Tribal Football

Liverpool boss Slot explains new Gravenberch role for victory at Ipswich

Paul Vegas
Liverpool boss Slot explains new Gravenberch role for victory at Ipswich
Liverpool boss Slot explains new Gravenberch role for victory at IpswichAction Plus
Liverpool boss Arne Slot was happy with Ryan Gravenberch's performance in their win at Ipswich Town.

Slot fielded Gravenberch in the defensive No6 role on the day.

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He later said, "For me, it is always about the team so if individual performance is really good, that is because the team does really well. Everybody is emphasising on the goal Mo (Salah) scored and the assist he had, but both goals were from a build-up situation where we started one time with Virgil (van Dijk) and the other time, I think, even with Alisson. So, we need to make sure these players, the attackers, come into promising positions and the team needs to help them for that.

"It's the same with Ryan. Of course, Ryan is attacking-minded but if we play with him then the rest of the team needs to help him as well. It takes a lot of effort for the attackers and the attacking midfielders to help him there, but what we do know with Ryan is that he can play the ball forward if he sees options to do so. That helped us today, especially in the second half.

"Defending we do with 11, we don't do this with one player, so we need to help him as all the others in the position where he's playing in or where anyone else is playing in. It's not that only Virgil and Ibou or only Virgil and Jarell (Quansah) are defending – the whole team has to do so. If we defend with 11, that will help Ryan or whoever is playing there a lot. Last season, Macca (Alexis Mac Allister) played there a lot and I think he has certain qualities that Ryan has as well.

"If you look at both players, the first thing you think of is with the ball, in ball possession and that's why we as a team have to make sure that whoever is playing in that position is not too exposed. That's what happened today because I think the team really helped to defend in the best possible way, and because of that Ryan had a good performance."