COUTINHO INJURY: HOW CAN LIVERPOOL COPE WITH HIS SETBACK

Countiho will be out until October (Picture: LiverpoolEcho)

"Oh shite, how can we cope without him?" some of my fellow Kopites told me when they heard over the news that Coutinho will be rested until October due to injury from match against Swansea. First impression caused panic reaction, but I've took some time for analyzing on how will Mr Brendan overcome to Coutinho's unavailability.

Coutinho's injury is a big loss for Rodgers, but it's not the end of the world for him. Rodgers have stock of players to temporarily filling in void left by that Brazillian playmaker. Just the different is, the creativity burden that held by Countiho's need to be shared among all the attacking lineup. Lets assume this following formation includes to Suarez's suspension.

This is my initial analysis according to Coutinho's setback, as simple as that. Rodgers is not the kind of rotating squad he have, all of us known that, similar to his mentor's approach, Jose Mourinho. Now, how is creativity burden will be shared among all attackers lineup? I would say, this burden will be share to near half of first eleven, they are Sturridge, Aspas, Moses, Henderson, Gerrard and even Enrique. Enrique could be playing on higher pitch to cover Moses, Aspas will be back into first eleven to lead attack from middle of the park with more free roaming privileges  and Gerrard will lead attack from depth on box-to-box basis, providing support for workhorse Henderson, and even will move forward when he sees the opportunity to do so. From this, we could see the attacking play pattern is still the same, concentrated to penetrate from middle, more cut inside from wide players. It's still the same pattern, except how the creativity or playmaking burden will be shared among first eleven. 

Now, maybe some of you could question, "Where is Sterling? Where is Luis Alberto? Where is Allen? Why Toure played on RB instead of Wisdom?". That will be answered in my coming analysis Liverpool vs Southampton.

Feel free to comment as suggestion and ideas for my preview article vs Southampton.