If We had Maldini, Nesta, Cannavaro in their prime in defence it still doesnt mean opponents should have such a free ride trough our midfield to put pessure on defence. We should be super catious losing balls. We would need extreme 85-90% possession literally never give it away. As once we give it away one long ball can cause panic at the back.
Its another thing how Fernandinho, Stones, angelino, Mendy etc handling these situations, quite shit to be honest as Ederson are left to work with shots that are unchallenged most of the time unlike our shots which get blocked or we just 1/4th of a second to release a shot before they tackle, unlike shots against us where they have time to place the shot...
Defending in our system starts from the front by proper and relentless pressing. Thats how Barca started under Pep, same with Bayern and we were pretty good at this in Pep's second season.
aggressive, pressing, high energy etc.
That seems to have gone. The loss of the urge to win the ball back has a very bad effect on the team. Loss of intensity when we have the ball too. Makes us more predictable, less dangerous, forces us to try more desperate crossing without a tall target man.