"Liverkusen": Alonso’s Leverkusen Destroy Bayern. Proof His Template Fits Liverpool’s Squad

Analysis of Liverpool's current squad and which players might best suit Alonso's system

Part One

Liverpool’s low-key win against Burnley, with ten players absent and a star player limping off at half-time (but where the Reds still led for most of the game), made the big match in the German league the more interesting watch this weekend.

It also led to more headlines about how Alonso was the man for Liverpool.

While I’ve written a few articles on the subject, I thought I’d take a look at things from a slightly different angle in this piece, once I’ve reestablished the case for Alonso.

I’ve no idea if Liverpool are officially thinking of approaching Alonso or have already done so. But in his own unique way he seems perfect.

Bob Paisley, Joe Fagan, Kenny Dalglish (first time) and Rafa Benítez were not larger than life personalities; yet all four sit alongside Jürgen Klopp on famous Koppite flags for what they won.

Dalglish was taciturn, terse, albeit also dryly witty; but in the late ‘80s he took Liverpool’s playing style to a new level, and won three titles and a double. Paisley was all about the gubbins and the doings and the whatnots, and may have struggled with the modern media. He followed Bill Shankly, the Reds’ previous “impossible to follow” manager, and the Reds became champions of Europe for the first, second and third time, and won the league almost every year, from doing so once every now and then.

(There have been very few Shanklys and Klopps in football history, but Paisley was unique, too; as was what Dalglish achieved as a player-manager. There is no one model, other than the fan-manager relationship at Liverpool is perhaps like a no other club, albeit I’m not objective on this, obviously. As I keep saying, “fit” is everything, and that’s an ethos and a playing style, more than an exact tactical blueprint, which will change and evolve from season to season no matter who is boss.)

Alonso has an aura, a calmness – a collation of his uniquely impressive history as a player. And he has a brilliant football brain, born of that experience. I won’t repeat all the reasons why he’s such a good fit, but I’ve yet to find any negatives, just more positives.

Having watched Bayer Leverkusen’s game against Bayern Munich, after consuming various videos and articles on Xabi Alonso’s tactics, it continues to make sense to me. Some differences in details, but the same overall ethos.

I see a perfect squad to replicate his vision at Liverpool, only with more depth and mostly better players at the club leading the Premier League, to the one tearing up German football.

(Of course, the current Liverpool XI will be much better, as will the bench, when there aren’t 10 players absent and one hobbling off at half-time.)

I’ve never agreed with the notion that Liverpool’s football is that different from that other top clubs; that was true in 2017, but not so much now.

While there are differences, they are differences by degree, not by kind. More shorter passes, but the same overall ethos.

James Gheerbrant, in a Times’ article called “If Liverpool had any doubts about Xabi Alonso, they shouldn’t now”, wrote:

“There has been some thoughtful discussion about whether Alonso would mesh well with the squad at Liverpool, where the style is more direct and transitional than what he has established at Leverkusen. But that seems to underestimate his capacity to adjust, and, perhaps, to overestimate the importance of tactical fit. Players absorb known ideas, drummed-in patterns and principles, but there are also managers with the quality [Jonathan] Tah describes: that thing which makes you want to raise your game, shift the paradigm, meet them on their level. Alonso has this trait and, on the evidence so far, he is a coach of such rarity that if you have the chance to go out and get him, you really don’t think twice about it.”

On the scale of the win against Bayern, Raphael Honigstein wrote in the Athletic:

“Seeing the serial champions being outplayed on an occasion of such magnitude was barely believable. For 11 years running, they have always turned up when it matters against whoever was closest at the time, but their defeat at BayArena was reminiscent of the 5-2 hammering by Jürgen Klopp’s Borussia Dortmund in the 2012 DFB-Pokal final, the year before their hegemony started.

“In the league, you had to go back even further, to 2009’s 5-1 humiliation away to eventual champions Wolfsburg, to find a title bout this one-sided in their opponents’ favour.

“Tuchel could not have known that Xabi Alonso would opt for a different system, too, moving away from his wing-back-reliant game to a hybrid four/five-at-the-back with the much more defensively-minded Bayern-loanee Josip Stanisic in [Jeremie] Frimpong’s place.”

Alonso adjusted his tactics for this game, which shows he’s more than just a rinse-and-repeat manager.

And it worked wonders. But it’s more that it was the 27th win of their season, in just 31 games, with no defeats, that blows my mind.

Liverkusen

After the game on Saturday, I looked at the styles and compared attributes across the two squads, and everything Alonso would want, if offered and if accepting the job, is surely there.

I’m calling it Liverkusen (if someone else hasn’t already).

Jürgen Klopp, his staff and the back-office team has assembled and trained a brilliant, largely young and versatile squad, from the ruins of last season.

Indeed, as just one example, if you compare the player in the world most statically similar to Darwin Núñez via FBRefs it’s Victor Boniface, Leverkusen’s star 6’3” striker who Alonso signed in the summer, and if you look at the player most statistically similar to Victor Boniface it’s Darwin Núñez (albeit the latter is more likely to hit the woodwork, which is not included in the comparison).

You could also argue that, rather than be clones (no two players can ever be identical), the data shows that they are asked to do a similar job. In different teams, the players’ data would look different.

Boniface has been more clinical, and Núñez does better defensive work, but their charts are about as close to identical as you’ll ever see.

For all Leverkusen’s immense number of passes, the two strikers average c.22 touches each per game, and complete 70-71% of their own passes, which is the same as Erling Haaland. (Albeit Núñez has spent time on the wing as well.) Incidentally, Haaland does very little but score, which I why I think Man City play better without him, even if he is a freakishly good finisher.

Like Liverpool, Leverkusen can score from various areas. The idea that Liverpool “relied” on Mo Salah was ludicrous, as you always have other players; you don’t play with 10. But he’s still a great player, and an important member of the squad. It’s the same as if you sell someone like that – you then get the money to buy someone else, who may offer different qualities. No one is mentioning Liverpool missing Sadio Mané anymore.

(Where Salah would be missed would be if Diogo Jota, Núñez, Luis Díaz and Cody Gakpo were all injured too, especially as Ben Doak, the prodigy who plays in Salah’s position, is out for the season. As I said in early 2021, it wasn’t so much the injury to the imperious and important van Dijk four months earlier that hurt, given that the Reds remained top until December, as it was the subsequent injuries to Joe Gomez, Joël Matip and stand-in Fabinho, that meant no cover for anyone, and no players to rotate. Just like having Jordan Henderson as the centre-back at that point was understandable desperation but far from ideal, if Joe Gomez was the right-winger right now, Liverpool would not be as effective. However, if the choice is Jota, or Gakpo, there’s no alarming drop-off; and while they may be less effective in some ways, they do more pressing than Salah, as a compensatory measure.)

Liverpool have two midfielders on five open-play goals each, and have a whopping 62 from the front five; or 44 from the non-Salah four, who obviously have mostly played fewer minutes than Salah, who also takes penalties.

While Salah has 18 goals in all competitions, four more than Jota, he has scored five penalties, and essentially scored another as the only player close enough to turn home the rebound to his own penalty (another advantage to taking penalties!). Without the five penalties and the one rebound, Salah (12) has fewer open-play goals than Jota (14), but Salah has been creatively superb this season too.

Equally, Jota has still only played 75% as many minutes as Salah this season, even though Salah hasn’t really played in 2024. This digression is to point out that someone being out of the team is not necessarily a problem, and and present new opportunities and fresh dimensions to the play; but that you ideally want all your players fit to rotate and avoid further injuries.

Anyway, Leverkusen have no fewer than 11 players with five or more goals, and have scored 90 in all competitions and 52 in the league; Liverpool have scored 92, with 55 in the league. That seems like a similar emphasis, allied to a tight defence.

Again, passing distance seems an interesting thing to look at but odd thing to fixate on; Leverkusen are a match for Liverpool in attacking ethos and intent, and in outcomes.

While Jamie Carragher covered the shorter passing on Sky, it seemed like a needless diversion (a chance to show some fancy graphics) before he drew the correct conclusion and how Alonso would mix his styles:

“From the company Leverkusen are keeping, we can say that Alonso’s own influence is more like Pep Guardiola, which makes sense as he’s been his manager.

“But if Xabi Alonso was to become the Liverpool manager, I think he will, I feel Liverpool are quite fortunate that Jürgen Klopp‘s left at this time.”

I mean, if anyone is worried that the next Liverpool manager may have learnt a lot from Guardiola (and, as well as some earlier elite managers for their time, and also Carlo Ancelotti), then it’s hardly a reason for concern; it’s not like Alonso is a disciple of Roy Hodgson, and 1970s’ 4-fucking-4-2.

And – here’s the rub – it’s not like Leverkusen don’t pass long!

They’ve hit 1,188 long passes this season, which is still 56 per game; and, at 63.8%, have the best completion rate in Germany. Liverpool average 74 long passes per game, at a 56% completion rate. It’s not like it’s two or three times as many long passes by Liverpool to Leverkusen.

So we’re only talking one additional long pass by Liverpool every five minutes.

You can teach Trent Alexander-Arnold, Virgil van Dijk, Alexis Mac Allister, Dominik Szoboszlai, Thiago Alcântara (if he stays, albeit he already knows) and others to pass short and fast (and narrower on the pitch) within set specific patterns if that’s what you want – that’s what the training drills are there for – but you can’t teach ordinary players to have their kind of vision and range of passing.

You have to make use of their longer passing, but elite technicians like those guys can do shorter passing better than the average player, too. While sadly injury prone, Thiago personifies that, from his Barca days. It just means you can mix it up a bit more. You also make use of the faster transitions Liverpool have perfected, and things like how Núñez knows where to run when Alexander-Arnold has the ball.

It’s not like oil and water; just two different forms of oil.

If anything, the only concern with Alonso is that his team’s season is going so well (P31 W27 L0) that he won’t have the time or inclination to negotiate the move to Liverpool, that I think he would want.

That said, quite how these deals work, in their finest details, remains a mystery to me – other than backchannel chats occur during seasons all the time (for players and for managers, and even directors of football), and it’s rarely simple to resolve. Clearly the German club will be concerned about admitting anything publicly, for obvious reasons.

That said, I did take a few calls from John Henry over the early years of FSG reign, one of which was March 25th 2012, to talk about potential Directors of Football – albeit obviously not Kenny Dalglish’s future, as I was clearly not going to get involved in such talk; and at that point fully expected him to stay on, as someone who had pushed to have Kenny made caretaker in late 2010 to rid us of the horrors of Hodgeball.

I pointed out that I didn’t really know enough about the DoFs out there (that wasn’t my forte), and the talk, to me, was more about bringing someone in above Damien Comolli; and then Comolli was sacked the next month.

(I was also asked my opinion on Jordan Henderson, amongst others, and I said not to judge him out his output as a wide midfielder, as that was not his position – but he was learning and integrating, and was worth sticking with. As he was nearly sold for just £5m a few months later, it maybe fell on deaf ears! – but that may also have been down to Brendan Rodgers not initially wanting the future captain.)

As I wrote many years ago and have said over the years, as regular readers will know, the issue with Comolli that was made clear to me was that he didn’t communicate anything to FSG. But now Comolli himself finally admits it:

“And Comolli regrets not speaking the the Boston-based group more often as he may have remained in his post longer. He said: “You have to remind people you are doing a good job and you need to manage up. You need to constantly sell your project and keep the ownership on board. I was useless at it.”

It’s a far more honest assessment than saying he was sacked because he bought Jordan Henderson.

So all I can say is that I have some experience of the behind-the-scenes machinations, but this was over a decade ago, and I was happy to be taken out of the loop. (I did meet Mike Gordon at his request several years later, and various people at the club would email me from time to time, to chat football but not for me to have any input.)

But what’s happening now is just a case of me guessing.

Leverkusen (“Neverkusen”) have famously never won the league, and no team in Germany has ever been this good (at this point of a season). Their focus will be clear.

An 87% win rate for a season across all competitions with zero defeats is insane.

On Saturday, Bayern played like the team of cheaper recruits, Leverkusen like the one with all the expensive players. Harry Kane may have gone to Germany to yet again win nothing (albeit there’s a long way to go).

It would feel harsh trying to disrupt the Leverkusen flow, but as a Liverpool fan I just want things to be in place as soon as possible to ensure that Klopp’s departure – traumatic enough in itself – isn’t into a vacuum of uncertainty. And just because nothing is announced, doesn’t mean deals aren’t in place (nor that they are).

(And for anyone, sorting your future now, ahead of the summer, need not automatically be disrupting. Indeed, finalising it and then focusing purely on the job at hand can be better than uncertainty, for all concerned. But making that public is another issue entirely, just as Klopp telling the club in November did not come to light until recently, when the timing was better.)

I also just don’t see how you can leave planning the retention of players, new contracts, who to let go, new purchases and the Director of Football, amongst other things, until the summer; even if sorting these will not be easy.

(Incidentally, Tim Steidten, currently apparently frozen out of the loop by David Moyes at West Ham, brought Alonso and many of the players to Leverkusen, before becoming the Hammers’ technical director last summer. Steidten to Liverpool would make so much sense if tied to Alonso. But Moyes, said to be the reason Steidten is unhappy, hasn’t exactly enhanced his reputation or job prospects this week. Even so, Steidten would presumably rather be at Liverpool, if offered the DoF job, than at West Ham, regardless of Moyes. Again, this is just me speculating.)

The other worry – that another club (Bayern? Real Madrid? Barcelona?) – may want Alonso isn’t bothering me so much, as I think he’d choose the Liverpool long-term project over any of those chaotic pressure cookers. Real Madrid would have the next-biggest chance, but they have tied Ancelotti down to a new deal. Madrid are one of very few bigger clubs than Liverpool, but the Premier League is stronger, and the place to be. And he said he felt more at home on Merseyside than in Madrid.

Tactically, and in all other aspects, Alonso only increasingly strikes me as the right candidate (which doesn’t mean there aren’t other great managers out there.) Bayern was his biggest test so far, and he not only passed it, he passed it with flying colours in every regard.

He didn’t want his players to over-celebrate the wonderful third goal (why did Bayern send their keeper up in the last minute of stoppage time when 2-0 down? – there wouldn’t be time to get an equaliser even if they did score), but did take his entire, sizeable coaching staff to join the players in saluting the crowd.

He has real humility, and that’s a big plus.

Alonso and Liverkusen

In the current best Liverpool XI there's only one position where I think there’s not a total plug-and-play type of player Alonso uses (and the alternatives at Liverpool, while different, are still elite); and one other area in the Liverpool squad where I see a weakness, whoever the manager is.

And any new manager with common sense will adapt to the unique qualities found at each different club, and make a signing or two, at least, to help shape the side.

But I see a lot more that chimes with what I feel this Liverpool squad offers than I expected (even if this Liverpool squad is very modern and flexible). Indeed, some undervalued aspects that I wasn’t expecting to see in Leverkusen were there in spades when I looked in more detail. I'm even more onboard the Alonso train.

While I think any new Liverpool manager in 2024/25 may keep the same formation (4-3-3 or 3-box-3), I also had a go at fitting Liverpool's current squad into a Leverkusen-style setup, and seeing who fits in where, and how adaptable players can be.

In some ways, it’s a detailed analysis of the current squad.

Part Two

Of course, no team is ever a constant best XI, set in stone. The quality of players means some can cover various positions. But I’ll go through all that below, in the rest of this piece.

*The second half of this article is for paying TTT Main Hub subscribers only, in which I go through the players I think are most suited to Alonso’s football, and why. As I don’t like even logging on to social media anymore, please feel free to share article links on my behalf!*