Our comeback against Wolves came in a large part due to a tactical change of replacing MacAllister at #6 with a double-pivot of Szoboszlai and Jones, which allowed us to crowd the attacking spaces with 4 forwards and quickly turned the game around. This got me thinking – could a 4-4-2 or a 4-2-2-2 system be viable from the start?
Let's imagine a double pivot of consisting of Szoboszlai and either Gravenberch or MacAllister (with Trent or Bajcetic drifting in from RB to add another screener against counter-attacks). This would allow Klopp to field 4 forwards with Gakpo or Jota playing off Nunez in the middle and Salah and Diaz creating from the wings (Elliott would be part of this attacking mix too). As I said before, I would love to see Diaz cut or drift inside as much as possible, which means a LB – probably Robbo – would also need to be actively shuffling forward. Against a deep defending team, this would result in something like this structure:
---------Gakpo/Jota-----Nunez------------
-----Diaz------------------------------Salah-
Robbo----Gravy/Mac--Szobo---Trent--
--------------Van Dijk------Konate---------
The advantage of a Szobo/Gravy partnership in midfield will be that they are both powerful and athletic runners and thus could be counted on to track back when needed to snuff out a counter-attack (remains to be seen with Gravenberch if he will be diligent enough to do that on a regular basis, but this is exactly what Klopp will be working on with him). So if one of the full-backs stays "home" while the other attacks, we will rarely be outnumbered at the back whenever the opposition tires to counter and the whole system resembles the way Man City now defend, only with more speed in the middle. Who needs a #6 anyway? 🙂 (With Macca or Endo or even Thiago in this position instead of Gravenberch, there would be less mobility, so that would mean they mostly sit and Szobo is the one who gets to roam – that could also work in many games.)
Frankly, I don't see any huge downsides with this formation. Having an extra attacker from the start will force more teams to defend deep and we could see some additional chemistry developing between Gakpo/Jota/Diaz and Nunez which will help everyone. The job of snuffing out opposition counters will be more of a collective affair, as it should be, rather than relying on one superman DM to clean up everything. I like having Bajcetic as a defensive back-up to Trent; having him or Gomez as a defensive option would help shore up our right flank if we're having too much trouble there – but plan A is to force the opposition to retreat into a defensive crouch because our attacking threats are just too powerful to ignore.
