Liverpool FC Forum

by **The Manhattan Project** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 9:24 pm

Wigan (Home) - WIN
Boro (Away) - WIN
Villa (Home) - DRAW
West Ham (Away) - DRAW
Sunderland (Home) - WIN
Chelsea (Away) - DRAW

by **TheBestia11** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 10:00 pm

What a pity!We can to win this match!How we played?

by **parchpea** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 10:09 pm

A team ready to win the title would have gone for City and taken all 3 points.

You only have to look at the way Arsenal dismantled Everton as soon as Utd slipped up. Thats what potential winners do and we didnt and never do it.

We did the same thing at Portsmouth and Blackburn going for it in the last 20 mins and drawing the match. This tactic will not win us the league but Benitez will persist with this approach.

You can talk about stats and Rafa is the stato alright but bottom line is we didnt win because we only committed players forward in the last phase of the match. 17 shots yes but most where long range efforts and half chances. We didnt rip City to ribbons, not at all.

by **Leonmc0708** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 10:21 pm

parchpea wrote:A team ready to win the title would have gone for City and taken all 3 points.

Like United ?

by **LittleHobo** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 10:25 pm

Leonmc0708 wrote:
parchpea wrote:A team ready to win the title would have gone for City and taken all 3 points.

Like United ?

a scrappy 1-0 in a game like that is what title winners do

we dont seem to be able to pull that kind of win out of the bag

by **LittleHobo** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 10:33 pm

anyway i cant believe others are still being positive

its title over by christmas yet again

we look nowhere near title contenders, we cant beat the top teams and struggle to beat teams who come and try to stop us playing

our title challenge has once again been a joke, man utd fans are laughing at us

by **redtrader74** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 10:34 pm

Leonmc0708 wrote:
s@int wrote:
Leonmc0708 wrote:
lakes10 wrote:I dont see the point of having 3 good sub and only use one with 10 mins left, when we all could see the sub needed to be on at around 60 mins.

We could ?

We bossed the game, restricted City to one break and should have scored five but its Rafa's fault for not bringing a sub on ?

Yes, I think most of us could see we needed fresh legs and a change Leon.

Nothing to do with blame it on Rafa, just using our options to the best advantage.

s@int
LFC Elite Member

Group: LFC Premium Members
Posts: 8267
Joined: April 2006 Posted: Dec. 30 2007,17:24

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We need to make a change

---------------------------

Just to show I am not just being "clever" after the event.

Fairy muff.

I didnt see it though, from where I was stood it was right to keep the same people doing hte same things, which was everything BUT score.

I thought Torres looked tired for the record, wasnt his usual sharp best.

I agree, although there are times i think that Rafa waits too long to make changes, today was not one of them, we did everything right, except score.(i know) They were pinned in their box, at home, with the best record at home, personally it just seemed a matter of time.

Changes weren't really needed any earlier, what we needed was a break in their box, maybe better decision making with the final ball, or a ref that could see that Torres was being kicked all over the place.

by **LittleHobo** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 10:37 pm

today just showed we need a true goalscorer as partner to torres

torres cant do it every game, he needs help with the goalscoring duties

kuyt cant do that

by **holylamb2006** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 10:37 pm

Its a draw ..... not the end of the world but equally disappointing in a way ....

The game cant be blamed on Rafa fr not using his subs ......
Cant blame Dirk because he had an alright game ......

The team didnt pull their socks up and do their jobs ..... it was maximized when Man City defended the whole game ...

Its not all doom and gloom YET but we're getting closer

by **LittleHobo** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 10:53 pm

im just unhappy at one thing that hasnt changed since last season

when decent teams come and try to stop us playing and play for the draw they normally do it......we havent the guile to break them down

by **mungi** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 11:06 pm

i thought rafa had no other players that could win the game other than babel. thus he only used th 1 sub. alonso can unlock defences with his passing but i doubt he could play well with 10 men behind the ball. his options would be limited. dissappointing overall. lets hope now that arsenal and man u get caught up in some match fixing scandal and lose points. might be the only way to win the title:P

by **Bad Bob** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 11:08 pm

Well the result was not what we needed at all but hats off to City, they defended like lions and kept a clean sheet.

Yes, we had problems breaking them down but I don't think we lacked ideas. Torres had chances to score, Kewell got in behind their fullback on a few occasions, Kuyt had a few sniffs and Benayoun looked like he might just conjure something up with one of his jinking runs. Alas, we didn't bury the few chances we had and Dunne especially was immense for the rest. We still need more attacking quality to truly contend, IMO, but I was not displeased with the way we got after what is, in fact, a very decent team with a very strong home record.

On the defensive side, I was very impressed with Aurelio. He got forward with good purpose but also kept Ireland and then Fernandes quiet all game. On the other side, Finnan did a fantastic job on Petrov despite being short of some match fitness. Carra was a rock, as usual, and Arbeloa recovered from a very shaky start to put in a quite strong performance. Special mention goes to Mascherano as well, who had Elano in his pocket all match, snuffed out several threatening moves and moved the ball about effectively.

On the issue of the subs, I'm with those who suggest that we had the right personnel on the pitch and just needed a little break or extra quality in the final third. I'm still not convinced by Babel and I don't think bringing him on any earlier would have made the difference. Once Kewell started to tire, the change was necessary but Harry was contributing well for most of the match. As for other subs, I suppose Alonso could have come on but City had 10 men behind the ball and were denying passing channels and I wonder whether a short-of-fitness Alonso would have been able to open them up. Beyond those two, the subs bench was very lean today and calling on the likes of Voronin simply does not seem like a game changing move to me. Indeed, if truth be told, Gerrard and Torres looked to be the most knackered out there but subbing one or both of them in such a pivotal game would have been foolish.

As I've said, I don't think we quite have the team to win the title yet and today underscored that for me once more. We have taken a major step forward with the signing of Torres but I think it will take another summer of that calibre of transfer to put us in the frame for next season.

by **parchpea** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 11:50 pm

You can pick up on other scores and make yourself feel better about our showings but we are 10 behind going into new year.

We have not done enough and in my opinion that gap will widen and by the finish we will be 15-20 adrift of the eventual winners.

We are playing catchup after stuffing up too many times already and when the cup games kick it wll be rotation again and we all know what that means.

I am sorry but we are not good enough to win the league and I refuse to bury my head in the sand and think there is something great coming because it aint.

by **Ciggy** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 11:57 pm

Feck off Liverpool anyone thinks we will win the league now is a fool, thank feck the bitters got beat yesterday.

Gutted really thought we would have won that one. :down:

by **yckatbjywtbiastkamb** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 11:57 pm

i cant really fault the players, if kuyts header would have gone in at the end or the keeper would have parried it into the path of benayoun to knock in people would be saying it was one of the best performances of the year.
we missed a chance to close the gap at the top but it was just an ironic twist of fate that man united lost when we had on paper at least one of our harder games of the season.
if we win our game in hand we are 5 points behind united and 7 behind arsenal, definately not out of it.

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