442 or 451 v Liverpool ?

[alwaysaclaret]

Just wondering what people's thoughts are for this one, given how easy it was for Swansea to get down the flanks and get tons of crosses/corners in, which in my opinion lost us the game in the end. Just to take it on a bit, ,.3 failures imo, if we don't stop Swansea footballing us off the park,we then have to stop them getting the crosses in, and if we dont stop that we have to man mark Llorente. None of which we did. So just how do we approach Liverpool on Sunday, we have to get this win from somewhere.

[FactualFrank]

I think we tried to mark Llorente, he was just too bloody strong/good to keep him out. But regarding the question, I'd feel more confident with 3 men in central midfield in a 4-5-1.

[Spijed]

4-4-2 worked very well at Arsenal.

[ashtonlongsider]

Bob Paisley used to praise us for going to Liverpool and playing expansive football. In other words 'getting taken to the cleaners'. 4-5-1 for me with Barnes slotting into midfield, but I doubt it will happen.

[alwaysaclaret]

Bob Paisley used to praise us for going to Liverpool and playing expansive football. In other words 'getting taken to the cleaners'. 4-5-1 for me with Barnes slotting into midfield, but I doubt it will happen.

Really not sure whether it's 451 or 442 for me, 451 to try to stop their potential dominance in midfield or 442 and try to actually win the game instead of being so bloody negative, but can't quite work out why you think Barnes is a midfielder ?

[claretspice]

4-4-2, all day long. I don't want to lose by 2 clear goals or more, something we've done every time we've played 4-4-2 away from home in this and the previous premier league campaign. Playing 4-4-2, we've only lost by 2 twice, once at Chelsea and once at Stoke in the first game after we re-adopted it. Our biggest goal threat is Gray, and he is ineffective as a lone striker. So 4-4-2 is the only show in town.

For this game, I think we might make a change in dropping Boyd. We might be tempted to slot Defour in on the right flank if he is fit, because Milner at left back isn't that quick and although he's a fine crosser of the ball, he's on his wrong foot on the right so is unlikely to drag Defour all the way to the byline.

If Defour isn't fit enough for that job, then we might go with Arfield on the right in place of Boyd to give us someone out there who retains the ball a bit better than Boyd (particularly given that for the same reasons, Arfield is capable of handling Milner defensively.

Barnes will presumably replace Vokes, and Gray can run the channels and try and unsettle Liverpool's slightly vulnerable back 4.

[lucs86]

I think 442. Liverpool are different to Swansea, Swansea have a big number 9 so when they get the ball wide they can put early, direct crosses in and let him battle the CB. Liverpool don't have that, they have lots of number 10s so when going wide they generally try to play it back inside on the deck. With the tight midfield we play with in 442 we have defended Liverpool's type of attack much more effectively than the more direct stuff that Swansea play.

As long as we don't concede early we can frustrate Livepool and with 2 up top, hopefully not so isolated from eachother and the rest of the team, we might have a chance.

[minnieclaret]

4-4-2 worked ont'Turf. No reason it shouldn't work Sunday. Given a fair referee.

[dsr]

I'm not bothered about Liverpool crossing the ball. Who are they crossing it to?

As for 4-5-1, I don't want to recreate the "glory days" of early season - Chelsea, West Brom, Leicester and the rest. 4-5-1 was disastrously bad then - why would it be better now?

[jojomk1]

Would normally prefer 4-5-1 away but, given the weakness of Liverpool's central defenders, then see little harm in starting 4-4-2

The problem is that our two wide men (whoever they may be) are restricted by the manager to playing as almost tandem full backs to Lowton and Ward, hardly ever moving so far in front of them to actually get over the halfway line never mind up to the opposing penalty area

Given the above and our total lack of pace from midfield there's going to be very little support for the front two

[Spijed]

If we do manage to go a goal up I'd be far more confident of defending it than we did against Swansea.

Liverpool try to play through you, a bit like Arsenal, and we did well at the Emirates in that respect. They struggled away against Leicester recently and didn't seem to know how to break the Foxes down.

[Quickenthetempo]

Too much is made of systems and tactics in this day and age. The players playing well makes the biggest difference.

[Belial]

I would presume 9-1 as usual away