The Midweek Maxi #1 – Klopp, Alonso, Núñez, Khéphren Thuram, Bellingham, Fair-Play & Much More
Our new Liverpool FC weekly compendium. News. Stats. Views. Debate. Links. Data. Insights. Delights.
New feature!
After years of giving away Free Friday, and making quite a lot of TTT articles free to read anyway (more so when the team is struggling and everyone is losing their shit, so more than usual this season), it's time to pull together the best aspects of Free Friday with even more Liverpool FC content.
Except this time, for paying subscribers only, albeit perhaps once a month it will be free-to-all. Paying subscribers are what fund this entire enterprise, and as we don't do ads, clickbait and create social media outrage, it needs people to pay for quality (if they think it's quality).
However, before the paywall will be the links to various TTT Network pieces, some of which (or parts of which) may be free, if you've missed any of our content. There are snippets from each article below. (The different TTT sites having separate subscriptions.)
The Midweek Maxi will generally appear on a Wednesday, unless there's a game; otherwise a Tuesday or a Thursday.
(My aim is to name as many things after Reds' fringe wingers from 2006-2010; so far I've got the ZenDen and the Midweek Maxi, but nothing so far with Yossi Benayoun, albeit Ryan Babel's surname could be used for wordplay on a series about pundits talking shit.)
The Midweek Maxi hive-minds the hell out of the TTT writing talent and the generally great commenting we've had on the site dating back to the old WordPress days beginning in 2009.
Note: the Maxi may exceed the email size limit on Substack, but the whole piece can be read online by paying subscribers.
TTT Network Roundup
Links and excerpts
TTT Main Hub
The primary analysis and article on the Main Hub this week was Paul’s in-depth look at the term ‘embarrassing’ being used in the football context, as well as various other common, hyper-critical bits of language used to describe players and performances.
In my quest to work out why so many football fans are increasingly unhinged, social media has always seemed to be the main driver, where outrage and hysteria puts pressure on clubs, players and many match-going fans, resulting in a negative feedback loop from (and to) hell.
It struck me that the language used by many pundits recently taps into the new dynamic. Yet being publicly shamed (as seen in the books and research of Jon Ronson and Brené Brown) is often felt as worse than physical pain.
…
The more we identify with something, the more our whole sense of identity and our ego can feel absolutely obliterated in moments of 'shame'.
We feel 'destroyed', as people look to destroy. We feel 'owned', as people in those moments seem to own us. It feels hideous. Defeat is a personal slight, a knife to the heart.
Yet victory is not enough.
This is the key: victory alone is never enough.
It needs to be a beautiful victory.
A lucky or undeserved victory feels hollow to many; the jibes will follow, that you should feel ashamed that your team was so lucky. And if you beat a team you should be beating anyway, so fucking what?! Losers!
(I saw Liverpool fans underneath an article moaning that Liverpool only beat Leeds and Nottingham Forest this past week or so, so it didn't really count. It's been a tough season, for sure; but if you can't be happy after a week with two wins and nine goals scored, why even bother? If you want to squeeze all the joy out of wins, what's the point?)
Indeed, a win needs to be perfect, flawless – and against an elite side or big rival – so no one can say a word.
Other articles included the West Ham preview and match thread, as well as the Bumper Post-Match analysis from last night.
Here’s a section of Andrew Beasley’s reaction to the away victory over the Hammers.
If you look at the xG for this match then it looks to be a fair score line and result. And it probably was, but it was something of a strange game that could have swung either way, particularly if VAR had not come to Liverpool’s rescue.
The Reds’ recent dominance of the ball continued, with 73 per cent possession here following the same figure at Leeds and 80 per cent against Nottingham Forest in between. As in the first half at Elland Road, it occasionally tipped into the ‘sterile domination’ category, with Jürgen Klopp’s men guilty of some very foolish shot choices tonight. Once again, they didn’t create loads in open play, relying on a set piece to claim the three points.
What will please the boss is that his side made more tackles and interceptions than West Ham, and matched them for ball recoveries (with what looks like 10 in the final third, based on the pitch map). To do that while taking effectively three quarters of the passes speaks to a team working, defending and pressing hard.
Yet some of the issues of the campaign remain, with the Hammers getting behind the back line a little too easily at times. As much as Trent Alexander-Arnold is playing well in his new position, it leaves opposing teams to attack Liverpool in the same way as they have for years, targeting the space down their right flank. Saïd Benrahma should’ve made far more of the opportunities he had in the first half.
The Zen Den
Paul’s focus on The ZenDen looked at the return to form for some of our peak-age players, and Gakpo further improved on his goals-to-xG after the piece was published.
Cody Gakpo continues to outscore his xG, and has been excellent as a false 9 so far, adapting to a new role with five goals and various lovely pieces of link play.
It's a role that requires experience, and he's younger than Roberto Firmino was when the Brazilian began his journey towards perfecting the art, aged 24.
But the biggest bonus has been Trent Alexander-Arnold, who has moved from moody, struggling right-back being constantly sprinted past and questioned (albeit still creating chances) to a free-roaming playmaker, with the options of Konaté and Gomez to cover the space he now purposefully vacates to move infield rather than upfield; but still also gets some crosses in from his old advanced wide position, as seen when zipping it across the goal for Gakpo to tap home at Leeds.
TAA feels reborn. From a world-class asset perhaps being lost to criticism and feeling jaded (and derided as England's 4th-best right-back), whose place in the team was under debate, he now has a spring in his step, and a few more touches of leadership.
He's literally more central to everything. Before he was either heavily involved (if the ball was on the right), or out of the game.
Now he's now got more space to play with: the central areas where he tries to get free, and then the wider areas, that he can time his runs into in more unexpected ways. I also can’t remember him having to do much running/marking of wingers since the shift.
Dynasty
On Dynasty we had the second instalment of a major new series looking at the dawn of Roy Evans’ tenure.
Originally a series of articles covering the period 1992 to Klopp’s arrival in 2017, it was written by TTT Subscriber Anthony Stanley, serialised on The Tomkins Times and then published by TTT as a book called A BANQUET WITHOUT WINE - A Quarter-Century of Liverpool FC in the Premier League Era.
To those who weren’t around for the coming of Fowler, it’s hard to describe just what it was that provoked such worship from Liverpool fans. Obviously his nerveless finishing and precocious ability was a big part of the draw, but there was so much more. Robbie was an icon, made for Liverpool fans; a squattish lad who didn’t appear like a natural athlete, who wasn’t particularly pacy, who – and even more so when footballers weren’t so removed from the fans – looked like one of us. Had this lad wandered on to the pitch from the stands? But then that left foot would swing and Anfield would erupt. Robbie scored goals from all over the pitch, a dizzying number, and this is perhaps encapsulated by his historic hat trick against Arsenal. Sometimes Robbie seemed bemused and self-deprecating (of the glut of goals against the Gunners he remarked: “I didn’t really know the goals came so quickly, I thought they were fifteen minutes apart”), and though there were some indiscretions looming in his future, if anything these merely added to his legend.
Evans was aware of what he had at his disposal in the Toxteth terrier: “The lad Fowler is obviously an immense talent, frightening,” he beamed.
The Transfer Hub
Mizgan’s deep dive this week was on a player I’ve been excited about for a well and would be a perfect fit for the Reds’ midfield, and that’s Khéphren Thuram.
[PT: and he’s 6’4”!]
Thuram has been one of the best in the league when it comes to progressive running, dribbling, winning of aerial duels and assists. His duel win rate is not bad as well. What this table does is encapsulate everything we discussed about him as a player attribute-wise.
Some Opta Analyst Numbers
I got some of the ball-carrying numbers from the Opta Analyst website to see where Thuram stands in the Ligue 1 against players of all positions (they have minimum 900 minutes as the condition) -
Carries per 90 - 21 (joint 12th in the league, joint 4th in Nice)
Total Chance-creating Carries - 26 (joint 14th in the league, top in Nice)
Total Key-pass ending Carries - 14 (joint 11th in the league, top in Nice)
Yep, as expected, the 22-year-old shines high in these carry numbers. For a midfielder, those are exceptional returns.
This Red Planet
It was a free chapter from the book of the same name, and arguably my favourite because of the variety of contributions from lots of TTT stalwarts and legends.
Alan in Australia
About 18 months ago my marriage ended suddenly and, thus far at least, acrimoniously. One thing has kept me sane during the past 18 months: my subscription to TTT. Not only does it provide easy access to intelligent, cogent and respectful discussion of all things LFC, but it has also provided a bridge back to human engagement, from which I temporarily withdrew. It’s only about three months since I recovered the ability to eat and crap regularly. The previous 15 months I found myself so miserable I couldn’t consume much food at all, and when I did I’d usually vomit. (All of this aged 55, eek!)
Happily my resumption of eating, currently two healthy meals per day plus regular bowel movements, has led to a subsequent recovery of my sanity, by and large. I’ve managed to engage with Family Court processes, and hopefully will soon regain access to my two children, now 11 and nine. (I’ve even managed to type this with a wry smile rather than sobbing! A major achievement.)
Sadly I suspect my 18-year marriage is over, much to my regret, but hopefully we will recover the ability to co-parent sooner rather than later, notwithstanding the intrinsic adversarial nature of Western Australian family law processes.
These past year or two, I’ve taken an enormous amount of strength and solace from TTT. Primarily it’s your writing which appeals to me, whether it be football analysis, discussion of the insidious impacts of confirmation bias (my own as well as others’), the wonderful Jeff’s posts on all and sundry (particularly anything about Dallas, who has become my substitute pet), the sweet reason of Nari Singh, the self-deprecating humour of Krishaldo – I could go on for ever.
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