DESTROYER is coming for Liverpool's midfield after major Arne Slot call | OneFootball

Wataru Endo has his place back

Slot’s decision to switch Liverpool from 4-3-3 to 4-2-3-1 had an effect on just about everyone. Few felt it more than Wataru Endo, though, who had his position completely taken out of the team.

Endo was used under Jurgen Klopp as a defensive midfielder and usually the only one in the team. He sat behind the other midfielders, shielding the defence and allowing everyone else to focus on attacking while he stopped transitions through the middle.

Slot didn’t want such a player. He essentially removed the defensive midfielder role and swapped it for an attacking midfielder role. Instead of stopping transitions with a sitting player, he wanted someone further forward in the press.

Now he’s moving, once again, to something new. Liverpool’s current midfield setup has both, with a deeper midfielder covering for a series of players in front of him that move all the way across the pitch.

That player has been Ryan Gravenberch in recent weeks but we do wonder if Slot will give Endo a go there. Maybe not as a first-choice option but with his role having returned to the side, surely the veteran gets games?

He’s an expert at shielding on his own and that’s something that is now absolutely required when the three other centre-midfielders have such licence to advance.

In a lot of ways, bringing Endo into the team is a more attacking option, allowing those midfielders even more freedom with an out-and-out defender behind them. It’s absolutely an option for Slot going forward - and a very exciting one.

He’s barely used Endo, starting him just once in the Premier League over the last 18 months. We expect that to change in the near-future.