nonsense - every top club in the world is increasingly using statistical analysis to improve their football and in fact you wont find many bigger exponents than Rafa himself. Its the WAY in which they are being used that i think is the problem.


We have targeted players who create chances in the transfer window (since the best teams in the league create the most chances). So lets take Adam as an example - a fantastic player on his day and currently our leading chance creator as he was at Blackpool  - which was the main reason we signed him. But what the statistics DON'T tell you is how the rest of the team was set up around him to deal with his deficiencies (im not getting at Charlie here - even Messi has pros and cons to his game). result? Adam starts forming a relationship with Lucas and playing well but when Lucas gets injured Adam has to adjust his game and thereby struggles to do it - in the process damaging the good parts of his game.

In fact I think its likely that the players who stand out MOST statistically are generally less good at adapting their game to play in a different way.

The problem is that we have signed a bunch of these specialist players (with Commolli and the owner's moneyball techniques) and are asking them to adapt their games and play flexibly (as Kenny would like).


So although everyone is trying hard and doing their best to succeed at the club I wonder if the recruitment policy driven by statistics is currently unable to pick up the qualities that we need most from our players. I wonder if we have built a team that could steamroller the opposition if everyone was fit and doing the job they are meant to be doing but as soon as injuries, suspensions and poor form are thrown into the equation we are unable to produce convincing football.

Its like a made-to-measure suit, it either looks fantastic or terrible depending who's wearing it rather than an off the peg number which will generally look good on most people.

We need to give some serious consideration as to whether these two visions of football are marrying well together rather than pointing the blame at individuals. So feel free to flame away!

Fucks sake.

You do make some good points, but if I am honest I had to read the post to try find out what Cognitive Dissonance meant.....and I still had to google it.

We have gone from a team that went on a run of playing some amazing free-flowing football for the second half of last season to one that is stuttering and heading in the wrong direction, unable to produce a run of good form in this season.

Have to pull you up on that.

I have actually enjoyed our football for the majority of this season.  The fundamental problem is that we have not been clinical enough in the vast number of games we have dominated and deserved much better.  Our results have been poor far far more than our performances.

I'm not denying there have been a handful of very poor performances in the league, but for you to start your post with the central fact being that our football has been poor is actually a little wide of the mark in my opinion.

I doubt there is any sensible Liverpool fan who doesn't accept that if we had someone as prolific as Van Persie in the side then he would have been gifted a barrage of chances and would probably have as many, if not more, goals for us this season as he has had at Arsenal.

I think our performances this season, in general, especially in the first half of the season were good. We played well in majority of the games but we have not got more points than we actually deserved.

However, the last 8 games results only gave us one win and five defeats which is horrible but we were good against Arsenal and Spurs.

The problem is our lack of goalscoring abilities. We've created enough chances in the past only to come away with a draw or a defeat and that has cost us.

While Kenny Dalglish can be questioned with his tactics sometimes or for not bringing subs on early enough, I don't think we can put the blame on him when Suarez heads to Friedel from 5 yards, Kuyt missing two penalties or Kelly missing a sitter.

Thanks for your thoughts.

I suppose I agree with you that we have played some good football this season - I'm not denying that, in fact when we have clicked and the conditions have been right we've arguably played better than last season (see the suit analogy above). What I was trying to get across is that the team is relatively brittle and lacks flexibility - and I think you agree that means we have fits and starts of playing very well but are unable to sustain that through different periods and conditions. Looking back at the season I think it's hard to identify a consistent period of form which supports my argument above.


I agree with you RVP would transform us but then he' s currently a contender for the best striker in the world and can carry teams by himself. If we have to rely on that to achieve anything there's something wrong by default. It's like saying we don't have to bother coaching our defenders during the week if we sign the worlds best goalkeeper to pull us out of the ****.

But the lack of flexibility in certain games wouldn't be pointed out straightaway if we had gathered more points than we currently have.

I don't know what's wrong with the football club because every season, it's almost the same story - no consistency. 2008/2009 was probably the most consistent I've seen us play but then again, dropped points at home cost us the title - no surprises there.

Cognitive Dissonance? Couldn't you find a simple word for that?

Flexibility is not an issue because it is our consistency and finishing touches that costing us valuable points this season. We created too many wasted chances to be exact and that showed that we're flexible enough. We showed that we could vary our games in most of times but during that most of times we didn't show our consistency. If we're not flexible enough, we couldn't even set foot in Wembley that day.

Three words; sharpness, consistent, composure. That's what we're lacking right now.

Cognitive Dissonance? Couldn't you find a simple word for that?

He has a new thesaurus, he can't let it go to waste.

I can't bring myself to agree with your post, Carlos.

Tactical flexibility can be argued as being shown by Henderson being operated in a holding midfield position, on the right wing and in a natural central midfield position, Enrique operating as a wingback and a defensive fullback, and Downing having been played on both flanks and through the middle.

Their flexibility has not been an issue, it's their performance. 

Overall, i don't think it can be debated as to whether we have been a good footballing side - i think that much is obvious bar the odd couple games which every team will experience. But by and large, we have been the better team in most of our matches. The problem lies with taking the chances and having the mental capacity to beat teams when things are not going our way on the scoreboard.

That will come with time and confidence. It's clear the team is struggling a bit in that department and only a sustained run of form through hard work and taking our chances will that change.

We have a versatile squad that is currently hampered with a few key injuries to Agger, Gerrard and Lucas. It just restricts the ability to be flexible, it doesn't eliminate it.

Lucky you we got Kenny, wonder if Woy read that?

INRAT

I most certainly agree with this moneyball principal not working out for us and comolli spearheading this movement. It really seems to be hit and miss and buying us players that can only play a certain way/who are flawed in some major way.

The trained eye can tell you carroll is immobile to play in a pass and move system, adam has no engine or defensive metal for this standard, henderson is a master of nothing except decent touches(the new joe cole) and downing at 27 obviously doesnt have the pedigree for this level.

They may have a ton of statistics in their favour but they are all from mid table clubs and 3 out of 4 have been relegated from the premier league already.

Common sense should prevail. I always felt rafa was a great a judge of talent but never had the financial muscle to get the best, always having to settle for the cheaper option. I dont have that excuse for this liverpool.

I don't agree that we played better football last season than we have this. More successful football yes, in that we won most of the games we deserved to win and a few we didn't in the second half of the season, whilst this season we have failed to win a lot of games we deserved to win and none that we didn't. 

This season we have outplayed almost every side we have come up against, but lack of goals has let us down badly (not yesterday). As a result confidence has dropped and goals become even harder to score, wins harder to get.

I do agree that the players we have brought in under Kenny have been less flexible positionally, but more importantly than this we didn't have sufficient quality backup to the first team and it is this that has led to the lack of flexibilty being exposed.

A quality defensive midfielder to cover for Lucas would have meant Adam could still play to his strengths. A clinical striker and maybe Carroll wouldn't be under so much pressure, Suarez might be less inclined to try to beat the oppositionon his own, Downing might feel there was some point in just putting a cross in.

Enrique, I think you are being a little harsh, but I prefer defenders who defend first and foremost and I think he has been excellent for most of the season.

So the simple addition of two top quality players will solve all our problems..... nah, but they could have made things a little easier.

The main thing I believe we are missing is genuine pace up front. Bellamy has pace but in the main runs from deep or is played on the wing. Pace up front as Owen and Torres had, playing on the last man forces defences to play deeper, creates space in midfield that Suarez like Gerrard in previous years could exploit.

Lack of flexibility yes but lack of genuine options even more so.

Arsenal at the start of the season looked like they might get relegated. We beat them 2-0 at Arseland and they looked a shambles.
Then RVP came back, scored a pile of goals, papers over the cracks, pressures mainly off (but not fully off) Wenger and they now look like they'll get 4th.
IMO it's simple - one guy who can score goals made the difference in their season.

Whatever about the many problems we may have, the one we need to sort out is scoring goals.
We don't conceed many => defense not too bad.
We create a lot of chances => midfield maybe not as bad as made out
We score hardly any goals => we need AT LEAST one more, realistically two more strikers (with one going the other way)

Not saying we don't need to improve in other areas but any team will suffer if strikers are not scoring goals.
In the games we've deserved to win we haven't had someone to stick chances away.
And in games we've been poor, we've had noone to dig us out of a hole (eg. RVP against us, they STOLE that game)

Until we sort that area out think we'll continue in the way of current results, inconsistent, waste chance, be frustrating.

Except on Tues when we'll give the bitters a good flailing

I told you I didn't speak Tex Mex , Senor Qiqabal.

You can't seriously say that Adam compares favourably to Alonso of old or Carroll, Torres of old. Henderson has made virtually no impact at all in his time with us, while the other three signings; Suarez, Enrique and Bellamy have been very successful. Any challenged those three face havenothing to with lacking positional or 'tactical' flexibiity. So, for me, the problem with some our signings is that they fundamentally lack quality.

IWe can get more from Adam, we have got more from Adam when partnered with Lucas who compensates for his defensive weaknesses, but as for the others, I'm not convinced it's the system that's preventing them from performing as much as it is a lack of quality. We bought two of the biggest assist getters, two of the best set-piece experts from last season, stuck them in the team with Carroll and he can't score love nor money.

The team should always a good balance to it, but it's very hard to compensate for a lack of quality in so many key positions.

Our Style of football hasn't been the problem, finishing our chances has.

Our Style of football hasn't been the problem, finishing our chances has.

Exactly mate.

Our football on the whole this season has been excellent to watch and I think a few people are only looking at the bad games and forgetting how good we have been for the vast majority of the season.

People are saying our football has been better but to be honest that is not what we need, we need to start winning more games instead of drawing, the result needs to come first then we talk about how our performances can improve, well thats the way i would like to look at things. To show progress our results need to be better and they have been in cup competitions so there are signs of progression, just not enough in the league maybe.

Arsenal at the start of the season looked like they might get relegated. We beat them 2-0 at Arseland and they looked a shambles.
Then RVP came back, scored a pile of goals, papers over the cracks, pressures mainly off (but not fully off) Wenger and they now look like they'll get 4th.
IMO it's simple - one guy who can score goals made the difference in their season.

Whatever about the many problems we may have, the one we need to sort out is scoring goals.
We don't conceed many => defense not too bad.
We create a lot of chances => midfield maybe not as bad as made out
We score hardly any goals => we need AT LEAST one more, realistically two more strikers (with one going the other way)

Not saying we don't need to improve in other areas but any team will suffer if strikers are not scoring goals.
In the games we've deserved to win we haven't had someone to stick chances away.
And in games we've been poor, we've had noone to dig us out of a hole (eg. RVP against us, they STOLE that game)

Until we sort that area out think we'll continue in the way of current results, inconsistent, waste chance, be frustrating.

Except on Tues when we'll give the bitters a good flailing

Quite a good analogy of whats wrong in our club, We need a striker desperatly, the one we bought last year for a record fee, is how do you say is......sh*t, thanks Comolli.

Thats it though isn't it, one striker in a purple patch and we have an extra 10 pts and we are fourth.

Thats it though isn't it, one striker in a purple patch and we have an extra 10 pts and we are fourth.

Agreed.

Most of our lads look like they're in a yellow patch when they're one on one.