Liverpool FC Forum

[Bad Bob]

People should not let this Yanks situation deflect away from the poor performances on the pitch.  Its easy to just lay the blame at the Americans but that aint fair.  4 seasons in and still no title challenge.

And other people should not underestimate the unsettling effect this whole off-field mess has had on the team.  It's not just an excuse.  How many people have worked at a company/organization where difficulties were occurring in the head office and where there were new rumours, media stories, etc. every day?  Is it such an easy thing just to go about your business and ignore the turmoil surrounding your employer?  Is it f.uck.  Granted, it has been a disappointing season but let's not pretend it's just like any other season and that this row with the Yanks is just part of the normal course of events that a manager and professional footballers should be able to deal with.  That would be naive, IMO.

[heimdall]

Don't you guys see that this is not the team that Rafa wants.  How could you believe that we could make a challenge for title with such mediocre players in the wide positions.  We are absolutely outclassed in those areas by Man U, Chelsea, and Arsenal.  If this is his ideal side than why does he insist on more funds?  Why is it that we are always linked with players like Malouda, Alves and Simao?  That's because those are the ideal players that Rafa wants, but instead he is only given enough funds for players like Benayoun and Pennant.  Sure he says that they are good enough, but I don't believe for a second that he believes that.  I just want to see what Rafa would do with a proper budget.  If he still decides to keep players like Kuyt and Voronin then I would not support him anymore.

Nobody forced him to sign pennant or Benayoun.  If he cant find better players within the same budget thats his problem.  When Pennant was signed I thought from day 1 we had paid to much for an arsenal reject.

So who'd win us the league with this type of budget?  I can't possibly think of anyone except for Wenger, but where would you find someone like him?

Winning the league is one thing, but at the moment we are in a battle to get to 4th spot and don't tell me that Everton, Aston Villa, Man City etc have bigger budgets than us!!

It is not good enough from Rafa, he is to stubborn and I see absolutely no sign of genius from him at all.

I'm still waiting for one of the Rafa's many many supporters to justify why Rafa keeps playing Kuyt amongst other baffling tactical decisions.

Given the money and squad I would expect most of the other mangers in the top six or seven teams to do better than Rafa!

I want him and the yanks out, although I'd be willing to give Rafa till the end of the season.

[Ade]

I've spoken to someone with good contacts at DIC. Yeah, yeah, I hear you say… Well, take it or leave it, I know who I'm talking to. And if any mods want to PMS me about it, feel free.

Anyway, this isn't earth-shattering news, but it is a good source. He's told me that if DIC do buy the club, and they are seriously interested, they want to buy it with Rafa in place. DIC would want as little friction as possible, and know that keeping the fans onside is essential. They know what the Yanks have done wrong, and have no desire to repeat those mistakes: they know what the majority of fans feel about Rafa, so they would prefer to buy the club with Rafa in situ.

This means that if the Americans are interested in selling up, it is in their financial interests to sell LFC with Rafa at the helm. And for as long as Rafa remains, the chances of a sale can't be ruled out.

Conversely, if you see Rafa get the boot before the end of Feb, the chances of DIC buying the club will diminish. Not disappear, but they would view the instability and potential loss of key (Spanish) players as a serious loss, which would reduce what they'd be prepared to pay for the club. H&G will know this.

Looking ahead, if DIC do buy the club, I'd imagine they'd lob a pretty healthy wad Rafa's way this summer for transfers. I'd bet on him getting at least two years with DIC in charge, but properly funded to make the signings he wants. He will have every opportunity then, and no excuses.

[Ciggy]

Any fool can see the sh!t going on behind closed doors in the natinal media is getting to the players.

We looked great at the beginning of the season but since all this palava has been going on since November its no big suprise that we have suffered on the pitch due to it.

Ok some of our players are not good enough but for people to be ignorant to the fact that it is not having a huge impact on the players is just stupid.

[heimdall]

People should not let this Yanks situation deflect away from the poor performances on the pitch.  Its easy to just lay the blame at the Americans but that aint fair.  4 seasons in and still no title challenge.

And other people should not underestimate the unsettling effect this whole off-field mess has had on the team.  It's not just an excuse.  How many people have worked at a company/organization where difficulties were occurring in the head office and where there were new rumours, media stories, etc. every day?  Is it such an easy thing just to go about your business and ignore the turmoil surrounding your employer?  Is it f.uck.  Granted, it has been a disappointing season but let's not pretend it's just like any other season and that this row with the Yanks is just part of the normal course of events that a manager and professional footballers should be able to deal with.  That would be naive, IMO.

I agree with you on that, it has to be unsettling for the players, but Rafa should be using it to gee the lads up, telling them to prrove all the doubters wrong etc, in any case it still doesn't explain why he is so slow in making subs or why oh why he still plays Kuyt.

I really worry for Kuyt becuase his confidence is getting worse and worse, a good manger would shove him into the reserves for a few months to let him get some goals and start building himself up again, the way it's going for him he'll be completely broken and it might seriously feck up his entire footballing career.

[Leonmc0708]

We were poor in the league before the yanks came here. The reason for our poor performance over the last four years is Benitez.

Look at the facts before opening your trap.

[ruskiy playmaker]

Any fool can see the sh!t going on behind closed doors in the natinal media is getting to the players.

We looked great at the beginning of the season but since all this palava has been going on since November its no big suprise that we have suffered on the pitch due to it.

Ok some of our players are not good enough but for people to be ignorant to the fact that it is not having a huge impact on the players is just stupid.

That exactly what I'm saying.  We looked so promising at the begging of the season and suddenly this whole thing with owners started and the team just could not handle it.  We were never going to win the league this season but we would be much higher up right now if it weren't for this whole mess.

[mattylfc]

The owners are entitled to look for a new manager if they want to , the paid hundreds of millions for the club FFS!

They should not have gone public with klinnsman, but Benitez started the whole "public" side of the argument.

Does anyone doubt that Benitez was talking with LFC when GH was still manager?

Well if they do doubt that Rafa spoke to the club while Houllier was still the manager they would be naive Niall for sure. That said, I'm not sure the issue is the owners speaking to Klinnsman (although he would have been a bizarre choice as coach for us) but more that Hicks thought it was reasonable to advertise the fact in the media just when the furore was dying down.

For me there are a couple of givens out of the whole episode.

1. The new owners are vermin and need to be drummed out of the club at the earliest possible opportunity. I don't particularly care that we don't know too much about DIC. In this instance, it's better the devil you don't know.

2. Rafa's performance as manager this season has been below what could be reasonably be expected given the quality of the players at his disposal.

3. We have some players at the club who fairly obviously aren't good enough to play for a top four team, never mind one that has pretensions of challenging for the League title.

Agree completely Big Mick.

My worry still comes with Benitez though. Theres no question that off the field behaviour has hindered our perofrmances but even if we do change ownership (which i hope we do), will there be a huge change with Benitez in charge? We atill need a few top class additions to our squad and the way we set out is far too negative IMO.

Before people jump down my throat, this is not a rant against Benitez. I think the way that he has been treated is appauling and i am right behind the guy just like every other LFC fan last night. I just wonder if he can take us to the next level.

There is absolutely no doubt that Rafa is a world class manager and if he should leave it will no doubt be to one of the top european clubs. I just worry that Rafa is still struggling to come to terms with the PL and the English league may not be for him. I really hope this is not the case and Rafa gets the support he needs and the funds to turn us into a top PL team.

One thing that has annoyed me a bit in this thread is the fact that so many people have been jumping down Kuyts throat after last night. For me, Kuyt played very well in the 1st half and was poor in the 2nd. Lets not forget though that Torres didnt perform last night and Kewell and Aurelio were just awful. Kuyt cant be the scapegoat every game. 

How good was Hyypia by the way, class.  Wouldnt be surprised if that was Kewells last game for us if im being honest, didnt look interested.

[Big Niall]

We were poor in the league before the yanks came here. The reason for our poor performance over the last four years is Benitez.

Look at the facts before opening your trap.

We have been poor in the league before the yanks came. We had one good league season since Benitez came.

Look at the facts before opening your trap.

[ruskiy playmaker]

Don't you guys see that this is not the team that Rafa wants.  How could you believe that we could make a challenge for title with such mediocre players in the wide positions.  We are absolutely outclassed in those areas by Man U, Chelsea, and Arsenal.  If this is his ideal side than why does he insist on more funds?  Why is it that we are always linked with players like Malouda, Alves and Simao?  That's because those are the ideal players that Rafa wants, but instead he is only given enough funds for players like Benayoun and Pennant.  Sure he says that they are good enough, but I don't believe for a second that he believes that.  I just want to see what Rafa would do with a proper budget.  If he still decides to keep players like Kuyt and Voronin then I would not support him anymore.

Nobody forced him to sign pennant or Benayoun.  If he cant find better players within the same budget thats his problem.  When Pennant was signed I thought from day 1 we had paid to much for an arsenal reject.

So who'd win us the league with this type of budget?  I can't possibly think of anyone except for Wenger, but where would you find someone like him?

Winning the league is one thing, but at the moment we are in a battle to get to 4th spot and don't tell me that Everton, Aston Villa, Man City etc have bigger budgets than us!!

It is not good enough from Rafa, he is to stubborn and I see absolutely no sign of genius from him at all.

I'm still waiting for one of the Rafa's many many supporters to justify why Rafa keeps playing Kuyt amongst other baffling tactical decisions.

Given the money and squad I would expect most of the other mangers in the top six or seven teams to do better than Rafa!

I want him and the yanks out, although I'd be willing to give Rafa till the end of the season.

I don't think anyone knows why Rafa picks Kuyt over Crouch, maybe he thinks that Crouch is only effective as a sub.  But I'll bet that Kuyt will be off this summer for sure.

[SouthCoastShankly]

The whole topic is over Benitez and success is going to be sensitive. On one hand he has provided us with the greatest success since Dalglish but on the other hand he seems to have lost the plot with rotation and team selection. People say that no one mentions Rafa's rotation policy when we win but when we've won this season it has rarely been comfortably.

In terms of league performance our best season in recent years was 2001-02 under Houllier, that season we doubled Man Utd and finished second. That year we had a stable squad with great chemistry which in my opinion has never been bettered. Yeah at times we have seen hints of our potential under Benitez, Istanbul being the most prominent example, but when Benitez is refusing to play the obvious players and sticking with the sh!te players for the sake of his rotation policy the effects are seen in results and team chemistry.

I still for the life in me cannot see how Benitez has not realised that the system he used at Valencia will not and cannot work in the Premiership.

[SouthCoastShankly]

Don't you guys see that this is not the team that Rafa wants.  How could you believe that we could make a challenge for title with such mediocre players in the wide positions.  We are absolutely outclassed in those areas by Man U, Chelsea, and Arsenal.  If this is his ideal side than why does he insist on more funds?  Why is it that we are always linked with players like Malouda, Alves and Simao?  That's because those are the ideal players that Rafa wants, but instead he is only given enough funds for players like Benayoun and Pennant.  Sure he says that they are good enough, but I don't believe for a second that he believes that.  I just want to see what Rafa would do with a proper budget.  If he still decides to keep players like Kuyt and Voronin then I would not support him anymore.

Nobody forced him to sign pennant or Benayoun.  If he cant find better players within the same budget thats his problem.  When Pennant was signed I thought from day 1 we had paid to much for an arsenal reject.

So who'd win us the league with this type of budget?  I can't possibly think of anyone except for Wenger, but where would you find someone like him?

Winning the league is one thing, but at the moment we are in a battle to get to 4th spot and don't tell me that Everton, Aston Villa, Man City etc have bigger budgets than us!!

It is not good enough from Rafa, he is to stubborn and I see absolutely no sign of genius from him at all.

I'm still waiting for one of the Rafa's many many supporters to justify why Rafa keeps playing Kuyt amongst other baffling tactical decisions.

Given the money and squad I would expect most of the other mangers in the top six or seven teams to do better than Rafa!

I want him and the yanks out, although I'd be willing to give Rafa till the end of the season.

I don't think anyone knows why Rafa picks Kuyt over Crouch, maybe he thinks that Crouch is only effective as a sub.  But I'll bet that Kuyt will be off this summer for sure.

Show me one piece of evidence that Kuyt will be sold? If anything the evidence is that Crouch will be off.

Benitez was rotating Torres for fuck sack before the fans got on his back. If Benitez continues to make these stupid squad selections which inevitably cost us games he'll lose the fans support and his job.

[Owzat]

Even if our transfer budget isn't enough to match Chelsea and Man Utd, it is more than enough to be ahead of Arsenal and not struggling to stay ahead of the also rans in what we're making a race for fourth. We should be beating the likes of Wigan, brum and villa at home having spent plenty more than them. We lack consistency because too many of our players aren't good enough.

[Big Niall]

Even if our transfer budget isn't enough to match Chelsea and Man Utd, it is more than enough to be ahead of Arsenal and not struggling to stay ahead of the also rans in what we're making a race for fourth. We should be beating the likes of Wigan, brum and villa at home having spent plenty more than them. We lack consistency because too many of our players aren't good enough.

[NANNY RED]

Well im gonna get me twopeneth worth in We were all over them simple there two goals were that much of a blatent robbery they should of been on crimewatch.

Sammi and Masherano outstanding end of

I know loads of you will slate me for this but this game was about more than the three points it was about us standing up for what we believe in and i was made up to be part of it last night. It was good to see the Kemlyn Rd stand singin and the Anfield Rd, but every one on that Kop last night showed that these Yanks are gonna have a fight on there hands . Good to see them lads aswell from Gladbach paying there respects to the 96

At the end of the day i was happy with a point cause we certainly made our point . Lets carry it on

By the way Torres looked knackerd last night