Match date: 5 October 2013

Two sides on opposite ends of the table with six matches played in the Premier League season. Ian Holloway’s Crystal Palace has failed to make an impact on the league unlike when his newly promoted Blackpool entered week 7, coincidently against Liverpool at Anfield, with 7 points already. Blackpool went on to win that match 2-1.

In his attempt to match that feat, Ian Holloway opted to line up his side in something of a 4-3-3. Brendan Rodgers set out his Liverpool side in a 3-4-1-2, as most expected that they would and it is this tactical match up that seemed to determine the match.

3-4-1-2 v 4-3-3

Just as a start, Rodgers’ side was very much in a 3-4-1-2 as opposed to a 3-5-2, with the latter, a formation that would see three central midfielders, like Conte’s 3-5-2 at Juventus. With a 3-4-1-2, Victor Moses was very much given a free role that saw him play between the midfield and forward lines of Liverpool, but also allowed him to play in the wide areas when he felt the need to.

The telling area of the tactical match up, however, was not Moses’ ability to more freely in the space between the lines, but rather the wide areas that Liverpool as a team were able to exploit in the first half against Crystal Palace’s 4-3-3. When playing a 4-3-3, there are going to be gaps on either side of the field between the wide forwards and the full backs, especially in transition.

Above you can see Crystal Palace’s front three; Chamakh on the left, Jerome through the middle, and Kebe on the right. All three are high up the pitch and have left the space behind them to be used freely by Jose Enrique and Raheem Sterling, both of whom got on the ball in advanced areas of the pitch and were freed up from the marking of the Crystal Palace full backs by the fluid movement of Victor Moses, Daniel Sturridge, and Luis Suarez.

The first Liverpool goal came about because of the amount of space that Crystal Palace allowed Liverpool to play into on the left side of the pitch and because of Liverpool’s good ability in switching the field very quickly in the first half through Jordan Henderson, who really deserves a lot of praise for his performance, and Steven Gerrard. On this occasion, it was Moses who had sucked defenders to him and then switched play to Suarez, with Enrique making an overlapping run. The two then combined for Suarez to slot the ball home in Crystal Palace’s penalty area. In the picture below, however, you’ll see just how much room is on the left side of the pitch for Liverpool to play into. Pay particular attention to just where Kebe is in relation to Enrique, as it is pivotal to Enrique’s ability to get forward to overlap Suarez.

Liverpool’s second goal came about it a very similar manner. After a long ball from Jose Enrique, Daniel Sturridge found himself isolated with Delany on the left side of the pitch and, after turning him inside out, was able to fire in from a very tight angle past Speroni.

Liverpool’s Second Half

There is been a lot of talk about Liverpool’s second half performances this season; how the performance has dropped off and, up until last week, Liverpool hadn’t scored in the second half. Rodgers has said that it isn’t an instruction he is giving to his side. In fact, it wouldn’t really make sense for Rodgers to want his side to drop off as one of his philosophies is ‘death by football.’ Whatever the reason though, Liverpool again looked a bit off in the second half of this match, rather than look to kill the game off by keeping the ball, they sometimes looked to play on the counter (they have the players to do so) and allowed Crystal Palace to grow into the game a bit more.

In the match, which saw Liverpool attempt and complete more passes than in any other match this season and have more possession of the ball than any other match, they also created 10 chances, not including Steven Gerrard’s penalty kick. The interesting part, however, is that 8 of the chances came in the first half, as opposed to just 2 in the second half.

With that said, they did complete more passes and had a better pass accuracy rate in the second half, but there was certainly less build up in their play and less urgency when playing through the middle third and in the attacking third. It wasn’t ‘death by football’ and Rodgers was somewhat critical of the performance saying, “Our movement and combinations in the final third was good but the lack of control behind that was very disappointing.”

Conclusion

Ian Holloway looked to be changing things around the time that Liverpool scored their second goal based upon the brief moments that the cameras were on him and his hand gestures, however, Palace very much seemed to remain in their 4-3-3, and before halftime, the game was lost.

Despite Rodgers saying that Liverpool were not in complete control of the match, Jordan Henderson played well in a role that Rodgers would have almost certainly opted to have played Lucas’ had the Brazilian not been suspended. The England midfielder passed the ball well throughout, but it was more importantly his work rate that impressed. He was successful in all 7 of his tackles and made 12 ball recoveries.

It will be interesting to see how Rodgers sets up Liverpool after the international break when the likes of Glen Johnson, Coutinho, Joe Allen, and Aly Cissokho are fit again. In the current 3-4-1-2, Coutinho would excel in the number 10 role behind Suarez and Sturridge, both of whom possess clever movement that would be compliment Coutinho’s vision. Johnson would be the obvious choice at right wing back and Cissokho might be a better choice than Enrique on the opposite side. Joe Allen could certainly come in and ‘control’ games in midfield as Rodgers looks for an improvement there. Agger will be back to full fitness and could well take Skrtel’s place.