Liverpool FC Forum

[RedSi35]

Poulsen's quality is absolutely glaringly obvious, despite a couple of mispaced passes. He will prove IMHo to be an excellent purchase, and will push Masherano extremely hard for a starting slot. The last bit isn't a misprint, I think he's good enough to keep Masherano out of the team.

Spot on there.

You could see how rusty he was in the first half on thursday, however in the 2nd half his quality was really showing, he knocked a few nice passes around as well which is good.

Assuming that Masch doesnt want to be here anymore ( im sure that may change if we put a decent run together though ) i think he will be more than adequate to fill his position.

[zarababe]

Roy defo looks more serious.. quite on edge actually, comes with being at a big club. He's not the soft touch I thought he might be.

[BKrimmel]

While everything right now isn't as horrible as it seems and we all just keep telling ourselves that it is going to get better, that there will be some exciting moments and that there is just too much pure quality on the field to be playing this poorly, I think that is a very delusional feeling. This club has six major problems:

1. Not getting a share of possession: No better shown than tonight against City. Midway through the second ESPN flashed up the possession numbers and it was 74 to 26. Seriously? You can not win games (or even earn draws) with only 26 percent of the ball. City was able to hold the ball very well after going up early one nil and was able to be patient, so it is understandable that they had more of the possession, but Liverpool couldn't even hold the ball in their own half. Then as they went forward it was embarrassingly inaccurate passes to the front men, sloppy passes in the midfield, and players trying to dribble through double teams. This led to easy City possession and chances for them on the break to score. The biggest offender is Lucas. His midfield play was horrible tonight. He would either pass backwards to a defender or Gerrard or would "pass" (using pass loosely, because I have no idea what he is doing sometimes) it forwards to a member of City. With Alberto gone, and Javier packing his bags, Poulsen better become the player to spread the ball and hold midfield, because I think Lucas is a detriment to LFC holding the ball.

2. The midfield is old: Kuyt, Gerrard, Poulsen are all 30. Milan, Maxi, Joe Cole (in early November) are 29. Javier is 26 and Lucas is 23, but you know how I feel about Lucas. The midfield should be the heart of the team, as it was in 2004-2008 (remember the best midfield in the world chant? Xabi Alonso, Momo...). Youngsters are on the club but get no first team experience behind this ancient roadblock of players. Now I am not knocking the play of Gerrard, Kuyt, Milan (who has really impressed these first two starts), Maxi, and Javier, but I don't know how much more good football these guys can put onto the field. Where is the future of the club? Where is the next Gerrard coming from? Liverpool doesn’t seem to have much growing on the farm and hasn’t made any moves for a young guy to come learn the Premier League game so he can be ready for his time. Part of this is due to the new manager, but the clock is ticking. Not making the top four would be disastrous for the future of the club this year and it seems that disaster is headed our way. When the guys coming in off the bench are as old as the starters something is wrong. These leads right into problem number 3...

3. Extreme lack of pace: Does Liverpool have anybody on the field who can get the ball on the wing and take off down the touch line? Just bust past backs? Or grab a clearing header from a corner kick and lead the counterstrike? Anybody? Torres had that amazing speed, but hasn’t showed any of it, not in the World Cup and definitely not today against City. Ngog has decent speed, Babel does too, but anyone in the Midfield? The wingers can not get past anybody in a foot race. Kuyt doesn’t seem to have the pace, Milan hasn’t showed it either, nor Maxi. (I will wait to make a judgment on Joe Cole to see some more match time on him). But if the midfield poses no threat of blowing by defenders than you can expect more tight pressing on the midfield which will lead to more turnovers and more sickness for supporters. Gareth Bale, Adam Johnson, SWP, Ashley Young, Nani, Malouda, Nasri, Arshavin, Aaron Lennon, and Walcott (just to name a few), all have that ridiculous pace that makes defenders pray that they don’t get a running start at them, which forces back off when they have the ball leaving great space. Liverpool doesn’t have any sort of speedy winger who can fly down the touch line and scares the bejesus out of backs. Why does this matter so much? Because right now the offense is uncreative and lacks any type of threat in the half pitch offense. Who is going to make the big move? With the great run on goal? I don’t expect 2010 Kuyt or Maxi or Joe Cole to be able to do that type of maneuver. Now if this was 2006 or 2007, hell yea. But this is 2010 and the creativity with the ball is just gone.

4. Chalenging for the ball: Today against Man City there were a few occasions when there were three and four passes put together and a chance was created, Milan at one point in the second half swung a ball into the box which was easily cleared by the Man City back line. Seems insignificant, but there was no effort by Ngog, Torres, or Kuyt to even move towards the ball. Kuyt seemed to be watching the game like an official would as it was swung in. That seemed to be the case for every fifty fifty ball. Every ball in the air seemed to be won by a City player and several times there wasn’t a Liverpool player making the clearance difficult for the City defender. The first half against Arsenal and entire game against City seemed to have several minute stretches where the players seemed disinterested with the game. I think it is a case of lack of creativity and the lack of Roy Hodgson’s boot up some of the players butts. To question effort is a serious accusation, but after today’s performance against City it seems a fair point to make.

5. Money: There is no money available to go and buy anybody. These leads right into point five:

6. The Club must find a new Owner: Simple as that. New people. New money. A new player here or there and boom! More creativity up front, tons more ball control, and many less chances for the other team. A couple of million pounds, Euros, dollars, pesos could go a long way in securing a few creative options and hustle players who will bust their butts trying to win ball games. So I ask you, if you know somebody with money to spend, please tell them about our club.

[aCe']

Well.. that was the first fck up right there...
I like the guy, still do, but tonight he got his tactics all wrong imo !
Everything from Agger starting at LB to Lucas partnering Gerrard in CM and Torred pairing up with Ngog upfront didnt work out for him and he failed to respond to try and change things...

4-4-2 isnt a bad system when you have the players for it... Sadly, we dont.. I simply cant see Gerrard starting at CM, cant see Kuyt playing at RM, and cant see Ngog being a partner for Torres higher up..

Gerrard for me tonight was our best player out there.. However, he still didnt do his job the way you'd expect him to... We failed to keep possession (albeit against an excellent City side) mainly because of Gerrard, Lucas and Kuyt failing to open up spaces in tight areas... What we needed (and still do) is someone providing the easy pass to connect players across the pitch.. Gerrard has too much urgency in his play and Lucas simply lacks the quality to do so.. Kuyt at RM offers very little in terms of build up play, and that position also takes away any sort of goals return he might provide.. Leaves us with him pressing opposition and offering nothing else, which isnt exactly what you'd expect or want from a winger...   

There are other areas of concern, but im sure Roy would have realized all of this by now...

In some ways, tonights loss might be a blessing in disguise for us.. Might lead Roy to demand more from the board and might push them to do something about it... Whether it be selling the club or providing the funds, something has to give anyways...

[metalhead]

In some ways, tonights loss might be a blessing in disguise for us.. Might lead Roy to demand more from the board and might push them to do something about it... Whether it be selling the club or providing the funds, something has to give anyways...

Lets hope so, this team really need to add more quality into the side

[burjennio]

Oh deary deary dear, the bloom is off the rose after tonights tactical debacle. Hopefully Roy will learn from this match that 442 away at a quality side that play a 5 man midfield is going to do nothing but concede lots of possession and sucker inexperienced wide midfielders inside exposing full backs one on one with wingers, and as we saw tonight if you have a CB filling in out there it isnt pretty. Im still concerned with the depth of the defensive line and lack of pressing so far under Hodgson, as I thought that it was one area that tactically Benitez excelled in, especially at home. Not many positives to take but Id say Torres showed shades of his ability at times and if this is one game closer to full fitness for him then hallelujah.

[Zidane]

Well.. that was the first fck up right there...
I like the guy, still do, but tonight he got his tactics all wrong imo !
Everything from Agger starting at LB to Lucas partnering Gerrard in CM and Torred pairing up with Ngog upfront didnt work out for him and he failed to respond to try and change things...

4-4-2 isnt a bad system when you have the players for it... Sadly, we dont.. I simply cant see Gerrard starting at CM, cant see Kuyt playing at RM, and cant see Ngog being a partner for Torres higher up..

Gerrard for me tonight was our best player out there.. However, he still didnt do his job the way you'd expect him to... We failed to keep possession (albeit against an excellent City side) mainly because of Gerrard, Lucas and Kuyt failing to open up spaces in tight areas... What we needed (and still do) is someone providing the easy pass to connect players across the pitch.. Gerrard has too much urgency in his play and Lucas simply lacks the quality to do so.. Kuyt at RM offers very little in terms of build up play, and that position also takes away any sort of goals return he might provide.. Leaves us with him pressing opposition and offering nothing else, which isnt exactly what you'd expect or want from a winger...   

There are other areas of concern, but im sure Roy would have realized all of this by now...

In some ways, tonights loss might be a blessing in disguise for us.. Might lead Roy to demand more from the board and might push them to do something about it... Whether it be selling the club or providing the funds, something has to give anyways...

I agree, the tactics were completely off.  We NEED to buy a LB, ST, and CM before this window closes or we are in for a long season.  And all three have to be good players, not average.

[tubby]

I thought he could have engaged with the players a bit more after going 2-0 down. He didn't seem that interested.

[OneHotRed]

QUite simply, we do not have the personell to do a 4-4-2 we have no pace at all, and thus cannot pull players out wide, which then leads us into a very narrow team against bloody athletic defenders and cover = what happened tonight.

It wasnt just the tactics, but in all fairness id say 80% of it was poor tactics, no point playing 4-4-2 without wingers to scare the fullbacks, as all that led to was their fullbacks killing us too.

[Zidane]

I thought he could have engaged with the players a bit more after going 2-0 down. He didn't seem that interested.

Yeah I was getting worried about him, I don't know his managing methods during matches well but I felt like he was baffled about what to do.  It probably was the fact that our bench was completely skint of any quality/game changers though.  There wasn't much he could do to be fair.

[burjennio]

Just to add that Im 99% sure that this morning Hodgson wasn't planning to go into this match playing 442, but with Mascheranos little stunt and a relatively unfit Poulsen he had to reshuffle into the best team he could field given the situation. It just adds to my current burning desire to smack that ungrateful little pr*ck upside the head.

PS 1500 posts!

[sgs]

I thought he could have engaged with the players a bit more after going 2-0 down. He didn't seem that interested.

Yeah I was getting worried about him, I don't know his managing methods during matches well but I felt like he was baffled about what to do.  It probably was the fact that our bench was completely skint of any quality/game changers though.  There wasn't much he could do to be fair.

He could've reshaped the team for starters!

[sgs]

Just to add that Im 99% sure that this morning Hodgson wasn't planning to go into this match playing 442, but with Mascheranos little stunt and a relatively unfit Poulsen he had to reshuffle into the best team he could field given the situation. It just adds to my current burning desire to smack that ungrateful little pr*ck upside the head.

PS 1500 posts!

Thats as weak as Andy Gray claiming we were 'unlucky'....

[jimmy brighton]

Just to add that Im 99% sure that this morning Hodgson wasn't planning to go into this match playing 442, but with Mascheranos little stunt and a relatively unfit Poulsen he had to reshuffle into the best team he could field given the situation. It just adds to my current burning desire to smack that ungrateful little pr*ck upside the head.

PS 1500 posts!

here here

[fergieisawhiskeynosedtw@t]

rocky you have had too many punches to the head son!

ye your right i have plenty punches to my head over the years but no pipsqueak like you has ever knocked me out yet we can all act tough sat behind a computer?

just read your post



pipsqueak? that made me laugh  your an ok fella for a total mong