Liverpool’s defeat also a lesson for Arsenal + Guardiola on fatigue

Morning all.

I watched last night’s Merseyside derby more in hope than expectation – after all, the last time Everton beat Liverpool at home was October 17th 2010, when a certain Mikel Arteta scored their second goal in a 2-0 win.

I don’t watch Liverpool enough to know if this was completely atypical of them, but they had 76% possession, took 23 shots to Everton’s 16, but never looked quite as dangerous as you would expect. Darwin Nunez missed a great chance in the first half, but beyond that there was a lot of stout defending (I don’t think I’ve ever seen as many stooping defensive headers in one game), and set-piece threat from Sean Dyche’s side.

I don’t need to go through the game, the result is what focus will be on this morning and where it leaves Liverpool in the title race. I don’t think they’re 100% out of it, but at this point of the season, the margin for error is really small. Jurgen Klopp said afterwards:

I can’t say now that we are still fully in it. We need a crisis at Man City and Arsenal and we need to win football games because if they start losing all their games and we do what we did tonight then nothing changes. We are not safe in the Champions League qualification as well so we should just play better football. That would be really good.

So, while it’s a good result for us, I think there’s a real need to just stay in our lane for the time being. It’s ok to be happy that a title rival lost a game, but I’m not counting any chickens just yet. Last night’s game demonstrated very clearly that in a local derby, you just never quite know what’s going to happen. Liverpool’s record against Everton has been far superior in terms of derbies won in recent times, but there have been plenty of draws and the occasional defeat.

When you consider the game we have on Sunday, I’m sure Mikel Arteta will be hammering home that message to his players in his pre-game preparations. Like all of us, I’m sure, he’ll have been delighted his little piece of Everton trivia has been consigned to history (to some extent), but this is only really beneficial to us if we do what we need to do against that lot in the derby.

Tonight, all eyes will be on the south coast when Brighton take on Man City. Not for the first time of late, Pep Guardiola has referenced the physical demands on his players going into this one, saying:

“Not just in the legs, more they were tired in the head. These guys have three weeks off, one month , not much rest to recover. People say: ‘Ah, I complain.’ But I defend my players, I know what I’m talking about, much better than the people outside.

“Science says you need a certain time to recover, not just physically – mentally as well. And for many years we don’t give them that but still we are there. That’s why I say I’m really impressed but all the time I’m thinking: ‘They will fall down.’”

I have to say I find this fascinating. He referenced it after their Champions League exit to Real Madrid, he went off (with some justification to be fair) about the scheduling following their FA Cup semi-final, and now he’s talking about it again. I could be misremembering, but did Arsene Wenger say something once about how if you talk about players being tired, they’ll feel tired? I mean, it’s not as if he didn’t reference fatigue himself when results/performances weren’t bad, but I have some recollection of something like that.

It’s just interesting that during this period, Mikel Arteta has – as much as possible – tried to downplay talk of tiredness, both mental and physical. It doesn’t mean he’s not aware of it – because it will be obvious to him as he works with these players on a daily basis – or that some team selections haven’t been informed by it, but you go back to his most ‘famous’ public message about this stuff and it’s about how ‘Top players have to play every 3 days and the play 70 games a season’.

We’ve seen City’s machine-like qualities season after season, so it’s well within their capabilities to dig deep at the business-end of a campaign and find what’s needed to win games. I just can’t ever remember Guardiola making these kinds of statements in the past, and I’m curious to see if they have any impact on performance. If they hear their manager express some concerns over their ability to cope, does it become a self-fulfilling prophecy of some kind? Maybe I’m looking for any crack in the armour, any tiny weakness, so I guess we’ll see over the next couple of weeks.

Ok, let’s leave it there for now. We’ll have any news throughout the day on Arseblog News. Have a nice Thursday.

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