Match date: 16 March 2014

At this point last season, Manchester United and Liverpool were in almost complete opposite situations. Liverpool, with first year manager Brendan Rodgers, were looking up at the top four, with aspirations of getting there in the next two or three years. Manchester United, on the other hand, were top of the league. A year later, Manchester United need a miracle to qualify for the Champions League and Liverpool are right in the mix at the top of the league.

For this match, Rodgers continued with the diamond midfield that he used against Southampton, with Raheem Sterling coming in for Coutinho.

Moyes made just one change from the side that beat West Brom 3-0, with Vidic coming in for Smalling.

Liverpool’s Midfield, United’s Lack of Response

As mentioned above, Rodgers continued his usage of a midfield diamond, which was a surprise to some, especially considering how Rodgers has used Suarez and Sturridge in other ‘big’ games recently this year, with one having to play as a wide player. Against Arsenal, Suarez played as a right winger/inside forward, while against Everton, Sturridge and Suarez rotate the defensive responsibilities on the left side of Liverpool’s midfield. With that said, a midfield diamond is rarely used in English football and it was interesting to see how Manchester United just failed to adjust to it. With no true width in midfield, the diamond tactically leaves the full backs exposed; left to deal with both the opposition wingers and full backs coming forward.

Manchester United, however, played with Juan Mata and Adnan Januzaj as their two outside midfielders in a 4-2-3-1, but consistently throughout the match, Mata took up central positions and would occasionally drop deep to try to offer the United centre backs a forward option. For about the first 30 minutes of the match, Januzaj played on the left meaning he was up against Johnson, but switched over to Flanagan’s side, where he was equally ineffective in his play. He was unable to beat either full back with any consistency and failed to give Manchester United an option running in behind the Liverpool defense.

The Manchester United full backs really failed to have any significant impact going forward despite the relatively large amount of space they had, especially if United were able to quickly switch the ball. When Liverpool played Southampton with the midfield diamond, Luke Shaw was arguably the Saints’ best player until Henderson began to cover even more ground and stay back a bit more rather than pressing as high as he had been. Both Evra and Rafael, however, failed to replicate Shaw’s performance for Southampton, adding little to the Manchester United attack. It was Rafael that cut the ball back for Rooney for their best chance in the first half, but Mignolet saved well.

The United full backs’ lack of adventure could have been down to the threat of Suarez and Sturridge; it would have been incredibly risky to leave Jones and Vidic in a 2v2 situation with the Liverpool strikers and with the threat of Raheem Sterling’s pace through the middle, perhaps Moyes instructed his full backs to stay back a bit more, assuming Liverpool would look to play quick and direct.

Liverpool’s Attacks

The positioning of Joe Allen and Jordan Henderson caused problems for Michael Carrick and Marouane Fellaini. The two Liverpool midfielders were not tracked well by Mata or Januzaj which meant that Fellaini and Carrick were drawn out of the middle, which in turn, would open up space for Raheem Sterling to run at the United back four. What happened as the match went on was that Sterling would occupy the United central midfielders and open up the space for Henderson, more so than Allen, to get forward often, as well as the Liverpool full backs. A lot of Allen’s best play came on the defensive side of the ball as he was able to break up play and won tackles high up the pitch.

Despite their setup and how they’ve played in recent matches, Liverpool had majority of the ball, although just barely. Certainly since the new year, Liverpool have looked the most promising when playing the ball quickly and directly to Suarez and Sturridge. Against Manchester United, however, they played a slightly more patient game and had good moments of build up play in the attacking third as they moved United’s defense from side to side. Below, you can see a significant difference in the approach of Liverpool’s play in the Southampton and Manchester United matches, despite playing the same diamond midfield.

Against Southampton, there were a lot of quick, long passes made into the final third. Against Manchester United, as you can see above, there were significantly less passes being made from Liverpool’s half into the final and more short, intricate passes being made in the attacking third, especially on the right side of the attack with Daniel Sturridge typically drifting into a wide right position and the support of Glen Johnson and Jordan Henderson.

Manchester United’s Attacks

Despite being the home team, Manchester Untied played very much like the “away team” in that they had to rely counter attacking football against Liverpool, which like Liverpool, was the opposite of how the team seemed to be setup. Of the four attacking players that Moyes selected, Mata, Rooney, Januzaj, and van Persie, only the young Belgian is really going to cause a threat on counter attacks. Mata was sold from Chelsea for very much this reason, as Mourinho wants to play with more pace in his side. Rooney was playing in the hole, but stayed relatively high while van Persie has become much more of a limited striker compared to his days at Arsenal. As discussed in the first section, Januzaj struggled to beat his Jon Flanagan on the dribble, which significantly limited his influence on the match.

As mentioned above, Manchester United also failed to get their full backs forward with any real conviction, which could have drawn the attention of Joe Allen and Jordan Henderson. Had this happened, Manchester United could have looked to have a numerical advantage against Steven Gerrard in the centre of the pitch. With Rooney in the hole and Mata drifting, Manchester United should have looked to get as many bodies around Gerrard to make it more difficult for the Liverpool captain, especially when the Henderson and Allen were further up field, but overall Gerrard had a relatively easy night on the defensive side of the ball. This is really where Liverpool won the match as they had a numerical advantage in the middle of the field with 4v2 and 4v3 with Mata drifting inside and made it so Manchester United were forced to play more narrow and compact as the Liverpool midfield diamond stayed tight and went from side to side as a unit.

Changes

Rodgers made the first change in the match, bringing on Coutinho for Sterling. The midfield diamond stayed the same and with United having to commit more numbers forward, perhaps the thinking was that Coutinho would be able to find holes to pass into a bit better than Sterling could, but it would also make the midfield more solid for Liverpool as Coutinho doesn’t make runs in behind the opposition’s back line like Sterling does.

Moyes’ changes came after they were done 2-0, with Welbeck and Cleverly coming on for Januzaj and Fellaini. It was certainly an interesting move to bring on Welbeck and take off Januzaj, who had provided the only width for Manchester United throughout the match. They were overloaded in midfield against Liverpool’s diamond and could have looked to try to exploit the wide areas more with a Valencia and Young on the bench. A minute after the substitutions, however, Vidic was sent off and United were down to 10 men, so the changes were almost void at that point as United were left to struggle more so than they had for majority of the match.

Conclusion

Rodgers continues to show his tactical ability developing. The midfield diamond allowed Liverpool to control the match and dictate the play. Sturridge and Suarez may have only scored one of the goals between them, but their movement made United look clumsy and sloppy at the back, which led to three penalties, with Gerrard scoring two and hitting the post on the third. Interestingly, this is only the second time this season that Liverpool have managed consecutive clean sheets, with the others coming in the first three matches of the season. The key seems to be a consistent back four.

Moyes must be feeling an increasing amount of pressure and there will certainly be talks about his future amongst the board members, but they shouldn’t be focused on the result, but rather the fact that Moyes failed to react to Liverpool’s diamond midfield. The only change made was Januzaj and Mata switching sides, which had no impact on the match.

Liverpool now see themselves 4 points behind Chelsea with a game in hand, meaning that their match against Chelsea at Anfield could be a title deciding game.