Not sure if this is a serious post.
Joel at times is the only player that actually IS making passes between the lines to break low blocks and packed formations.
And when he makes his runs, the runs that are now being critiqued and evidently not good enough, it would be nice if mids and forwards weren’t standing around with their thumbs up their asses as spectators so he actually had some place to go with the ball.
The most incisive pass of the game was from Matip to Kostas at the end of one of those runs.
Yeah well you sort of need your mates to get into positions to receive passes, no?
To your second point, tell Klopp to keep Trent in his positions and not try to be Stevie 2.0. You watched the match last night, Trent was playing centrally almost the entire second half. That’s suicidal.
In this ridiculous setup he’s asking Joel to cover 2 positions. Your post is worded vaguely, but certainly there’s no way you’re blaming Joel for not defending the right side properly when Trent goes backpacking every match.
I shudder to think how laughable that right side would be defensively if Matip wasn’t covering Trent’s ass time and time again.
In many of our recent games, and definitely since the start of the season, that’s been our tactic, actually. You’ll also see the same happening on the left occasionally, although less frequently so. Our centre midfielders tend to be the ones on the overlap more often, and our wide forwards tend to stay wider. It’s been used to great success since the likes of Salah would have more space to use, to create opportunities either by dribbling, or holding the ball until a teammate makes themselves available, e.g. Jota making a run for Mané to then pass to him and run in on the edge of the box, or the same on the other side with Henderson in place of Jota.
100%, it’s a major piece of what we do. And fairly effectively for the most part.
I was responding directly to the strange “criticism” of Joel not defending the space, when nothing could be further from the truth. I wish we would all stop tip-toeing around the fact Trent has been an absolute nightmare, defensively. But yeah, Joel’s fault.
You take the good with the bad.
Yeah, he was not without his own little mistakes last night. But I can agree that overall he’s been our best CB so far this season. We don’t have to overexaggerate and make him a god or anything. It’s just good that he’s fit, on his way of playing more games than in the last 2 years and playing pretty well.
Which can be said about any player in world football.
I haven’t seen anyone refer to him as a footballing God but the whole cult thing is just supporters having fun with his personality. Eccentric, enigmatic, aloof, and his overall zaniness.
My point was it’s a collective failing, I pointed out at the start of the season our tactical shift which brings Trent inside, Hendo (was Elliot) goes out wide and Salah goes central was the tactical shift we were doing.
We do something similar on the left, yet it never looks like the opponent right winger has the freedom of the park… What’s different? Van Dijk organising? Kostas/Robbo hustling back? I’d say it’s both of them… Van Dijk communicating to Thiago/Ox and Fabinho to cover space and the left back actually tracking a runner…
On the right side we are a joke defensively. So collectively they need to sort it out. It’s shit we are half way through a season and even basic managers like Bodgers can watch a previous game, tell his team to sit deep and then punt it long into our right defensive channel for an easy chance…
To me that goal had nothing to do with the high line and little to do with Matip. It was a simple give and go, and Lookman just outhustled Hendo and TAA to create the imbalance. Matip’s in the position of having to put himself between Dewsbury-Hall and goal until he passes back to Lookman. By the time Matip reaches Lookman, Lookman’s in the penalty area and ahead of Matip, so he can’t really challenge. That still leaves Lookman with a lot to do, as VVD is in front of him, and Fab about to hustle into frame. For me it’s just a goal of individual effort; fair play to him and their only shot on target the entire match.
I think this is something that’s often overlooked. Sometimes, the opposition just makes a really good goal that isn’t a systemic failure on our part, or the weakness of one player.
I’d like him just to pass the ball, just stop him doing that ‘dribbling’ it’s so innocuous that the opposition just don’t even bother with him and just wait for the counter atacking moment (without Matip back to defend). Ridiculous tactic!
Maybe he should just stay back and boot the ball down the field and not try to create something.
Why boot it down the pitch? is that what he prefers doing, if so why doesn’t he do that?
I would prefer he gave the midfield a bolloxing who in turn could give the forwards a bolloxing.
Matip played well, not sure he should be getting criticism for the failure of the right hand side due to how poor Salah, Henderson and Trent were. Those 3 had one of their weakest games all season.
I wouldn’t actually say he’s been any better than Van Dijk in recent weeks, I think Virgil is being judged to a higher standard as usual, but he’s playing well. One of those mazy dribbles led to a chance a game or two back, not really sure why anyone would take issue with them, it’s not as if they’re leading to chances against us.
I don’t understand why we had changed the ‘system’ down that side, what was wrong with it before? 
Probably simple evolution. You always need to be offering something new through different tactics or players.
I believe he missed training today, fingers crossed Klopp gave him the day off.
Agree. Not that VVD is bad, it’s just that Joel, with now putting a run in the team has once again showed why he is often underrated in comparison to the world class VVD. Joel has been superb and goes about his work in his own ways and does it very well, I think it’s not an exaggeration that he has been better than VVD many a matches
Cut out the sloppy passes, please.
Huge nose dive in performance levels, sort it out Joel…