WHETHER YOU WERE watching for excitement, controversy, entertainment or tactical intrigue, Sunday’s game between Tottenham v Liverpool delivered.

Antonio Conte broke from his usual 3-4-2-1, instead tweaking it to pair Kane and Son up top together in a 3-5-2 shape.

Liverpool, despite being shorn of some of their star names, continued in their usual 4-3-3.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, this game was yet again all about the Liverpool full backs.

This time though, there would be two narratives.

Liverpool’s full backs at the heart of every attack yet again

The attacking threat provided by Liverpool’s full backs this season has gone to another level.

Trent Alexander Arnold, amazingly, has created more chances (51) than other player in the league, regardless of position.

Robertson’s tally (26) is bettered by only two defenders and would surely be a lot bit higher had he not missed out on a handful of games.

It took less than 60 seconds of this game for them to show why they are so hard to pin down.

As Robertson receives a pass from Konate in the first minute of the game, we can clearly see the shape of Tottenham’s defensive 5-3-2 set-up.

Ndombele, on the right of the three, is tasked with shuttling across to close down Robertson as Milner looks to join in the attack.

Robertson plays a pass down the line to Mane before making a darting run down the inside channel. This movement is now ingrained into his performances, and we see him do it on numerous occasions in every game.

On this occasion, the play moves across the field before coming back to the left again.

This time, Milner drops deep to join the build up phase rather than the attack. This movement caused Tottenham a lot more problems as Ndombele was now drawn towards him with Emerson then becoming responsible for Robertson.

Robertson performs his usual move, playing a forward pass before taking off on a run down the inside to effectively take up the centre forward position.

As Mane checks back out, Alexander Arnold calls for the ball to be switched to the opposite side of the field. Alli, having been pulled central, now has a long run to make to try to get across to him. Keita also spots the opportunity to make a forward run.

With Dier dragged towards the run of Keita, Alexander Arnold can take his pick from Jota and Robertson, who are both exploiting the vast space that’s been created between Dier and Sanchez.

The delivery as ever is perfect, but Robertson’s header is wayward and allows Tottenham off the hook.

Later in the half, with Liverpool 1-0 down, we see how the understanding between Milner and Robertson allows the Scot to flourish again.

Milner again looks to join in the attack first time around before then coming back towards the build up and signalling to Robertson to go beyond him.

This has the desired effect of drawing Ndombele to Milner and gives Robertson another opportunity to run off the back of Emerson and lose him again.

Mane’s movement, taking Sanchez up the field before darting back into the space behind is also instrumental to the build-up.

When the block on Mane’s attempted cross falls into the path of the onrushing Robertson, he inevitably takes advantage of his freedom and picks out the leaping Jota to head powerfully into the top corner.

On the other side of the field, Alexander-Arnold was, as ever, a constant attacking threat.

He had a shot saved by Lloris early in the half after taking up a narrow position before being denied again late in the half when arriving to volley at the back post.

Early in the second half he put in another fantastic delivery that almost saw Jota score his second header of the afternoon.

When Liverpool went 2-1 up, invariably it was the two full backs at the heart of it yet again.

Robertson, did his thing, playing a pass to Jota and then running beyond him, as Alexander-Arnold sneaked up on the other side.

Jota did very well to dig out a cross to Salah at the back post and when Lloris pushed his header away Liverpool’s right back was on hand to cross to their left back who scored.

Alexander-Arnold and Robertson passed the ball to each other on 7 occasions in this game, three of which created goalscoring opportunities.

To put this into context, Tottenham’s equivalent comparisons Emerson and Sessegnon, didn’t pass to each other once. This would more often than not be the norm in most sides.

Tottenham ensure Liverpool’s greatest strength is also their greatest weakness

For all that we’ve shown above, the tale of Liverpool’s full backs was very much a two-part story in this game.

Antonio Conte seemed to have concluded during the week that his side would have to accept the inevitable when it came to the attacking strengths of Alexander-Arnold and Robertson, but that in doing so there would also be opportunity to take advantage of a weakness.

This prompted his tactical tweak. By leaving two players high up the field his side were well positioned to exploit the full backs high starting positions and counterattack at every opportunity.

While the goals may not have come directly from this idea, it undoubtedly helped them to create their best opportunities of the game.

Below, we see the first example.

As Salah plays the ball forward to Jota, the Liverpool full backs are in their usual attacking positions.

Dier does well to nick the ball away and when Emerson clears, Winks and Son manage to work the ball as far as Kane via two headers.

Now Liverpool are in trouble and are all back pedalling.

Alexander-Arnold can’t catch up with Son from his starting position and when Kane plays him in, it looks as though their counterattack plan has worked perfectly, but the South Korean’s effort goes just wide.

An almost identical pattern would emerge twice more in the next 15 minutes, with Winks being key on both occasions.

First, he intercepted an Alexander Arnold pass to set Son away.

After playing a simple one-two with Kane, he was left with the final third of the field to himself but dithered for far too long in front of Alisson and allowed him to save.

Soon after, Winks repeated the trick.

With Milner on the ball, it’s striking how similar Liverpool’s set-up looks to when they created their opening chance of the game.

Robertson has again wandered to centre forward. Salah is encouraging Milner to go right to Alexander-Arnold, recognising that Alli has been pulled across.

But Milner decides to play central to Jota and Spurs pounce.

The movement of Tottenham’s front two is clever again, with Kane coming short to pull Konate forward while Son looks to run in behind.

It’s also worth noting the starting position of Alli compared to Alexander-Arnold.

When the initial break stalls, Kane again shows intelligence in moving Konate again to create room for the arrival of Dele Alli, who Son picks out.

A goal looked certain, but Allison somehow did enough to push his effort wide of the post.

Liverpool played 415 successful passes in this game compared to Tottenham’s 296, despite playing over 20 minutes with 10 men.

But Tottenham’s tally of ‘long accurate passes’ (33) was more than double Liverpool’s (16). That probably tells you all you need to know about the contrast in playing styles.

Conclusion

Its hard to know which manager will come away from this game the happier.

Conte will surely see it as a missed opportunity given the number of chances his side squandered and the opportunity they had in playing against 10 men for 20 minutes.

At the same time, he will know that this could have been a very different game had either, or both, of the contentious referring decisions in the first half gone against his team.

Kane should have been sent off. Jota should have had a penalty.

What we can say is that Conte has surely provided a template that many other managers, if brave enough, will now try and follow.

How will Liverpool deal with things if they start to come up against a 3-5-2 on a regular basis? Or would the return of Van Dijk, Fabinho and Henderson solve all ills?

For the sake of entertaining football, it’s a tactical conundrum I hope is posed more often.