After beating Manchester City on Sunday, the atmosphere surrounding Liverpool is looking much brighter.
Jürgen Klopp made five changes to the side that beat the reigning champions, with Trent Alexander-Arnold, Kostas Tsimikas, Jordan Henderson, Fabio Carvalho and Darwin Nuñez replacing James Milner, Andy Robertson, Fabinho, Harvey Elliott and Diogo Jota. Liverpool set up in a 4-4-2 formation.
David Moyes made three changes to the team that drew with Southampton. Injuries at centre-back meant West Ham lined up with five full-backs in defence for that game, but Kurt Zouma returned for the trip to Anfield, while Flynn Downes and Pablo Fornals started on the wings; out went Vladimir Coufal, Emerson Palmieri and Lucas Paqueta. West Ham matched Liverpool’s 4-4-2 shape.
West Ham were conservative but they weren’t ultra defensive. They had their defenders drop off to give themselves a metre or so head start on any runs and had their midfielders tuck inside to block up the centre, but there was also a willingness to step up and pressure Liverpool if the opportunity arose.
Unfortunately for them, they didn’t quite get the balance right, leaving gaps. Liverpool once again formed a makeshift back three in possession, with Alexander-Arnold staying back in line with the centre-backs. This enabled Liverpool to outnumber and play around West Ham’s two forwards, while Fornals would start in the midfield line but then step up to pressure Alexander-Arnold in attack. Starting in the midfield line meant Fornals was typically too far away from Alexander-Arnold to effectively pressure him though, giving the full-back the time and space to pick out a pass.
This was also a problem in midfield for West Ham. Gianluca Scamacca and Jarrod Bowen would step up to pressure Joe Gomez and Virgil van Dijk, yet this would leave space for Thiago Alcântara and Henderson in midfield, or for Alexander-Arnold to cut inside into.
If Declan Rice and Tomas Soucek stepped up to deny Henderson and Thiago space, then this left space behind them for Roberto Firmino and Fabio Carvalho, constantly cutting in off the left, to make use of.
Liverpool took the lead from a far simpler attack though. Thiago spread the ball out to Tsimikas down the left and he crossed into the box. Thilo Kehrer was marking Nuñez, but a run from Firmino distracted him enough to win some space for the Uruguayan to get to the ball first and head home. For several years Liverpool’s main creativity has come from their full-backs, and they would frequently find themselves crossing into a crowded box where their attacking teammates were outsized by the defenders. Nuñez is much bigger though, making him much more likely to win headers against defenders than the likes of Mohamed Salah or Firmino, and so Liverpool are more likely to score from these crosses into the box.
West Ham didn’t exactly offer a great deal going forward. They would often send it long, handing the ball straight back over to Liverpool.
They did also try to overload Liverpool down the left though. Rice would frequently drop back to the left of the centre-backs as Aaron Cresswell pushed on, putting Henderson in a difficult position: if he followed Rice, he would leave space in midfield for a West Ham player to exploit, but if he didn’t, Rice was left free to do as he wished. With Rice dropping deep, Soucek would come across to the left side to join Cresswell and Fornals to outnumber Liverpool, exchanging quick passes to work the ball forward.
In the second half, Liverpool would still press West Ham when the opportunity arose, but were happier to sit off and protect their lead.
It wasn’t a spectacular performance from Liverpool, but they did what they needed to claim their three points and looked in control, which is a significant improvement from how they started the season.
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