Liverpool FC Forum

Gerrard is are only class player, for the last 14 years. full stop.

We should play him for another 20 years at least, if he can still walk and the knees haven't packed in. as signing a suitable replacement looks a long way off.

Gerrard's dropping back into our back four with annoying repetition is a problem that needs addressing by Rodgers post haste ,put simply if Gerrard wasn't
where he was on Saturday for their goal, Mignolet saves comfortably.     

gerrard was supposed to be in there RBG as it was a corner and he was on the post. mingolet was never going to get that in a million years regardless of whether gerrard was there or not. mignolet came out a yard, dropped on one knee and threw his arm at it and got nowhere near it. gerrard should have maybe done better as it passed mingolet but from the replays it looked like both of them got caught flatfooted.
if anything lovren was the culprit for me. he was swinging out of senderos and still managed to let him get goalside and in front.

red till i die!! » Sun Sep 14, 2014 8:07 pm wrote:gerrard was supposed to be in there RBG as it was a corner and he was on the post. mingolet was never going to get that in a million years regardless of whether gerrard was there or not. mignolet came out a yard, dropped on one knee and threw his arm at it and got nowhere near it. gerrard should have maybe done better as it passed mingolet but from the replays it looked like both of them got caught flatfooted.
if anything lovren was the culprit for me. he was swinging out of senderos and still managed to let him get goalside and in front.

He does it all the time mate ,he's constantly dropping in between our defenders ,its not just exclusively corners ,seriously I think its a massive problem that needs
sorting ,and I disagree, Mignolet had no room to manoeuvre let alone attempt to dive for the ball with Gerrard's presence on the line .

red till i die!! » Sun Sep 14, 2014 9:07 pm wrote:gerrard was supposed to be in there RBG as it was a corner and he was on the post. mingolet was never going to get that in a million years regardless of whether gerrard was there or not. mignolet came out a yard, dropped on one knee and threw his arm at it and got nowhere near it. gerrard should have maybe done better as it passed mingolet but from the replays it looked like both of them got caught flatfooted.
if anything lovren was the culprit for me. he was swinging out of senderos and still managed to let him get goalside and in front.

       Spot On !

red till i die!! » Sun Sep 14, 2014 8:07 pm wrote:gerrard was supposed to be in there RBG as it was a corner and he was on the post. mingolet was never going to get that in a million years regardless of whether gerrard was there or not. mignolet came out a yard, dropped on one knee and threw his arm at it and got nowhere near it. gerrard should have maybe done better as it passed mingolet but from the replays it looked like both of them got caught flatfooted.
if anything lovren was the culprit for me. he was swinging out of senderos and still managed to let him get goalside and in front.

If it was Gerrards job to cover that post mate then he didn't do a very good job. The ball bobbled over the line at about 3 mph. If the opposition strings together a great move and scores against you then fair enough but to concede cheap goals like that is a real sickener. A boozer team would be gutted about letting that one in.

RBG yours is a very confusing post regarding the dropping in between the centre backs.
That's what Rodgers wants him doing with the centre backs splitting.

The goal was a shambles on Saturday but I wouldnt be putting the blame at Gerrards feet.
Lovren allowed his man to get the wrong side which caused the problem.
After it dropped to Agbonlahor it appeared that both Mignolet and Gerrard where caught on there heels expecting it to go the other side.
Scrappy terrible goal.

I actually thought Gerrard was one of our better players Saturday. His range of passing was superb and seemed to be our only creative spark.
He also made a few driving runs at times.

It appears to me our skipper has found himself being made the scapegoat when things dont go well.

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Mon Sep 15, 2014 10:12 am wrote:

red till i die!! » Sun Sep 14, 2014 8:07 pm wrote:gerrard was supposed to be in there RBG as it was a corner and he was on the post. mingolet was never going to get that in a million years regardless of whether gerrard was there or not. mignolet came out a yard, dropped on one knee and threw his arm at it and got nowhere near it. gerrard should have maybe done better as it passed mingolet but from the replays it looked like both of them got caught flatfooted.
if anything lovren was the culprit for me. he was swinging out of senderos and still managed to let him get goalside and in front.

If it was Gerrards job to cover that post mate then he didn't do a very good job. The ball bobbled over the line at about 3 mph. If the opposition strings together a great move and scores against you then fair enough but to concede cheap goals like that is a real sickener. A boozer team would be gutted about letting that one in.

mingolet was ball watching and came out to close down the header that senderos won, he got caught in no mans land when it came off agbonlahor. watch the replays and look at mingolets position, he comes out drops to one knee with his body then leaning right, once his knee was down he was rooted and was so far off balance that all he could do was throw a limp left arm at it.
had gerrard remained on the post then he would have cleared it but he didnt and came out alongside mingolet and as i said the scabby touch threw the both of them.
still i couldnt fault either of them for it even though they could have done a bit better. the problem for me was both our CH's. sakho aka traore couldnt deal with a simple clearance which led to the corner and then lovren completely lost senderos when it was taken. if either of those mistakes didnt happen there was no goal.
FWIW i do agree that gerrard dropping constantly between the CH's is a problem but not in this instance.

Ben Patrick » Mon Sep 15, 2014 9:28 am wrote:RBG yours is a very confusing post regarding the dropping in between the centre backs.
That's what Rodgers wants him doing with the centre backs splitting.

The goal was a shambles on Saturday but I wouldnt be putting the blame at Gerrards feet.
Lovren allowed his man to get the wrong side which caused the problem.
After it dropped to Agbonlahor it appeared that both Mignolet and Gerrard where caught on there heels expecting it to go the other side.
Scrappy terrible goal.

I actually thought Gerrard was one of our better players Saturday. His range of passing was superb and seemed to be our only creative spark.
He also made a few driving runs at times.

It appears to me our skipper has found himself being made the scapegoat when things dont go well.

I honestly don't know what game you were watching Ben, Gerrard was poor. He offers nothing defensively and when he does 'attack' he just stands on Lovren's toes at the halfway line and nurdles the ball sideways and backwards. Every now and then he might launch one to the flanks with about a 50/50 success rate.
Even Hendo is starting to drop back now making things even worse, we were supposed to be chasing the game but 2 of our 3 CM's were standing in the back line, it was ridiculous, no wonder our forwards were feeding on scraps.
I thought the idea of Gerrard playing that deeper role was so that he could 'control' games from the quarterback position but from what I can see he is doing nothing there that the CB's couldn't do themselves, if he was carving teams apart with incisive passing from deep then I'd say fair enough but he's just shuffling the ball sideways and backwards.
If anyone else was putting in the type of performances that Gerrard currently is they'd be getting a rest.

Yakka that's what he is being asked to do.
He isnt standing on their toes he is dropping in and they split.
Everton do the same, it's what Barca have being doing for the last 5 years.
You and others might not like it but it's the tactics that Brendan employs.
I'm not having it that he was playing simple passes sideways the whole game. He was constantly switching play with superb raking passes either side.
The problem we had is that we conceded an early goal and villa then had something to defend. To be fair to them they defending pretty well.

I think where we were poor Saturday was more to do with the attacking players.

If you dont think we controlled the game I think you need to look at the stats again.
We dominated posession and territory. We just lacked guile and decision making in the final third - nothing to do with Gerrard.

Think I'm with Ben on this one.

Villa threw everything at us from the off and having got their goal they parked the proverbial bus in their own half for the rest of the game just looking to hit us on the break.
The reason Gerrard apparently just moved the ball from side to side was because Villa's 10 man defence had closed off any space into which a decent ball could be played . There was little to no movement from Balotelli, Coutinho tried hard but got nowhere and our most promising attempts to get down the flanks, usually from balls provided by Gerrard, came to very little as our wide players were snuffed out. We shouldn't dismiss the energy shown by Villa and a game plan that worked a treat for them. Certainly we were poor but if I had to point fingers at anyone I'd start with the man who devised our game plan.

Ben Patrick » Mon Sep 15, 2014 1:15 pm wrote:Yakka that's what he is being asked to do.
He isnt standing on their toes he is dropping in and they split.
Everton do the same, it's what Barca have being doing for the last 5 years.
You and others might not like it but it's the tactics that Brendan employs.
I'm not having it that he was playing simple passes sideways the whole game. He was constantly switching play with superb raking passes either side.
The problem we had is that we conceded an early goal and villa then had something to defend. To be fair to them they defending pretty well.

I think where we were poor Saturday was more to do with the attacking players.

If you dont think we controlled the game I think you need to look at the stats again.
We dominated posession and territory. We just lacked guile and decision making in the final third - nothing to do with Gerrard.

That's wasn't controlling the game Ben, Villa attacked until they got their goal then just sat back and said to us break us down if you can. They weren't under any real pressure and looked very comfortable, they fully deserved their win. You make it sound like we were robbed when in reality we were out thought, out fought and outplayed.
Rodgers needs to change the way we play because with Gerrard sitting so deep our build up play has become slow, predictable and laborious, we knock it around in our half constantly going sideways and backwards allowing teams to get back and set into their defensive positions.
We need to get some energy into our midfield and start playing higher up the pitch, we need to get back to pressing teams at the edge of their box and we need to increase the tempo of our play. All our best performances over the past 18 months have been when we've played at an incredible pace that has just blitzed teams and blown them away, the problem is that playing games at a breakneck pace doesn't suit Gerrard anymore. Pace and energy is the way forward for this team, that is road we need to go down to perfect Brendan's philosophy, at 34 Gerrard is not compatible with that style of play.
We are a team caught between two stools and two styles of play at the moment and it shows.

Well I actually agree about how we should play. Whether we can do it with Gerrard playing that role in the side is open to debate.

However Gerrards performance Saturday was for me in no way the reason we lost the game.

I didnt make out we played brilliant and where robbed. What I said is he did what he could in the game. Villa nulified our attacking players Saturday.

On the subject of whether he can still play in a high intensity pace setting side the games last season showed he could then.

Part of the problem for me Saturday was how quickly EVERY player moved the ball in posession. That could be due to so many new faces, the movement wasnt quite what it should be.

I am actually not too worried as I think we will get better.
The Villa game I am hoping is more of a early season lack of cohesion type of performance - last seasons Southampton early home game.

Ben Patrick » Mon Sep 15, 2014 2:25 pm wrote:Well I actually agree about how we should play. Whether we can do it with Gerrard playing that role in the side is open to debate.

However Gerrards performance Saturday was for me in no way the reason we lost the game.

I didnt make out we played brilliant and where robbed. What I said is he did what he could in the game. Villa nulified our attacking players Saturday.

On the subject of whether he can still play in a high intensity pace setting side the games last season showed he could then.

Part of the problem for me Saturday was how quickly EVERY player moved the ball in posession. That could be due to so many new faces, the movement wasnt quite what it should be.

I am actually not too worried as I think we will get better.
The Villa game I am hoping is more of a early season lack of cohesion type of performance - last seasons Southampton early home game.

Interestingly I noticed a clear difference in Gerrards role. He still acted as the quarterback, for want of a better term. But he occasionally reverted back to his box to box style of getting forward and taking up advanced attacking positions.

I wonder whether he is being given more license to roam?

SouthCoastShankly » Mon Sep 15, 2014 2:37 pm wrote:

Ben Patrick » Mon Sep 15, 2014 2:25 pm wrote:Well I actually agree about how we should play. Whether we can do it with Gerrard playing that role in the side is open to debate.

However Gerrards performance Saturday was for me in no way the reason we lost the game.

I didnt make out we played brilliant and where robbed. What I said is he did what he could in the game. Villa nulified our attacking players Saturday.

On the subject of whether he can still play in a high intensity pace setting side the games last season showed he could then.

Part of the problem for me Saturday was how quickly EVERY player moved the ball in posession. That could be due to so many new faces, the movement wasnt quite what it should be.

I am actually not too worried as I think we will get better.
The Villa game I am hoping is more of a early season lack of cohesion type of performance - last seasons Southampton early home game.

Interestingly I noticed a clear difference in Gerrards role. He still acted as the quarterback, for want of a better term. But he occasionally reverted back to his box to box style of getting forward and taking up advanced attacking positions.

I wonder whether he is being given more license to roam?

It's hard to know whether in the last half an hour he was given the licence or he just chose to break further forward.