WHEN Liverpool announced the signings of both Luis Suarez and Andy Carroll, I believed that they could form one of the most formidable partnerships in the Premier League, and I still do.
The reason for this is because they are a mix of my favourite types of forward; a target man and a smaller, trickier player – often referred to as the ‘little and large’ partnership.
Although many teams now opt for a lone striker with faster players on the wing to support, I believe this little and large partnership could be key for Liverpool. Carroll stands at 6’3″ and poses a great aerial threat. This is enough to strike fear into defenders knowing that they have to be careful when defending crosses, corners and free kicks as if Carroll gets a run on you, chances are you’ll end up losing out. Despite not being the tallest target man in the Premier League (Peter Crouch stands at 6’7″) he actually wins the second most headers per game in the Premier League (ironically, only eclipsed by Peter Crouch).
Another of Andy Carroll’s traits is his ability to hold up the ball. A number of times this season I’ve seen high balls into him where he brought the ball down on his chest with relative ease, held it up and laid it off to a team mate. This helps bring other people into play whilst taking defenders out of the game.
Luis Suarez stands at 5’11” and is known for his quick feet, ability to beat a man and create a chance out of nothing. His turn of pace and sometimes audacious attempts at taking people on make him more than a handful for even the best centre backs in the world. He also possesses a fair amount of pace and all these combined, adds a new dimension to Liverpool’s attack.
Knowing that defenders will have to keep a constant watchful eye over Suarez and Carroll frees-up other roles in the team, such as an attacking midfielder and wingers.
What are the benefits to this?
Well adding two different styles of strikers in the squad means that teams need to combat this with certain defenders, and defensive partnerships to tackle both balls in the air and the trickery of a player is rare. Combined with creative midfielders and wingers we could find ourselves proving to be one of the best attacking teams, providing we get it tactically sound.
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One other point about both Suarez and Carroll is they have the ability to shoot from long range, we saw this against when Carroll scored his excellent drive against Man City after first signing for Liverpool and then Suarez’s excellent chip against Norwich. This adds another dimension to our attack as even if the opposition defence is able to force us away from the box, both striker’s posses the ability to have a crack and force the keeper into work.
Although neither striker really hit the heights last season, Carroll’s form and overall commitment seemed to be questioned and we all know about Suarez’s on-field antics, I still predict a bright future for both our strikers and given time they will develop a partnership which will have defences fearing playing against us. I’m hoping Carroll has an excellent Euro 2012 and comes back to Liverpool full of confidence and ready to continue his form for the next domestic campaign.
By Chris Rheeston: Twitter – @RheesSnow
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Interesting article but I can’t see Carroll having a great Euro 12 simply because Hodgson’s style won’t favour the abilities of attacking players.
Rodgers (not Hodgson-LOL) plays 4-3-2-1 which morphs into 3-4-3 in attack, If Carrol plays in Zone 7, Suarez will be out wide in Zone 6. So the Little and large comination will be with both Zone 6 wide players and both Zone 5 attcking mids.
theres the problem right there. Do you think Carrol will understand what you’ve just written
Just get Boudebouz in and watch him across the middle of the park linking with those two!He plays in all midfield positions equally!
How is it ironic that only Crouch wins more headers if he’s taller than him? Seems more than probable to me!
I recokon suarez might go! I really hope not, because if u want to be successful, u don’t sell your best player! But there’s never smoke with out fire, and all these rumours, and brendan rodgers never mentioned him when saying liverpool have great players like gerrard, carra, pepe and bellamy! ( Probally meant nothing) but the rumours don’t seem to be going away! Hope its just paper trash, or his agent trying for a big pay rise! Anyway, the big fella (andy) has started to look something half decent, and I reckon he will start against france, wellbeck just didn’t hold the ball well enough, but did score with a class finish, made up for martin kelly for replacing cahill, phil jones will be cover for centre back and kelly will be johnsons understudy, it shows people like micah richards, carrick and ferdinand (but not sure he did) refuse to be on standby, coz richards and carrick would of replace lampard and barry, and rio for cahill. But we all no that roy and the f.a don’t want terry and rio in same group, if it was terry who was injured, bet ya dollar, rio would of been called up!
So they will do well because they are your favourite type of strikers ? Is that why they lit up the premiership last season ? Would you like to give them more time maybe ? 5 years to see glimpses? Saurez plays well with quick passing to feet, and carroll from long balls and crosses, the team will be passing under rodgers, so goodbye carroll
We’ll find it hard to hold on to Suarez in January unfortunately and we re gonna have an even bigger problem attracting a world class replacement. Mediocrity awaits.
Dirk is just the beginning. Thanks for everything dk. Ynwa