Columnist image

TSN Soccer Analyst

| Archive

It wasn't just one of the most entertaining games of the Premier League season.

Liverpool's 2-1 victory over Manchester City at Anfield on Sunday showed just what impact a manager can have on his team.

It is now two months since Liverpool arrived at Old Trafford to play Manchester United and before the game Rodgers attempted to draw a line underneath the previous four months, which had seen the Reds take just 21 points from the opening 15 games.

"We need to get back to what we are good at, we are based on a technical game and need to play with a high level of intensity," said the manager before the game.

United would beat Liverpool 3-0.

It was one of those days, however, that Rodgers needed to push the result to the back of his mind and keep the performance at the front.

Raheem Sterling played up front and brought what Rodgers wanted. The manager switched to a back three soon after, while abandoning hopes of trying to fit a large personality like Mario Balotelli into the team.

Liverpool suddenly looked more like the side that came close to the title last season. Emre Can's intelligence and calmness in possession has given them a key element at the back, underperforming players like Glen Johnson and Dejan Lovren joined Balotelli on the bench and the system helped players like Lazar Markovic, Sterling and, specifically, Philippe Coutinho blossom.

After gaining 21 points through the first 16 games (1.31 PPG) losing to teams like Aston Villa, West Ham, Newcastle and Crystal Palace, they have now gained 27 points in the 11 matches since (2.45 PPG) defeating Tottenham, Southampton and Manchester City in their last three matches.

The latest victory over City brought back memories of their enormous win over the same team during last season's title challenge. The game was played earlier in the season this time and clearly Liverpool are not challenging for the title but the standard of their goals, combined with their movement and intensity, showed how much progress they have made since December. All of this with Daniel Sturridge on the bench (he would come on to play the last 15 minutes) and Luis Suarez in Barcelona.

Suarez already exposed City five days earlier in the Champions League, another night where Pellegrini was rightfully questioned for playing an open 4-4-2.

He opted for a similar shape to start their game at Anfield with Yaya Toure replacing James Milner alongside Fernandinho in midfield and the foursome of Samir Nasri, David Silva, Eden Dzeko and Sergio Aguero ahead of them.

On paper those six players could pose a real threat to any team but a problem for City all season long was further exemplified at Anfield.

"The team has balance. To win you need to keep the balance."

Those were the words of Man City's Chief Executive Ferran Soriano inside Yankee Stadium last summer.

Seven months later the jury is in. City are incredibly unbalanced.

Pellegrini regularly switches between a lone striker and a pair up front, even in games.

Aguero, when healthy, is the mainstay. He has now started 19 Premier League games this season but it speaks to the inconsistencies of the team when you see what Pellegrini has done with his front line when the Argentine has been healthy. Of the 19 starts, Aguero has started seven up top by himself, seven with Dzeko and five with Stevan Jovetic.

When playing one man up top, Pellegrini usually prefers Silva to play just in behind Aguero and has only once started the midfield trio of Fernando, Fernandinho and Toure together. This came at QPR and Pellegrini abandoned this plan after 64 minutes when his team were being at outplayed at 1-1.

It is clear that Pellegrini wants Toure to play the role of the 'sixth man' with five more defensive players behind him (back four, defensive midfielder) and four more offensive players ahead. Toure, subsequently, should then be the link between both sets.

The issue Pellegrini has had, however, is form. Toure has always been a slightly overrated player whose stock last season rose when he scored 20 goals, although it should be noted most came when games were effectively over as a contest.

Toure is, of course, a very good player but he hasn't been anywhere close to his best this season. Fernandinho has also not been close to his best and it is now fair to wonder whether his best is really good enough for a team like City.

The Brazilian was bought for 30 million pounds less than two years ago and is not suited to the role of defensive midfielder. Six months after he was signed, Chelsea spent 21 million pounds on Nemanja Matic.

The former Shakhtar man, unlike Matic, can get drawn out of key spaces too easily and does not have the tendencies needed to win key tackles at crucial moments.

City clearly knew this when they went to get Fernando in the summer. However, the former Porto man has also been poor this season and Hull City, of all teams, exposed the partnership of Fernando and Fernandinho at the Etihad last month.

A midfield imbalance has had a knock-on effect throughout the side. Eliaquim Mangala's development is taking much longer because of what is happening in front of him and Vincent Kompany has also been exposed.

Kompany is a good defender but has been overrated for some time now. His inclusion in last season's team of the year, for example, was laughable. The skipper's biggest problem is his willingness to come out into midfield, his former position, to go touch tight to the man with the ball. This leaves enormous spaces in behind for quick, technical teams to expose. So, why does he keep doing it? The midfield. Toure shows very little appetite for the defensive aspect of the game leaving Fernandinho, in effect, to defend against an onrush, in a key transition. Germany already emphatically showed what teams can do to Fernandinho when he is given this amount of responsibility. Yet, even when Toure is deeper and there is a double pivot it is Fernandinho who is on the right side ahead of Kompany.

The defender reads the game well but, perhaps, too well as he too often picks the wrong moment to step up closer to his wide full back, Pablo Zabaleta, to attempt to end the opponent's possession because he doesn't have trust in Fernandinho to do his job.

Kompany's decision-making deserves to be questioned but the lack of balance in the team is a significant contributor because Fernandinho, and Zabaleta, are rarely helped defensively by the right-sided attacker, who in this case is Samir Nasri.

Nasri is an incredibly gifted but frustrating footballer. Watching Liverpool, under Rodgers, find a back three to get the best out of their team on Sunday it was logical to presume how City would perform by withdrawing a passenger like Nasri and playing Martin Demichelis in a back three. This would give Kompany more license to step up while also having a protector in behind Toure and Fernandinho who could not operate as box-to-box central midfielders.

It was Roberto Mancini who last tried a back three with this team and his players publicly turned on him when Micah Richards admitted to finding it hard to play in a back three after a loss in the Champions League.

"Good players should be able to play in any system," fired back Mancini. "If you are a top player, the system is not important. If you don't understand you are not a top player and you cannot play for a top team."

Losses to Barcelona and Liverpool have confirmed what many have known for some time. City are currently not a top team featuring far too many players not playing at a top level. Their manager's future is in doubt but as he shook the hands of Rodgers after another loss on Sunday he would be wise to take a look at just how he transformed Liverpool's season.