I generally think Can gives us something and stand up for him, but not so much tonight - if not his worst performance, it was up there, slow, overplaying, looked like he'd just rolled out of bed onto the pitch. Lucas and Studge were really poor too, the rest were ordinary, Karius improved (from a very low base) and Cou looked our most dangerous player in first game back after ages out! Even Lallana, Milner, generally reliable, not playing to level we know they can.
Few games now where we've really not been at it. Hendo is missed, captain is more incisive with some of his passing and is more of a presence in the middle. Mane's pace too. But we still have enough to be a LOT better than we've been. It happens, sides have ropey spells. We just need to be better at grinding out results at those times. With Manure coming up we'll need to be better. Great to see Cou get the guts of a half. And though Karius did fine, would expect Mignolet to come back in.
Not so bothered about tonight, we have a 2nd leg. More of a concern is that there's nobody really knocking on the first XI door to come in, so we need the main men to get serious amounts of wheetabix down them before the weekend...
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