When team shape changes due to transitions and little events throughout the game you can really tell which defenders have strong defensive principles. Yesterday, Trent Alexander-Arnold really struggled whether it was reading movement, positioning or spacial awareness.
This has occurred all season but little has been made of it as it does not happen a lot of the time due to how Liverpool's games often unfold. So, it is often forgotten about especially as more focus was given to his and Liverpool's offensive productivity.
Liverpool's possession and territorial dominance means they are often camped in their opponent's half with little to no reactive defending to do — pressing is proactive. This creates the basis to not only offensive pressure from them but less offensive pressure from the opponent.
When this occurs, no matter the team, many players who are defensively suspect can play because the system caters for that. Sarri utilised Jorginho as the base of a three-man midfield despite his deficiencies but Napoli's 65% possession protected him a lot of the time.
This is why having defensively weak players isn't necessarily a problem as long as you can mitigate their weaknesses with a solid, possession-based system that advocates high territorial advantages.
On the other hand, Andrew Robertson has solid defensive principles — cultivated at playing for lower quality teams on the back foot (e.g. Hull) — and he utilises them well when Liverpool's team shape changes. This cultivation has not settled with Trent.
This leads us to a wider conversation about systems and how they can amplify players’ strengths whilst mitigating their weaknesses. The best systems — centred on the right strategy and tactical set-up — will do this to a large extent.
These are just some early afternoon thoughts based on what I saw yesterday and how that reminded me of this discussion which I was meant to raise some time ago.
Perhaps we will delve into this more later on.
Perhaps we will delve into this more later on.
