Liverpool's Wide Areas Are Letting Us Down

A frustrated look at Liverpool’s display against Arsenal, focusing on poor wide play, dreadful delivery, and a lack of threat in transition, alongside concerns over tactics and a possession-based approach.

The Liverpool v Arsenal match really highlights just how poor we are in wide areas. Kerkez alone has put a ridiculous number of crosses into the box, and barring the Macca chance, virtually every single one has been shocking.

And don't even get me started on his positional play. He spends half the time standing on top of Barcola when we're supposed to be stretching the pitch, or running across Trey when the ball isn't even under pressure, rather than making himself available as a passing option. Kerkez has the positional awareness of a hedgehog crossing a road in the dark. I can say that because I play both full-back positions to a decent level, and based on that performance, I'd have been hooked by my coach after 20 minutes.

It's not just Kerkez, either. Crosses from virtually everyone, including corners and free kicks, either hit the first man or float harmlessly into the goalkeeper's hands. Deep crosses from beyond the halfway line swing back out towards the edge of the box and get intercepted, while crosses from the byline barely travel a yard before finding an opposition player. The quality of delivery is absolutely atrocious.

Gakpo looks like a giraffe trying to manoeuvre with a yoga ball stuck underneath him. I still don't understand the hype. We should have cashed in when we had the opportunity in the summer, and now we're stuck with him. His highest-ever Premier League return in a single season is 10 goals and 5 assists, and he hasn't even managed those numbers in the same campaign. When someone talks about a one-dimensional footballer, Gakpo is the perfect example. If he can't cut inside, which he doesn't do particularly well anyway, he's about as useful as a paper towel in a rainstorm.

Barcola, meanwhile, is as lightweight as they come. He was getting physically bullied by the likes of Odegaard and Madueke. It really does make you appreciate how spoiled we were with the quality of Trent, Robbo, Sadio and Salah.

Even our counter-attacks have become opportunities for the opposition to win the ball back and start building from the back. It was that bad today that you could actually see Arsenal leaving three players up the pitch when we countered because they knew we'd probably mess it up ourselves and hand possession straight back to them. That's how little threat we currently pose in transition.

I genuinely believe Liverpool can challenge again, but not with this squad, not with these tactics and certainly not with this man-to-man approach. It's far too open and lacks the compactness, organisation and structural discipline required to compete consistently at the highest level.

My biggest concern is still that we seem determined to become a possession-based side without having mastered the fundamentals that make that style of football possible. I mentioned this during Slot's first season as well. Successful teams don't just flick a switch and become dominant possession sides overnight. There has to be a tactical evolution, building through the different phases of play: counter-attacking, counter-pressing, establishing a more direct approach, developing the ability to defend in a low block and, eventually, becoming a team capable of controlling games through possession.

You can't simply turn up at the beginning of a season, announce that we're going to be a possession-based team and expect it to work when we're struggling to get the basics right. And here's the irony: did our only real goal scoring opportunity today come from sustained possession? No. It came from counter-pressing.

There's a very long road ahead for the Reds. Hopefully, we can put together a decent cup run, get a trophy in the cabinet and secure Champions League qualification. At this point, that would represent a respectable return for the season.

Written by MCR November 1 2026 20:07:24