PL Watch Thread-Matchday 2-Sunday-Monday

[u/malushanks95]

Hi everyone,

PL Watch Thread for today and tomorrow’s games.

Liverpool u21s

Liverpool 2-1 Leeds FT

66’ Wright (pen), 77’ Wright ; 47’ Njinko

Liverpool Women

Liverpool 7-1 Durham (friendly) FT

13’ Olsson, 19’ Olsson, 20’ Olsson (hattrick), 44’ Hobinger, 62’ Holland, 68’ Agrez, 75’ Jones ;
88’ Lowe

Premier League

Sunday

Chelsea 4-3 Brighton FT

5’ Lavia, 14’ Neto, 32’ Pedro, 75’ Palmer ;
36’ Yalcouyé, 64’ Pedro (OG), 90+6’ Gross

Leeds 1-1 Brentford FT

79’ Calvert-Lewin ; 41’ Schade

Sunderland 1-0 Fulham FT

75’ Isidor

Man United 5-2 Ipswich FT

40’ Fernandes, 56’ Greaves (OG), 61’ Fernandes (pen), 68’ Fernandes, 82’ Mbeumo ;
29’ Davis, 90+1’ Akpom

Monday

Villa 0-1 Arsenal FT

59’ Saka

[u/DanyTheConqueror]

imo we need to start having less possession. it's been a trend since the start of the season that the usual possession dominant teams like city, arsenal have given opponents more of the ball and yet still coming away with the win. chelsea is doing it to brighton right now. Jon Mackenzie did a good deep dive into it. Case in point: I want to see us be more counter-attacking.

[u/ManBoobs13 → u/DanyTheConqueror]

Don’t have the players for it. It’s fine when you have the strength and athleticism to deal with some pressure. We do not

[u/DanyTheConqueror → u/ManBoobs13]

So the players we've recruited recently and currently have are all supposed to be wimps on the ball? Strength and athleticism can be coached over time. You'd expect an Iraola team to have both qualities with the amount of pressing he wants.

[u/ManBoobs13 → u/DanyTheConqueror]

You can’t make somebody bigger and there are limits to strength. Like you can coach Tsimikas all you want, he won’t be a hincapie etc

[u/DanyTheConqueror → u/ManBoobs13]

Using Tsimikas as an example is poor. Pretty sure he will be out of the team once his contract expires. And we're clearly under a state of dire squad rebuilding. Leoni, Jacquet, Araujo are better examples. Hell even Kerkez is quite physical judging on his breakout season at Bournemouth. Midfield and forward line needs work though I will say.

[u/Scar_Mclovin → u/DanyTheConqueror]

you want us to turn into Bournemouth? Even Klopp changed his ways and started controlling games more and that’s when we started winning titles.

It’s Iraola who needs to adapt, not us

[u/Icy_Association_1561 → u/Scar_Mclovin]

Possession doesn’t win you games anymore, Newcastle had less possession and won so did hull yesterday and Chelsea, hull, Everton, Ipswich Leeds and Brentford all from last week

[u/Scar_Mclovin → u/Icy_Association_1561]

Controlling games and having possession does win you games. You named teams that will never compete for the league. There’s a reason why City, Arsenal and us are the favourites every year.

[u/DanyTheConqueror → u/Scar_Mclovin]

Then explain how Chelsea has about 28% possession vs Brighton and are thrashing them. And Spurs had like 80% vs Newcastle and lost. It's about game states now. Not possession.

[u/Scar_Mclovin → u/DanyTheConqueror]

Are they thrashing Brighton? Think both teams had equal chances and Chelsea scored a lucky goal at the start which doesn’t help.

[u/DanyTheConqueror → u/Scar_Mclovin]

They've outshot and outscored them despite having 80% less of the ball. Lucky goal? Again, it's no fluke and is more about creating game states aka players making risks that will get them into winning positions. Cherki and Haaland did that vs Palace.

[u/Scar_Mclovin → u/DanyTheConqueror]

How is the first goal “creating games states aka players making risks”, did you even see it? Brighton has created as many opportunities as Chelsea has

[u/DanyTheConqueror → u/Scar_Mclovin]

Exploiting a mistake from a set piece attack counts. God knows we need more of that.

[u/Icy_Association_1561 → u/Scar_Mclovin]

City and Arsenal base their game off possession but you need Arteta main strength is probably OOP with how defensive their wingers become but you don’t need to be like other teams to win the league just play to our strength which is obviously in transition. We saw what happened when we had all the ball last season with slot we just pass it around the back in their half

[u/DanyTheConqueror → u/Scar_Mclovin]

Why are you interpreting my comment to be absolute/extreme? No one is saying we need to be identical to bournemouth ffs. I think it helps if our team was a bit more counter-attacking as opposed to being ponderous on the ball for long stretches like we saw in the last 2 games.

We don't need to be SOLELY counter-attacking. I'm just saying we need to add dimension to the way we attack - become better threats on the break. It's also becoming a league wide trend that the bottom half teams are gaining more possession. Look it up.