I posted a tactical analysis of the Hoffenheim game in the "Tactics geeks of the world unite..."-thread. (
https://www.lfcreds.com/reds/index.php/topic,43593.msg2073369.html#new)
This post, also by BabuYagu, gives some interesting information and food for thought.
"Our left side is always the pressing trap. (Could be wrong, just speaking from gut feeling watching us). That probably could be flipped but I suspect would require a change of personnel if the case as our right appears far more passive which then defeats the point of a pressing trap. You can´t have a passive ambush
An interesting thing was a discussion we had pre-season. Mane on the left would be good for Moreno because he protects full backs more than Coutinho. True, he certainly did. Coutinho tucks in more and doesn´t really track overlapping full backs so the theory was good. The thing is, the shift to the left has so far unburdened Mane with defensive responsibility rather than help Moreno.
Now this defies all logic because it's one of those accepted facts that Moreno cannot defend and yet Klopp just bet our European Qualification on Moreno last night. He was happy to let Hoffenheim have overloads on him for the chance for Mane to run riot on their right center back. The interesting thing from looking into defensive stats on the full backs thread is that Moreno has an incredibly totals of things he does.
For example, his average tackle success in 2015/16 was 75%. Last season Milner´s was 67%. League average for full backs was 71%. That was while making 4.3 tackles per game compared to 2.7 for Milner. League average was 2.4. Now obviously if you are making a lot of tackles, even at a high success rate that means a lot more failed tackles. They both made around 1 foul per 90 (1,08 Milner, 1,02 Moreno) but if you look at fouls per tackle, Milner´s comes out at almost double. Moreno was also dribbled past less also (1,09 Moreno vs 1,4 Milner). He also has twice as many interceptions as Clyne or Milner and is the only one to get over 50% in aerial challenges (Moreno 51,7%, Milner 40,8%, Clyne 23,2%).
When you add up all the defensive actions a player does (blocks of all kind, recoveries, interceptions, tackles, etc) Moreno comes out highest in the league. This doesn´t mean best. It could even mean worst. Those are both subjective. It just means he is either very aggressive, has a large area of responsibility &/or sees a lot of defensive action in his area of the pitch.
Also when you look at reactive actions (recoveries, interceptions) vs active actions (blocks, tackles) the league average is roughly 2.3 times as many reactive as active. Clyne and Milner are similar (1.85 & 1.9). Moreno is 1.3 which is the highest score recorded. Rose & Davies - by comparison, both come out at 1.4 (they are 2nd & 3rd on the list). There is no particular magic score that is good, or not, but it does tell us how aggressive Moreno is by comparison to our other full backs and those to another pressing side in Spurs. And I suspect if you treat pressing traps as an ambush situation - the unofficial SAS motto of speed, aggression and surprise come into play. This makes me wonder that if, despite his obvious faults, if a Moreno type left back perfect for our system. Is this why Pochettino persisted with Danny Rose despite the fan base deeming him a brain dead liability when he arrived at the club. Therefore Klopp may be willing to give chances that we aren't in the hope the same basics of defending can result in a similar upward turn as we saw with Rose?
I´m not saying these are the answers, merely trying to open a discussion that makes sense of the decisions Klopp makes rather than dismiss his decisions, like playing Moreno, as stupid."
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It has been suggested before that under Klopp, Lovren has played better when he was being played as an RCB (something I noticed too and that I agree with). Looking at this and the tactical analysis where we deliberately use the left side as a trap, it does make both Lovren and Moreno prone to more errors and leaves them exposed at times. Interesting stuff and looking forward to read what you guys think about it!