I went to the match today mostly hoping we could keep the score respectable. Needless to say, the final result came as a surprise.
Here are my ratings:
Schmeichel: 9 - Aside from some big saves, he was far more active than usual aerially at set pieces.
Castagne: 7 - Best game for some time, occasionally active in attack and held his own in defence.
Amartey: 8 - Can have good or bad games, and this was a decent and solid performance. Centre back is definitely his best position.
Ndidi: 7 - Clumsy to concede a penalty, which he really got away with. Aside from that he put in a very good, commanding performance.
Thomas: 9 - Won a lot more battles than he lost, also picking his moments to step out and make a challenge or interception. Dealt with Salah largely very well. I hear we're being linked with Lucas Digne in January; I'm not sure whether left back is really the position we need to be prioritising.
Soumare: 6 - Continues to frustrate but largely held his position and is getting involved more than he used to.
Choudhury: 6 - No faulting his effort but very often in the wrong position. Liverpool never really took full advantage.
Dewsbury-Hall: 9 - Excellent performance; seemed to have boundless energy, linked the play confidently against a high-pressing side and never neglected his defensive duties. Played the difficult tactical position of "side of the diamond" brilliantly, the contrast between him and Choudhury on the other side was notable. Threw in an assist to boot. My choice for our MOTM.
Maddison: 7 - Involved more defensively than offensively as he filled gaps and helped out Soumare. Didn't really have the opportunity to create a lot in attack but played a strong team part.
Iheanacho: 6 - Some nice, inventive touches; some poor, clumsy touches. I continue to fear that playing in front of a crowd is the thing that he struggles with.
Vardy: 7 - Each season he seems to go through a patch when he loses confidence in front of goal, and there were a couple of times today when he hesitated and looked for options instead of charging forward and testing the keeper. Even so, he was often active in helping out the team defensively and provided a threat to Liverpool for much of the game. Played on when injured for the last 15 minutes.
Tielemans: 5 - Seemed to come out of the freezer. Really struggled to get up to the pace of the game today.
Lookman: 9 - If Tielemans came out of the freezer, he came out of the furnace. Flaming hot for five minutes and scored a goal from it. After that, contributed generally.
Albrighton: 7 - Another who threw himself into the game helping out the defensive effort.
Perhaps the most noteworthy thing about the match for us today was the effort that the whole team put in defensively. Obviously we weren't on top aside from the odd five minute spell here or there, and Liverpool created and missed a number of chances. But for what was all but our second team out there, the defending from back to front was impressive and something that has been missing too often this season. A big shout out to the local boys on the left hand side as well, who have played two lots of 90 minutes over the last three days, were full of running throughout and earned the atmosphere in the ground this evening.
Ultimately, this was a game that highlighted the importance of a missed penalty, and how it can change a game. It's striking just how often missing a penalty ends up costing teams, even one on around 15 minutes like this one. Quite why, I'm not sure. Perhaps it sets an atmosphere, gets the crowd excited or nervous, or just imparts the idea that it's going to be your day or not. And there's little doubt that if the penalty was scored then the outcome would have been very different today.
P.S. changed my mind: Decided to give Amartey an 8.
Player ratings vs. Liverpool
posted on 29/12/21
TB
Had the voodoo doll out yesterday,
Guy could hardly walk either that or over did the Christmas pudding and nobody told him there's alcohol in it? 🙄
Or he swollowed the six pence 🤣😂
posted on 29/12/21
Yeah, the change to man-to-man marking at set pieces was interesting. Through result alone you’d say it worked, but that may be incidental. There were several things I noticed:
- Schmeichel came for more crosses, although the way Liverpool set up gave him more space to do so.
- Liverpool players did get their heads to the ball from corners and they spurned some presentable while not completely free chances from them.
- When Firmino came on, nobody picked him up and he wandered completely free in the middle of the box. Whether Liverpool didn’t notice or didn’t find the accuracy of delivery to find him, I don’t know. But we were lucky they didn’t.
- Even so, at least there was more aggression toward defending the corners. And given the lack of height in yesterday’s team they were always going to be problematic.
I can see why Rodgers wouldn’t like man-to-man. There are better ways of defending corners. But for whatever reason we’ve been executing those modern approaches so badly that the coaching staff decided to return to this more basic approach. I feel it’s a short-term solution and not without its problems, but maybe stands a hope of elevating us from terrible to questionable.
posted on 29/12/21
Yes, I saw that Dunge. On two seperate occasions is was screaming “Somebody pick up Firmino” with some other choice words added.
How on earth could we see that but none of the players astounds me!! People need to look around and others need to take responsibility for what they see.
Liverpool did miss a couple of decent headed chances (Jota I think had the best) as well. So it was by no means perfect, but it was better. Definitely better.
posted on 29/12/21
I think Firmino was Tilly's man
posted on 29/12/21
comment by True Blue (U9486)
posted 16 minutes ago
I think Firmino was Tilly's man
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He was absolutely nobody’s man that was clear!!
posted on 29/12/21
comment by Merseysidefox (U4842)
posted 5 minutes ago
comment by True Blue (U9486)
posted 16 minutes ago
I think Firmino was Tilly's man
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He was absolutely nobody’s man that was clear!!
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That's Tilly for you ' nobody'
posted on 29/12/21
A fair appraisal as usual from the cave dweller.
This was a match where we had no chance. None!
To get any kind of decent result a few things needed to happen:
1. Liverpool not at their best - certainly a massive difference to the team that flattened us on Boxing Day in their title winning year
2. A bit of luck - Schmeichel diving the right way and Salah hitting the bar
3. A fully committed performance - we were never going to play at our best with that starting line up, but we needed to be fully focussed and fight for everything
We did it and, whilst it wasn't our best performance of the season, it was easily our best win.
A final thought: Thomas, Dewsbury-Hall and Amartey were the three highest rated outfield players here and most of us agree. If we'd said six months ago that would be the case then I think everyone would have been wondering what had transpired over the course of those six months. In all the doom, gloom, injuries, covid and inconsistency there are a few who can be commended for taking their chance and stepping up.
posted on 29/12/21
Nothing much to disagree with Dunge. A couple of minor points:
I'm giving Castagne, N'didi (despite the peno) and Amartey an extra half point just because the defence did not concede against a free-scoring Liverpool attack; Thomas particularly needs to be singled out for dealing with Salah. Yes I'm aware that we had a bit of luck and Liverpool did not display their usual clinical finishing in front of goal, but our defence was outstanding. Much better in defending corners too, towards the end I had nearly stopped expecting the opposition to score at every corner.
Of the 9 rated players, there are cogent arguments for Schmeichel, Thomas, KDH or Lookman to get the MoM award; Thomas and KDH - as you said, Lookman - impact off the bench and scoring a well-taken goal, but I'm going to go with Kasper - he not only saved the penalty (which got a bigger cheer from the crowd than the goal!), but also made numerous other saves, including at least one of world class. If Liverpool had gone ahead I doubt we'd be celebrating today, so his interventions were critical to us getting the result.
The crowd get an 8 for the best atmosphere so far this season.
Brendan gets an 8 for orchestrating a much improved performance.
posted on 29/12/21
comment by Jobyfox (U4183)
posted 1 minute ago
A fair appraisal as usual from the cave dweller.
This was a match where we had no chance. None!
To get any kind of decent result a few things needed to happen:
1. Liverpool not at their best - certainly a massive difference to the team that flattened us on Boxing Day in their title winning year
2. A bit of luck - Schmeichel diving the right way and Salah hitting the bar
3. A fully committed performance - we were never going to play at our best with that starting line up, but we needed to be fully focussed and fight for everything
We did it and, whilst it wasn't our best performance of the season, it was easily our best win.
A final thought: Thomas, Dewsbury-Hall and Amartey were the three highest rated outfield players here and most of us agree. If we'd said six months ago that would be the case then I think everyone would have been wondering what had transpired over the course of those six months. In all the doom, gloom, injuries, covid and inconsistency there are a few who can be commended for taking their chance and stepping up.
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Sorry Joby, I have to disagree, that was the stand out performance of the season so far for me, given the threadbare state of the squad and the opponent.
posted on 29/12/21
comment by Nuneaton_fox (U7936)
posted 33 minutes ago
comment by Jobyfox (U4183)
posted 1 minute ago
A fair appraisal as usual from the cave dweller.
This was a match where we had no chance. None!
To get any kind of decent result a few things needed to happen:
1. Liverpool not at their best - certainly a massive difference to the team that flattened us on Boxing Day in their title winning year
2. A bit of luck - Schmeichel diving the right way and Salah hitting the bar
3. A fully committed performance - we were never going to play at our best with that starting line up, but we needed to be fully focussed and fight for everything
We did it and, whilst it wasn't our best performance of the season, it was easily our best win.
A final thought: Thomas, Dewsbury-Hall and Amartey were the three highest rated outfield players here and most of us agree. If we'd said six months ago that would be the case then I think everyone would have been wondering what had transpired over the course of those six months. In all the doom, gloom, injuries, covid and inconsistency there are a few who can be commended for taking their chance and stepping up.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Sorry Joby, I have to disagree, that was the stand out performance of the season so far for me, given the threadbare state of the squad and the opponent.
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I think what I'm saying is that it wasn't high quality passing and running with incisive movement and goals. Not necessarily one for the purist.
It was high energy, backs to the wall, never say die and fully committed.
Given the circumstances best result/win.