Alexis Mac Allister shares what position he really played for Argentina this week, after rave reviews

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Liverpool fans have become used to seeing Alexis Mac Allister in a deeper-lying midfield role this season.

With Wataru Endo the only natural holding midfielder at the club, Jurgen Klopp has opted to use Mac Allister in-front of the defence. This has led to some criticism of the Argentine, who isn’t a natural defensive midfielder.

For his national team, Mac Allister tends to play slightly higher up the pitch. And having played the full 90 minutes of Argentina’s 1-0 win over Paraguay on Wednesday night, the 24-year-old earned some fantastic reviews.

One clip of Mac Allister dancing around the edge of the Paraguayan box may have led fans to believe he had excelled in a more attacking position. However, in quotes from the Liverpool ECHO, the Reds No.10 revealed that this wasn’t the case.

“I played more or less as I do at the club,” Mac Allister insisted. “It is a new position but I feel very comfortable. (Lionel) Scaloni asks me to manage the balance of the team, to take care of the relays and to take care of myself when I leave.”

Mac Allister excels in deeper role

On paper, there’s no reason Mac Allister can’t be a superb holding midfielder for Liverpool. He generally looks after the ball well, is strong in the tackle and reads the game brilliantly.

That’s all fine, and if the World Cup winner had been brought in to do that job, then fans could get behind the work in progress.

But it’s abundantly clear that this was not the original plan with Mac Allister.

Klopp didn’t initially use him as a deep-lying midfielder during pre-season. Had he earmarked the former Brighton man as his Fabinho replacement, then surely this is what would have happened. Instead, Macca has been thrust into the role as something of a stop-gap.

There is another side to this, too, and that’s that Liverpool haven’t seen the best of Mac Allister yet.

There’s a strong feeling that were he to have a natural holder sitting behind him, he’d be able to show the creative qualities the Reds signed him for.

Despite all of that, there does seem to now have been a shift from both club and country to get Mac Allister playing deeper. There is clearly something there to work with, but we need to see some progression for it to continue.