With Manchester City stumbling at West Ham, the race for the Premier League title was still on so long as Liverpool could get a result against Southampton.
Jürgen Klopp made nine changes to the side that beat Chelsea in the FA Cup final, with Alisson Becker and Ibrahima Konaté the only men to continue on after a gruelling 120 minutes. Liverpool set up in their usual 4-3-3 formation.
Ralph Hasenhüttl made five changes to the team that lost to Brentford, as Alex McCarthy, Lyanco, Jack Stephens, Mohamed Elyounoussi and Nathan Tella replaced Fraser Forster, Jan Bednarek, Romain Perraud, Stuart Armstrong and Adam Armstrong. Southampton switched between their usual 4-4-2 and a 5-4-1 shape.
Southampton would switch between a 4-4-2 and 5-4-1 defensively but in truth there was little difference between the two. This was because of Liverpool’s shape: Joe Gomez would hold back on the right to form a makeshift back three, allowing Konaté to push wider on the left. With three men, Liverpool could outnumber and play around Southampton’s frontline regardless of whether or not it consisted of one or two men. As they couldn’t effectively press, or chose not to, Southampton sat off, so the forwards’ role was to block the pass into James Milner in midfield, which could be done by the pair of them but Armando Broja managed just fine by himself. As a result, it didn’t really matter what formation Southampton were set up in, as Liverpool’s ability to play around them but not into midfield remained the same regardless of which one they went with.
The back five was arguably more useful defensively just by adding an extra man, but in terms of dealing with or hampering Liverpool’s build-up, it made little difference.
Liverpool’s thrown together midfield, none of them playing their natural roles, made it difficult for them to play through the centre. Milner played well at the base of the midfield defensively, but he lacks the ability to play line-breaking passes, while Curtis Jones and Harvey Elliott, both attacking midfielders, would push up away from him to join Roberto Firmino between the lines, which meant Liverpool had no one at the base of the midfield able to play passes through the centre, yet they had three players waiting for those passes in attack.
It was this disconnect that led to Southampton’s opening goal. He got the ball by arguably fouling Diogo Jota, but Lyanco came away with possession and was able to push forward and move the ball on. With Jones and Elliott in attacking positions, neither were on hand to counterpress, requiring Milner to step up to meet Lyanco, but he was too far away to effectively pressure the Brazilian, enabling him to control the ball and pass it on. Lyanco passed to Tella, who spread the ball wide to Nathan Redmond, and the winger burst forward, cut inside and shot at goal, the ball deflecting off of Milner to loop over Alisson into the net.
Struggling to play through the centre, Liverpool would instead play wide, typically down the right. With Takumi Minamino a more natural central player, Elliott would often pull wide, allowing the Japanese to tuck inside, while Gomez would push forward too. Hitting crosses into a crowded box rarely worked, yet Liverpool had some success by playing wide to stretch the Southampton backline, then knocking the ball inside to a player running through the gap between the wing-back and centre-back.
Liverpool equalised by playing wide to Gomez, who crossed. Mohammed Salisu was drawn out but missed his header, seeing the ball run through to Jota, who simply laid off the ball into Minamino attacking the gap Salisu had left to attack the ball. Minamino took a touch then fired it powerfully inside the near post.
An injury to Gomez saw Milner move to full-back, pushing forward to provide width more consistently than Gomez had rather than staying back to form a back three. With Southampton sitting back to defend in a 5-4-1, Liverpool had little need for three men in the backline and this allowed Minamino and Elliott, eventually replaced by Divock Origi, to stay central.
Liverpool continued to put Southampton under pressure in the second half before they finally had a breakthrough at a corner. Elyounoussi got his head to the cross but only weakly flicked the ball away, sending it as far as Matip, who diverted it back towards goal to give Liverpool the lead.
Unsurprisingly given the makeshift nature of the starting eleven, Liverpool started the game iffily, but they grew into the game and did exactly what they needed to do: claiming the three points necessary to take the Premier League title race to the final day.
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