That’s a subjective opinion. I highly doubt that Lampard opted to start Torp ahead of Eccles if he wasn’t match fit/sharp. Eccles was our MOTM v Stoke and scored v Birmingham so that point just doesn’t make sense and would be quite irresponsible of Lampard.
Lampard came out and said himself that it was tactical so it’s not being pompous. You can see that the shape was attacked by Leicester effectively (I shared a similar vid on the Manchester Derby), that exposed not just Torp, but Kitching, JDS and Grimes. Leicester had too much space between the fullbacks, CB/Grimes and Torp. So unless you and your mates know better than Lampard and his staff…
Around Xmas, it’s a fair observation but he had a good week off and looked good v Leicester. When the opposition beats the press and puts the ball on the wider channels, you’re asking a lot of Torp and Grimes. The latter was regularly dropping in as a 3 CB in that 1st half because our fullbacks were so high up.
The tactical tweaks of bringing the wingers in narrower, and defending in a 4-4-2 shape basically resolved those tactical issues we faced. In the first half, Leicester exploited the 4-1-1-4 (more of a 2-3-1-4 in the initial press) that we defended in. There were a few times we won the ball back in decent positions high up the pitch but by and large, we were bypassed easily.
