by bigmick » Sat Jan 24, 2009 12:07 am
The transfer side of it has been done to death but recent history doesn't look great. This Summer, we spent 40 million quid with the net improvement to our first choice team being Albert Riera. Allied to that, it's only because nobody would stump up 16 million quid that we still have Xabi Alonso. If he had signed for Arsenal and was playing for them as well as he's played for us this season, how would people see that little exchange?
Now in fairness to Rafa almost nobody could have forseen Alonso's massive improvement this season, but he certainly isn't still at the club because of any excess of judgement on our part.
We have bought some good players over the years with the 150-200 million we have spent, but feck me we have bought some rubbish as well. Most troubling for me are the signings which simply look ill thought out, and psoitions within the squad where we appear threadbare at best. Last season we spent the whole of the Summer trying to sign Gabriel Hienze. When the transfer fell through, many people on here were of the opinion that we needed a centre half then. Course we didn't buy one, then lo and behold a month into the season we are short of a centre half. The same thing could be said for the last couple of seasons at left-midfield. We end up having to make do with a semi-converted striker. Thankfully we've got somebody who can play there now, no genuine cover mind if he gets injured or tired after an hour, but at least we can line up with a genuine left midfielder.
After flying along with the 4-5-1 at the end of last season, we decide we ought to be able to play 4-4-2 as well. I think this was probably considered a first option, but even as any option it's fair enough. Unfortunately, after four years and umpteen strikers (some of who were still here) we decide that none of them are suitable for the role. So we go out and spend/spunk 20 million quid on another striker who isn't suitable for the role. We in doing so make ourselves a little conundrum of who we are going to play in central midfield in this 4-4-2, as we have a lot of central midfielders. This is a bit of a blow, as one of the pluses of the 4-5-1 is that it allowed us to get Alonso (valued by Rafa 16 million), Masherano (18 million) and Gerrard (priceless) on the same pitch.
While all this is going on, we come to the startling conclusion that the drunken waster we bought from Birmingham is a drunken waster, so we decide we aren't going to play him any more. It doesn't matter, we only spent/spunked 6.7 million quid on him so he can feck off for nothing at the end of the season. The only problem with that is, when you play 4-4-2 as opposed to 4-5-1 you need a genuine right midfielder. we don't have one. We have a striker who's been converted to a bloke who can do a job on the right in a 4-5-1, but not a genuine right midfielder in sight.
We do have Yossi Benayoun who probably doesn't even know his best position himself I shouldn't think, and wherever it is he isn't good enough IMHO. We also have Babel who probably can't remember what his best position is as he hasn't played there in years.
In defence, Arbeloa gets suspended and we realise that after four years, we ain't got any cover. Charitably, you could say it's not Rafa's fault that Degan is injured. By the same token, you could argue that it's not Rafa's fault that Vorinin is garbage but a little look at their record in both cases should tell you all you need to know. Anyway, once Arbeloa is injured, as we have no cover Carragher (our best defender) has to play there. Then we get a completely new central defensive partnership, and so on.
There are times when I just can't see this meticulous building process for the life of me. I've asked on another thread, given that Keane is currently garbage, do we need another striker? I think we do, and if Torres breaks down in a couple of weeks we'll see why. I know, "we've got no money". You know what though? if I knew we had no money, I'd have been building up Keane and babel all the time Torres was out injured. Soon as Keane started scoring I'd have been in the press telling them what a great player he was, telling them what a steal he was at 20 million. I'd have played him while he was on his streak, so that if Torres was to break down we DO have an alternative.
There are many questions, and even real fans can ask them sometimes.
"se e in una bottigla ed e bianco, e latte".