THE match ratings from Liverpool’s 1-0 first leg defeat to Southampton in the League Cup semi-final.
Loris Karius: 8
Two really sharp stops and unlucky with the one that went in. Handling sharp and, one flap aside under heavy pressure (which averted a free header), a faultless performance from the young German. The readjustment (from a movement expecting a header) for the one-v-one save just before their goal was particularly impressive.
Hopefully take a lot of pressure, both internally and externally off his shoulders. Needs another few of those behind him to clear his head and challenge Simon Mignolet who’s having his best season at Liverpool so far.
Nathaniel Clyne: 6
The other side of being uber consistent is that you’ve not got much to pull out the bag when you need something else, would maybe like to see him commit a little more when we’re being stifled.
Dejan Lovren: 6
Had a few shaky games at St Mary’s and today was no better.
Rescued half a point late on with a header off the line, but not the most assured and played everyone onside for the goal after a horrific error from…
Ragnar Klavan: 4
No idea, absolutely nothing at all as to what he thought he was doing to gift Southampton their goal.
So bad that an OK second half only gets him a four across the whole 90.
James Milner: 5
Suffers when we don’t move the ball as quickly as he’s a brilliant catalyst, too ploddy to dominate a game himself, especially from left-back.
Using his face to protect the ball was possibly the moment of the season, though.
Lucas Leiva: 6
At least tried to get things going and force the issue, looked goosed at the end. Can be a good option when he has decent performances around him but when he’s playing in such a pedestrian midfield he suffers.
Emre Can: 3
Slower off the mark than King Koopa.
Don’t like being mean, but everything was off tonight.
Has good technical ability and an eye for a pass but when this fails him, as it did tonight, you have a slow on the turn, cumbersome passenger in the midfield, whose only contribution is to break any meaningful possession down.
He knew he was stinking the place out which doesn’t help.
Still has time on his side but needs to step up massively.
Georginio Wijnaldum: 5
Anonymous.
Adam Lallana: 6.5
Tried to get things going, looked much better when Phil Coutinho came on but offered very little by others and seemed too far away from his partners in attack.
Daniel Sturridge: 5
Thought he started brightly but faded, no cohesion going forward and started looking for the ball too much.
Nothing sticking for him either, seems between a rock and a hard place but tonight must go down as a missed opportunity to stamp a place in the team for Sunday.
Roberto Firmino: 5
Save the tricks for the box, mate. And bring the top knot back, Samson.
SUBS
Philippe Coutinho: 7
Class above everyone else. Touch, technique and awareness a cut above.
That we only looked remotely threatening once he came on tells you how important he is, and that’s with three man markers, too.
Divock Origi: N/A
Southampton 1 Liverpool 0: Match Review
Southampton 1 Liverpool 0: The Pink
Recent Posts:
[rpfc_recent_posts_from_category meta=”true”]
Pics: David Rawcliffe-Propaganda Photo
If 5 out of 10 is par – the minimum required score to be satisfactory, then your marks are probably 2 too many across the board.
Without focussing on the scores though the write ups are sound.
Yeah the Gazzetta dello Sport had an exact formula for the ratings. I think 6 was adequate or even above average – basically the standard expected of a player. Players very rarely got above 7 or below 5. A stellar world class performance would often just bring a 7.5.
Everything was wrong tonight. IMO our worst performance of the season. Can and Lucas in the same midfield is terrible. We miss Henderson so much.
Yeah – bang on these ratings. With Phil being such a class above everyone else he might be tempted by offers abroad this summer – everyone has to raise their game to his level – which they are all capable of. Frustrating.
The passing seemed so slow, maybe the pitch played a part, but we’re missing the venom in our passing that other teams couldn’t live with.
That’s as bad as I’ve seen us for a while, really need to get out of this shite phase and push on again for rest of season. Forster only had one save to make FFS. Thank god little Phil is back, got a funny feeling though that all will click on Sunday. Those games never go the way you think they will (apart from 13/14)
Slower off the mark than King Koppa
Pretty spot on there except the 3 for Can who has gone backwards and can now do nothing right. Big performance from Karius, much more assured and improved.
i’ll give Can some leeway here based on he had a long summer at the EUROs, a disrupted pre-season and start to the season with in juries and also lack of game time – then thrown into about 4 games in 15 days or so.
But – he needs to get this sorted pretty sharpish.
Seeing as how it was so obvious Can was having one of his worst matches in a LFC shirt, why did Klopp not take him off when Coutinho came on rather than Gini? At least Gini’s lack of pace is covered by his incredible ability to shield the ball until he can get a pass off.
Exactly. Can and to a lesser extent that Brazilian ingrate were crap yet they both do 90? Do me a favour.
Thought Lucas and Can were both awful don’t want to see them again in midfield together! Studge was fairly rubbish as well. Only half time but feels like we’re going off the boil at the wrong time!
In other words we were shite. We’ve lost energy and verve and I don’t think it’s down to Mane being away – I think it’s mainly the loss of Henderson – what he does isn’t spectacular but he brings good forward momentum that we seem to have lost of recent. I also don’t get Lucas – decent positioning but slow and too many mistakes. As a plus, only the first half and I’m confident we’ll win at Anfield. Phil looked good when he came on too.
Not sure which game you were watching but Lucas was by far our best outfield player. Retained possession and kept it simple. At least the Echo got the rating right.
Generous towards Lallana that. Almost as bad as Can and his worst performance under Klopp easily. Don’t whether it’s a playing at Southampton thing but balls shouldn’t be bouncing off him when he’s so good technically.
Agreed, Tom M. Lallana had a shocker.
The note handed to Sturridge with which he ran onto the field (an embarrassment in itself) presumably said that we should adjust to three at the back to push the fullbacks up with Lucas as the deepest man. That made sense against Rodriguez perhaps but when Long came on it was crazy.
The immobility in midfield was excruciating to watch and I fear now for Can’s future. His touch was poor, his passing and positioning wayward.
Mane is a massive miss and in his absence Divvy has to play otherwise everything is to feet.
Klopp’s piece of paper MOTM for me, 9/10
I agree entirely with the Samson reference for Firmino. I always felt Torres was like Samson as well.
Klopp has to take some heat for the midfield selection, and not changing it when Lucas and Can wasn’t working. Is now the time to cosider moving Lucas on ? Surprised when Gini got pulled, thought Can was the clear candidate
Somewhere earlier today I
saw a post questioning if we should keep Can. My response before tonight echoes exactly what we saw tonight slow of thought and action, gives the ball away too often.
He’s had plenty of time to improve but it’s not happening. Can see no future for him at Liverpool.
He was our best midfielder last season. He gave the ball away less than Lallana tonight. You are talking absolute rubbish.
Lallana, Henderson and other average players got plenty of time to find something resembling form, yet you see no future for Can. Give the game up. It’s not for you.
Well said Mark. Absolute nonsense saying get rid of Can after one poor game. Embarrassing.
It seemed to me that every time lallana was in possession the nearest Southampton player made sure he was aware of their presence, a foot left in, a shove in the back, a heavy shoulder after the ball had gone etc. I think this close attention got in his head and his usual touch deserted him, he needed to man up a bit.
Might be time to give Bobby F a rest. He’s been off it for a while now.
I can only assume these marks are out of a hundred
One of our worst performances in a long while, but panic stations it ain’t.
Karius was excellent. Nobody should doubt he was under pressure. He will have felt that coming in having had a few errors come under such scrutiny from people like Neville and Carragher, who dug him out in public, before Carragher predictably said we should sign the error-prone Joe Hart. Karius can be proud of what was easily his best showing in a Liverpool shirt. The two saves off Redmond, especially the first, were crucial and kept the score down. There was also a moment second half where he kept hold of a venomous cross at the near post. Kicking was also crisp. Well played lad.
There were some disappointing performances across the field, most noticeably from Can. There is no explaining Klavan’s error to be honest and we looked as vulnerable at the back as we have done in a long while. Lallana wasn’t at his best but he’s always a player you want out there. The upturn in his performance when Coutinho came on was obvious. Coutinho, as you would expect, looked a class above anyone on the field.
We take our 1-0 and get back to Anfield. Not ideal, but when viewed in context it will do.
Milner and Sturridge were beyond dreadful. All season Danny has been terrible starting and exciting off the bench.
I can cut Lucas some slack. He hardly gets a full game and when he plays we expect him to be as sharp as the regulars. At least he was the only midfielder for most of the game trying to pass the ball forward with some purpose. Can was atrocious and Wjanldum seemed to be auditioning for the lead in ‘The Invisible Man’.