‘There are certain things’: Ajax boss admits he’s watched how Erik ten Hag beat Liverpool last month

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Ajax boss, Alfred Schreuder, will take ‘certain things’ from how Erik ten Hag and Manchester United beat Liverpool last month. The Reds struggled at Old Trafford.

Liverpool are in a bit of a crisis right now and teams are becoming more and more confident against them. That was perhaps most obvious at Old Trafford as a Manchester United side that lost 4-0 against Brentford came out and pressed the Reds.

Fast-forward a month and Liverpool aren’t doing much better. In fact, their 4-1 defeat to Napoli last week may be an all-time low under Jurgen Klopp. He certainly sees it that way.

Next up is Ajax as Liverpool try to get their Champions League campaign on any sort of positive track. However, they may end up facing something similar to the Manchester United defeat.

Ajax boss, Alfred Schreuder, says he’s paid attention to how Erik ten Hag beat Liverpool last month.

“I have looked at the match what they did,” said Schreuder, per the Belfast Telegraph. “There are certain things they did that are applicable to us from the Manchester United match.”

How Erik ten Hag beat Liverpool

Ten Hag’s plan wasn’t too complicated – hence why United were able to adapt to it so quickly. It simply hit Liverpool right where they’re hurting.

That was primarily through pressing the back-four with intensity. United didn’t sit too deep and instead trusted their forwards to stop any long balls over the top. They preyed on the fact that a Thiago-less Liverpool struggled to play through a press.

And they were right. Their second goal came directly through that tactic as they forced Trent Alexander-Arnold into a poor pass and immediately countered with pace.

Now, it’s worth saying that every team (except poor Bournemouth) have tried this since. It continues to work, too, and we fully expect Ajax will go for a similar style.

The saving grace for Liverpool is that Thiago is back. We don’t expect the Reds to struggle quite as badly against a press, especially with Arthur to call on, also.

So we’ll see. No one would blame Ajax for following Ten Hag’s tactic as they’ll certainly have the players for it. Liverpool, though, may not be quite so vulnerable to it.