After a postponement due to positive Covid tests and much crying about the postponement, the first leg of the League Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Arsenal finally took place.
Jürgen Klopp returned to a strong starting eleven after fielding a weakened team in the FA Cup against Shrewsbury, making four changes to the team that drew with Chelsea. With Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mané away at the African Cup of Nations, Roberto Firmino and Takumi Minamino started in attack, while Andy Robertson and Joël Matip replaced Kostas Tsimikas and Ibrahima Konaté at the back. Liverpool set up in their usual 4-3-3 formation.
With Martin Odegaard testing positive for Covid, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Thomas Partey, Mohamed Elneny, and Nicolas Pépé away at the African Cup of Nations, and Takehiro Tomiyasu, Emile Smith Rowe and Sead Kolasinac out with injuries, Mikel Arteta had selection headaches of his own. This saw him make three changes to the side that lost to Manchester City, lining up in a 4-4-2 shape.
Arsenal had a lot more success with their pressing than they did in these teams’ last meeting. They took a more zonal approach this time around rather than leaving Bukayo Saka to cover three men, as Eddie Nketiah and Alexandre Lacazette hovered around Fabinho before stepping up to press the centre-backs, leaving the wingers to press the full-backs. If both men were drawn away from Fabinho, then Granit Xhaka would step up to pick up the Brazilian. By doing this Arsenal were able to force Liverpool into long balls early on.
Liverpool soon adapted though. The centre-backs split wider, while Fabinho started to drop deeper between them. These wider positions meant there was greater distance for Arsenal’s strikers to cover, meaning they could no longer effectively shadow Fabinho, forcing Xhaka forward more often if they were going to press the centre-backs. With Xhaka pulled forward more, there was more space in midfield for Liverpool to take advantage of, particularly with Fabinho often dropping very deep, pulling Xhaka even further away from Albert Sambi Lokonga.
Arsenal found themselves reduced to ten men after just 24 minutes though when Xhaka was shown a red card for kicking Diogo Jota in the chest. The Gunners had counter-attacked, with Saka, Lacazette and Nketiah attacking the box, but Jordan Henderson intercepted the ball and Liverpool got it away. Gabriel Martinelli, Kieran Tierney, Xhaka and Gabriel attempted to counterpress, all stepping up to pressure Liverpool, but Saka, Lacazette and Nketiah made no attempt to support them or even track back, meaning Liverpool could easily pass out. This meant Robertson had the ball in acres of space with only Ben White back for Arsenal. Unsurprisingly the Scot took the opportunity to play a long pass in behind for Jota, and Xhaka tried a desperate lunge to cut out the pass, only to kick Jota instead. The Swiss has a habit of picking up red cards but maybe if his teammates had made more of an effort to help out defensively here, he wouldn’t have had to make the challenge.
With a second leg at eleven versus eleven still to play, it wasn’t exactly a surprise that Arteta moved to shut up shop and fight another day. Nketiah was removed and replaced by centre-back Rob Holding as Arsenal shifted to a 5-3-1 shape, sitting back and soaking up the Liverpool pressure.
Liverpool weren’t really set up to break Arsenal down. Their front three were all the type of players who could receive the ball between the lines and combine between themselves, but the midfielders weren’t really the type of men to get it to them. As we have discussed previously, James Milner and Henderson are not the midfielders you want for feeding the ball forward with tight passes through the centre.
With only Lacazette to worry about, Matip took the opportunity to stride forward on the ball into attack, but, with Arsenal keeping compact, he was finding it difficult to squeeze anything useful through once he actually ventured into the final third.
Liverpool also tried to work around this by having Trent Alexander-Arnold tuck inside or Firmino drop deep, however it took until the 60th minute for Klopp to attempt a real solution. Curtis Jones replacing Milner was an obvious decision, and, although Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain isn’t exactly the kind of foot-on-the-ball player that suits this kind of match, he was certainly a more attacking option than Fabinho, who, along with Virgil van Dijk, was uncharacteristically sloppy, when he replaced him fifteen minutes later. Jones was the only Liverpool player to get a shot on target and it took until injury time.
Klopp said “Last night we didn’t miss pace, that wasn’t the problem. There was no space to use that. We just have to build on how we start. We have to play between the lines – quick thinking more important than quick running. We are here to find solutions.” He was without two of those solutions in Thiago Alcântara and Naby Keïta, but Milner and Henderson clearly weren’t the answer yet still played the majority of and all of the match respectively.
If this was a potential view into a future without Salah, then it isn’t one many Liverpool supporters will be keen on.
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