Opinion: Southampton - Liverpool 3-2 /Premier League /20-3-2016

At st Mary’s stadium Liverpool gave away a two nil lead, suffering three goals after the break. 

The introduction of Martin Skrtel coming on for, already booked, Dejan Lovren played a major role for the defeat, as the Slovakian was horrendous for his first 45 minutes back in the senior team after injury. Minutes into the second half he gave away a typical of him -shirt pulling- penalty, which thankfully for the defender, Simon Mignolet was able to catch. However he lost all of his aerial duels; he didn’t make a single tackle and overall he was abysmal. However, although nobody can defend Skrtel, we should remember that it was his first game after a long spell out due to injury. Hence, we shouldn’t bash on him and blame him for the loss.

Another player who received a lot of stick was Christian Benteke. Coming on for Sturridge, the Belgian wasn’t able to produce anything attacking wise, while he tossed away a glorious chance to put Liverpool back in front by two goals. It was yet another horrendous miss for the striker who cost Liverpool 32 million pounds.

However the blame doesn’t fall just for those two players. In fact the whole Liverpool team didn’t show up in that second half. Jon Flanagan, as a skipper, made a lot of mistakes and couldn’t carry the team on his back after Sadio Manè put Southampton back in the game. The whole team didn’t show any desire and took the game for granted. Jurgen Klopp is another man to blame for this performance in the second half. His substitutions didn’t make any impact, whatsoever, and moreover cost Liverpool the game.

Now the Reds have once more to pick their pieces up as important games are ahead. Firstly Liverpool host Tottenham at Anfield next Saturday and after this comes the first leg with Borrusia Dortmund for the Europa League quarter finals.

Stay tuned for the tactical analysis for all the details about this shambolic Liverpool performance in the second half.