Interesting that lallana started in the midfield in all the big away wins that we had in 2016/7. This doesn't prove me right, but it certainly adds to my case.
Without goals or assists in said matches, he isnt impacting the outcome of the match. Keeping in mind that we didn't have the fullbacks we do today at that particular time.
I don't know about depth, we probably have more 1st team squad midfielders than they do (we just choose not to select certain people in the big away games), but City certainly have more strength in quality and this is an area, we need to address this going forward IMO
They have more midfielders who are capable of scoring goals as they've done through out their career, they have several midfielders with similar technical ability and creativity, there is a significant difference between us and in them in that regard. That's why I said it was redundant to compare the two.
Their depth in attacking positions succeeds ours. Last year they had Aguero,Sterling,Jesus,Mahrez,Bernando Silva,Sane competing for 3 attacking positions in the final third [you can even play David Silva in the front 3 as he's played there in his career before] and the drop of in quality when they rotate is very very minimal.
We had Mane,Firmino,Salah,Shaqiri,Origi and Sturridge. Ox was injured all year but he's ineffective in a front 3, as is Lallana [who was also injured all year]. That's a massive difference. They can afford to have that while we can't. There is a massive gap in quality between our starting front three and everyone else I listed in there.
You seem to be suggesting us winning 2 out of 12 big aways in the league and losing more(5) than we win away(2) in the champions league, is largely down to missed chances, bad luck, unlucky fixture scheduling in approx 20 fixtures over 2 yrs, I think our approach is a bigger issue, I hope, I'm right as that is something we can fix, I believe there is a trend, that we can and should address.
Each game is different from one to the next, particularly when it comes to fixtures of that magnitude. The approach isn't always the same, and us winning 2 out of 12 big aways isn't SOLELY ON THE MIDFIELD APPROACH. That's my argument. It's not one individual reason. I've watched every single one of those games and the results we've gotten aren't because of the midfield in each and every one of those fixtures. I've specifically said that there are number of reasons and that there are fine margins. Your argument on the other hand it's down to the cautious midfield approach. There is context in every one of those matches.
For instance, in that statistic that you're providing, away matches to Chelsea,Everton [2018] are included, both which occurred in the last 4 games of the season whilst we were making our way to a European cup final, and we were running on fumes, it was impossible for us to rotate as we only had 3 fit midfielders at the time and we had to play them in every match for the last 2 months of the season [The only fit midfielders were Henderson,Milner and Wijnaldum] So the context in those matches is far different to us playing Chelsea last year at the Bridge where the match was open and could have done either way [it certainly wasn't a cautious approach]
Then there's the 3-3 match against Arsenal in which we had a 2-0 lead. The points certainly weren't dropped because we were cautious in that match. Our defending was poor, the lack of midfield protection was poor and Mignolet gifted them a goal as well 35 yards out.
There have been good performances, good enough performances to get more than we did Again that has nothing to do with the cautious away approach.
Again I am not saying that we cant improve or that there haven't been poor displays in some of those matches but the notion that a cautious approach took place in 12 away matches is incorrect.
