Liverpool Tactical Preview: How Brendan Rodgers Will Set His Team Up

How will Liverpool set themselves up tactically this season, and what can we expect with regard to changes moving from the Kenny Dalglish period to the Brendan Rodgers era?

Here we will outline the probable starting XI for Liverpool's English Premier League opener against West Bromwich Albion and talk about how that starting XI will change.

Probable Starting XI vs. West Bromwich Albion

This diagram depicts what we'll likely see against West Brom on the opening day of the season.

*Joe Allen should replace Jonjo Shelvey when he's all caught up with practice, Shelvey vs. Jordan Henderson to start is a toss-up.

They key area in any Brendan Rodgers team is the midfield trio. Allen, Lucas Leiva and Henderson are all very capable of playing the Rodgers way—short passes, control the game.

Steven Gerrard is a far more direct player, but is as capable as anyone technically and should play slightly higher up the pitch than any of these three.

Allen has been brought in specifically to speed up the transition to tiki-taka-esque football, and welcoming Lucas back is nothing short of huge. The Brazilian will add bite to a midfield that struggled last season to play at their own tempo.

Out of the three, Lucas is the most likely to play the "Leon Britton role"—a midfield sweeper who lurks behind the other two and provides even, simple distribution to the full-backs. If you thought Jose Enrique was pivotal last season, just wait.

New Emphasis on Defenders

It's no secret that Rodgers wants his team to play out from the back. Last season, Swansea City defenders Ashley Williams and Steven Caulker averaged a whopping 70.1 and 61.5 passes per game, respectively (via WhoScored?).

Conversely, Martin Skrtel (44.2) and Daniel Agger (38.9) had significantly less passes per game last season. Rodgers has been working on fixing that in preseason, and Agger and Skrtel are both well capable of adapting to a very different way of playing.

Revolutionary Forward Line

As per B/R's Karl Matchett:

"

Fabio Borini is very likely to play the left forward role this term. He's capable of drifting infield which has worked really well with Suarez dropping deep as we still retain a central advanced presence in the box—the wide players not attacking box was a major problem last season. Gerrard has, in that instance, wandered out to the left so it looks like very good interplay between the three. It could have a big effect.

"

Matchett sums up one of Liverpool's biggest problems last season aptly here. Stewart Downing was torrid last season, but how much of that was down to the role he was given?

For Aston Villa, in his final and, coincidentally, Player of the Season campaign, you would frequently find him lurking at the back post and inside the penalty area. That's how he got his seven goals in the 2010/11 season, but what chance did he have of replicating that?

This is something Rodgers has clearly tried to fix. The movement of Fabio Borini and Stewart Downing will be inward, not outward, and this is one measure the manager has taken to solving the scoring problem home and away.

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