It’s only pre-season, but another hugely encouraging performance (and result) as Liverpool beat Man United in the wet and warm conditions in South Carolina.
Liverpool 3-0 Man United
Pre-season friendly (3)
Williams-Brice Stadium; Columbia, South Carolina
August 3, 2024
Goals: Carvalho 10′, Jones 36′, Tsimikas 61′
1. Playing out from the back
The teething troubles remained early in the first half and we put ourselves under quite a bit of avoidable pressure.
Then, just when you wonder why we’re doing it, it all clicks, we move through the gears and create overloads in the final third. Two goals against Arsenal two more in the first half here against United.
The general feeling is that it will take some time to perfect, especially with some of our senior defenders and midfielders still to return and play a ‘new’ system – but will it? With even more experienced players playing this system maybe the learning curve actually becomes less steep.
On the returning players, Slot said post-match: “It’s interesting to see how these players fit into the team and implement them as soon as we can.”
That second friendly next Sunday against Las Palmas could prove very interesting.
2. Mo Salah, captain and creator
It was a feature of Mo’s game last season and looks set to continue this.
Of course, he will still be a major source of goals, but his ability to find space in behind and then pick the right pass is sublime.
It would be right to expect Mo to be right up there in the ‘assists’ column this season, as well as the goals scored column.
He’s actually registered double figures for assists in the Premier League in five of his seven seasons at Anfield, which is truly impressive.
Overall he has 87 assists for the Reds, expect him to hit the 100 milestone this season – only six players in the club’s history have achieved that before.
3. Carvalho stakes a claim
Two goals in two games against Arsenal and Man United is tremendous for Fabio Carvalho. The 21-year-old will be gaining immense confidence rubbing shoulders with Salah and Diogo Jota and ‘outscoring’ them in preseason.
But it’s not just been his finishing. His overall game has shown very positive signs of a player more ready for this level of football than ever before.
With the likes of Darwin Nunez, Luis Diaza and Cody Gakpo still to return, game time for Carvalho will likely become much more limited – but how exciting is it to see another of our technical, gifted youngsters making a case for more first team starts.
The Reds’ best player according to FotMob‘s stats, Slot’s identification of his ‘best’ role being on the left could be an interesting development this season.
4. Kelleher the keeper we must keep
Caoimhin Kelleher has to make the talking points after that display. He was perfect in every way and United could have played until Tuesday and not found a way past him.
His superb form over the course of last season and this preseason has elevated him to top class.
Against United he made four saves in the first half and had a 100% pass completion. Worth mentioning that his replacement, Vitezslav Jaros, also looked impressive in the second half.
It will be a huge shame if we have to lose Kelleher to first team football elsewhere, but he really is now too good to be considered only a back-up keeper.
Hopefully he stays and we have the ‘problem’ of having two of the best keepers in the league vying for the shirt.
5. A VERY productive and impressive tour
Three games, three wins, six goals scored, one conceded – it makes for fantastic reading, especially when two of those teams are Arsenal and United.
And yet each game and performance have seen many different attributes on show. Speed of transition, intricate football, organisation, discipline, dogged defending, efficient finishing, superb goalkeeping.
It’s been a mixed bag of tactical performances with each ending with the same result – a win!
All of this achieved of course, without a host of first team, world-class regulars – and seemingly without picking up any injuries.
This, by the way, was the team that played the latter half of the United game: Jaros; Bradley, Van den Berg, Phillips, Chambers; Bajcetic, Morton, Endo; Doak, Blair, Nyoni.
It’s often said, don’t read too much in to preseason, but three wins and a +5 goal difference looks and feels like a very positive start to Arne Slot’s reign.
