Andoni Iraola must listen to Pep Guardiola & Noel Gallagher to bring back ‘nightmare’ Liverpool | OneFootball

Andoni Iraola seems to have understood the assignment at Liverpool from the get-go.

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Build a connection with the fanbase, respect playing with emotion as a key facet of the club’s identity, and return the Reds to full-throttle football.

And if the Basque-born head coach needs a clearer reminder of expectations at L4, he’d be well-advised to pay close attention to a recent discussion between Pep Guardiola and Oasis’ Noel Gallagher.

Pep Guardiola and Noel Gallagher talk up ‘nightmare’ Liverpool

Recapping a highly successful decade of football over on the blue half of Manchester, the pair couldn’t help but mention the challenge of facing off against Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool side.

“Those three years are what I think defines these last 10 years,” Gallagher said on City TV.

“To win this amount of trophies, and a third of them were won against that team. That team, whenever they got the ball, you were in trouble, constantly in trouble.”

Guardiola added: “The quality of opponent we faced in Liverpool… it was a nightmare. Every time, it was a nightmare.”

And who can blame them? At its apex, it’s a rivalry that yielded a record-breaking centenary season for the Sky Blues, while we recorded 99-point, 97-point and 92-point seasons.

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Premier League football may never reach such glorious heights again.

Andoni Iraola knows what he needs to do

We’re not going to undermine Arne Slot’s achievements at Liverpool. After all, winning a Premier League title on your first go, with a squad you’ve inherited, is a remarkable achievement – and one that won’t be quickly matched.

That said, it would very much suit Liverpool to return to its roots of front-footed, in-your-face football moving forward.

A possession-heavy style didn’t seem to provide any answers for us this season as we struggled against sides that were perfectly happy to cede possession and watch us doing nothing on the ball.

There are still question marks over how an Iraola side will get over this obstacle, given Liverpool are still likely to dominate possession against most sides in the Premier League.

But a return to risk-taking on the ball will surely prove more advantageous to a side of this quality than Slot’s preference for patient play.

Only time will tell, but the point remains: we need to see a radical change in tack from last season.

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