The Liverpool head coach took the rap for Liverpool's broken press in the first half but corrected his mistake to win his first-ever Champions League game
Iraola had never previously played or managed in a game in the Champions League, but can boast a 100% winning record for now
Iraola had never previously played or managed in a game in the Champions League, but can boast a 100% winning record for now(Image: Peter Byrne/PA Wire)
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Andoni Iraola is off to a winning start in the Champions League as Liverpool's new head coach - and there was plenty for supporters to enjoy as the Basque tackled his first-ever game as player or manager in Europe's premier club competition on Wednesday.
A good win against historically tricky opposition was backed up by a good performance, with an atmosphere to boot that turned a pretty inconsequential league phase tie into a proper European night at Anfield.
Liverpool started as they meant to go on, Dominik Szoboszlai winning the ball back from kick-off to release Alexander Isak, who couldn't replicate his lightning start to the Ipswich game on Friday and failed to find the target.
But it was Atleti who struck first through Marcos Llorente, the right-back astonishingly scoring his fifth goal at Anfield from three games. Only Andy Cole has scored more against the Reds at their home stadium in the Premier League era, Llorente having racked up more than generational foes like Wayne Rooney, Alan Shearer and Thierry Henry.
Liverpool had to come from behind once again, but this wasn't quite as simple as a game of two halves. Iraola was seen scribbling furiously into his notepad during the first half, and admitted in his post-match media duties that he hadn't been prepared for Atleti's back three.
"I think today I have to blame myself a little bit for the start of the game," he said. "I think Atletico used a structure that they haven't used before this season, and it has cost us a little bit to match up properly.
"I think until we conceded the goal, we've had a couple of minutes where we've adjusted things and we matched up much better, and it was the moment where we've started playing better.
"Obviously, after half-time you have more time, everything was better set, and second half I think we were the best team. I think the team, the players, have shown big character, big character. And also the crowd has helped us massively in the second half."
Essentially, Iraola was lamenting how Atleti were able to bypass Liverpool's press so easily in the opening stages, especially for Llorente's goal. But what exactly went wrong - and how did he fix it?
Simeone springs a surprise
Diego Simeone set Atleti up in a back four for their opening four LaLiga games of the new season, so perhaps Iraola could be forgiven for expecting the fiery Argentine to do the same in this one.
But Simeone, no doubt anticipating Iraola's aggressive man-for-man press, sprung a surprise by instructing his team - which looked like a 4-4-2 on paper - to play with a back three, the manager's son Giuliano being the player to drop into an unfamiliar left wing-back role.
That bait and switch clearly caught Liverpool off guard. While the Reds' front three aggressively pressed Atleti's back three, chaos ensued behind them.
The uncertainty had an effect on Virgil van Dijk and Jeremy Jacquet, who sat off in the first half when Lee Kang-in, Alex Baena or Julian Alvarez repeatedly dropped deep to fill out the midfield, while one of the wingers would stretch play on the flanks meaning at least one of Atleti's wing-backs was usually unmarked in build-up.
Szoboszlai and Alexis Mac Allister were thus left to cover far too much space, caught between tracking the free wing-back, the central midfield pairing of Koke and Pablo Barrios, or the roaming attackers.
With the gaps gaping between Liverpool's defensive lines, it was a recipe for disaster. Llorente's goal exploited this off-the-ball disjointedness perfectly.
When Jan Oblak played the ball out to his left centre-back, David Hancko, Bradley Barcola took his cue to press the Slovakian. But with Ronald Araujo wary of Baena, who had taken up a wide left position, no Liverpool player pressed Simeone Jr, who was able to collect Hancko's lobbed pass around Barcola and carry the ball unchallenged towards the halfway line.
Mac Allister sensed the danger and drifted across but without any real conviction, being aware of Alvarez's deep position behind him. That left him in no man's land when Simeone Jr passed to Alvarez, unable to cut out the pass or make a challenge on either player.
Szoboszlai - starting to the right of Mac Allister but quickly switching to the left after kick-off - shunted across to cover the passing line to Lee, also dropping deep, but with Atleti having generated a numbers advantage in midfield the Hungarian was caught in a similar position to Mac Allister, unable to react quickly enough to Alvarez's decision to instead carry the ball forward himself.
Milos Kerkez, who received criticism for trying to play Llorente offside, was actually Liverpool's deepest defender in the build-up to the goal. But in an attempt to stay in line and avoid playing Baena onside on the opposite flank, Kerkez failed to keep pace with Llorente - who made a lung-busting run inside him to get on the end of the pass that Alvarez slipped between Jacquet and Van Dijk.
It was a moment of individually poor defending, but the play had opened up because Simeone had caught Iraola unawares tactically. That uncertainty meant Liverpool's players were late into their duels (winning just 42% on the ground and 38% in the air during the first half) and outnumbered in dangerous areas when defending counter-attacks.
Liverpool work it out 'live'
Iraola explained that he would have expected his players to do a better job of working out Atleti's setup 'live' if they had been playing his system for several years, but was nevertheless pleased with the adjustments his team made during the first half before a bigger rejig took place at half time.
Fotmob momentum and top stats: Liverpool were the more threatening team for the majority of the game despite seeing less of the ball. Atleti struggled to create clear chances despite growing into the second half
Fotmob momentum and top stats: Liverpool were the more threatening team for the majority of the game despite seeing less of the ball. Atleti struggled to create clear chances despite growing into the second half(Image: Fotmob)
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This was noticeable not just in how Liverpool's wingers tracked back more to support with defending Atleti's wing-backs - Barcola on the right finishing his evening's work with two tackles and plenty of covering runs - but also in how the full-backs stepped in to support the midfield.
Kerkez provided the best example of this in the build-up to Szoboszlai's equaliser. Noticing that Lee had once again dropped into his own half and was unmarked near the halfway line, the 22-year-old took a massive gamble in leaving Llorente on his own on the right flank to steam into the Korean international and win the ball back before he could turn.
Kerkez's pass to Barcola could have seen him clock an assist with better finishing from the £123m signing, but his positivity nevertheless paid off with Florian Wirtz making the recovery before Szoboszlai slotted from Araujo's nifty flicked pass.
This was still a high-wire act from Liverpool, and it was far from seamless, but it showed more proactivity off the ball to match what had actually been an incredibly promising first half on it.
136 of the Reds' first-half passes were in Atleti's defensive half compared to just 76 in their own half and, though the game was open, Liverpool were by far the more direct and threatening team on the attack.
The Reds racked up 17 touches in the opposition box during the first half, and never let their heads drop even as Atleti repeatedly reached the ball first in duels and predictably milked every bit of contact to win fouls from the referee.
The only real issue going forwards in the first half was the isolated performance of Barcola, who had two chances to score worth a total of 0.40 xG (expected goals), but wasn't especially involved in the build-up.
This improved somewhat in the second half, but overall the Frenchman received the second-fewest passes of any starter (18), behind only Isak (16) (UEFA). Instead, Liverpool directed a huge 50% of their attacks down Rio Ngumoha's left side, which produced limited returns with Atleti doubling up on the 18-year-old.
Nevertheless, Ngumoha was a reliable threat, attempting five dribbles and completing two, and played his part in Liverpool amassing a whopping 11 carries into the penalty area - eight of which came in that supposedly poor first half.
Atleti, by contrast, only managed the feat twice over the course of the entire game. But it was in the second half when Liverpool truly worked Simeone's side out, and ultimately made the final result inevitable.
Iraola gets his half-time message right
Though he achieved plenty in the couple of minutes that play was stopped after Llorente's goal, it was Iraola's half-time tweaks that won the game.
For starters, Jacquet and Van Dijk were immediately much more aggressive in their positioning. In the lead-up to Mac Allister's sensational winner, the centre-back duo were no more than 30 yards from Atleti's goal, condensing the pitch and making it impossible for the Madrid side's players to gain the same sort of advantage in midfield they had enjoyed in the first half.
In turn, that gave Mac Allister and Szoboszlai license to position themselves to win the ball back quickly when it was turned over in Atleti's defensive third, without worrying so much about what was going on behind them.
This played a part in the winning goal, but it was also what allowed Ryan Gravenberch to steal the ball from Morten Hjulmand later in the game - safe in the knowledge that Jacquet had Alvarez covered in his rear-view mirror.
Mac Allister made a recovery in such a situation just before his goal, leading to Rio's successful dribble past Llorente before the ball bounced back to the Argentine - via Isak - for him to smash it into the bottom corner on his left foot.
It was a goal of pure narrative from Mac Allister, who had made clear his unhappiness about his contract situation prior to the game. He knows that his Liverpool future will be defined by his performances this season, and showed his commitment to improving on a dreadful last campaign under Arne Slot on a personal level with a tenacious display.
Liverpool improved across the board in terms of duels after half time, winning just 40% in the first half but seeing that number tick up to 47.7% by full time after a second-half performance that was much more suffocating.
Mac Allister was one of the main beneficiaries of the tactical tweaks, winning 50% of his ground duels by the end of the game, along with both of his aerials - numbers that are made more impressive given his first-half booking might otherwise have seen the Argentine start to shirk the more physical contests.
Szoboszlai enjoyed his best performance of the season, too. Both midfielders found the net but beyond that, Szoboszlai won 55% of his duels, made the most touches (86) and successful passes (52 out of 57), created five chances and succeeded with four out of six dribbles.
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Opta's Michael Reid revealed on X (Twitter) that Szoboszlai was the first Liverpool player to put in such a complete performance since Philippe Coutinho against Maribor in 2017.
It was noticeable that the Hungary captain was more involved in central areas than in previous games this season, particularly in the second half, without seeing his impact in the final third reduced.
Dominik Szoboszlai heatmap (Fotmob): the No. 8 put in a complete performance and was influential across the midfield and attack
Dominik Szoboszlai heatmap (Fotmob): the No. 8 put in a complete performance and was influential across the midfield and attack(Image: Fotmob)
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The burgeoning relationship between Wirtz and Barcola also came to the fore more in the second half - or at least for the 15 minutes Barcola stayed on the pitch before being substituted with cramp, according to Iraola.
The only player to pass to Barcola more often than Wirtz (six) was Araujo (seven), according to UEFA, while the German playmaker was also Barcola's top pass receiver (five).
It was their link-up that led to a clear-cut chance for the Frenchman early in the second half, which should have put Liverpool ahead and given Wirtz his second assist from four games.
Instead, Barcola shanked his effort wide, the worst miss from an evening of poor finishes for the new signing. All the same, accumulating 0.76 xG is very promising for a player who has historically scored in line with his expected goals, and should result in a strong goalscoring return if mirrored over the course of the full season.
Though the Reds didn't keep the pressure on as intensely towards the end of the game, they didn't need to. Shoring up the press had allowed Iraola's charges to limit Atleti to just three shots worth a total of 0.29 xG in the second half, and with Simeone's side forced to play Liverpool's game, the result became a foregone conclusion.
A different kind of control
Ultimately, this game became a continuation of the themes set by the victory over Ipswich, the first of the season. Liverpool have found a way to control games without necessarily always having the ball, through allowing their opponents next to no time on it and posing enough of a direct threat to force opposition managers to think twice about committing players forward.
This time, it took Iraola working things out on the fly to get it right, but that he was able to do so effectively during a game is a very promising sign indeed. Far from being an inflexible systems manager, the Basque has already proven his ability to adjust his tactical plan to achieve the same results in an unexpected scenario.
A night that started with a sickening sense of deja vu became a convincing win, along with probably the best midfield performance of the season to boot.
Atletico Madrid grew back into the game towards the end, and a better side might have punished Liverpool even more during that uncomfortable period in the first half, but here there was no debate as to who deserved the three points.
The advantages of a man-for-man pressing structure are obvious for the Reds. Though it can produce confusion when an opponent sets up unexpectedly, as seen on Wednesday, when properly prepared it means greater certainty over individual defensive responsibilities and it generally favours the best players.
Liverpool not only have a potentially world-leading forward line, with everyone firing, but they are also a team with plenty of players who care about and want to win those individual battles - Mac Allister, Araujo, Wirtz, even Kerkez, whose match-leading numbers for tackles (four) and interceptions (two) show the positive side to a player who still clearly has errors to iron out of his game.
Though Iraola described the Atletico game as a good test of where his squad is up to, the Manchester City match on October 11 - the first game back after the international break - will almost certainly provide a tougher assignment.
With three matches to go until then - Fulham at home on Saturday, before a League Cup tie against Tottenham Hotspur and a trip to Iraola's old club Bournemouth - it will be fascinating to see how the Reds match up a genuinely elite opponent.
On the basis of this performance, from a physical and tactical perspective, you would have to fancy Liverpool's chances of at least disrupting Enzo Maresca's rigidly-positional City side.
The Reds just need to keep this good momentum going.
*All statistics used are from Fotmob unless otherwise stated.