Pundit Kenny Cunningham has recently criticised Liverpool midfielder Thiago Alcantara’s tackling abilities.
Cunningham was a guest on the latest episode of the OTB Football podcast and the panel discussed multiple issues in European football. One topic of debate was Thiago and his performance against Chelsea on Sunday. Cunningham had some criticism for the midfielder and he believes that the Spaniard doesn’t know how to tackle.
While Liverpool did beat Chelsea on Sunday, Thiago had given away a penalty in the game. Jorginho missed the penalty though, as the Reds picked up a 2-0 win at Stamford Bridge (as per BBC Sport).
Cunningham talked about Thiago and gave a rather negative verdict about the Spaniard’s tackling abilities.
He said: “I think he will get game time, don’t get me wrong, to a certain extent in Champions League, cup games and certain league games. You saw a snapshot of it yesterday [Sunday], they had a man spare in that game yesterday and he was asked a couple of questions defensively and he just hadn’t got the answers. That challenge he made for the penalty, you can’t just close your eyes to that.
Do you think Thiago is a bad tackler?
Yes
No
“That kind of decision-making, really, the alarm bells are screaming there. If I’m the manager or a player and I’m seeing that, I’m thinking ‘wow’. When the big games come along, when it really kind of matters, when we need somebody there who we can trust, be disciplined, see danger, sense danger, make good decisions, when to stay at your feet, when to go to ground and actually how to tackle. I don’t think technically, he actually understands how to tackle.”
TIF Thoughts…
Against Chelsea, Thiago won a single tackle in the 45 minutes that he played in. For Bayern Munich last season, the Spaniard won 1.9 tackles per game in the Bundesliga and was the club’s second-best tackler in the whole campaign.
In the club’s UEFA Champions League campaign, he won 3.4 tackles per game – the highest for the club by some distance in the season.
It shows that Cunningham’s perception of Thiago is pretty wrong and he can be an efficient tackler. While he did give away the penalty on Sunday, Liverpool fans might look forward to him tackling the opposition in a much more reliable style in the future.