Liverpool suffered yet another defeat in the Premier League, this time losing 1-0 to Brighton and Hove Albion at Anfield.
The Anfield outfit looked lack-lustre all throughout the match as they did very little to stretch and test the Brighton backline and their goalkeeper. Liverpool attempted 11 shots during the match and only one of them was on target and according to Michael Owen, the midfielder trio for Jurgen Klopp’s side failed to provide any major variety during the game.
He told Premier League Productions, as quoted by The Metro: “I often think as that Mane when he plays and Salah they’re better when they start wide.
“Think of the chance Salah had early on, he needs to start wide and run inside as soon as Firmino drops in it leaves those gaps and they come wide.
“A lot of the time this season they’ve been starting narrow and then you’ve got nowhere to run the only way you can run is out and away from the goal. I think Liverpool are better when they have width.
“They get clustering. They have a lot of samey players in midfield in Thiago, Wijnaldum and Milner.
“I would like to see them stretching play a lot more, upping the tempo, winning the ball high again, committing players forward to win the ball high, they have to do it, they have to stem it themselves because they don’t have the Anfield crowd.
“You can react off the crowd, it’s a powerful thing but they can’t call upon that now they need to do it themselves to get this monkey off their back.
“I don’t fear for them against Manchester City or against better teams. It’s against packed defenders that I think they’re running out of ideas.”
View this post on Instagram
Klopp named mostly youngsters on the bench against Brighton and given the number of injuries the manager has had to deal with, the same theme might occur when Liverpool host Manchester City this weekend.
The likes of Fabinho, Naby Keita are still out injured and now with Joel Matip ruled out for the rest of the season, Jordan Henderson has been filling in at centre-back along with youngster Nathaniel Phillips.
So keeping all these injuries in mind, Thiago and Wijnaldum should be guaranteed starters for Liverpool vs Man City on Sunday but James Milner is likely to drop back to the bench as Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain comes into the starting line-up.
