I don’t think many Liverpool fans would have been that optimistic of getting a result in Braga after looking at the Reds starting line up before the match. Initially it looked to me that we were going to play a 4-5-1 formation with three holding midfield players in Christian Poulsen, Jay Spearing and Lucas Leiva with Raul Meireles playing from the right hand side. As the match got going though it was clear that Liverpool were going to play a 4-4-1-1 formation with Meireles playing in behind Dirk Kuyt and Spearing taking the position on the right hand side. With Joe Cole playing on the left hand side too, the team had absolutely no width and we were always going to struggle in the first half with the personnel playing.
With a lack of width in midfield, you would expect the width to come from the full back areas but with Carragher playing right back, and rarely getting forward, while Glen Johnson also favoured to come inside onto his right foot when he decided to make forward runs, there was rarely an outlet for the Reds to get any creative spark going forward. Playing Spearing wide right, Cole cutting in from the left and two defensive midfielders in Lucas and Poulsen in the middle meant Dirk Kuyt only really had Raul Meireles in close contact and the Portuguese midfielder had a pretty poor night by his standards, giving the ball away on countless occasions as he became increasingly isolated.
So what did we learn from the display? Never ever play all three of Lucas, Poulsen and Spearing in the same team. Away from home in Europe you can get away with having two holding midfielders but to have all three playing was never going to work in my view and Kenny Dalglish should make sure in future matches that there is a more positive intent in away European fixtures, more akin to the attitude taken in the Premier League. Perhaps Kenny feels that the Europa League is not top priority as otherwise I see no reason why, with a week to go to Liverpool’s next match, he didn’t pick Maxi Rodriguez from the start instead of Poulsen or Spearing to give us at least another attacking threat. A midfield of Cole and Maxi on the wings with Meireles the most attacking central midfielder ahead of Spearing and Lucas, would have made more sense.
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Poulsen(NOT good enough), Spearing(needs more time) and Cole(NOT good enough)should NOT be playing for Liverpool FC
it was really a huge mistake to use all three of Spearing,Lucas,Poulsen at the same time..it’s like asking for the game to end.when carroll came in we had some chances to equalise and the team pressurised up front..i think that also Maxi should have come in for Spearing’s place..now at Anfield,i’d say a 4-4-2 like this:
Reina
Johnson Carragher Agger Wilson
Lucas Meireles
J.Cole Maxi
Kuyt Carroll
Attack Attack Attack..our objective should be to score an early goal and then take our time to score 2 more..but put pressure on them from the 1st minute so that it doesnt get bad in the end..lets go on to the next round and with zenit,manchester city in difficult home games,if they get out of europa league,we have a huge chance of winning it..YNWA
I’d add Lucas in there, a centre midfield pairing of Lucas and Poulsen must be the most uncreative in the clubs history.
I knew when I saw Poulsen, Lucas and Spearing in the midfield we would struggle. None of them has an attacking bone in their body
my line up in a 4-2-3-1 would have read:
johnson–Carra–Skrtel–Wilson
—–Spearing–Lucas——
Kuyt——-Raul——-Maxi
——–Carroll———-
Raul has to be played in the centre where he plays for Portugal. Spearing isn’t up to it. You’d drop Suarez as well Oz
it took u until now to realise that those three shudn’t be played together??? i was absolutely flabbergasted when i saw the team line-up, it was the most outrageous liverpool team to step on a football pitch for quite some time…
firstly, playing three defensive midfielders together was inexplicable to say the least, out of the eleven players, just three were attacking players…
secondly, playng kuyt up front as a lone striker was just as bad.. he can play as a secondary striker feeding off the scraps but he has no quality or skills required to play as a lone striker…
this result shows the lack of depth in our squad required to seriously challenge for honours in europe…
I must admit as soon as I saw Poulsen and Cole playing I watched 25 minutes of the crap and went and found something useful to do on the computer. Whatever was KD’s idea?????
Agreed on the article, but yet again, we are very limited in players. The depth of the squad is amazingly poor. If we would have Shelvey he could have made a difference. But still he is a youngster too. Lets just hope we get Gerrard back soon and Kenny has learned never to play Poulsen ever again.
Agger, Gerrard and Kelly should all return in the next 4 weeks. Hopefully all in time for some crucial matches.
I would love to see Daniel Pacheco given the chance he is miles ahead of spearing n poulsen. He has been our best player in the reserves for the last 2 seasons yet he gets no opportunity? Not feeling the negative tactics daglish keeps on playing in Europe away from home! Dnt understand it…?
I agree, I just don’t get it either, 20 mins to go I was almost shouting at the box Pacheco should’ve been on givin’ us at least some width especially with Carroll on, why won’t he (KK) give him a chance can’t do any worse than the players on the pitch. He might be a bit of a lightweight but he’s got pace and skill and he needs to be on the pitch.
Liverpool lacked the creativity and attacking threat last night with Meireles and Cole the only ones supporting Kuyt up front on his own. There was no need to play with three midfielders with no attacking abilities in Poulsen, Lucas and especially Spearing. Playing those three together also meant there was no space for a natural winger or wide man. Maxi or Pacheco should have played instead of the average Spearing and for some reason Jovanovic was missing from the squad. He would have provided a much greater threat out wide and would have given us a different dimension in attack. Also, injuries to Kelly, Agger and Aurelio meant Kenny didn’t really have much choice at the back and was forced to play Skrtel and Soto together at the back which meant no pace and no one to distribute the ball from the back. The second half introduction of Andy Carroll was pretty much the only positive from a poor game and I expect him to play a major role in the return leg at Anfield next week. Hopefully we have Agger back by next week which will give us more options at the back but the absence of Gerrard and Suarez means we will have to rely more on Meireles and Cole while Carroll must start if we are to keep our Europa League dreams alive. Liverpool really need to step up in the second leg. My team for the game would be:
Reina
Carra Skrtel Agger Johnson
Maxi Lucas Meireles Cole
Kuyt
Carroll
Subs:Gulacsi Soto Wilson Poulsen Jova Pacheco Ngog
Little Jay, for all his enthusiasm and as much as I desperately want to see him succeed, just isn’t cut out for being anything other than a squad player at Premier League level. God how we could have done with an Aquilani the other night. No ingenuity in the middle at all. Completely devoid of ideas. Joe Cole is exactly what Mourinho always said he was. A luxury player. Can’t ever expect a performance of any consistency except bad from him. To add vicous insult to an already life threatening injury is the lamentable Dirk Kuyt. Just has not got the footballing intelligence to comtribute constructively at the top level. He has nothing except work rate about him. I remember something Ronnie Moran once said about the modern young players coming through Academies. They teach them everything. The attributes, the physicality everything except how to play football. Dirk Kuyt, sure he can run all day, but he brings nothing else other than his stamina. We might as well hire an Ethiopian long distance runner if stamina is all we require. A clearout is absolutely desperately required and players with above all else a footballing brain brought in.
Jovanovic offers nothing, he came from a rubbish league and was useless on the leftwing earlier this season coming infield and compressing the play.
COLE is crap! Spearing is crap!Poulson is crap! Wilson is NOT ready!, so why the hell these very average players keep getting selected?, ahead of the likes of PACHECO and MAXI?……for god sake KD take a closer look at ‘video replays’ and see what we are seeing!!!.
Time to let spearing go on a free transfer, he’s just not good enough and never will be
to be fair, cole has only played 2 or 3 FULL games with a full strength liverpool team
Cole is an extremely limited player, he has no speed,strength,shooting power or tactical awareness. It says a lot about Carragher and Gerrard that they lauded Cole as a great signing. Maybe they wanted Cole signed so he could go boozing with them at Carragher’s restaurant every week.