Chelsea and Liverpool’s scuffling draw at Stamford Bridge failed to live up to the excitement of the Moisés Caicedo transfer-double-hijack drama of last week. Maybe no mere game ever could, but from this game two things were plain. First, you could see why both are so desperate to sign Caicedo. Second, neither Liverpool nor Chelsea look likely to compete this year with Manchester City, Arsenal or even Newcastle.
The disintegration of Liverpool’s midfield has been a talking point for a year now, but what happened at Chelsea over the summer is equally extreme. The summer fire-sale, necessary to trim down the Boehly-bloated squad, included the sales of N’Golo Kanté, Mason Mount, Mateo Kovacic and Kai Havertz, i.e. the backbone of the 2021 Champions League-winning team. The great Kanté was increasingly subject to fitness problems, but the other three all joined teams in last season’s Premier League top four. Certainly all are classier footballers than Conor Gallagher, whom Chelsea, after £700 million of spending, were reduced to picking in central midfield alongside Enzo Fernández.
As it turned out, Gallagher had a very good game, hurling all of his formidable energy into the task of disrupting Liverpool’s patterns, and whenever he won the ball and looked up, Fernandez was never far away.
Fernandez arrived at Chelsea in January with a £105 million transfer fee to live up to and didn’t always succeed in rising above the chaos that surrounded him. Here, in his first game for Pochettino, he was absolutely brilliant. His 117 touches were twice as many as his World Cup-winning team-mate Alexis McAllister, he demanded the ball constantly and hardly gave it away at all. He excels both at switching and stretching the play with long passes – 10 out of 11 found their target against Liverpool – and wriggling out of pressure in small spaces. If Chelsea do, as now looks likely, secure the signing of Caicedo, they will have a combination in central midfield to compare with anyone in the game. Someone really ought to sponsor their shirt.
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As for Liverpool, since they seem to be unable to find a suitable central midfielder on the market, maybe they should switch to looking for a right-back instead, and use Trent Alexander-Arnold in the central position where he plainly now wants to play.
Against Chelsea, Liverpool’s new vice-captain was back in something more like a conventional right-back role, his forays into the centre less frequent, most of his involvement coming down the right touchline. His 60 touches were the fewest he’s had in any game since the 4-1 defeat at Manchester City on April 1st. The game after that was the 2-2 draw against Arsenal which was his first game in the ‘new’ position. That started a run of 10 matches in which Alexander-Arnold averaged 104 touches per game and Liverpool recorded their longest unbeaten run of the season.
[ Chelsea and Liverpool share the spoils with goal apiece at Stamford BridgeOpens in new window ]
But a hybrid role that combines right-back and central midfield is always going to run up against the problem that any player can only be in one place at a time. Liverpool’s defending in pre-season was noticeably porous, with Bayern Munich among the teams to expose Alexander-Arnold’s positioning with quick balls down Liverpool’s right side. Maybe giving Alexander-Arnold the vice-captaincy was Klopp’s way of trying to keep him sweet while easing him back towards his old position. It would be better to accept that Alexander-Arnold is a midfielder now, and allow him to play in the centre without also burdening him with the defensive responsibilities of a right-back. It’s not like Liverpool have (or are likely to sign) anyone better for the job.
Another member of Klopp’s recently-rejigged ‘leadership group’, Mohamed Salah, was cheered off the pitch by Chelsea fans after making his anger at being substituted so obvious that everyone in the stadium could see. You had to feel for Salah, who did not have his best game but still contributed most of Liverpool’s quality in attacking moments. Did it make any sense that he spent the last 20 minutes sulking on the bench while Darwin Nuñez was out on the pitch?
Maybe giving Alexander-Arnold the vice-captaincy was Klopp’s way of trying to keep him sweet while easing him back towards his old position
The current standing of Liverpool’s second-most expensive signing ever can be gauged from the fact that they started the game with four forwards and none of them was him. On 68 minutes, with Chelsea now dominating, Darwin Núñez was eventually called from the bench. His first meaningful involvement was to drift to the right and attempt to form a triangle with Salah and Alexander-Arnold, a triangle with only two points as the other two didn’t seem interested in passing to him. Instead they dithered and moved backwards, Alexander-Arnold lost possession, and Nicolas Jackson was suddenly streaking through, only for Alisson to save one-on-one.
That near-miss may have been why Klopp took Salah off a couple of minutes later, but it would have been better to take Núñez off, even though he had only been on the pitch for seven minutes at that point.
Gallagher had a very good game, hurling all of his formidable energy into the task of disrupting Liverpool’s patterns
His highlights in the remaining quarter hour: losing a 50-50 with the 39-year old Thiago Silva, stepping backwards when Dominik Szoboszlai wanted him to step forwards for a quick one-two, and miscontrolling Alexis Mac Allister’s quick forward pass when alone and unmarked in the Chelsea penalty area. Mac Allister’s pass wasn’t good, but Nuñez’s touch was worse.
At the very end he shouldered Malo Gusto to the ground, turned, ran and hit a 25-yard shot which deflected off Ugochukwu and wide.
It was a moment that showed the qualities that would make Núñez a good player for a bad team. With his power, speed and tunnel vision, he could be a phenomenal player for the current Everton side, or any slow defensive team that needs an out-ball to a game and speedy forward.
But Klopp’s Liverpool have always been about putting more and more pressure on the opponent until they buckle. Keeping the pressure on means keeping the ball in tight spaces, and this is where Nuñez struggles. With him in the side, no sooner are they threatening to build some pressure when along comes Núñez to let the air out. Unless he’s got secret admirers in Saudi Arabia, it’s looking like another awkward season in prospect.
