Digging Deeper Into Liverpool’s Draw Against Manchester City

With a draw against Manchester City in the books, we dig a
little deeper into what it means for Liverpool.

There’s a cliche in football that the most important match is
the next one you play. Managers and players always say that when
they’re interviewed by the media, including ours. Today’s 1-1 draw
between Manchester City and Liverpool, you feel, was more about what’s happened
before the game and what’s going to happen in the weeks to come. A
relentless first half led to players from both teams being dead on
their feet by the 60th minute. On the whole, I think both Jurgen
Klopp and Pep Guardiola will be happy with the draw.

There’s always a massive build up to this fixture, which is
completely justified given that these two teams have been the best
in the business for the better part of 3 seasons. There’s been some
classics between these two over the years but I won’t blame anyone
for forgetting this one. The intensity from the first whistle was
high, but only lasted about 20 minutes. Liverpool got their goal
from a perfectly taken Mo Salah penalty that was won by Sadio Mane being fouled by Kyle Walker. Manchester City was able to equalize through a well
worked goal by Gabriel Jesus. The talking point from this match
will obviously be the penalty that Kevin De Bruyne eventually
missed.

The second half was nothing like the first, where not much
happened at all. There was only one shot between the two teams in
the final 35 minutes. The players are tired and so are we. Now we
get rewarded with too many international games this week. What a
joy. Let’s dig deeper into this 1-1 draw.

Talking Points

The Formation

The talk all week heading into this match was about whether
Klopp would drop Roberto Firmino for Diogo Jota. The narrative
has been that Firmino hasn’t been in good form and Jota’s been
lightning when he’s played. When Jota scored a hat trick in the
Champions League during the week, Klopp was
immediately asked about Firmino’s form. So instead of giving this
narrative any more fuel the manager decided to start both players.
Fair play to Klopp for that.

Liverpool’s formation in the first half was mostly just vibes.
Firmino was nominally behind the striker and Jota was nominally
playing on the right side. It was 4-2-3-1 and 4-2-2-2 and 4-2-4 and
4-4-2 all at once. The idea broadly worked for the first half of
the first half, with City not really dealing well with Liverpool’s
frantic start.

Where it didn’t work well was behind the attackers. Jordan Henderson and Gini Wijnaldum had too
much to deal with in transition and it pulled the shape apart when
City got to attacking. I genuinely don’t know what the manager will
think about how it worked. I imagine he’s happy with the chances
that were created.

The Penalty Decision

We should just have a section of this blog where we argue about
daft penalty decisions. This one doesn’t matter. Kevin De Bruyne
missed.

The Second Half

I mentioned at the top that there was only 1 shot between the
two teams in the final 35 minutes. That was bound to happen because
both teams are exhausted because there’s too many games happening.
There’s no coincidence that Liverpool got worse when both Firmino
and Trent Alexander-Arnold came off. City had the better chances in
the second half but none of them resulted in actual shots. Can’t
score goals if you don’t shoot the ball.

The Need For Five Substitutions

Falling the match both managers have used their press
conferences to have a go at the Premier League for the lack of 5
subs. And they’re both right to do so, just like Ole Gunnar
Solskjær was right to do so yesterday. Here’s what Pep and Jurgen
had to say:

This matchup is supposed to be the best the Premier League has
to offer. It’s the last two champions facing off, and neither team
is allowed to be at their best because those in charge of the
scheduling and the rules care more about TV money than they do the
actual football. It’s a disaster and it’s good that these managers
are finally speaking out about it.

What Happens Next?

There’s an international break coming up. You get this idea in
your head that the players will finally get a break but that’s the
furthest thing from the truth. Most of Liverpool’s best players
will now fly all over the world during a global pandemic to play
three games in about ten days. Great stuff. This season will be a
slog.

Up the Reds.