My biggest issue is that I don't see any good to come out of this style of play this season. I see two possible options:
- This is the planned playstyle, with the incredibly open midfield, deep lying defence and attack pushed up. ETH just thinks that better players will allow it to work.
- The plan is that with more suitable defenders, the defence will push up higher and close that space in the middle of the pitch.
If it's #1, it's a shit playstyle which I can't see being successful no matter which players we have in there. It deliberately sets us up in a way that makes it impossible to get any kind of control in a match against even remotely decent opposition.
If it's #2, I could understand sticking to it this season if it was something that would benefit our players in the future as they got used to this style. But closing that space in the middle will change so much across the entire team, what we're seeing now is basically pointless. It'd make much more sense to push the defence up now even if individual players aren't particularly suited to it, and wear the mistakes this season with the knowledge that the team as a whole will be better for it in the long term. Klopp's early days at Liverpool are an obvious example where you could see the good stuff right from the beginning and felt it would improve as time wore on, even though there were definite teething issues.
I look at our players and think to myself, how many players are actually getting any benefit or experience that will stand them in good stead in future seasons, more than they would if we played more similarly to how we did last season?
Attackers? No. They are the ones least impacted by this playstyle, but our inability to control anything means they are getting less service, less build-up and having to rely on scraps. I don't see any benefit at all.
Midfielders? No. If the plan is to close up all that space in the future, what benefits do they get from spending this entire season getting overrun? All it's doing is making it significantly more difficult for them. You could say that Mainoo/McTominay/Mount are getting used to playing higher up like we want them in the future, but the overrun middle of the park holds far more negatives than that very small benefit.
Central defenders? No. Most will probably have to be sold, so there's no future benefit. And for any that do remain, the fact we are getting so overrun and having the opposition constantly running at them in huge space doesn't do any good and will be completely different than what will happen if the plan is to push up higher in the future.
Fullbacks? This is the one position that I can see some benefit for the future. Dalot and even AWB are getting used to inverting and helping out in more central areas. Of course if that's how we want to use our fullbacks then AWB isn't going to be good enough, so it's really just about Dalot.
Keeper? Nope. Makes it harder to play the ball out when in possession, and is on the end of a ridiculous barrage of shots when out of possession.
So when I look at this season, Dalot is literally the only player in the entire squad that I see being able to use these tactics in positive development for the future. Mainoo and Garnacho are getting plenty of game time so it's positive in that sense for them, but there'd be more positives if they were playing in the same system as we used last season. Hell, that'd probably even be true for Dalot, as he was already inverting quite a bit last season and could easily have increased it anyway like he has.