If you’re going to lose to a great side, there are worse ways to do it but few this painful.
Wolves kicked and headed and scratched and rode their luck and ran the clock down and slowed the game and blocked on the line and did everything else you can possibly do to take something from a contest in which they were clearly second best.
In our defensive organisation and commitment to the cause, you can’t fault anyone in a gold shirt.
The wingbacks in particular, who I’ve long considered weak links out of possession were both star performers. Semedo kept Mane quiet and Ait-Nouri was Man of the Match down the other side prior to going off with cramp.
I did wonder when Hoever came on for those final seconds whether that change would prove costly and unfortunately for Wolves that’s exactly how it played out.
First he marched forward with the ball and inexplicably surrendered possession and then moments later was hesitant against Salah who played the decisive ball in for Origi.
Harsh, but those are the margins you’re talking about with this level of opposition.
If there’s a disappointment, other than losing with the last kick of the game, it’s how little we offered as an attacking force.
Of course it was nigh on impossible to break that Liverpool press but I did think there were many instances where better decisions could have got us into dangerous positions.
But I suppose that’s what this Liverpool team do; smother the ball to the extent you feel a tackle is coming even when it’s not.
You have to tip your hat to how they move around the pitch as a unit. As good as they are with the ball, they’re just as devestatingly efficient without it.
It takes a player like Traore to unsettle them and he was our only real pathway up the pitch, but when he did get moving there simply wasn’t anything happening around him.
Hwang and Raul didn’t do enough, even allowing for the difficulty of the challenge.
Going back to the opposite end of the pitch, I thought Sa was excellent.
Yes, there was that horrible moment when he charged into Saiss allowing Jota to run in for what should have been a goal, but his judgement around that mistake was pretty much flawless. He’s going to make those types of errors because of his high starting position and sweeper keeper directives, but considering how much he was involved I thought this performance enhanced an increasingly strong reputation.
Bruno Lage will be happy with him and content with what he got from his team. I don’t think he could extract more from the group.
And when the dust has settled and the pain subsided a bit, he can reflect on pushing Liverpool’s best team to their absolute limit and that is at least something worth salvaging.
I think what today really shows is we are probably a mid table prem team. Defensively good. Offensively not too good. Shame we never really threatened Liverpool. I thought we might unsettle them now and then. But we did really. Oh well.
Absolutely agree. A bitter pill to swallow but a point would have flattered us in reality. The gulf in class was obvious. Disappointed that we didn’t take the game to Liverpool more In the first half but the team and Lage are doing a good job with meagre resources. It’s time for Fosun to start walking the talk.
Big disappointment, so close and yet so far. Still we pushed them to the very end, but still no points for all that hard work. Shame really.
After today’s performance, feel we are about three or four players from being a really good team, but financial constraints are financial constraints.
Everyone played well.
Really proud of the boys today.
Well, my prediction went tits up because the real Wolves turned up!
I have no problem in admitting I got it wrong and should have had more faith but you had to be either on drugs or drunk to think Wolves would stop Liverpool… but they almost did!
Adama Traore had the game of his life and Rayan Ait-Nouri , where did he find that form from?
He was just magnificent!
Would Liverpool have scored if he hadn’t gone off?
Well we’ll never know but fantastic performances from everyone and a very special thank you to Diogo Jota for missing those chances.
Which Wolves player slipped him a brown envelope?
Can Wolves produce a similar performance next time and will Traore show the world that todays performance was not a one-off?
Of course Traore had the game of his life.
Klopp was on the touchline.
Pathetic!
He’s produced similar performances for virtually every game that he has started, as opposed to the games when he’s thrown on towards the end when it is more difficult to get into the flow of the game. Typical carping and scapegoat comment therefore in my opinion.
But no end product.
Lots of mazy runs at electrifying pace.
Not one goal or assist this season and I think ne of each last season.
That’s what I’d call pathetic.
one of each
And lots of entertainment. The fact that teams have to try and crowd him out automatically gives more space for teammates. We all know he needs to improve but to hear some people continually going on and on you’d think he is the only one in that particular boat. To my eyes, Semedo regularly struggles to make an impact and yet receives far less bad press.
I agree – great entertainment and no little skill, but so bloody frustrating. He never looks up to assess options.
Truce?
There’s a rumor Traore’s price tag has been reduced to 20mill. Way too low in my opinion. The club should try to get a swap deal with a player worth the double in return. Ansi Fati or Dembele would fit the bill, or Umtiti.
That’s ridiculous in todays market but if he’s running his contract down then i guess they’ll take what they can get.
When Bruno was appointed I, probably like many others, envisaged an emphasis on attacking free flowing football which would almost certainly mean a less efficient defensive unit. In short a lot of goals at both ends of the pitch. But how different is the reality!
We now have a defense to be envied by all. Kilman a class center back: Coady upping his game immeasurably, without giving away any of his leadership charisma: Saiss playing soundly, limiting costly errors. And two wingbacks now showing an abiltyto defend as well as to get forward. Couple this with a keeper who is a step up on Rui, having great instinctive responses as well as commanding his area, and thereby giving confidence to all around him. All of this totally beyond my expectations.
But at the other end, our lack of goals is appalling. We`ve gone from being very average under Nuno to being downright poor. Worse yet, we rarely look like scoring. Surely this has to change if we are to retain even a mid table position !
Looking at our bench it is impossible not to feel sorry for Bruno. We are threadbare.
Bruno has no alternatives available to him.
Dare I suggest that more than anything we need a Dave Edwards type of midfielder. A guy who instinctively knows how to time runs into the box in support of the main strikers and is able to contribute his share of goals. Before I`m shouted down as being nuts, I am not suggesting that Dave would have been anywhere near good enough even at his peak. But there can be no doubt that we are hugely missing a genuine attacking midfielder able to carry out this role. How Raul and Hwang would benefit from this support.
The reality is that our season comes down to just what support will be forthcoming for Bruno from Mr. Shi in January. I firmly believe that if given the tools to build on the defensive unit that he has so successfully established, we could become a very good side capable of holding our own against anyone in the Premiership. If however Mr. Shi continues to prevaricate and does little, then the second half of our season could well become a nightmare.
Mike
Arguably on the evidence to date Sa is the best goalkeeper I’ve seen in 60 years watching Wolves; a big man commanding his area and a shot stopper as well. With a football brain as a bonus.
And on the same page with the rest of your comments as well.
As a boy, I idolised Phil Parkes, so it’s a bit tough to admit — but I think you’re probably right. 🙂
Our first three games of the season were fantastic from an attacking sense, very exciting, although unproductive! However, we seem to have gone into a solid defensive mode, at the expense of attacking intent. While this game against Liverpool was understandably defensive, the games against Norwich and Burnley were not a reason for caution! Even Newcastle have beat Burnley, and we did not!
But our squad is very thin, and rumor has it that Jeff Shi says, we have to sell to buy. And no. 1 target is Hwang, which is great, but will not improve the current team — as he is already with us.
As a former center back myself!!!, I am thrilled with our defensive strength, but I need the adrenaline rush of goals. Very few in the last few games! More balance please, Bruno!
Merson suggested the same but said Dele Alli would be ideal to run beyond Jiminez into the box! Just like Dave Edwards did!
We are a mid table team .We will remain no more than that unless we not just upgrade some players but critically get a bigger squad .Nuno’s legacy on that lives on .
Poor from Hoever at the death as he messed up rushing forward and then losing the ball but these top teams spot a weak link and exploit it .
Defence absolute fantastic but the offensive side is not near the best teams which will continue to haunt us .I hope Podence gets a chance in place of Hwang next week .Sadly Man City will do the same against us so not hopeful about any points from that game .
On the positive side it was a heroic rearguard action. The whole defence were excellent.
But let’s be honest, it was rather ugly. And anyone who says otherwise after the brickbats we threw at Burnley is hypocritical. We almost outBurnleyed Burnley. Personally I’d rather go down giving it a go than trying (and failing) to scratch a point with non football.
And again our desperate need to bring in fresh faces in Jan. and/or recall some old ones was illustrated by lack of any real ability to change it from the bench.
As for booing Jota – sad.
I agree with all your points. Liverpool exerted a stranglehold for much of the game and whilst I admired our desire to play out of the press, occasionally we had to resort to hoofing it. I thought we missed a fit Podence today, his clever use of minimal space might have provided openings. Very easy to adopt a ‘holier than thou ‘ attitude towards Burnley, as most of us do, but when you play a superior, technical team at the top of their game, you can only do your best as we did today. Liverpool fans were delighted our time wasting ultimately did not pay- how often does it come back to bite you. We will need the same levels of application against City but hope springs eternal.
Yes, those drongo’s, mainly in the south bank, should be ashamed of themselves for the booing.
The booing of what?
Kota.
I mean Jota!
Duh!
Excellent summation of today’s events, Thomas.
Thanks Hertford, much appreciated mate.
Can’t add anything that has not already been said………. Oh, apart from I hate scousers.
They’re not all bad Marnhull. That Conor Coady seems like a smashing fella.
Connor Coady isn’t a scouser – He is from St helens. They call them “wools” up here.
Fair point Wolf 🙂
However the rest if them…..
Disappointed our hard work didn’t get us a point. Cody was a trooper, and all that talk of us being a walk over clearly wrong. Great effort.
Can someone explain to me why we were booing jotta? It seems a little harsh to reward everything he did for the club with a response like that. I was a bit embarrassed.
CW
Only the lunatic fringe were booing Jota – those with an IQ <80.
And it was very much a minority.
It was rather loud,so a fairly large minority!
True SP, so we have quite a lot of fans with IQ<80, but fortunately still very much a minority unlike our opponents yesterday.
Jota’s heart is, subconsciously, still at Wolves. Missing an open goal chance like that :=)))
Was nice to see those hard working, affable, friendly, mild mannered, humble “fans” in the away end stealing our seats.
A class act if ever there was one.
Make sure they are nailed down at Anfield for the last game of the season, chaps, as we will win up there to prevent you winning the league.
Contrary to most observers, I thought we deserved a point.
Yes they had more chances than us, but they were only half chances, except one, and they didn’t take them.
Loffed me edd off when Jota had a brain fart, although I don’t agree with the booing he got.
I was thoroughly entertained, and felt we deserved a point.
Still, as I’ve said many times, the record books will only show the score, not the hard luck story.
Five games this season we have shown our finest qualities, and only beat West Ham.
Our luck will change, Bruno will get some support from upstairs, and we will all be happy bunnies.
Onwards and upwards, never fear, and keep the faith boys and girls.
And I’m sober.
We were at our finest when we beat Everton. Albeit only for the first half.
From a defensive point of view we were brilliant. We kept Salah and Mane, two of the best attackers in the world, quiet for most of the game. It was disappointing to see us offer no threat at all. Of course the caliber of the opposition needs to be taken into account but there was nothing there. We were always unlikely to score in this game but I think that’s one goal in five games which is an embarrassing return.
It was frustrating we were unable to really utilise Traore. The reason he was on the pitch was to try and stretch them on the break, particularly as their full backs play more like attackers. In fairness, I thought Thiago did a brilliant job on him and whenever the ball came near Traore there were players swarming all over him. But we really should have made more use of him.
Hoever had a brain fart losing the ball upfield but the touch from Salah for the goal was magnificent. That sort of ability really is the difference. Gut wrenching, hard to take, but we can’t really argue with the result. More pain to come in the next few weeks I expect.
There is some heart to be taken from the fact we were the first team in a long time to stop them scoring twice. Defensively, we’re rock solid. If we could only sort the other end out we’d be a hell of a team.
Re. the comments (on here and elsewhere) about the booing of Jota, I absolutely loved him when he was with us, not the biggest, but strong as an ox, spiky, with real quality and goals to boot, was my fave player in the early days.
Then he left us, fair enough, but from what I can remember of his interview after his first game back at the Mol for Liverpool (albeit with no crowd), when asked about being back at the Mol for the first time, the gist was something along the lines of “I was here, but not any more, end of”, or something like that
That then reminded me of one of his first interviews when he first signed for us when he was questioned about the number of games in the Championship, to which his response was something along the lines of “the more games I play, the more chance there is of someone seeing what I’m capable of”.
I get players are ambitious, and I didn’t begrudge Jota his move, but, even if he didn’t mean it (and most players probably don’t when they talk about ex-clubs), it would have been nice if he’d at least acknowledged he had some good times with us but times move on.
If he had’ve done, I’d have clapped him off today, but he didn’t, and that’s why I booed him off.
I’m not sober.
Cue the barrage…
You booed him cos he didn’t give us a goodbye hug…….
He seems nonplussed about his time with us, so he doesn’t get the Robbie Keane treatment from me.
Question: Would we have conceded that goal if the superb Ait-Nouri, who had one of the best strikers in World football so securely in his pocket, had remained on the pitch?
Question: Given that his very presence on the pitch ensured that although Liverpool were desperate for a goal they couldn’t commit entirely to attack, should Bruno have substituted him and brought Trincao on with just a few minutes left?
Question: Did our magnificent defence deserve to suffer such a painful defeat?
Question: Is our attack good enough to score enough goals to win us enough matches to secure a position in the top echelon of the Premier League?
Unfortunately there’s one answer to all these questions.
But did our team put up a performance to make us proud to be Wolves supporters, and does it make us think that when we put our minds to it, even with our small squad and lack of meaningful recruitment, we can compete with the biggest spending and best sides in football?
I think we all know the answer to that.
And as far as Jota being booed is concerned, yes there were boos, a bit like you boo the villain in a Christmas pantomime, but when he was subbed, he was applauded off by Wolves fans and the South Bank even chanted his name.
Lucky we’ve got a guaranteed 3 points at PerryboyCity coming up.
Anyone who puts their bollox on the line for his team gets a salute from InI. We didn’t get a look in tho so can’t feel hard done by. Ait Nori deserves a medal. Traore – just being on the pitch is enough to make teams jumpy. What happened to Raul?
You’ve got to feel for the youth Ki – Jana, and symetrically weird that we got him in the Jota deal. Bet he was chuffed to be leaving Scoustopia.
Thanks Jota for playing like a Hobbit for a change.
Toothy, you could show a bit of class on the touchline when your team scrape a win, instead of jumping around like a demented German Tooth Toad on acid.
1 lv & COYW.
Just had a message from a Mr K. Dodd of Diddy Dental Insurance, Knotty Ash:
‘We have had to downgrade Mr Klopps cover to 3rd party only. This is due to wreckless brandishing of the insured teeth in a hostile environment in a manner likely to cause damage to the insured. Namely jumping around like a demented German Tooth Toad on acid.’
You heard it here first folks. 1 lv.
Can’t really add anything to what the Doogooder has commented except where do the premier league find these bloody refs and how much is in the brown envelopes they get for favouring the so called “Big 6”.
5 minutes added time my arse it should have been a absolute max of 3 imo, but still never mind it only cost little Wolve points so who cares. It bloody stinks to the list of Dean, Atwell, Mariner add Kavanagh . All very dubious
Come off it Tipton, we were doing a pretty good impression of Brentfordesque timewasting, never mind the genuine injuries and the substitutions. I was anticipating more to be honest.
Toothless in attack but immense in defence. With Podence and Neto to come back so the cupboard is not bare. Its unlikely that we’ll bring anyone of any significance in during Jan cos of inflated prices. We got Jose on lian last season so nuff said although on paper he looked far better than it turned out. We lack an attacking midfielder and MGW is pulling up trees up in Sheffield. Two assists and a goal yesterday. We need to be careful he doesn’t do a Rafa. We can take heart from that performance though, Liverpool have been taking teams apart for fun and they didn’t do that to us by any means and got lucky with the RAN subbing. Glass half full for me.
Not sure why that ended up on your thread tipton
I do think it was ultimately dropping two home points to Burnley mid-week that governed our approach in this game. 3 points earned then, which should have been pretty much a banker, and Liverpool would have been a free hit.
As it was we played with the shackles on and let Liverpool come onto us far too much. Their defenders enjoyed far too much time and space to pick a pass and put us under pressure.
Some great do or die heroics, but at the end of the day a piece of sloppiness cost us a good home draw against a team who score and win at will.
I don’t like to see us play like this to be honest, but it’s pragmatic and necessary I guess because as Bruno keeps banging on it’s points we need in a tough December and January.
If Fosun are not going to buy in the January sales, then I guess w’ell have to pull MGW, Giles and Sanderson back from what are fruitful loans. MGW’s goal for the Blades yesterday was a beauty.
But they will need to play games for us because we can’t continue with this goal drought, we really do need some fresh impetus up front and in midfield.
Our DNA dictates a last minute give away.. how many times have we seen this..?
Terrible sight on match of the day
– It just shouldn’t happen..
We did enough to hold our head up
and frustrate Klopp which we did brilliantly and then……..
We were IMO so unlucky to concede that goal… and I agree with the time added on of 5 mins being outrageous…. The question I have is .. what’s the rules on giving offsides…?
My take.. is that the passage of play has to end before the linesman indicates an offside.
Can someone tell me then … the linesman tracking Wolves’ back line follows this… let’s play continue etc … BUT the linesman tracking Liverpool’s back line (our attackers) had his flag up the second the ball was forward passed … faster than a Grand Prix safety marshall.
The reason for raising this is that the clock ticks on when play is allowed to continue and ultimately stops in the first instance.
The 2nd instance favoured Liverpool as ball in play time was increased.
In summary the little jerk running the line on the BW stand second half has jiffed us. At least 2/3 minutes have been taken away from us…
Air Nouri … what a MOTM performance.. undeserving to be on the losing side.
Great evening later on though… thanks to Dougie, the DOOGooders, Brompton, Wolfstroker and the ladies.
This is going to be boring but I basically agree with everyone!
I think everyone played to the top of their abilities although Raul needs to play further up the field.
I also agree that the wingbacks had their best game this season if not ever and the three centre backs were superb.
You could see the goal coming for a good while.
It’s no use pretending we’re as good as Liverpool because we’re not but I’m still very proud of the performance if not somewhat frustrated by the result.
Spot on summary Prawny 🙂
Must agree with all that’s been said. Horrible feeling leaving the ground into that driving rain but we need to move on and hope that after our heroic display yesterday we have enough left in the tank for our trip to City. Increasingly obvious that the £35m spent on Silva should have been spent elsewhere.
I saw a lady in the Novotel with a Wolves shirt on which had Fabio Silva on the back of it…
I can only think she must have won it in a raffle….
Remember he’s still only 19 so don’t write him off just yet.
We also have a number of players out on loan who are considerably older than him and still considered prospects.
Prawny … I would love him to be a fantastic success for us…
My only nagging doubt is that what I’ve seen of him from his beginnings with Wolves to where he is now is that it was a lot of money and value for money was low…
I truly hope he fulfils the potential ….
Can’t see how people write Silva off.
Last season he did ok given that he was usually paired with the useless Willian and still managed a few goals and this season has had no game time.
Giving up on him at 19 is ridiculous.
.
I gotta last year away shirt with Fabio Silva on it.
I still think he’s gonna come good.
So there!
Agree with you Cloive
Too soon to judge the lad.
Bruno doesn’t appear to have any confidence in him. How can you have a striker on the bench that he won’t use? Could have been an opportunity for a striker to come on yesterday. Someone who can at least hold the ball up front. Alas not this lad
TOFFEE HAMMER !!!!!
KLOPPS TEETH !!!!!
Positives first. Defensively we kept Liverpools attack quiet. Ait Nouri did a brilliant job on Salah. Jose saved us a few times.
But……no clear cut chances. Allison only made one save. We gave the ball away far too easily in the first half. Our bench is not strong enough. Why didn’t we settle for a point and run the clock down in stoppage time?
Just watched 2nd half on Sky. In the last 10 minutes Jimenez slips Roberson for a run in towards goal. Robertson simply stops and raises his arm and linesman accordingly raises flag. Guess what on tv rerun Jimenez is ON SIDE. Jimenez also shoved in to the boards by Mane – play on and 3 crude tackles on Adama but two yellows given with the third obvious yellow missed. It never is a level playing field against these clubs is it? Kavanagh was very weak yesterday and easily intimidated – especially by Henderson.
Definitely agree on everything you say…. That linesman’s flag went up quicker than the Apollo 13 rocket….
And ask Tom Hanks what happened to the Apollo 13 mission then……………
Q: What do you call a gathering of ageing Wolves Bloggers?
A: Anything you like. They’re all too pissed to notice.
A meal and a few beers with some good mates on Saturday night, helped banish the Liverpool blues.
Or should that be reds?
(Photo courtesy of PMDG’erpics).
If ever there was a definitive picture of a Rogues Gallery, this is it!!
Only one rogue missing……………….
Yeah, Matt couldn’t make it.
So my Californian magic dust worked on Jota But I missed the swapping in of a right back Hoever for a left back position… Sorry my fault
But
Why did he trip over when he had the ball in the Liverpool half ?
I get that Salah is unstoppable but Ait Nouri was a giant before he went off
Ah well
Brilliant time at Molineux
Best singing and sound Ive heard
Great to catch up with Doogooder Brompton and Wolfstroker
OODCL
Back in May!!
Yes I think the ref was generous and lenient in waving play on when there were clear and obvious fouls. The puzzle was more to do with linesman flagging immediately when they spotted an offside player, this was how it used to be and broadly acceptable to players and fans even if very occasionally it was wrong.
So in games we’ve seen at Molineux and on TV, linesman have allowed blatantly offside players to continue until there is a natural break in play, by which time players have made last ditch tackles and got hurt in the process. Inconsistent or what?
So yesterday, Liverpool were seriously well drilled and machine like and will give certain teams a complete battering during the season, they are a level above 17 other Premier League teams and all but 2 0r 3 in Europe, it looked like they had more players on the pitch and at times passed to team mates without looking, they had extra artillery on the bench and by 80 minutes had a 2-3-5 formation on the pitch.
Scapegoating Hoever for allowing arguably the best player in the world a yard of space is pointless, likewise criticising Raul for a quiet game is insulting . Every man jack in a gold shirt gave 100% for 95minutes , a defensive masterclass apart from one split second . I’m not a good loser and sometimes it’s Sunday till I’m calm again but I actually walked away from the ground feeling disappointed but also quite proud.
Will any player keep Mane quiet like Max Kilman did?, Has Ait-Nourri finally won our approval ? Hope you are praying like me that Connor Coady isn’t injured and unavailable any time soon . All three were immense yesterday with Saiss not far behind.
One of us was talking to WM radio afterwards and his comment hit the nail on the head. We are so close to being seriously good , how do we know if Fosun are watching , listening and prepared to do something about it?
Good to see you too mate.
And lovely to meet Marin Junior again and the new Lady Marin.
See you all again in May.
Good to see you, your good lady and your lad in APV my friend. Looking forward to a longer natter in May. Hope your journey back was/is uneventful.
Some serious dickheads on Molineux Mix. Saying we were hopeless and should have lost 4-0. Ok. So we didn’t do much up front but that is just the nature of what you are up against. I thought there was some heroic defending which is just as much part of the game as scoring goals. I thought we were gonna get the point we deserved. Gutted at the end.
Before the season started, those looking at our squad would say sparkling attack and iffy defence.
We’ve turned that completely on its head.
The heroics of our three centre backs and two excellent wing backs kept the nation’s most feared forward line in check for 94 breathless minutes. They played absolutely for the shirt and we watching fans. That last minute Liverpool reprieve does nothing to lesson the immense pride I feel in our team today.
Thanks to West Parkian for arranging some delicious nosh to accompany the convivial chit chat between bloggers on Saturday night. Also especially good to bump into Marin and family pre match.
I think we can all agree that, for the most part, Paul Merson is a twat, but he might just have come up with his first good idea.
Deli Ali to Wolves.
I always rated him, ( not Merson!) several years ago, and as the old saying goes, loss of form is temporary, but class is pernament, or something like that.
I feel, like Kane, he needs a move away from North London, and his career rebooting.
He couldn’t even get a sub’s appearance yesterday against Norwich.
Possibly a loan appointee next month, to see if he can fill the attacking midfield role we so desperately need?
Thoughts, Children of the Blog??
You’ve had much worse ideas mate.
He definitely needs his career rebooting. Which would probably involve his backside rebooting too.
But Bruno might be the man to do it.
Deli Ali is a very gifted player, but his loss of form is inexplicable. There are concerns about his attitude and certain disciplinary issues. If Bruno could unlock his potential for Wolves that would be awesome. A loan would have to come with an option to buy. No point in getting Ali performing again and then Spurs taking him back. Ali might go through his whole career achieving less than his talent warrants.
Fabio Silva seems to share the same flaws with Ali. Silva has been criticised for not warming up when it looked like he would come on as a sub against Burnley. His attitude in the Under 23s has been left wanting.
Talent alone is not enough. Players of lesser talent but more commitment can outperform gifted players.
That would be great if it happened.
I’m with Bruno, no departures and two or three quality additions. (Dreamland)
Loanees return and a fudge for Hwang. (Reality)
It’s the second time RAN has had cramp late on and had to go off and we have conceded due to cover playing out of position. Semedo had to play out of position at Leeds just before they equalised in added time. It’s not unusual to see players with cramp but it’s unusual to see players have to go off.
Just decided to look up what we achieved after 14 games since our first time in the Prem under Nuno and
where we sit under Bruno:
2018/19
W 4 D4 L6 F 13 A 17
Pos 11th
2019/20
W 4 D 7 L 2 F 19 A 17
Pos 6th
2020/21
W 6 D 2 L6 F 14 A 19
Pos 11th
Now
W 6 D 3 L 5 F 12 A 12
Pos 8th
So what can I get from that. Not a lot really apart from seeing that the ‘more of an attacking force under Bruno’ statement I am hearing is in fact not confirmed. We have scored less goals under Bruno than we did under Nuno at the same stage each season, but we have conceded less too. So, to me, based on that calculation, we are a more defensive side.
Thoughts?
I think the problem is that Bruno is playing with Nuno’s players, largely. Bought in to play the Nuno way. So really he’s making a pretty good fist of it.
Of course, we all want to see gung-how, up an’ at ’em football but we tried that in the first three games and look where that got us.
I feel it will take two years at least before we see the team perform the ‘Bruno way’. But I also feel that we are, bit by bit, improving.
Thanks Steve,
I do not consider it a problem though. I am quite happy with where we are and I am not trying to suggest that Nuno is/was better than Bruno (and I know you are not saying I was) I was just trying to see how we compared at this stage.
As Spikey says below, a comparison is only good if we played the same teams, but to be honest, each season a team is different than the previous season, but I get what he means if we played top teams as opposed to those with lesser quality.
I hear that statement a lot, that Bruno is working with Nuno’s players. Personally i don’t agree with it, firstly because we have needed additions from before the start of last season and secondly, players adapt to the new managers style if they’re good enough, with the possible exception if they are playing out of position. Teams don’t wholesale change when new managers come in, the spine of the side remains with a couple of additions if they start the job in the Summer. No such luck if they start mid-season.
We have already seen glimpses of what the team can do, Everton and West Ham games being prime examples of this. I don’t think we are that far off being a very good side.
The problem is though, can we hang on to our best players. The vultures will come circling in the Summer for sure.
I’d be interested to know who you think are Nuno players and who are not Wolfstroker?
I suppose quite literally really BHW. Those bought in before Bruno’s arrival.
Did you get back OK on Sunday mate?
I take it you were asking Steve. So, yeah thanks.
I did Mark, thanks. No stopping so no caffeine top up, but made it just the same.
Shiny new battery in her already.
Interesting stats but who had we played during that period compared to this one ?
Another stat id like a look at if I get time is how many Liverpool out balls are on the money and how many of our out balls are on the money because I think that’s one of their greatest assets and one of our biggest problems.
They have an uncanny knack of almost always finding their man and not just finding him but delivering it in such a way that it can be controlled and away they go defence into attack whereas we seem to have the right idea but lack the accuracy and delivery which leaves our three outstanding outfield men either heading it on …to no one ..or chasing a pretty hopeless loose ball which invariably gets intercepted.
We have the players up front in wang who is quick traore who is super quick and of course Raúl who is no slouch either but the balls delivered to them are usually hopelessly inaccurate too hard too high or too wide .
Now I don’t think Liverpool have supernatural players who can deliver a perfect ball with their eyes shut any more than we do so its just down to practice and when we get it right ( if Bruno sees it that way) our front three would be right up there with the best.
The little dink across the box to the player running in from the blind side is another of their tricks which we almost succumbed to on a couple of occasions but Bruno noticed that and semedo tightened up on Marne .
Wolves have almost all the attributes to become a real top team just a few players short and a few simple tactics short but I really feel we are getting there.
All in all I’m not too down about the result as i feel we can learn a lot from playing top teams like Liverpool whereas we learn little or nothing from a slog against the Burnley’s of this world .
Thanks mate. I like your views.
There are too many caveats to those stats at this stage in the season, 19 games in is the only time they hold any water when comparing managers.
I wasn’t comparing managers