Ruben Amorim made an unexpected Manchester United personnel change at Anfield which proved to be effective.
Benjamin Šeško’s exclusion from Manchester United’s starting XI on Sunday afternoon against Liverpool was a surprise to many.
The Slovenian striker is in hot form and prior to today, he had scored goals in consecutive games for Manchester United.
Despite this, Ruben Amorim selected Matheus Cunha to lead Manchester United’s line against Liverpool, with Bryan Mbeumo and Mason Mount playing behind him.
While it was undoubtedly controversial, Cunha put in an industrious performance and played quite well despite not scoring.
Cunha up top posed more complicated challenge
Prior to the game, Liverpool manager Arne Slot touched on Amorim’s decision to leave out Šeško. “We’ve seen Sesko play the last three, four five or six times, but they go to Liverpool they change the line-up. That’s not the first where we’ve faced a team and they’ve done that,” Slot said.
After the game, Ruben Amorim explained the decision to use Cunha instead of Šeško up top. “Sometimes the characteristic of the game change way we approach. Cunha in middle, if we put Ben it is easier for these kind of centre-backs to control our striker.”
Šeško is a brilliant duel-winner, but any centre-forward would struggle to reliably win duels against a centre-back partnership of Ibrahima Konate and Virgil van Dijk.
By using Cunha, it posed Liverpool a different kind of challenge – more tactical than physical.
Cunha likes to drop deep. He likes to receive the ball between the lines. Amorim’s idea would’ve been to use him to force Liverpool’s centre-back pairing to make a decision – either let Cunha roam freely or follow him and leave empty space in the last line.
Was it the right call?
Šeško is an ‘elite‘ centre-forward talent and will certainly be a pivotal figure at United for many years to come. That being said, any centre-forward in Europe will struggle to win duels regularly against Liverpool’s two centre-backs.
In theory, using Cunha made a lot of sense. Instead of making it a physical battle against two physically dominant centre-backs, you make it more tactical and potentially avoid playing to their strengths.
The plan could’ve been to keep the ball on the ground and get the ball to Cunha who could then cause Liverpool a tactical issue by dropping deep.
In practice though, it didn’t quite work that way. Every time Senne Lammens got the ball, he went long and the game was still very much about first and second balls, and winning duels.
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This approach would’ve suited Šeško better and he won three of his four aerial duels after coming on. But, as shown by Mbeumo’s opening goal, United were able to win the majority of the second balls to secure posession.
So, while there was definitely logical reasoning to using Cunha, United could’ve made him far more effective by simply keeping the ball on the ground more.
It is good to see Amorim showing a level of tactical flexibility and as United become a team who can dominate the ball, using Cunha as a false nine at times could certainly prove to be an effective tool.
However, United’s general play isn’t at the level yet to the point where a false nine like Cunha or Zirkzee can be majorly effective.
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