this is name, goals, assists, games Salah 27 11 44 Núñez 15 4 38 Firmino 11 5 33 Elliott 5 2 41 Gakpo 5 1 19 Jota 4 8 21 Díaz 4 2 14 Trent 3 7 40 Robertson 0 10 37 gakpo return is classic first season stuff trying to come to terms. the forwards are doing alright, there's a spread across the line with salah carrying the burden look at the assists. the full backs as per. the midfield barely chips in with either assists or goals. we are struggling for control, for defensive solidity and for creativity. salah has done quite the job to be honest, he's now chasing Gerrard for 5th in all time lfc scoring list. 3 more for 30 goals overall and 4 for 20 league goals. kind of interesting in how he gets huge critique for his wages and efforts. 7 games to go.
No different from normal. full backs getting most of the assists (also helps they take all set pieces and we are very good at scoring from them, plus have good delivery). Forwards scoring the goals wit bit of a spread and Salah getting majority (despite 2 misses!) and midfield are being functional and not chipping in other than Elliott. That was always fine for the midfield to be functional and not provide the goals/assists because they helped solidify the defence. Problem now is that isn’t happening. Does show just how good Salah is. Worse season since joined us, everyone saying has been poor. 38 goal involvements already. How many forwards would die for a season like that!! shame diaz got that injury as expected him to bump his numbers from last year where ws about 1 in 2 goal involvement. Expect him Jota Nunez to be getting a goal/assist a game next year
these numbers are obviously padded out of 3 games, Bournemouth, utd and Leeds. 4 when you add rangers in. our issue has been giving up silly goals where individual mistakes have zero cover and an inability to break down teams to defend deep and don't open up. games like Leeds, forest, Bournemouth, Palace, Everton should be automatically 3 points but we either drew 0-0 or lost 1-0 it's as simple as that really, we have been porr but add 13 points and we are on 63 looking down at utd and newcastle fighting for 4th. we have been worse than prior seasons bitbhave absolutely thrown away 4th against the bottom half by not being capable of breaking them down
There was a lot of criticism of Salah this season, off the back of his new contract. his numbers are looking very good now, whilst doing it in a **** team. have opinions changed? …
I was among his critics, and I stand by what I said. It wasn't a gratuitous dig, it was a critique based on what I was seeing, rather than stats. His overall play was nowhere near the high standard he had set in previous years - he wasn't beating players either in a foot race or in dribbling through a crowd and a lot of his shots were wayward. He's got it back to a degree over the last few weeks and I'm happy with that, but though his stats are good, he was far better than good before. Saying he was doing it in a **** team is one way of looking at it, but equally you could say it was his poorer performance contributing to that team being ****. Then we end up punting the ball of opinion back and forth yet again, and that gets us nowhere.
It all just goes to that football is a team game. Salah has to do his part off the ball and the other 10 have to as well for him to achieve the personal stats. I think the team wasn't delivering off the ball, if they are not pnning sides in and giving salah the runs he needs to score then he won't get those numbers For the record: CL: Ajax H 1 goals Rangers H 1 goal Rangers A 3 goals Ajax A 1 goal, 1 assist Napoli H 1 Goal Real madrid (h) 1 goal, 1 assists 8 goals 2 assists FA cup Wolves H 1 goals Brighton A 1 assist League cup Man city A 1 assist Community shield Man city: 1 goal 1 assist Premier league Fulham A 1 goal Man utd A 1 goal Newcastle H 2 assists Brighton H 1 assist Man city H 1 goal (this was 5 games without a goal in league btw) Leeds H 1 goal Spurs A 2 goals villa A 1 goal 1 assist Everton 1 goal (again 5 gamegap between goals as side struggled in worst point of season Newcastle A 1 assist Wolves H 1 goals Man utd H 2 goals 2 assists Man city 1 goal Arsenal 1 goal Leeds 2 goals Forest H 1 goal Theres a little bit of a pattern there, when the side is struggling to create salah doesn't get chances and often is stuck miles from goal on the right. He scores in games where sides don't sit deep and just park a bus. there is space to work in. He gets assists from wide areas Its all about speed of our play for salah. if we are taking extra touches or passes to move the ball then he gets negated by teams getting into good shap. He works the right side for us so often against a set defence he's miles wide trying to cut in and shoot form distance. when we get counters this is prime salah. we need to get it forward quickly and hit sides fast. the slower eopel are with the ball the more we waste what he does.
It would take me about a week to compile that post. I agree with the first sentence - it's fairly pointless picking on individual players unless they have a disastrous run of performances, littered with avoidable errors, because they all have their part to play. For instance, my current problem with Trent is not about him - he's a great talent - but what it does to the balance of the team playing him essentially out of position without compensating for it. I also feel we lose more than we gain from having him in-field, but that's my opinion and others may differ.
yeah this reminds me of Rodgers with his 343 with markovic at lwb and sterling at false 9. he was scrabling for something based on a **** set of results and it worked for a little while till the obvious flaws were pulled apart. we have a near fully fit squad bar firmino and now options plus 1 game a week so finding so many in odd positions seems very over complicated.
I know you didn't mean it in that way but isn't the truth the opposite of that. We've won both games he's been in his 'new role".
He's provided a phenomenal amount of assists and chances created from out wide for years, I'm not going to change my mind on the basis of a couple of results. I've already said that if he starts matching that creativity consistently then I'll reconsider, but at the moment I just see it as an overall loss.
if the sole thing that happened was trent stood there and he put in a 9/10 and won the games for us then sure why not. however that not what we all saw. We played the worst two teams in form terms in the league, we played in front of both for a while til they gifted us a chance. Forest coughed up chance after chance on set piece, leeds coughed up chance after chance on the break. the massive hole in our side is obvious. Its up to sides to find the means to exploit.
I'm reserving judgement until I see whether or not we can actually get more out of him in a midfield role. 3 assists over 2 games is a good return so far.
You've extrapolated something from my comment that wasn't there. I just pointed out a fact. Now if you'd waited a minute, you could have made this comment on my next comment - ^^
Isn't that what I said, just in different words? When it comes to your stats, are you factoring in the other games where he's played there, officially or not?
