Liverpool FC Forum

[Bad Bob]

From today's Echo:

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Liverpool ease up on the fitness front

Jul 17 2007

by Chris Bascombe, Liverpool Echo


Rafa Benitez

LIVERPOOL’S players returned to pre-season training a fortnight ago relieved to hear Rafa Benitez has slightly amended their punishing schedule ahead of the new campaign.

Since the Spanish manager took over, the demanding physical preparation overseen by Pako Ayesteran has been compared to the Marines.

Liverpool have been transformed into one of the fittest squads in Europe, but there have been observations the benefits are more noticeable from the middle of the season onwards, with some players struggling earlier in the campaign.

The meticulous management team have assessed every factor which could influence a flying start to the season as they look to fine tune their players ahead of the August kick-off.


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And while there’s nothing Benitez and his staff can do about the arduous travelling arrangements to the Far East and Holland later this month, they will be altering their training in a bid to ensure their side doesn’t suffer in the key early months.

“We know the importance of making a good start and that depends on a number of factors,” explained Benitez.

“You always need to see how each players settles into the club, but we also have players who are very experienced and this will also help.

“We have been making a number of small changes to the training this summer. Our idea is to train a bit less, but when we do train it will be with more intensity.”

On most days the players endure double training sessions, but Benitez has included rest days into the schedule this summer.

Last week the squad even enjoyed a day off – unheard of during the first three pre-seasons of the Benitez reign.

There is no compromise on the effort demanded from the players, however.

At Melwood, there is an area referred to as ‘Pako Hill’. That’s where the assistant manager mounted some turf, creating his own hill for the players to run up and down during their stamina exercises.

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As I know fook all about training, I can't comment too much on the pros and cons of this new system.  Anyone out there been throw the rigours of proper training that could give us more insight?   

[Lando_Griffin]

I once ran to the door when someone shouted "McDonalds!", but I didn't have the energy to carry on past that.

Does that count, Bob?

[Bad Bob]

I once ran to the door when someone shouted "McDonalds!", but I didn't have the energy to carry on past that.

Does that count, Bob?

Pako would be able to get you to the door in the half the time, mate, with enough energy left in the tank to scarf down the party pack of cheeseburgers you no doubt ordered!   

[dawson99]

guessing it takes a while to build up to the limits they are going for. doing amore gradual thingy this time means getting betetr faster.

i think we need stu for this type of q as he has managed the best players in the universe and could tell you the ability of non changement

[The_Rock]

Well.....at least rafa shows he is willing to adapt....... 

[Rafa D]

To me this can only be a good thing. This time last year I remember reading a similar article on training but its main points were how vigourously the squad were training and I clearly remember it mentioning these double training sessions and in some cases we even done double sessions and then played a friendly in the evening!

If you remember our friendly results last pre-season showed us how tired the lads were when we were losing to FC Mainz 5 - 0.

A less demanding start to the season will mean the players should at least in theory be fit enough to show our true potential in the early stages. It says that Rafa has changed it from the last 3 seasons, and to be honest, the last 3 seasons have been among our worst starts for many a year.

Something had to change, I am glad Rafa has the conviction to do it.

[Igor Zidane]

Carring on from what doody has said , in previous seasons rafa has worked the players really hard pre sesaon with the intention of them being stronger later on in the year, which has basically been the case.

Now he seems to be easing up a little with the start of the season in mind, this should please the likes of Bigmick and peewee as it does show hat rafa is open to change and can see where he has been going wrong. Now in theory with this new training regime the team should hit the round ruunung at the start of the season, but it will remain to be seen if we still have the same levels of fitness come the back end of the season .

As i said before peewee and bigmick have both said it's no good being super fit towards the end of the season if your not even in the title race, hopefully this is a change that will see us challenge from the very off.

[tubby]

guessing it takes a while to build up to the limits they are going for.

Yeah thats true. Well works for me on footy manager anyway 

[Bad Bob]

"The meticulous management team have assessed every factor which could influence a flying start to the season as they look to fine tune their players ahead of the August kick-off."

Here's hoping that this statement is true and that early season squad rotation has been included in the re-think.  With a less vigorous training regime and no World Cup this summer, there should be no reason why virtually all of our players can't be fit and raring to go come August 11th.  I'm not so daft as to expect that Rafa will simply pick a "best 11" and stick with it but keeping rotation down to 1-2 players per game, primarily in the wide positions, is the way forward.