A disappointing result to cap a deflating month bookended by breaks for international games. While it must be said that Newcastle defended well, we were reasonably good at penetrating their lines and had enough clear cut chances to put the game away. That LFC failed to do so is more or less the narrative of September.
While it’s true that many fans are impatient and may have unrealistic expectations regarding how their team should perform against one team or another, for me what constitutes a “must-win” game is one where we dominated the game to such an extent that we should have won it by some margin. Personally, I don’t come into games thinking that we should be spanking teams like Newcastle or Burnley or even Palace, because I am aware of the history we have against these teams and how much harder it seems to summon a good performance against so-called “lesser” sides compared with against bigger ones.
But it’s after we’ve played well, created good chances, executed Klopp’s plans reasonably faithfully, only to be let down by sloppy finishing and defending, with the result not getting a win – that’s when I think “we should’ve won that”. After all, playing well and executing a tactical plan properly is about as much control a manager and a player can exert on a game: theoretically, you shouldn't need as much luck to win the match as say, if you're playing poorly. If a team is playing badly then it probably requires a big serving of luck to come through with a win.
In this sense, I wouldn’t feel as bad if we played poorly against such teams and end up drawing or losing; well, I would probably feel angry about the team’s performance but I wouldn’t think that it was a “must-win” game since we wouldn’t have done much to deserve winning it. One post I saw cited the xG statistics over the last 3 weeks (excluding the City game) as being +6.6 in LFC's favour, against the reality of a -1 deficit when counting actual goals. That about sums up LFC's disappointing match.
For the record, over the last month, with the exception of the City game after Mané had been sent off, I never thought we played poorly. Usually we played very well, but it just seemed like - with the exception of the Leicester league game - we always needed to be near our very best to get a win, and that was unrealistic even of an experienced title-winning team.
What seems clear is we have stopped being able to punish teams for mistakes since the Arsenal game. In the Newcastle game, Sturridge was gifted a glorious through ball after a defender failed to clear the ball only to fail to beat the keeper; Salah’s subsequently hoisted the ball over the open goal. Newcastle had the ball cleared off the line twice - one of which came after the ball was struck literally less than two feet from the goal. Not to mention we had several great counterattacking positions that culminating in poor final passes. And then the only goal we were able to score is the kind of world class goal from outside the area. It really didn't make much sense.
As has been pointed out, one key issue may be an apparent lack of confidence running through the squad at the moment. When it seems that nothing you’re doing is really coming off, that must take a toll psychologically. Paired to the fact that you feel that you’re always vulnerable defensively, that you’re always a simple mistake away from conceding, and that must be a struggle. The players just seemed visibly deflated when they conceded the equaliser.
I also don’t mean to rag on about defenders and individuals but if we look back at the goals conceded, how many of those would come down to individual errors as opposed to defenders not being able to cope well with the kind of offensive system Klopp has? It has been pointed out that our defenders might not be suited to Klopp's high line. But the goals we've conceded don't exactly come from brilliant counterattacking play. Today’s goal conceded is a case in point of a player bisecting the centerbacks who should have either picked him up or played him offside; it’s the same template for quite a few goals we’ve conceded this season.
This asymmetry – not punishing teams for mistakes but getting ruthlessly punished in return – will probably persist as long as the team is lacking in confidence. I’m not sure what Klopp can do about the team at the moment: they are playing better against parked opposition than last season – more patient, more penetrating – only the results haven’t improved much. Despite my criticism of the defence, I don’t think it’s making many more mistakes (in fact, probably fewer since we are in a defensive posture less of of the time given our possession stats) than the opposition we face, though we pay much heavier prices for any mistakes.
It’s clear that the early season swagger and joy have dissipated for now, which undermines the team’s performance because that’s what the players thrive on. The players have become pensive and somewhat passionless, lacking flair and conviction. They are still playing well but not at that exciting level they are capable off, while being susceptible to the faintest setback becoming a full-blown panic. The only thing that might bring back the swagger and joy of the early season is a good result against United, so hopefully the players rise to the occasion.
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