Liverpool FC Forum

[burjennio]

At least most of you got to watch the game yesterday interruption free. N. Ireland Setanta reception apparently cant cope with a bit of rain. However when the coverage came on I realized it was a lot more serious than that:



EL NINO 

Anywho, since we had by far the most difficult game of any of the top four I'l take a 1-0 away win. Granted a few players will have to get there act together but you know they will with a few games under their belt.

PS If anybody up there thought Kuyt had a worse game than Benayoun or Keane yesterday you probably shouldnt be commenting on a football chatroom. In fact, you probably should not be allowed ouside without adult supervision

[woof woof !]

The foul on Benayoun in the box was irrelevant since the initial foul was on Gerrard, hence no penalty.

The ref didn't blow for the foul on Gerrard, he allowed play to continue to see if we got an advantage, Benayoun was then flattened in the box, debatable I know, but denying the penalty was in fact depriving us of the advantage .

[Rockthekop]

Yeah I know what you're saying.  It is debatable of course as you say.  Fortunately it didn't matter thanks to Torres.

[Rafa D]

Rafa took Keane off and brought on El Zhar to play on the right, with Kuyt moving into a central role. This was a very strange move considering we were trying to get a goal.  It was a move you might expect had the team been in front but we weren't and had Torres not scored we would have been going away with a poor draw.  Keane or Torres can be quiet for 80mins then create a goal out of nothing as proved yesterday, neither should be subbed unless we are in front.  If that becomes a common occurrence we may well draw as many games as we did last season.

But it worked.....

[red187]

The block by Keane on Torres didn't make a difference to this result and it showed the sharpness of our main strikers, either could have scored as they reacted far more quickly than any of the Sunderland defenders. That has to be a positive
As for Rafa bringing El Zhar on I thought he looked far more effective than Kuyt or Youssi, also when Kuyt played his natural game of being a target man towards the end our ball retension improved.
The long balls that had been aimlessly bypassing Torres and Keans seemed to suit Kuyt's game far better

[Simari]

In summary, it was a pretty woeful performance and there's absolutely no way this can continue if we're to realise our aspirations of challenging for the title. We need to improve drastically, and a great goal and a salvaged three points shouldn't detract from that.

LFC2007, I did read the rest of the post (and it was a very good summary of the way the match played out) - so this isn't just selectively picking, but here's what Man U's start to last season looked like. They were playing without any fluency but still nicking wins. We all know what they ended up with ...


Man Utd 0 - 0 Reading EPL
Portsmouth     1 - 1 Man Utd       EPL
Man City 1 - 0 Man Utd         EPL
Man Utd 1 - 0 Tottenham     EPL
Man Utd 1 - 0 Sunderland     EPL
Everton 0 - 1 Man Utd         EPL
Sport. Lisbon 0 - 1 Man Utd        Champions League

We will improve, but as long as the results keep coming in, even with dire 1-0 wins - it's just what we need to stay in the race till the team gels and plays flowing football.

[Rockthekop]

I was wondering when someone would mention the `tactical genius` theory.  We won the game thanks to a fantastic strike by Torres, not because of Rafa's `inspired` substitution.  The fact of the matter is that we were very fortunate to come away with a win.  When you need a goal you don't take off your 20M striker and leave an ineffective Kuyt on the field.  On another day we would have drawn.  We can't rely on Gerrard or Torres to dig us out of a hole all the time.

But in saying that 3pts is all that matters.

[maguskwt]

I was wondering when someone would mention the `tactical genius` theory.  We won the game thanks to a fantastic strike by Torres, not because of Rafa's `inspired` substitution.  The fact of the matter is that we were very fortunate to come away with a win.  When you need a goal you don't take off your 20M striker and leave an ineffective Kuyt on the field.  On another day we would have drawn.  We can't rely on Gerrard or Torres to dig us out of a hole all the time.

But in saying that 3pts is all that matters.

it doesn't matter if you're a 20M striker or not... you have to see if that 20M striker is performing or not on the day and the fact is that keane wasn't performing that well... funny enough when kuyt moved inside... his movement with the ball created more problems then when keane was playing there and managed to put in some shots that their keeper spilled... I'm not saying kuyt is better than keane but that was just how it went... whether or not Torres won the game with his wonder strike, it was benitez substitutions that allowed us to put more pressure on sunderland... if your judgement as a manager will be influenced by how much your striker cost you will never become a good manager...

[The Manhattan Project]

I notice that Torres was described by the BBC as having "saved" Liverpool by getting the only goal of the game.


So whenever Man Utd won 1-0 with Cantona scoring the only goal, was he described as "saving" them?

What about Lampard when Chelsea win 1-0?


Why would a striker be described as "saving" a team?

Surely a striker's purpose is to score goals?

[Rockthekop]

I agree that Keane wasn't playing that well, then again neither was Torres or Kuyt.  Regardless of the price Keane is worth, he's a proven premiership player who can create or score goals.  Kuyt on the other hand has shown time and time again he can't hit a barn door.  Who would you have taken off? Keane? I think not.

[RedBlood]

terrible first half performance, second half was much better and the result(whitch is more important then the performance at this moment) was a good one

great strike from el nino and i can see him banging in 30 again this season, great to see alonso back and hungry to prove some doubters wrong

i reckon when we get over a few injuries and the olympic boys return and keane and dossena settle in we will be much much better, all we need to do is pick up results until then

[hello_red]

In 3 or 4 games time and we are still performing like we did yesterday, that is the time to start worrying about what it is to support Liverpool FC.

Now is the time to get some points on the board regardless of style and grace. 3 points is better than 1 or 0 'oh but we put together some lovely passes and passges of play!'. Shut it and get on with it.

Rant over.

[LFC2007]

In summary, it was a pretty woeful performance and there's absolutely no way this can continue if we're to realise our aspirations of challenging for the title. We need to improve drastically, and a great goal and a salvaged three points shouldn't detract from that.

LFC2007, I did read the rest of the post (and it was a very good summary of the way the match played out) - so this isn't just selectively picking, but here's what Man U's start to last season looked like. They were playing without any fluency but still nicking wins. We all know what they ended up with ...


Man Utd 0 - 0 Reading EPL
Portsmouth     1 - 1 Man Utd       EPL
Man City 1 - 0 Man Utd         EPL
Man Utd 1 - 0 Tottenham     EPL
Man Utd 1 - 0 Sunderland     EPL
Everton 0 - 1 Man Utd         EPL
Sport. Lisbon 0 - 1 Man Utd        Champions League

We will improve, but as long as the results keep coming in, even with dire 1-0 wins - it's just what we need to stay in the race till the team gels and plays flowing football.

I'm aware that even the best teams play badly in spells, it's just that the performances against Liege and Sunderland were indicative of performances in seasons gone by - where we've also failed to challenge for the title, and I didn't expect that going into this season. I thought we performed as poorly in the Liege game as against Besiktas away last season, and I thought yesterday's game was as bad a performance as Wigan away last season. The problems we experienced in these games were the same types of problems which dogged us last season, and just as last season, my worry is that we won't be able to get away with it as often as others. Whilst the Manc's and Chelsea have lacked fluency and cohesion in spells, they haven't put in performances as bad as these, at least not in league games. I also think that when Chelsea/Manc's have bad spells, it's not because of a lack of quality, perhaps a lack of focus, a lack of intensity in their play, but not problems inherent in their team - e.g. fundamental problems in retaining possession in wide areas. They still tend to create good quality opportunities. We don't create anything like the same number of good chances as the top two teams, or Arsenal for that matter, and yesterday was a great example of that. We showed nowhere near enough cutting edge, ability to create, ability to get in behind defences, to advance in wave after wave of attack etc... That's been a problem for a long, long time, and it's no wonder the bookies have it down as a two horse race this season, with us and Arsenal touch and go for third.

A convincing win and performance against Boro will be important, but it shouldn't mask these deficiencies, otherwise they'll never get addressed, and people will continue to wonder why we haven't managed to sustain a title challenge.

It sounds a negative post, but I honestly didn't expect us to perform as badly as we have, and it's worrying.

[SupitsJonF]

Start is good enough to put us ahead of United 

[aco67]

I was reminded today about something Ian Holloway said after a scrappy win ....

To put it in gentleman's terms, if you've been out for a night and you're looking for a young lady and you pull one, you've done what you set out to do. We didn't look our best today but we've pulled.

Some weeks the lady is good looking and some weeks they're not. Our performance today would have been not the best looking bird but at least we got her in the taxi.

She may not have been the best looking lady we ended up taking home but it was still very pleasant and very nice, so thanks very much and let's have coffee.