The departure of Jurgen Klopp will raise questions about Liverpool's ability to sustain both a highly successful period, as well as an extremely demanding and effective style of play. But Arne Slot, Klopp’s Dutch successor, takes the lead with a lot of ambition from the Reds campaign to remain in contention for both domestic and continental levels. The pre-season USA tour was considered as Slot’s first real exposure to show up with his own tactical approach, as he faced versatile teams with different game models: Real Betis, Arsenal and Manchester United; Let’s put the new Dutch man team tactics under the spotlight, analyzing the most significant game phases in which Liverpool was involved: Buildup and High pressing.
Buildup:
During the first pre-season game against Real Betis, Arne Slot central and vertical buildup had a main and almost only target: Delivering the ball to Jones (Nyoni). To help achieve this, regardless of the result, Liverpool showed up with a successful build from the tactical point of view.Liverpool were building up with a hybrid (3+4) / asymmetric (3+3) shape depending on the direct involvement of Kelleher in such a process, where Tsimikas was moving between the second and first lines accordingly.
With seven Liverpool players directly involved in build-up phase attempts, and five opponent players (Four backline players +1 of the pivots) pinned back against the Reds front four (Szobszlai and Elliot dropping centrally) to provide backline numerical advantage, Real Betis found themselves outnumbered by two players during such situations.
Hence, it was essential for them to close the direct passing angles to Jones; while letting the ball circulate between the first line trio freely, which Liverpool players could overcome easily with simple third man combinations.
That was almost similar When Kelleher was not directly involved in such situations according Tsimikas dropped to the first line to grant superiority and drag the opponent wide player away from Jones; Moreover, ball circulation between the first line players acted as a pressing trigger to the opponents’ forwards, providing room to reach Jones using similar combinations to the previous scheme.
As such scheme became hardly applicable when Pellegrini switched to orthodox man for man high pressing, Kelleher became the only free player who tried to access a dropping front line player to receive the ball with time and space or even looked to play long balls over the opponent high press to reach wide players in 1V1 situations.
Against Arsenal, Arne Slot tried to use the similar buildup schemes but facing a more aggressive and proactive team than his first opponent, life was much harder for the Reds who started with Szoboszlay deeper alongside Jones instead of Endo, while Jota took his place in the starting eleven as a Centre Forward.
It's also worth mentioning that the only tactical tweak which was introduced (comparing to the first game) was the start for Curtis Jone. As shown below, Jones started to drop a little bit towards the left half-space rather than centrally, the reason for such positioning against an opponent pressing high with the intention of forcing the play wide in one direction was to ensure he could receive the progressive and diagonal pass from his backline with a positional advantage (Ready for the half turn to progress the ball forward quickly), more importantly to get away from Odegaard’s cover shadow area, especially that Partey started the game more like as a floating midfielder instead of strictly marking Jones, probably to guarantee a numerical advantage for his backline.
This tactical tweak was quickly noticed by Arteta, who then switched to a complete man-oriented scheme, as Partey started to mark Jones strictly, preventing them from their intended clean central buildup; For example, you can see below how Liverpool were desperately forced to build up wide towards their left flank, while Jones stepped up to vacate space for a potential combination.
Against such aggressive high pressing, Liverpool (similarly to Real Betis game) tried from time to time to release long balls from Kelleher (the only free player), seeking for forward runs in behind or between Arsenal centre backs or even trying to win the second balls; which was sometimes successful as Salah could score the opening goal from one of those attempts.
In the final game against Manchester United, Liverpool faced different high pressing aspects from their rivals, as the latter relied on man oriented high pressing but with a narrow and passive nature; which aimed to close the central and inside channels and only jumping to press intensely when triggers (particularly back and sideways passes) were released.
In order to drag the opponent player higher and wider for the purpose of opening inside passing lanes, Slot’s team buildup had to be re-adjusted to take more like a (1+4+2) shape.
It is also worth to mention that Liverpool could overcome United high press during many situations due to poor individual decisions from their players, but this won’t be the issue to be discussed, as this article targets to analyze Liverpool team tactics under Slot leadership.
Liverpool faced issues when their opponents could force the play wide, because this was almost the only way to continue with their intense man oriented pressing approach while Jota and Elliott were dropping deep centrally to decrease the threat potential in the absence of permanent backline numerical superiority.
Collyer can’t jump to press Gravenberch until Liverpool buildup is forced wide.
When Liverpool buildup was forced wide, marking Jones was alternated so Casemiro could support his backline as an extra man.
Liverpool were only able to overcome such pressure scheme if they could keep the ball in central areas, like a 2V1 situation would take place when one of their pivots could get away from the shadow cover field of the nearest front line player.
Such an issue needed a solution as it was difficult to keep the ball circulating only in central areas against that high pressing scheme; but a question shall be asked about the reason of only applying the tweak shown below only once.
Liverpool buildup was switched to a (4-1-4-1) shape as Gravenberch took the role of a single pivot while Jones stepped up to join the front line, which prevented Casemiro from any involvement of his team high pressing as he followed Liverpool midfielder.
Moreover, Elliott, Salah and Carvalho also dropped alongside Jones in central areas and inside channels, eliminating any probable isolation option of a wide off ball side player and hence providing room for Gravenberch to receive the ball as a free man, as his marker (Collyer) was forced to delay his pressing action to grant numerical advantage for his backline against such a variation.
High pressing:
Against Real Betis, Arne Slot showed a great ball recovery success rate during high pressing phase, as he relied on a man-oriented scheme where Liverpool front trio (Salah, Elliot and Carvalho) were ready to press the opponent Centre Backs and far Full Back respectively while Szoboszlay was taking care of Real Betis dropping pivot.
Wide pressing traps were set against the opponent left back as Bradley (Right Back) stepped up with high intensity and aggression just as his opponent received the ball while the rest of Liverpool backline aimed to shift across to provide cover for their mate; the same was done by the opposite wide player (Carvalho), who was usually shifting across to mark the opponent off-ball side advanced midfielder to give Nyoni a chance to grant his backline numerical superiority.
Against Arsenal, it was like a big chess game between Arteta and Slot regarding such a phase; much High pressing / Build up flexibility has been proved by both of managers by applying many variations during short time intervals. Both teams started their clash with a similar high pressing / build up scheme to what happened during Liverpool previous game, Arsenal were hence forced to long balls with clear numerical advantage for Liverpool when speaking about first and second ball situations.
The first variation was Arteta’s quick reaction by letting Partey drop between centre backs, this aimed (as shown in the tactical board below) to provide more ball circulation across the first line and hence increasing the chances of creating central gaps/progressive passing angles while Liverpool pressing lines were shifting.
Moreover, Partey’s deep drop might drag Eliott (his marker) out of position to press him, which might be followed by dragging Jones to press Odegaard, which eliminates the Reds numerical superiority as the long has been released, otherwise, Odegaard would receive the ball as a free man.
But Arne Slot quickly ceased relying on direct man marking as Jota and Eliott started to alternate pressing against the opposing holding midfielder (Kiwior/Partey) and Odegaard, while Salah and Carvalho kept dividing the nearest two for them according to the play direction, as Jones played the floating midfielder role in front of his backline, granting their numerical advantage.
Based on Liverpool previous high pressing scenario (Shifting and pressing alteration), Arteta applied another variation: By letting Zinchenko tuck-in as an inverted Full Back beside Partey, Bradley won’t probably follow him to such central areas, but this wasn’t the end of the story.
It is clear from the tactical board above, that Arsenal’s double pivots are much higher from their backline, much distant from each other, and the ball side pivot kept also moving wider towards the play direction.
All of the above enlarged the distance covered by Liverpool high pressing players and made such shifting and pressure alternation harder and harder while the ball was being circulated from side to side.
During the final game against Manchester United, Liverpool high pressing main schemes had to be changed completely; as they were facing a team whose main build up aim was to find spaces behind the opponent backline to be targeted by forward runs or even to reach 1V1 situations upfront.
Such approach relies on frontline density (1+2+2+6 shape) providing time and space for their goalkeeper (Onana), to reach out for one of the above situations.
As United used their Left Back (Amass) in an inverted position, Liverpool pressed high trying to prevent vertical passing options by Salah and one of Elliot/Jota while the other pressed Onana while shadow covering the nearest Centre Back in order to force the build up to one direction.
Pressing traps were also set as Carvalho was providing time and space for the other Centre Back (Evans) to receive the ball, the option that Manchester United goalkeeper didn’t take, as he was almost releasing long ball to the frontline wide players.
This made Liverpool benefit from numerical superiority (7V6) during first and second balls situations as Carvalho was able to provide the same when the long balls were released to wide areas.
As the pre-season tour came to an end, Slot certainly showed up with an efficient and flexible tactical structure facing different game models through the most complicated game phases. Liverpool were able to contain all of their opponents’ buildup with successful and versatile high pressing schemes, but the questions to be asked are about the team ability to secure a clean buildup against different pressing approaches and finding quick solutions by introducing game changing tweaks to progress the ball forward, as the Reds faced issues with the same against Arsenal and Manchester United.
However, this question can’t be answered at the moment, until such a team with a new manager becomes available with its full squad and reach their top physical and technical levels, a few weeks after the season starts.
This article was written by Louai Hussain
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