da dobrowin： Liverpool midfielder Lucas Leiva has endured a stop-start campaign on his return to first-team action this season under Brendan Rodgers, struggling for both form and full fitness, which is why one of the club’s top transfer priorities in the summer should be a new holding midfielder.
da fazobetai： This is not a call for the Brazilian to be banished from selection, for he is an excellent option to have in your squad, and will quite rightly play, fitness permitting, at least 25 or more league games every season, but considering the anterior cruciate ligament injury suffered last season and the thigh problem picked up earlier on in the campaign, it was harsh to expect so much of him and Rodgers may come to regret relying on him in the way he has done at Anfield this year.
The 26-year-old was always destined to have an up and down season simply because he’s spent so much time on the injury table in the past 18 months, all while trying to get to grips with a new manager, a new system and a new style of play from the side he left under Kenny Dalglish. Having another player within the ranks to step in when he needed a rest would have done his confidence wonders and he wouldn’t have to play while so obviously out of form.
Rodgers stated in an interview with the Liverpool Echo last month with regards to Lucas: “I’ve been delighted with Lucas. We were very wary of the fact he had had a serious knee injury last season, and then obviously another problem on top of that this season. It was important for the team to get him back, but it was important for him that we did so at the right pace and that we paced his recovery right.
“It is a big credit to him as a professional. He has worked so hard, and his attitude and his application has been first class. He deserves every praise for the way he has conducted himself. I still believe, having worked with these kind of injuries in the past, that it won’t be until the summer, and beyond even, that we see him back at full level. It will be great for him to get a full pre-season with the group under his belt, but you can see in recent games that his mobility and the speed of his game is getting better and better all the time.”
To say Rodgers has handled Lucas poorly would be something of an understatement, though, despite talking the talk above. He was thrown back into action too early after returning slightly ahead of schedule from his three-month lay-off with a thigh strain so that the manager’s protégé Joe Allen could be pushed further forward; a player also enduring a difficult campaign from a personal perspective in his debut year at Anfield.
The Welshman enjoyed a bright start to life on Merseyside, but once Lucas was injured, he was pushed deeper into a screening role just in front of the back four and his form collapsed, after he simply struggled to come to terms with the physical nature of the position. It has since been revealed that he’s been playing with a shoulder injury which has required surgery for a number of months. That’s not fantastic management and a pattern has quickly emerged.
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The 40-year-old’s predecessor Kenny Dalglish was clearly mindful of the need to add cover to the squad over the summer and had reportedly earmarked West Ham enforcer Mohamed Diame to fill the role. Instead, Dalglish was sacked, Diame moved to West Ham and Rodgers pursued a player he was familiar with as some sort of tactical comfort blanket in signing Allen from Swansea. The squad was left without cover after the admittedly limited Jay Spearing was sent out on loan to Bolton for the season and Lucas was left holding down the fort all on his own, bereft of any back-up precisely during a period when he needed it above all else.
Expectations about the Brazil international’s return at the start of the season were high because he was truly outstanding prior to his knee injury. He was hailed as the missing ingredient and one of the main reasons for the club’s indifferent league form under Dalglish towards the back end of last season, but his return shows there is no quick fix regarding the muddled midfield policy on show this term. He can be a key component in the future and he still represents one of the best holding men in the top flight, but he needs help.
Against Southampton, Lucas was guilty of letting Jay Rodriguez drive right at the heart of the midfield and into the box before scoring with a simple tap-in on the rebound. On Sunday away at Aston Villa, he made just 79% of his passes in the middle of the park and looked sluggish on the ball and slow in the tackle after making six fouls. However, it’s difficult to say the blame rests on him, he is trying his best without being at his best and the results and his performances are beyond his control.
The blame rests with Rodgers and the fact that when it comes to the balance of the side and the overall shape of the squad, he’s got it seriously wrong at times. It’s clear to everyone at the moment Liverpool’s best midfield triumvirate is Lucas, captain Steven Gerrard and the energetic Jordan Henderson, who has really come into his own the past few months, but they haven’t played enough together across the campaign, with an out-of-form Allen often preferred, an out-of-position Nuri Sahin occasionally selected and the exciting Jonjo Shelvey also in the mix, before subsequently being marginalised after the festive period.
Rodgers may talk a good game about dominating possession and controlling the midfield, but there have not been many games this season where that has been the case and the gaps between the back four and midfield have at times been huge. On the one hand, that’s to be expected with a relatively new manager trying to impose his own philosophy on them, but it hardly speaks volumes for his communicative skills and something is clearly being lost in translation.
Whether it’s 4-2-3-1 or 4-1-2-3-1, the club have developed a soft underbelly and are liable to panic when they come up against teams that either play a physical style or press high up the pitch. Inverting to two holding men may not be the answer, but the link between the back four and the midfield has clearly left them exposed at times, resulting in some truly inconsistent defensive performances, with Daniel Agger and Martin Skrtel both suffering through their worst seasons at Liverpool. It’s all linked together and like a domino effect, when one wobbles and falls over, they repercussions are huge.
Addressing the imbalance in midfield is important to the overall cohesiveness of the side, and given that possession is a supposed area of expertise for Rodgers, his handling of Lucas’ fitness and the way he’s at times looked lost in the middle of the park hardly reflects well on him. More depth is required and while major surgery is the top priority at the back, Lucas needs to be supplemented with another player similar to him in the summer, otherwise the club will continue to display a somewhat Jekyll and Hyde nature from week to week.
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