Liverpool boss Arne Slot must find an antidote to his team’s long-ball problem before facing Nottingham Forestplaceholder image
Liverpool boss Arne Slot must find an antidote to his team’s long-ball problem before facing Nottingham Forest | Getty Images/ Canva
Liverpool boss Arne Slot must find an antidote to his team’s long-ball problem before facing Nottingham Forest
After a disappointing 3-0 loss to title rivals Manchester City, Liverpool boss Arne Slot knows there is basically no room for error after his side are to fight their way back into this season’s title race.
The Reds won the league at a canter last season, but have thus far failed to adapt to an evolving Premier League which has seen teams place a greater emphasis on direct patterns of play, long throwings into the box and goalkeepers often launching the ball forward rather than rolling it to the defender’s feet.
Of course, every team in the Premier League plays a slightly different brand of football. Liverpool proved themselves as the masters of the high-press under Jurgen Klopp and attacked teams with a pace and purpose that often made games end-to-end while Slot adopted more of a slower possession based brand of football with an emphasis on controlling games rather than overpowering the opposition through pace and power.
Both have their perks but at the moment, Slot’s biggest kryptonite is that he’s struggling to adapt to what teams are now doing against Liverpool. He told Sky Sports after the Brentford loss that his team are yet to find an answer for teams utilising long balls and low blocks. And many teams have been aware of this for a while…
Liverpool have been vulnerable to direct football this season
Manchester United attempted 75 long balls in their shock win over Liverpool in October - the most of any in a top-flight match this season.
Crystal Palace, who started Liverpool’s dip down the table attempted the second most in a match this term with 71 in their victory. Meanwhile, Bournemouth on matchday one despite losing 3-2, were the first time to try and expose this chink in the Reds’ armour with 70 on matchday one - the third most in a match this season.
The fact that all three of the games with the most long-balls against any opponent are Liverpool matches shows that it’s no coincidence that teams are deploying this tactic against the champions, particularly when Arne Slot himself has publicly declared that it’s a problem he’s struggling to deal with.
It’s an area which Liverpool must work on during the break with the few squad members that aren’t on international duty and something that they must find an antidote for.
Liverpool’s long-ball problem will be music to the ears of Sean Dyche
For most of Sean Dyche’s managerial career, his brand of football has been ridiculed for not always being pretty on the eye. He’s been synonymous with the 4-4-2 formation, low-blocks, isn’t the biggest fan of playing it out from the back and likes his teams to be compact and a threat from set pieces. However, all of that appears to be back in vogue now as Dyche joked in his Nottingham Forest press conference.
“I’ve been put in many boxes, I’m not bothered,” he said, via The Guardian. “I’ve never tried to hide behind what’s effective.
“It’s no badge of honour to me. Five years ago people were going: ‘Why do you rely on set pieces?’ Now they’re in vogue. Skinny jeans, flared jeans, skinny jeans, flared jeans … my daughter hammers me for whatever jeans I wear.
“Apparently on social media even I got some stick for my trainers walking into training [on Tuesday] … couldn’t believe that. Tom Ford [trainers] but, anyway, don’t like to mention it.”
Nottingham Forest recently picked up their first win of the Dyche era, beating Leeds United 3-1 at home. They were deserved winners in a fairly poor game and will head to Anfield after the international break with hopes of causing an upset.
As it stands, they’ve had the ninth most accurate long-balls in the division this season, but that number is bound to increase in the coming weeks. Everton and Burnley were always high on this metric while Dyche was there - and it’s hardly going to take a dramatic change for that to be translated to Forest as it’s something Nuno’s team were also renowned for.
Liverpool must find an antidote to Forest’s brand of football if they are to come out on top at Anfield in the first match of the international break. Forest scored the second most goals from headers last term (13) and the man that bagged the majority of them, Chris Wood, could be on the verge of returning for the game.
He netted 20 goals in total last term - eight of those came with his head. The New Zealand international is yet to play under Dyche due to injury but is believed to be nearing a return from a dead leg, meaning he could well feature against Liverpool.
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