Liverpool FC Forum

FIrst leg of a crucial qualifier facing a decent German side.
They will be up for it for sure so we can't  underestimate them.

Bonus would be if we could come home with a clean sheet and snatch an away goal.
There will be plenty of goals in this tie.

By all accounts Hoffenheim are a physical team who like to counter but are powerful on set plays, our achilles heel.

We need to stay in the tie and hope Anfield drives us over the line.

If they are strong at set pieces then that means it will be a high scoring game.

1st Leg  Hoffenheim 23-24 Liverpool
2nd Leg  Liverpool 45-44 Hoffenheim

We win 69-67

I don't think this game could have come at a worse time tbh, we looked very impressive in pre season but this carry on surrounding Coutinho has obviously rocked the club and shook our confidence. I hate to be negative but it honestly wouldn't surprise me if we did a 'Newcastle' and crashed out the CL before we are actually in it.
Let's face it if Watford can score 3 against us anyone can, Watford are terrible going forward in fact I doubt they'll score 3 goals in a game again this season.
Any sort of win will do me, a dodgy pen, own goal, huge deflection.....anything, just as long as we go through and buy ourselves a bit of time to regroup.

This is no easy game for the manager, let us see his team selection and tactics and how his team to defend against a tough agrassive team!.. My gut feeling it might be a bad result, However I wish all the players a best of luck.

parchpea » Mon Aug 14, 2017 6:50 am wrote:By all accounts Hoffenheim are a physical team who like to counter but are powerful on set plays, our achilles heel.

We need to stay in the tie and hope Anfield drives us over the line.

Any idea who are their main players?

kazza » Tue Aug 15, 2017 1:59 pm wrote:More than a little worried about this tie. We are overwhelming favorites and that never goes well for us, our confidence has been shaken and our best hope ( Firmino) is playing against his former team that he only has nice things to say about. They have a young charismatic manager and the team seem to be excited about this matchup, whereas we have a lot of pressure to get through this.

If we can play with confidence like we can it should be no contest. I think keeping a clean sheet is unlikely so I hope we can score enough.

The bookies don't have us favourites they have it more a less even for both teams. I read a stat that they're unbeaten at home since they got their new manager which was Xmas time if I'm not mistaken. They're not gonna be a push over and with the club failing so hard to get better players in the confidence of the whole camp is gonna be low for this one.

Hoffenheim have Amiri ,Demirbay ,and Gnabry three very inventive midfielders, I watched my fair share of Bundesliga last season and Demirbay in particular and if we don't put the shackles on this fella he will be our chief executioner, Can and Henderson need to be bang on their game for this encounter because Demirbay is their main source of inspiration. Upfront they have Kramaric and Wagner two big strikers so defending set pieces will be vital to us leaving Germany with something to bring back to our yard.

I'm hoping Liverpool will have too much in attack , but Hoffenheim also have a defence that have kept out the likes of Bayern last season.

After Watford and all the off the pitch stuff going on at the moment something just doesn't feel right to me. I'd take a draw right now

None of the teams we could have potentially faced were super strong but the two we would have liked to have avoided are Hoffenheim and Nice. Both did very well in decent leagues last year and have a number of players who are likely to move onto bigger clubs in the coming windows.

We were quite strong in defence at the end of last season so let's hope Watford was a blip on a sleepy Saturday early afternoon game. We'll start much faster in an evening midweek game with the cobwebs well and truly brushed off after the weekend.

I'm pretty bullish. 2-1 to us.

Agree with pig snatcher. I can't see them keeping us out over. Fancy an away goal or two and will finish off the job at Anfield

Doeboy » Tue Aug 15, 2017 4:22 pm wrote:Agree with pig snatcher. I can't see them keeping us out over. Fancy an away goal or two and will finish off the job at Anfield

After our performance at Watford I should be feeling uneasy about his one. I am however optomistic. Kloppo knows the oppo and provided the team steps ups we should come away with a decent result.

I'm hoping for the win, but even a score draw will do , don't think this mob will handle the second leg at our place.

The plus side is that they have lost a couple of key players since last year.

Good article here saying that Hoffenheim, despite losing two of their better players in the summer, are well organised, flexible formation and tactics wise and very strong from set pieces. Wagner and Kramaric strong up front.

http://www.liverpoolfc.com/news/first-t ... hoffenheim