- Anfield Index

The Times’ David Walsh called Liverpool’s 5-1 deconstruction of Arsenal “their best performance of the season”. Liverpool barely pushed themselves. This was a clinical, ruthless and efficient dismembering of Arsenal, and precisely why Pep Guardiola said Liverpool are "the best team in the world right now". To thoroughly outplay Arsenal, score five goals, and create opportunities for at least two more, are doing so without breaking a sweat, and while needlessly opening up space for Arsenal to exploit was intimidatingly …

If I were asked to sum up the Liverpool victory over Huddersfield, there's one term which would immediately spring to mind: game management. Quite often, football games aren't decided by tactics, errors, luck and the like all come into play from time to time, and usually, it's Liverpool making errors where they should not be doing so which costs them. For this game, however, Liverpool did not fall back into the same costly traps which we've seen many a time, …

The previous episode of this accidental series on Liverpool’s tactics and tribulations, ended with thought that Liverpool’s season should be judged after 38 games. And what a 38th game it was… The defeat at Stoke was one of the worst games in memory, but was only one part of an uninspiring season from Rodgers’ Reds. European frailty, the manager’s strengths and weaknesses, poor recruitment, good recruitment, and tactical changes have all been discussed in the previous two installments, which can …

A fantastic result at home, matched by a superb performance that could and should have been rewarded with more goals. Game plan One of the main changes Rodgers made in this match was to shift his focus to an area of the pitch he has often left open this season - midfield. Rodgers, significantly in certain games, has often left this area relatively uncontrolled. Much of this is tactical; the reflex reaction of the backline is often to drop rather …

Well it's international break so unfortunately there has been no club football to comment on from the weekend *groans*. Happily, what it does do is allow a bit of time to reflect on things from the last few weeks - in particular a couple of defensive issues. Under Brendan Rodgers' management, Liverpool have used a number of different shapes. Just eleven games into the league season, at least four basic formations have been used - 4-2-3-1, 3-4-1-2, 3-1-4-2 and 4-4-2. …

On Saturday, Arsenal became only the 2nd team next to Southampton to beat Liverpool in the league since February 11th this year. There will be varying opinions on the biggest attribute to these improvements, especially concerning which system of play will provide the most success. Many Liverpool FC associated writers and fans have spoken in recent months about the potential gains to be had by Brendan Rodgers through the utilisation of the 4-4-2 diamond formation. Rodgers has even mentioned it …