Don't get me wrong, we have a lot of good players.
Gravenberch, TAA, Konate, Mac Allister and Diaz are all top class players who would start for any team going.
And Jota, Szoboslai, Jones, Robinson, Kelleher, Bradley, Gomez and Elliot are all very good players that I have no worries about whenever they are starting games.
The big three are a level above anyone else in their positions in the league though. There are very few players of their caliber in the premier league and the fact that we have three such players is amazing. They are the real difference makers and the three players in this side with an easy entrance into the Liverpool alltime XI.
Kelleher is good, probably the best keeper we've had not named Reina or Alisson since Grobbelaar left in 94. Which tells its own sad story I suppose. But Alisson is still levels above. Kelleher makes good saves and he saves the ones you expect your keeper to save which is a huge quality. And every now and then even a great save that he didn't really have the right to save. Alisson does that as a matter of course though and makes it looks easy with his positioning. For me, the best keeper in the world. His only downside is injuries.
I'll leave aside if the three mentioned are actually a level above, I always have a problem with the "level" above between elite players, even between geniuses (or even Leagues), yet that's subject for another matter. BTW I of course think that are the basement of the team and all timers in my view.
Yet I wasn't talking about big names, trajectories or even current form or level regarding players, I was talking about the actual tendencies of Liverpool players, atributes and operation of the team.
In such sense, Macca is vital and other players I've mentioned surrounding him, are vital for him.
Liverpool has too many let's call "instictive" players, some very skill like Lucho, Trent, Curtis, etc...others very physical pool alike like Robertson, but Pool, like many current teams lack in some sense brains, real clever footballers, not clever in the sense of pulling out a rabbit in a moment, a play or a couple of them (the kids right now had done that). I mean it in the big picture, how to order your mates, where to stand, when to press, when to wait, when to hold it, when to do a fast transtition, even shithousery and a large etc...small things like when to risk it in some steal or offensive play and those apparently simplier things but that few players do that is sending a pass with a message: run to the space, attack/shoot, hold it, and do those to the right foot, speed and weight.
People lately tend to talk abot lack of technique in many major teams, it's not that much about that, it's more lack of mature and intelligent figures and the roles they play.
Modric is aging, Kross it's not there, Kevin even not being entirely for me in that department is older and not entirely fit, Gundo it's far from his best self, etc...
That's why I've mentioned Virgil/Macca being vital in producing the sort of perfomances like the ones against Madrid and City. Of course without the numbers and output of Moh, would be futile, but without the brains of those two, you play another game, you can still win, have great perfomances, but you loose that edge that is primarly lacking in other major teams. Not even Chelsea has these two, lots of young guns in top form, but not with the maturity and intelligence that most times gets a team over the line in extremely tough circumstances.
