After struggling last season, Cody Gakpo looks to have worked through some of his weaknesses, something Florian Wirtz could learn from…
SUNDAY was a huge win. Enormous.
Mostly because the game was fairly awful, and those are the sort of affairs where people just want to get off the pitch and try again in a few days. See Fulham last week.
Liverpool scored and got over the line. A mucky 0-1. My favourite type of game.
Two wins and three draws. As Jamie Carragher said in commentary, there’d be a world of difference between that and one win with four draws. True, it’s not perfect, but it’s unbeaten and the basis for something.
Liverpool boxed clever in Bournemouth, and it’s great to see The Reds win a game by being intelligent with the ball and recognising the attritional nature of how it was going.
There are still issues. I’m holding onto my Wirtz/Bez analogy (it’s nice to see him, but he doesn’t overly contribute to what’s going on around him) despite his sort of assist.
Milos Kerkez continues to draw both angst and excitement from me in equal measure, but the change in attitude is marked.
The improvements too are marked, though.
Alexis Mac Allister is getting back to something like his normal self, though yet to hit his peak, but it’s Cody Gakpo who’s rightly taken the headlines. There’s a partnership of sorts in the making with Alexander Isak, and it seems to come from him playing on the opposite flank to his preferred position.
I don’t know if the Dutchman’s game has improved due to having to improvise his play rather than adopt his usual ‘cut inside from the left flank and shoot from distance’ manoeuvre, but the unpredictability looks like it’s a factor in our more creative play. He’s using the space much better than last season.
There are often cries of hypocrisy about this sort of thing, about plaudits replacing brickbats. How dare he get praise now from people who sanctioned a move away in the summer? I just think it’s because he’s improved, which is all we ever wanted. I also think he was used as a stick to deflect criticism from Mo Salah’s quieter months. ‘Yes, but Gakpo’ etc.
We just want to see the lads do well.
I mean, I’d dearly love Milos Kerkez to slowly morph into an Andy Robertson/Steve Nicol hybrid and will sing his name to the skies if he does, but until then he’ll still earn more frowns than acclaim. I just find him a bit… Mad.
I think fans can forgive a change in form. It happens. It’s only the lack of effort, imagination or bravery that truly irks. It was interesting to hear Gary Neville criticise both Manchester United and Fulham for ‘walking around the pitch’ rather than improve their play. I’m completely with him on that.
I don’t think people were labelling Cody Gakpo with that sort of crime last season. It was just the predictability on show. Similarly, I don’t doubt that Florian Wirtz is working hard. It’s just either he or the system isn’t seeing the results as yet. You can criticise without personal spite coming into play.
Similarly to Gakpo, Wirtz will come good. He just needs to work things out. It just takes time sometimes.
There are few ultimates in this game, only form.
An international break will help at this point. A fourth draw would have been uncomfortable, but the win changes the tone.
Small steps.
