Liverpool FC Forum

by **Bad Bob** » Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:45 pm

bigmick wrote:Quite simply the comparison between Ferguson and Mourinho doesn't stand up. Neither would have played Bolo Zenden in central midfiled at Highbury, with the inevitable consequences.

No doubt someone will point out that as they've both got better squads to deal with, they wouldn't NEED to play Bolo Zenden in central midfield. While that is true, it's also worth considering that steven Gerrard played wide right that day, so I would contest we didn't need to play Zenden in central midfield either. It's this type of slaveish addiction to the mantra "you've got to use the whole squad" which does my head in, it's just plain silly.

Similarly neither Mourinho nor Ferguson would have played Gerrard wide-left against Chelsea. People need to realise that football in real life is not like Championship Manager, you can't draw pretty patterns on the pitch with arcs and dotted lines telling each player where to run. Similarly, frustrate and p!ss off your best player by playing him in the one position on a football pitch to which he is most unsuited (I suppose in goal might be even more unsuitable) and it carries forward to the next game.

We've seen it every season in Rafa's reign so far. Silliness at the start of the season ("maybe the players will have got their heads around the system this time") reulting in the inevitable poor results, followed by selectorial stability and a steady climb up the table. Hopefully this year we'll give ourselves at least a chance of winning the thing.

I wonder, if Ferguson and Mourinho really did decide to rotate and tinker Rafa style at the start of this season would we be worried or glad? Would we be thinking "oh no, that means they'll be fresher at the end of the season and that they're going to use the full squad", or would we be thinking "that's handy we've got a bit of a chance now"?

Tompkins can do he likes with figures, but Rafa needs to bugger about with the team much less this season than he has in his Liverpool career so far. Forget about all this nonsense as well that as the players are better this season, he'll be able to rotate without affecting the rhythm of the team so much as there'll be like for like rotations. No team, ever, will win the English Premier League with mass rotation of formation, position and personel. If Tompkins thinks that last years top three all messed around with their team to an equal extent he's a mug.

Two points, mate, and then I'll leave it because, God knows, we've been through all of this before.

First, I think it so important to remember that there were key injuries at the start of our season last year (along with a whack of new signings) that forced Rafa to chop and change and in part fed into a rotation policy. "Play your best 11" sounds great in theory but there was never any clear best 11 at the start of the last campaign and of those who were sure to be included, a couple were injured straight away.

Second, I've just had a cursory look at Man U's teamsheets through the end of October last season. As Tompkins suggests, there were plenty of changes (not one identical two matches in a row from what I saw) and there were several selections that were every bit as puzzling as us playing Zenden (Richardson starting? O'Shea at CM?). Now, I have no idea about their injury situation etc. but that's not the point: they got off to a flyer whilst still chopping and changing quite a bit. It can be done.

by **JoeTerp** » Thu Aug 09, 2007 10:14 pm

I think our main "problem" with the squad rotation issue is our lack of quality depth or Rafa putting to much faith in it. Rotation, by itself (at any point in the season) is not bad when the drop in quality is minimal and its more of "trying a different look" than playing a player that is simply not up standard. Dropping Gonzo, Zenden, Bellamy, Garcia for Babel, Yossi, Voronin and Torres looks like a monster upgrade in the overall quality in the sqaud, and we will have Mascherano adn Kewell for the whole season this time around, so I think the start of our season looks MUCH brighter. All of our games against the "Big 3" are at Anfield at the begining, so that should help our start as well.

by **roberto green** » Thu Aug 09, 2007 11:10 pm

even if there is quite alot of rotation this year i dont think any of us will be conplaining as long as were getting the results, if this is the caSE EVERYONE WILL BE SAYING WHAT A GREAT IDEA THIS IS, THIS COULD BE VERY POSSIBLE NOW LIVERPOOL IN MY EYES HAVE GOT THE BEST SQUAD WITH THE MOST PROMISE SINCE 1989.NOT ONLY IS THERE 2 GOOD PLOAYERS FOR EVERY POSITION BUT THERE IS A LOT OF DIFFERENT COMBINATIONS AND FORMATIONS BENITEZ CAN PLAY ABOUT WITH HOME AND AWAY IN THE LEAGUE THIS SEASON.

by **god_bless_john_houlding** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 12:10 am

I'm back, 1st post in a while, after a little trip and no worries about footy. Glad to see I've come back and we've signed a new player. Never heard of him mind you. Also I'm glad to be back before the footy season begins, properly. As for rotation, my holiday hasn't changed my views on it, I still firmly believe it's a waste of time. But maybe, just maybe it's the quality of players who are being rotated. Take last year for example, when Riise/Kewell/Garcia was left winger for the day, they would be swapping with Gonzalez, no exactly the star signing we all expected, but this year Babel/Bennayoun will be coming in with a bit more quality. Last year when we rotated Crouch/Kuyt we had a sulking Bellamy and a past it Fowler. Now we have top striker in Torres and our best player during pre-season, Voronin. So maybe this year if Rafa sticks to his rotation policy, with the current squad, it won't be as much of a problem. My view is positive and it is we'll win the league this year. I just hope a few more of you realists would become optimists like myself, and believe. This is out year folks, no worries.

by **roberto green** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 12:28 am

god_bless_john_houlding wrote:I'm back, 1st post in a while, after a little trip and no worries about footy. Glad to see I've come back and we've signed a new player. Never heard of him mind you. Also I'm glad to be back before the footy season begins, properly. As for rotation, my holiday hasn't changed my views on it, I still firmly believe it's a waste of time. But maybe, just maybe it's the quality of players who are being rotated. Take last year for example, when Riise/Kewell/Garcia was left winger for the day, they would be swapping with Gonzalez, no exactly the star signing we all expected, but this year Babel/Bennayoun will be coming in with a bit more quality. Last year when we rotated Crouch/Kuyt we had a sulking Bellamy and a past it Fowler. Now we have top striker in Torres and our best player during pre-season, Voronin. So maybe this year if Rafa sticks to his rotation policy, with the current squad, it won't be as much of a problem. My view is positive and it is we'll win the league this year. I just hope a few more of you realists would become optimists like myself, and believe. This is out year folks, no worries.

totally agree ithink chelsea will not be up for the league plus they have key injuries going into the season plus arsenal havent got any bite without henry, so it only leave utd as our main rivals, of course this is easy said in hignsight,but i do belive the mighty reds are about to awake and i hope more of our fans started to belive :nod

by **god_bless_john_houlding** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 12:33 am

roberto green wrote:
god_bless_john_houlding wrote:I'm back, 1st post in a while, after a little trip and no worries about footy. Glad to see I've come back and we've signed a new player. Never heard of him mind you. Also I'm glad to be back before the footy season begins, properly. As for rotation, my holiday hasn't changed my views on it, I still firmly believe it's a waste of time. But maybe, just maybe it's the quality of players who are being rotated. Take last year for example, when Riise/Kewell/Garcia was left winger for the day, they would be swapping with Gonzalez, no exactly the star signing we all expected, but this year Babel/Bennayoun will be coming in with a bit more quality. Last year when we rotated Crouch/Kuyt we had a sulking Bellamy and a past it Fowler. Now we have top striker in Torres and our best player during pre-season, Voronin. So maybe this year if Rafa sticks to his rotation policy, with the current squad, it won't be as much of a problem. My view is positive and it is we'll win the league this year. I just hope a few more of you realists would become optimists like myself, and believe. This is out year folks, no worries.

totally agree ithink chelsea will not be up for the league plus they have key injuries going into the season plus arsenal havent got any bite without henry, so it only leave utd as our main rivals, of course this is easy said in hignsight,but i do belive the mighty reds are about to awake and i hope more of our fans started to belive

I've never lost belief. Even when it's mathamatically impossible, I think we can win the league. I'm also looking for a point deduction--it'll happen one year and you watch it'll be the year we win the league

At the start of every season since I've followed Liverpool, I've said we'll win the league. Hasn't happened for 17 years, so laws of average says we have to win it soon. But this is our year. Mark my words. If by some miracle we haven't won the league come the end of May, I'll promise to eat my hat.

by **roberto green** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 12:44 am

god_bless_john_houlding wrote:
roberto green wrote:
god_bless_john_houlding wrote:I'm back, 1st post in a while, after a little trip and no worries about footy. Glad to see I've come back and we've signed a new player. Never heard of him mind you. Also I'm glad to be back before the footy season begins, properly. As for rotation, my holiday hasn't changed my views on it, I still firmly believe it's a waste of time. But maybe, just maybe it's the quality of players who are being rotated. Take last year for example, when Riise/Kewell/Garcia was left winger for the day, they would be swapping with Gonzalez, no exactly the star signing we all expected, but this year Babel/Bennayoun will be coming in with a bit more quality. Last year when we rotated Crouch/Kuyt we had a sulking Bellamy and a past it Fowler. Now we have top striker in Torres and our best player during pre-season, Voronin. So maybe this year if Rafa sticks to his rotation policy, with the current squad, it won't be as much of a problem. My view is positive and it is we'll win the league this year. I just hope a few more of you realists would become optimists like myself, and believe. This is out year folks, no worries.

totally agree ithink chelsea will not be up for the league plus they have key injuries going into the season plus arsenal havent got any bite without henry, so it only leave utd as our main rivals, of course this is easy said in hignsight,but i do belive the mighty reds are about to awake and i hope more of our fans started to belive

I've never lost belief. Even when it's mathamatically impossible, I think we can win the league. I'm also looking for a point deduction--it'll happen one year and you watch it'll be the year we win the league

At the start of every season since I've followed Liverpool, I've said we'll win the league. Hasn't happened for 17 years, so laws of average says we have to win it soon. But this is our year. Mark my words. If by some miracle we haven't won the league come the end of May, I'll promise to eat my hat.

i was ten the last time we won the league and i took it for granted i would love to see it again
:eyebrow

by **stmichael** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 12:04 pm

bigmick wrote:I haven't really got time to go into it now, but his figures (or the interpretation of them at least) are pure unadultatarated tosh. If we are talking about rotation purely in "numbers of rotations", does this include positional changes, ie Gerrard on the left, shuffling of the back four, Garcia playing everywhichwaybutwhere, Bellamy/Cisse being asked to play wide right?

But United do that too. Giggs plays up front, left wing, centre-mid. Ronaldo played as winger or striker. Rooney played left-mid on occasions! Gary Neville plays right-back or centre-back sometimes. Wes Brown plays centre-back or right-back. And so on.

Or what about Chelsea and Michael Essien? He was played at centre-mid, right-mid, right-back AND centre-back. F#cking hell, he made Gerrard look like a one-position wonder. He was still considered Chelsea's best player last season. But if you move Gerrard around it's somehow a travesty...

by **Salty Sock** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 12:18 pm

Espionage wrote:Now Big Mick, I will finish with another business analogy. If you are predicting a trend (and you have a logical base around your assumptions), and buy into it when others are still doubting it through misinfomation, you have the opportunity to get in and make higher returns before all others follow suit.

It is not always a matter of business Espionage friend. Forging the world as an emulator of 'business' is what eventuates to a frothpondering world of greed, money, and unrealistic demands and desires. We must taking to the adhere of how the system of our team operates as a whole unit, simply ensquirreling a high ranked player into the system will not necessarily mean a better team. It is like a kidney operation, you may have found the best kidney organ in the field of many, but the body may still reject it and the system will not operate as a full unit. We see your attempts to create intelligence from your ideas, but maybe it failing on your boat trip :pirate

by **Wilhelmsson** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 1:07 pm

redtrader74 wrote:

Point 1, i don't know why Fergie and Mourinho rotate, and neither do you, and the reason given by them do not necessarily have to be true. Also you assume that Rafas reasons for rotation are different, which again we do not know.

Evidently, I have not suggested I am aware of the reasons behind Mourinho, Ferguson or Benitez’s thoughts. I am merely offering my opinion(s) on the discussion in hand. Rafa’s reasoning for rotation seems on initial inspection to have similar and contrasting motives to that of his counterparts.

The point that Mourinho/Fergie don't change formations/tactics to counteract opponents is laughable, what top manager does not take into account the oppositions strengths and weaknesses when planning for a match??

I alluded to the point that Mourinho and Ferguson rarely change their formations and tactics to counter the opposition. I have not mentioned or suggested that Mourinho and Ferguson are dismissive of the opposition. Clearly all managers focus to a certain degree on the opposition, whilst acknowledging their team’s strengths and weaknesses in the process.

IMO Rafa focuses more on the opposition and breaking the opposition piece by piece instead of focusing on his own team. An example of this would be his team selection and substitutes in the CL final which were designed to cancel out AC rather than allowing the team to play to their strengths and give AC food for thought.

just maybe there was something in training that the managemant saw which told them he was either fatigued, or carrying a slight injury that precluded him from starting.

Are you being serious?

Crouch was not played consistently to have fatigue and if he did suffer from any fatigue then there is a problem or two with Rafa’s training methods.

Injuries in training happen, however are you seriously suggesting that Crouch might have picked up several injuries from training? If this is true, then Rafa’s training methods need to come into question.

Unfortunatly Crouch is not a complete striker/ player when compared to Drogba and Ronaldo, these two can play and cause problems against anyone.

You are correct,

Crouch is not a complete player; however this is irrelevant as he is the clubs main source of goals in the forward positions and the clubs main threat on goal in forward positions. Crouch should be an automatic starter for most matches. It should be Kuyt, Voronin and Torres that have to show the work ethic in training/matches and score goals to either a) play alongside Crouch or b) displace Crouch from the starting eleven.

Crouch was/is the clubs most prolific forward and the main goal threat; he is full of confidence and brings more than just an angular frame and goals to the equation.

Fergie has built his sqaud over 21 years at the club, and Mourinho with the biggest budget in history, so they might just have a better level of player to come in to the team when players are rotated, than Rafa has had at his disposal.

Precisely, this paragraph only adds weight to my opinion and acts as a cornerstone to interlock some of my earlier points. Rafa has a lack of strength in depth to be able to rotate in the key areas. Chelsea/MU would never replace Scholes or Essien with Zenden in a match against a top four/top class European club.

If there is a lack of depth within a squad then rotation on the scale of Mourinho, Ferguson and Benitez’s is not astute.

by **god_bless_john_houlding** » Sat Aug 11, 2007 12:43 am

StMichael, I see your point about United and Chelsea swapping their players out of positions, but only when it's forced upon them, however Rafa changes a players position without being forced 2.

by **Espionage** » Sat Aug 11, 2007 12:28 pm

Who the hell i Salty Sock.. and why is my name in his list of friends

by **red37** » Sat Aug 11, 2007 12:50 pm

Artcle from The TimesOnline:

August 10, 2007 - James Ducker

Benitez willing to learn from mistakes

Rafael Benitez is not one who likes to admit when he gets it wrong, but the Liverpool manager knows that it was his blunder on the first day of last season that effectively derailed his team’s intended title charge before it had even begun.

While Manchester United, the eventual champions, set out as they meant to go on with a 5-1 mauling of Fulham, Liverpool stumbled to a miserable 1-1 draw away to Sheffield United as Benitez’s decision to pick a weakened team backfired.

Five of the players that featured that day – Craig Bellamy, Robbie Fowler, Mark Gonzalez, Jan Kromkamp and Boudewijn Zenden – are no longer at the club, and as a further 14 dropped points in the next eight Barclays Premier League games proved, Liverpool were without any momentum in the weeks that followed that underwhelming afternoon at Bramall Lane.

Benitez neglected to include the likes of Xabi Alonso and Dirk Kuyt in his squad because of the Champions League qualifier away to Maccabi Haifa a few days later, but faced with an almost identical situation this time around, the manager has made it clear that he will not be making the same mistakes again.

Liverpool travel to Toulouse for another Champions League qualifying tie next week, but rather than pick a team against Aston Villa that tries to over-compensate for that tricky test to France, Benitez has vowed to name his strongest possible XI today as the Merseyside club aim to send out a statement of intent.

“If you start winning straight away it’s clear it’ll be good for confidence,” he said. “The first game is important psychologically.”

Not that Benitez is about to abandon his fabled rotation policy. The Spaniard may have had a full pre-season in which to prepare his players, unlike last summer when the World Cup finals appeared to hinder Liverpool more than United or Chelsea, but the man from Madrid remains convinced that the only way to prevent tiredness from permeating the ranks is to meddle with the team.

Closer inspection of the statistics actually reveals that Benitez made only as many changes – 118 – in Premier League games as Sir Alex Ferguson, the United manager, last season (Jose Mourinho made the same number in Chelsea’s title-winning campaign the previous season).

The difference was that Ferguson and Mourinho would rarely make wholesale changes, as Benitez often did, and as his critics argue, that is where Liverpool have fallen down. Benitez, nonetheless, remains undeterred.

“You play too many, difficult games not to change players,” he said. “It’s not easy to keep the same team. I know everyone would like to see the same XI starters almost every week but it’s impossible.

“If we can keep some players who are playing well in the team and we’re winning we’ll try to do it, but if we need to use different players then we will.

“How many teams in the Premier League can keep the same XI each week? Maybe those from about eighth down can because they only play one game a week on average, but there’s a big difference between playing 60 or so games a season and 42 or something.”

Having signed two wide players in Ryan Babel and Yossi Benayoun, and with Harry Kewell fully recovered from the injuries that kept him sidelined for most of last season, Benitez is likely to appease some of his critics by starting with Steven Gerrard in central midfield more often than out on the right.

Gerrard and Benitez have not always seen eye to eye, but like his captain, the manager is reluctant to make predictions for the new season, even if he appears more confident than ever of ending the club’s 17-year wait for the league championship.

“I don’t want to seem arrogant but when I was at Valencia, the club went 31 years without winning the Spanish title and then we won it,” Benitez said. “After that we won it again. Why? Because my staff and players got better and better.

“Hopefully we can do that at Liverpool as well. I don’t know if it will be this year or the next one, because I don’t want to promise anything, but all I can say is that we have a better team, better squad, are working hard and I have confidence. If the new players settle down quickly and properly we will have more of a chance."

***********************************************

This will rumble on no doubt well into the season, its been done to death and back again. What is clear is that Rafa will continue to use the policy of change where HE see's fit. It is down to us to both accept and respect that...The difference this time round is, the squad is enhanced. Better horses for the course. Lets see how it all transpires over the next few weeks before bemoaning its failure.

by **Sabre** » Sat Aug 11, 2007 1:48 pm

This will rumble on no doubt well into the season, its been done to death and back again. What is clear is that Rafa will continue to use the policy of change where HE see's fit. It is down to us to both accept and respect that...The difference this time round is, the squad is enhanced. Better horses for the course. Lets see how it all transpires over the next few weeks before bemoaning its failure.

Thank God it's HE who takes the decissions and not some journo with no training experience and a willingness to write something juicy.

The number of changes Ferguson did does puts in perspective that rotation topic has been exagerated. The article says aswell that Rafa refused to play the likes of Alonso and Kuyt because we were playing Maccabi. Well, curiously enough both of them are internationals, had 2 weeks less of preparation than the rest of their team mates because they had longer holidays, so there's always a number of reasons, not just one.

This season there was not world cup, the squad is deeper, and the only problem in preseason is that once again we have to play a CL qualifier too early --no matter you give more importance to the league you have to qualify or you lose a lot of money. I think that everything will go better, and the rotations will be more reasonable for more eyes.

by **bigmick** » Sat Aug 11, 2007 6:18 pm

Well whatever. As I hoped and predicted, we have a very sensible selection today with ten of the eleven players which I mentioned about three weeks ago as the obvious starting line up, actually in the team. The result is we look organised, confident, and likely to win the game. Thanks Rafa, now lets try and press on from here with a similarly sensible selection in Europe midweek and Chelsea next up in the league.

As for this game I'm impressed with Torres so far, looks vey bright. Kuyt looks like he's revved up and ready and is staying much higher up the pitch, good ball from Gerrard gfor the goal and so far Alonso has been very impressive. As long as we don't go into our shell, we should win this comfortably.

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