Football News: Factors Affecting Liverpool's Performances This Season

Good afternoon Ed001, obviously the team has seen an upturn in form over the last couple of months. Would you mind doing a post for the readers on why you think this is. Are they adapting to the system more, has Jurgen Klopp got more involved, or is it that more players are returning from injuries and playing new positions? It would be interesting to hear your thoughts. Thanks for everything you do as always. From The Chief

Factors Affecting Liverpool's Performances This Season

As always, these kind of questions have more than one answer. It is always a combination of factors that makes a difference, which is why it's so difficult to achieve success in football. You have to get so many things right to make a difference. But once you get it right, it can take on a mind of its own and momentum can keep the success coming even when those factors have broken down. For me that was what happened last season with Liverpool. Most of the factors that brought success had been changed, but momentum kept the team going and picking up results.



In warfare they talk about strategy and tactics. Tactics win you individual battles, but your strategy is what wins you the war. It is similar in football, you have the strategy and then on-field tactics. Tactics can win you games, but it's the strategy you set up that decides your long-term success. There are so many variations, from the Manchester City, one of being able to cover all bases by throwing financially doped money at every aspect of the club, to the lower league teams that are just concerned with being able to keep the lights on each week and have difficulty finding money to invest in any kind of long-term strategy.



Like everyone else in football, even Real Madrid these days, Liverpool are not able to just throw money at everything. It's a balancing act that LFC has to do. This season. the balance was not quite right from the start of the season, but it should actually be to the benefit of the long-term plan for the club. Because things were not going right, it allowed Klopp to experiment with Alexander-Arnold in a hybrid midfield role, when those kind of experiments are only normally conducted in pre-season.

It has been coming for a while, which is also part of the reason for the problems. The gradual move over to him playing this role, changing him from being the man providing the width on the right to coming inside more and more has been done bit by bit. Each of the last few seasons has seen him spend more and more time in the midfield during matches. That has left the side unbalanced and forced top scorer, Salah to spend more time further away from the goal. It has played to Alexander-Arnold's strengths at the expense of everyone else's strengths.



They have ended up with a hybrid system that sort of works, but it still does not quite play to everyone's strengths, when a simple switch of Alexander-Arnold into a full-time midfield role and reverting to a proper full-back would have done. A full-back who gets wide and allows Salah to play more centrally would have fixed the issue far more simply. Instead, the coaching staff have come up with an overly-complicated way of doing neither and both to a degree.



With the forwards starting to develop an understanding and a return to more of a press, has allowed this set-up to function to a degree at least. There are still clear tactical issues to be resolved, but that really depends on what Klopp intends to do next season with Alexander-Arnold.



Which brings me to Klopp, he was wiped out by last season, as were many of the players and staff. Not just the mental fatigue of the constant push to succeed, but also the final day failings to miss out on the two biggest prizes. That hit everyone hard and there was a hangover at the start of the season, which took some time to overcome. By which time, form was terrible and confidence had nosedived. The problem was, that everyone at the club was looking for excuses, blaming pre-season, rather than just focusing on fixing the issues. It is difficult to fix issues when you're not seeing them because you are making excuses to avoid admitting to them. The club as a whole got the pre-season wrong, that includes Klopp, with a real lack of fitness work done, making it impossible to quickly revert to the old press.



They then compounded the issue, by not using the World Cup break to fix that. Yes, a lot of players were away with national sides, but they would have worked on fitness there, so the rest should have been given a mini pre-season, such as the Bundesliga teams do during their traditional winter break. That has to be laid at Klopp's door, he is the one who makes the final decision on what programme to do. Yes, he is guided by his staff, but the final decision is always his. He made the wrong decision and it set us back again.



There are so many other factors, but most of them are at least partly effected by fitness and some are majorly effected, such as the rash of injuries we suffered. Players who are not fit enough will pick up injuries more easily. I have often read claims that overtraining causes the injuries, but it is something I have never seen happen. It is more about getting the right rest periods to allow the body to recover, which is why late nights out on the lash are so bad, even if a player is not a drinker.

It is the lack of gaps in the schedule in the Premier League that is the big problem for getting players fit. It is very difficult to work on their fitness without them then playing the next game all heavy-legged and looking off the pace, as Everton found early on under Sean Dyche. He chose to take the early pain of players struggling in order to get them right for the run-in.



We tried to gradually raise fitness as we went on. That meant we never really reached the level of fitness needed for a return to Klopp's heavy metal football and we were stuck in the limbo of a semi-press. It was a decision that almost paid off though, as the team was able to do enough to get a good run for the last 10 games, so it's difficult to argue that it was not correct, even if it ultimately did not quite lead to Champions League football.



In basic terms, the club as a whole entered the season in the wrong shape of mind. They were hit hard by missing out on the big two trophies and that was not used to motivate them to work harder in pre-season as a more gentle programme was in place. So they were not fired up, instead they were relaxed and not quite there fitness-wise either. Added to tactical tweaks that failed, it was a recipe for disaster that hopefully the club have learnt from.

Certainly the plans for the forthcoming pre-season are completely different and some lessons have been taken. The trip to Asia that came too early to allow basic fitness to be developed before going, has been pushed back to later in the pre-season this time, when the players would have been on a more gentle programme of rest and recovery anyway. Hopefully this time it will be done right.

Written by Ed001 May 30 2023 23:14:46