I finally feel ready to talk about the debacle that was yesterday. But where do you start!? Usually in these sort of games it's one or two individuals that sum up the day and are ready made scape goats, but there genuinely isn't a single Liverpool player that can come out of that with any credit. First and foremost, full credit to Burnley, that was a very professional performance, they had to work very hard to keep their shape defend like that for 90 mins, I know it is frustrating for us but if we could defend half as well as they can then we wouldn't be so frustrated. And whether we like it or not there's another 4/5 teams that are going to look to do that to us this season.
I haven't read this thread as the whole reason I wait to post in here is to allow everyone time to calm down. But I imagine the Mignolet debate rages on, the defence have given him next to no help but to concede 5 goals from 5 shots on target is nowhere near good enough. And although there are obvious worries about Karius' starting position higher up the field, that at least pushes the rest of the team 10-15 yards further up and you would like to think we're not leaving ourselves in the situation we find ourselves in for Vokes goal and Walcott's last weekend.
The back four don't exactly shower themselves in glory. Clyne, Lovren and Klavan all get caught out for their goals, Milner had next to nothing to do defence wise but going forward he was as one dimensional as the rest of the team.
The countless side ways passing between the defence and the mid field was frustrating after 30 mins, but to spend the last 10 mins knocking it around as if we were seeing out the game was a joke! It epitomised the whole performance, clueless and completely out of ideas with no one willing to step up and force the issue. Pass it to the next man and hope he will take responsibility. I have to take particular issue with Henderson here, I said in the pre match thread that he is the best man we have to spray the ball and switch the play and all I seen were 5 yard side ways passes. And I also have an issue with his captains performance. I'm not expecting a Gerrard superhero performance and for Henderson to drag us over the line, but I do expect our captain to try at the very least. I was furious with him in particular in those last 10 mins, he completely went into his shell. Not good enough for Captain. For those exact reasons I wasn't impressed with Wijnaldum, but as his second game for the club and with no one around him exactly inspiring I'm not writing him off as a failure just yet. As for Lallana it was a performance we have seen far too many times from him, fading in and out of the match. He did look bright for about 10 mins in the first half and seemed to be the only Liverpool player capable of getting a touch in the box, he needs to be more clinical when he does get those touches. But as the game went on he slowly faded out.
The front three surprised me with their lack of creativity and imagination. We're not talking about a team that starved them of supply, they were more than happy to let Coutinho, Firmino and Sturridge have as much of the ball as they wanted. Coutinho drives me mad when he resorts to those pot shots from outside the box. I'm sure it's equally as frustrating for him because it is obvious he can bang them in, and no doubt he will score one of them soon and I'll be made eat my words again. I understand one or two desperate attempts in the dying stages of the match but for 88 minutes it was all he had in mind. I know no one else was coming up with anything else but a player of his ability needs to be smarter in those situations, draw a foul, run at them or pull a man out of position, but don't spend the whole game doing exactly what they want you to do.
I am as annoyed as anyone at Sturridge starting out wide right but who's decision was it that he would become a central mid fielder? I don't know whether that was Sturridge's desperation to get on the ball or an instruction from the coaching staff but it was ridiculous. The few opportunities we did get a few yards to run at them, our best striker was behind the play!
Firmino for me was the most guilty of the three, he brought nothing to the game. His passing was wayward, he was static up front and lacked the same creativity as everyone else.
It was always going to be tricky going to a place like Turf Moor but when you give them a goal so early you give them something to defend, you give them a purpose, a reason to defend with their lives. The players we have should be much better than they showed in defence and more worryingly in attack. 30 yard pot shots and countless lofted crosses into a defence that just came out of the Championship... they take them crosses all day, every day. We played into their hands and that was obvious after half an hour, the problem is we were incapable of changing that.
It was such a bad performance that you have to put it down as a one off, even thinking that it is anything more than that is terrifying! I think it is for the best that we're playing again on Tuesday, get a good performance and win in before going to Spurs. Plenty of work for Klopp and the lads to do this week, but we're still on for 111 points this season!
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