Good points Jack, not everything is doom and gloom. But equally there are some worrying signs.
I want to see Klopp tinker with his approach to help our weaknesses. Ultimately yes we might need Keita to really enhance our CM or VVD to improve the personnel at CB. But there are plenty of other ways for us to improve without new additions.
Klopp has shown a willingness to change his formation, tactics and approach to help get the best out of the team. This is what I want to see again.
If we had all our player fit, our attack was firing - scoring so many goals to papering over our defence, like the beginning of last season, then I would have no problem with our current tactics. However with no Lallana or Mane, our attack not really sparkling yet (bar Arsenal) - I would like to see us maybe try and focus a little more of the defence. At the moment it looks like we need to score 2,3+ goals to win a game of football. The end of last season when we had a poor run of form, the side really missing Mane, Klopp made us tough to beat, more dogged and we saw some clean sheets in some tough away from home games - West Brom & Watford being two.
Leciester have a good record against us. Vardy thrives on the space we give him on the counter attack. We know what their game plan is.
So instead of playing the way we always play which hasn't had much success recently and team have exploited. Would it not make sense to maybe play two CMs protecting the back four being disciplined, rather than one? Maybe tell the full backs to pivot, when one attacks the other stays back and vice versa. Thus reduce that space for Vardy down the channels. Maybe don't push up the pitch quite so much. Giving our back four more protection. Making us tougher to beat and then maybe only one goal will be good enough to win games rather than needing more.
We might have less shots on goals, we might have less possession, we might have less threat in general. But we should be tougher to beat and when your side still has Salah, Coutinho, Firmino etc we should still get chances even if we are more defensive and pragmatic. Actually they might get better chances as drawing Leicester on to us more could give our attack more space to hurt them.
I'm not advocating playing this way all the time. When Mane, Lallana etc are back and firing - then go back to what we're good at. We should fancy ourselves to out score the opposition. But given our injuries, suspensions, form and who we are playing - I'd like to see us be more disciplined, less naïve defensively, more dogged, maybe a more ugly brand of football. It could be more effective, like it was at the end of last season.
I'd go:
Mignolet
Gomez Matip Lovren* Robertson
Henderson Can
Salah Firmino Coutinho
Solanke
Play our best defensive RB who is available. That's Gomez, he also offers more height for set plays over TAA.
Don't really care who is at CB partnering Matip (if fit).
Play our best defensive LB - for me that's Robertson. Although wouldn't be too upset if Moreno starts as he's done better this season, so far on the whole.
Have two CMs who's main role is to protect the defence and merely feed the front four. Don't want them bursting in the oppositions box and trying to win us games, let the front four do that. Their job is to control the match, supply the front four with playing of possession and protect the back four by being disciplined. The Henderson / Can partnership got criticised heavily in the past, but I personally quite liked it. Even remember when we played Man City in the league cup final we had 60% possession with those two in CM together. It was our attacking players who didn't deliver that day for me.
Play our best player who can hold up the ball - that looks like Solanke to me. He's also a bigger goal threat than Sturridge from what we've seen since pre season.
Cut out the confusion. If the opposition full back goes forward, then Salah or Coutinho go back and track him. Don't leave it for one of the midfielders to shift over, like we're seeing often in this 4-3-3 formation, which creates gaps elsewhere to be exposed.
We all want to see fluid free flowing football. If we had Keita, VVD, Mane fit & Lallana fit - then it could no doubt work. But we don't have that.
I want three points. I don't want to see us leave those huge gaps for Vardy to exploit. Let's at least reduce the chances of that happening and give ourselves a much better chance of not conceding. If not, then I fear we're going to have to score 2 or 3+ goals to win this. We're capable of doing so, but I'd rather see us be more solid defensively to help our chances.
