Community Shield 2019: Liverpool Vs Manchester City

The overriding narrative over the course of this summer has surrounded the lack of new signings at Anfield. A Liverpool side which came to within a single point of winning the league title and who won their sixth Champions League found themselves under pressure to continue adding to their squad. Some sections of Liverpool-centric social media are questioning the ownership group, others are questioning the now famous transfer committee, led by Michael Edwards, while still others question Jurgen Klopp. Whilst a degree of frustration given the nature of the transfer window can perhaps be forgiven, these fans are overlooking the difficulty of adding quality to what is already a world-class squad. Any realistic targets will be wary of the challenge posed by displacing any of the first-choice players in their positions and the squad has a positive age profile. The start of competitive (almost) football in the Community Shield gave Liverpool the perfect opportunity to ease the fears of their fans after a difficult pre-season.

Transfer activity at the club on the other side of the Wembley pitch has also been relatively quiet. Spanish international midfielder Rodri arrived for a large fee to provide an alternative to Fernandinho at the base of the midfield. Manchester City also re-signed their former left-back Angeliño following a successful spell in Holland with PSV. Other than that the feeling coming from the blue side of Manchester is one of evolution rather than revolution. Another pre-season under the expert coaching of Pep Guardiola should see City continue their quest to dominate domestically while also taking the next step in European competition.

We should be clear that the Community Shield is largely an extension of the pre-season. With that said, however, this match gave us the first chance to assess the top two from the 2018/19 season and neither side would be happy with anything other than a win in this match.

In this tactical analysis, we will examine some of the lessons learnt in this match as Manchester City ran out winners after a penalty shoot-out.

Team News

There was some surprise for Liverpool to see Roberto Firmino and Mohamed Salah both starting the match. The other member of the fearsome front three, Sadio Mane, is behind the others in his pre-season preparation. This saw the hero of last seasons European triumph Divock Origi starting from the left-hand side of the attack. The other question was at centre-back as we waited to see whether Joel Matip or Joe Gomez would partner Virgil Van Dijk. In the end, we saw Gomez picked to start the game.

The only new signing from either side to start the match was the aforementioned Spanish international Rodri. The Spaniard took his place at the base of the midfield behind the exceptional duo of David Silva and Kevin De Bruyne. The other surprises from Guardiola saw the Chilean goalkeeper Claudio Bravo playing in place of Ederson with the Brazilian late back to training after having a break at the end of the Copa America. We also saw Sergio Aguero and Gabriel Jesus both on the bench as Guardiola started with a front three of Leroy Sane, Bernardo Silva and Raheem Sterling. The latter started the match centrally.