This Merseyside derby was played on Everton's home turf, with Everton lining up 4411 with defenders Branthwaite, Tarkowski, Mykolenko, Godfrey, midfielders McNeil, Gueye, Garner, Harrison, attacking midfielder Doucouré, striker Calvert-Lewin
Liverpool came out in 433, with defenders Van Dijk, Konate, Arnold, Robertson, midfielders MacAllister, Szoboszlai, Jones, and strikers Salah, Luis Diaz, Darwin Núñez.
(Pre-emptive link)
Everton are now very close to the relegation zone. The second half of the season is going to be a tight derby and they need the points already. Everton were frantic from the start of the game, attacking under pressure and not caring much for formations. As soon as they reached the 45-degree corners of the wings they were forced to pass the ball. When they rushed up, as Calvert-Lewin did, they would be forced to top the ball before they could reach dangerous distances for their attack. Everton, however, simply wanted to play hard. This approach left Liverpool in disarray at the outset. Liverpool's defense has not been consistent after this season.
With 16 minutes to go, Calvert-Lewin got a near total free header inside the box inside the 8-yard box and was caught by Alisson. This resulted in another random attack by Everton in 26 minutes when a free kick from the right was opened up into the box. Liverpool literally could not clear the ball. Eventually the ball rolled into the box. macallister tried to take a kick but it went wide allowing Branthwaite on the other side to shoot straight at the 8 yard box. It was too sudden. Although Alisso blocks the ball, he still lets it roll into the goal
In fact, there's nothing to it. It was a complete mess of punches that killed the master. Liverpool had been trying to reorganize their momentum, but Everton rushed on. Every time he opened a free kick, he made a mad dash for the top, and eventually this accident occurred
Liverpool lacked the ability to distribute the ball at the back when Hikaru Endo was not on the pitch. Furthermore, both Szoboszlai and Jones tended to attack, which only allowed MacAllister to fall behind. However, this resulted in a virtual lack of distribution up front from the front-wing positions, which limited Liverpool's first-half attack to direct transmissions of around 30 yards, most of which went straight to Darwin Núñez. at this point, neither the wings nor the midfield were pressed to the front of the penalty area. A fairly direct attacking pattern would have stopped pickford, and he stopped darwin. The close range attack between Núñez and LuisDiaz was due to the attacking pattern being so simple that Pickford could immediately face the striker with the ball
Everton replaced the injured Mykolenko with veteran A. Young at halftime. At the start of the second half, Everton switched to a defensive counterattack, and Liverpool pressed the attack.
However, Liverpool's attacking pattern has not changed. It still passes the ball straight down the flanks. The attackers up front are often not fully in place and there are not enough plugs in the midfield. In addition, they don't seem to be using the space in the half-space. They seemed reluctant to take the ball up front, but the accelerated pace of the attack did not result in the collapse of Everton's defense, which had completely retired
The result was a corner in the 56th minute caused by McNeil's long range shot, Everton kicked off and Calvert-Lewin slammed on to the door at the far post from 6 yards to give Everton a 2-0 lead, Calvert-Lewin purposely circled around the outside rather than stand in the penalty area, then Everton ran two in a row into the penalty box just before kick off to try to bring the Liverpool defenders into the The box, and finally Calcert-Lewin made the final rush up, when only Arnold was left on the far side, and there seemed to be something wrong with his defense, Calvert-Lewin was equal to taking off in front of him, and he instead had a flash of brilliance which led to Lewin being completely unimpeded in his efforts to get on top of the ball
After that, Klopp started to make a succession of substitutions with Elliott, Quahsah, Endo, Gomez, Tsimikias all coming on, but the rest of the game remained unchanged. Liverpool still played too direct. In the end, Everton beat Liverpool 2-0.
The Merseyside derby win went against Everton's 14-year winning run and meant a lot. Winning against Liverpool at such a crucial time in the second half of the season would have serious implications for the Reds' title. Currently, Liverpool have fallen into third place, with 74 points, ahead of Manchester City with 76 points, but with one game less. In fact, Liverpool are already 3 points behind the front with a huge gap in net wins. If Liverpool fall behind in the remaining four matches of the season, they will probably not be able to overtake Arsenal and Manchester City
