Liverpool team to face Tottenham Hotspur. Jones; Johnson, Carragher, Agger, Enrique; Lucas, Gerrard; Downing, Suarez, Coutinho; Sturridge. SUBS: Gulacsi, Wisdom, Skrtel, Henderson, Allen, Shelvey & Sterling. - That's the Liverpool team. Big news is that Reina is missing for us so Brad Jones comes into the side with Peter Gulacsi becoming the substitute 'keeper. Apart from that, it's as expected from Liverpool.
Lloris; Walker, Dawson, Vertonghen, Assou-Ekotto; Parker, Livermore; Sigurdsson, Dembele, Bale; Defoe. Friedel, Naughton, Caulker, Gallas, Huddlestone, Carroll, Holtby
Team: Lloris, Walker, Dawson, Vertonghen, Assou-Ekotto, Parker, Livermore, Sigurdsson, Dembele, Bale & Defoe Subs today: Friedel, Naughton, Caulker, Gallas, Huddlestone, Carroll & Holtby Jones, Johnson, Enrique, Agger, Carragher, Lucas, Gerrard, Downing, Coutinho, Sturridge & Suarez Off Twitter. No Lennon then but a big surprise that AVB's gone for Livermore instead of Holtby, should be interesting with Dembele being moved further forward.
From BBC: BREAKING TEAM NEWS - Liverpool v Tottenham (1600 GMT) There's no Aaron Lennon in the Spurs side - the winger picked up an injury late on against Inter in midweek. and... BREAKING TEAM NEWS - Liverpool v Tottenham (1600 GMT) Brad Jones starts in goal for Liverpool, while Daniel Sturridge, Luis Suarez and Philippe Coutinho all start.
Hadn't even spotted Reina was out. One big change to each side then, looking forward to the game but this could go anyway. I'm going to stick my neck out predict Spurs to win 3-1
So I presume we line up like this? HL KW MD JV BAE JL SP GS MD GB JD ? seems odd to me. I think the general lack of creativity from SP and JL will force MD to drop deeper, which'll leave JD on his own against a couple of defenders. (presuming that's how we're set up)
I'm sticking to my prediction of 2-1 to 'pool. We've got no width to our team, and with lennon out, we've lost a lot of pace. I don't care if you all think I'm negative, I'd rather be wrong every week and we do well
Not happy about the way that we've rejigged the side, to be honest. It'll be interesting to see whether Dembele just goes straight in on the right. The Belgian had a very good game over there for Fulham against Man Utd at the start of the season
A big surprise. I assumed Holtby was going to come on in midfield in the unlikely event he moved Gylfi over to take over on the right and moved the left-footed Dembele up to the left. Most of the time, AVB has done what I would have done, but I didn't guess this one, and I took six guesses. The idea is you don't take Bale's central role away, you still have counterattacking speed in him and Defoe, and you get as much defensive solidity as possible with two DMs and Gylfi and Dembele, who are both good defensively. You don't put in Holtby since he hasn't played the DM/playmaker role (though it's not like Livermore has played much with Parker). Offhand it seems too negative a setup to me. Hope I'm wrong. Maybe AVB is banking on the Livermore good luck charm effect.
I don't think it's being negative, Moorph, - more realistic I'd say. Surely Bale has to be playing on the left today? Our game plan is out of the window if we have no threat down the wings. In recent weeks, we've adopted this lop sided formation where everything goes down the right with the left being no threat at all. With Lennon out, we must be switching this to the left, by using Bale instead?
I hope that's how we set up but Sky think Dembele will go on the right which I don't understand at all if true.
Did anyone else just see Coulthirst warming up with the players? Was he our extra man in the squad Edit: Just rewound it and it looks like he's passing the ball around with Carroll, they must be the two that missed out.
And I think it's Dembele on the left, Gylfi on the right and Bale with a free role through the center. Though they certainly will be given license to switch and roam. If I'm right, one problem is that you're switching positions for two players who have been playing well where they were, and three positions overall in a team that's been playing well. I think I would have just brought in KW for Lennon to keep the team closer to what it was, as Roo said.
It's bloody frustrating that we can't just do a straight swap Lennon for Townsend and keep our shape and formation that has served is so well the last few weeks. Is it a crazy thought if we had Naughton at right back and walker playing right midfield? Could that work? Maybe not the game to try it but walker is certainly better going forward than defending. I'm being negative too I think we'll lose 2-0 today. Hope I'm wrong though!
Dembele needs to be central. We need that creative driving force in the heart of the midfield, not to mention his physical presence. Parker and Livermore won't know what to do with it. we'll be going sideways with no spark, in what is already a very narrow looking side, should bale be central. Our best game is to get in behind defenders. When we're narrow, it's all too congested and takes something of sheer brilliance for us to breakthrough. we can't reply on that today.
I thought we might have done this today, as I mentioned earlier. Instead, it looks very narrow indeed.
Still no Adebayor or Dempsey in the 18. A keeper, three defenders and three central midfielders on the bench, basically. We haven't got a lot of options available to spice things up if they're not going our way, have we?
