Liverpool FC Forum

s@int wrote:Yeah mate, Rafa would never do that. Like in 2006 when we won the FA CUP and had the best form AND the most points of any team after Christmas finishing only one point behind the mancs. He would never break that team up and buy players like Pennant and Bellamy.

s@int wrote:

Emerald Red wrote:

s@int wrote:Yeah mate, Rafa would never do that. Like in 2006 when we won the FA CUP and had the best form AND the most points of any team after Christmas finishing only one point behind the mancs. He would never break that team up and buy players like Pennant and Bellamy.

Was that a title winning side? When did we finish 1 point behind United in the league?

Like in 2006 when we won the FA CUP and had the best form AND the most points of any team after Christmas finishing only one point behind the mancs

Man Utd 38 13 5 1 37 8 12 3 4 35 26 38 83
LFC       38 15 3 1 32 8 10 4 5 25 17 32 82

s@int wrote:

maximus wrote:This season so far: 5 wins + 0 draws + 3 defeats = 15 points

This point last season: 3 wins + 5 draws + 0 defeats = 14 points

We're not doing any worse than last season so far   

After 8 games last season we had 20 points mate !


               p  w d l  f   a  pts
2 Liverpool 8  6 2 0 13 6  20

Emerald Red wrote:

s@int wrote:

Emerald Red wrote:

s@int wrote:Yeah mate, Rafa would never do that. Like in 2006 when we won the FA CUP and had the best form AND the most points of any team after Christmas finishing only one point behind the mancs. He would never break that team up and buy players like Pennant and Bellamy.

Was that a title winning side? When did we finish 1 point behind United in the league?

Like in 2006 when we won the FA CUP and had the best form AND the most points of any team after Christmas finishing only one point behind the mancs

Man Utd 38 13 5 1 37 8 12 3 4 35 26 38 83
LFC       38 15 3 1 32 8 10 4 5 25 17 32 82

Oh, right. I get you. You mean the season Chelsea romped away with the league with 91 points? We finished 3rd.

s@int wrote:

Emerald Red wrote:

s@int wrote:

Emerald Red wrote:

s@int wrote:Yeah mate, Rafa would never do that. Like in 2006 when we won the FA CUP and had the best form AND the most points of any team after Christmas finishing only one point behind the mancs. He would never break that team up and buy players like Pennant and Bellamy.

Was that a title winning side? When did we finish 1 point behind United in the league?

Like in 2006 when we won the FA CUP and had the best form AND the most points of any team after Christmas finishing only one point behind the mancs

Man Utd 38 13 5 1 37 8 12 3 4 35 26 38 83
LFC       38 15 3 1 32 8 10 4 5 25 17 32 82

Oh, right. I get you. You mean the season Chelsea romped away with the league with 91 points? We finished 3rd.

Chelsea may have romped away with the title, but we got more points than they did after Christmas...... which is pretty good don't you think ? Maybe if we had made the right buys we could have maintained that form into 2006/7 ?

Emerald Red wrote:I think it had more to do with mentality than buys. Bellamy isn't a sh*t player. Neither is Pennant. Both have quality and both have abillity. It's their mentality that's lacking. Unfortunately Rafa made that mistake. Regardless, I don't really believe that's what dented our progress.

The simple truth is we went from 82 points down to 68 points the following season. I am sure Houllier still says that Diouf and Cheyrou were good players and that they just lacked the mentality (Notice how I sidestepped Diao    )

Owzat wrote:I think we need to face one simple F.A.C.T - we're not good enough. Someone pointed out the other day we've lost to every half-decent side we've played, that is a F.A.C.T.

Fiorentina
Aston Villa
Chelsea
Tottenham

Our manager seems to have little concept of tactics, favouring tic-tacs and pre determined substitutions. Even when 2-0 down at half-time and playing poorly he waits until his substitution zone of the 64th minute onwards to change players and then they are largely predictable. I mean who didn't seen Benayoun on for Riera as the first? Second was bound to be Babel for someone, I'd be shocked if bookies gave odds on his substitutions (time and who for who). It hasn't been that easy a start to the season, few would want spudz and Chelsea away in their first eight games, but we have lost four and won the other seven games and overall we're losing more than one every third game, and that's poor when it includes villa at home and two beatable sides in Fiorentina and spudz away.

I think the problem against Chelsea is Rafa tries the same tic-tacs every time we go there, we got lucky there last season and the dynamic of the team has changed with Johnson and Lucas in for Arbeloa and Alonso. He's still trying the same tic-tacs even though it clearly isn't working, incapable of thinking beyond the two deeper midfielders. I feel sorry for Lucas, he gets all the stick yet Mascherano was the one who got caught in possession and the first goal came directly from that mistake. Lucas isn't an accomplished enough player to be bossing midfield and doesn't work in a one up front system.

We may not be out of the title race yet, but perhaps merely because enough games haven't gone yet for it to be confirmed. Losing Alonso was a body blow, Rafa doesn't have the ability to change the way it went. People were thrilled Johnson came in when all it required with Arbeloa and Alonso was an attacking mentality. Now we try the mentality, well sometimes, and simply don't have the exponents/components. Some firmly believe we won't win the league under Rafa and I can completely understand why they say it. Where is our current strength? We have a good keeper with a cr ap defence in front of him, our midfield is a joke and both Torres and Gerrard are driving forces but not when needed most.

Houllier got us close to thinking we could win the league and then went off the rails, methinks Rafa is set to follow in his footsteps.

Owzat wrote:I think we need to face one simple F.A.C.T - we're not good enough. Someone pointed out the other day we've lost to every half-decent side we've played, that is a F.A.C.T.

Fiorentina
Aston Villa
Chelsea
Tottenham

Our manager seems to have little concept of tactics, favouring tic-tacs and pre determined substitutions. Even when 2-0 down at half-time and playing poorly he waits until his substitution zone of the 64th minute onwards to change players and then they are largely predictable. I mean who didn't seen Benayoun on for Riera as the first? Second was bound to be Babel for someone, I'd be shocked if bookies gave odds on his substitutions (time and who for who). It hasn't been that easy a start to the season, few would want spudz and Chelsea away in their first eight games, but we have lost four and won the other seven games and overall we're losing more than one every third game, and that's poor when it includes villa at home and two beatable sides in Fiorentina and spudz away.

I think the problem against Chelsea is Rafa tries the same tic-tacs every time we go there, we got lucky there last season and the dynamic of the team has changed with Johnson and Lucas in for Arbeloa and Alonso. He's still trying the same tic-tacs even though it clearly isn't working, incapable of thinking beyond the two deeper midfielders. I feel sorry for Lucas, he gets all the stick yet Mascherano was the one who got caught in possession and the first goal came directly from that mistake. Lucas isn't an accomplished enough player to be bossing midfield and doesn't work in a one up front system.

We may not be out of the title race yet, but perhaps merely because enough games haven't gone yet for it to be confirmed. Losing Alonso was a body blow, Rafa doesn't have the ability to change the way it went. People were thrilled Johnson came in when all it required with Arbeloa and Alonso was an attacking mentality. Now we try the mentality, well sometimes, and simply don't have the exponents/components. Some firmly believe we won't win the league under Rafa and I can completely understand why they say it. Where is our current strength? We have a good keeper with a cr ap defence in front of him, our midfield is a joke and both Torres and Gerrard are driving forces but not when needed most.

Houllier got us close to thinking we could win the league and then went off the rails, methinks Rafa is set to follow in his footsteps.

s@int wrote:

Emerald Red wrote:I think it had more to do with mentality than buys. Bellamy isn't a sh*t player. Neither is Pennant. Both have quality and both have abillity. It's their mentality that's lacking. Unfortunately Rafa made that mistake. Regardless, I don't really believe that's what dented our progress.

The simple truth is we went from 82 points down to 68 points the following season. I am sure Houllier still says that Diouf and Cheyrou were good players and that they just lacked the mentality (Notice how I sidestepped Diao    )

GYBS wrote:

s@int wrote:

Emerald Red wrote:I think it had more to do with mentality than buys. Bellamy isn't a sh*t player. Neither is Pennant. Both have quality and both have abillity. It's their mentality that's lacking. Unfortunately Rafa made that mistake. Regardless, I don't really believe that's what dented our progress.

The simple truth is we went from 82 points down to 68 points the following season. I am sure Houllier still says that Diouf and Cheyrou were good players and that they just lacked the mentality (Notice how I sidestepped Diao    )

The season we got 82 points we t knocked out of the CL in first round of the knockout so the squad wasnt stretched.

The next season we were doing well in the league and also reached the final of the CL but during the last 8 games of that season Rafa rested and prioritized the CL so dropped a fair number of points by playing the back up team while we went for CL glory .



Down - Yes .

Out - Never .

We actually played ok yesterday and no way to chelsea out play us - we had the chances to score - torres two , gerrard, yossi but didnt take them and that was the difference between the two teams - if we had taken our chances we would of won the game - so we didnt loose becuase of poor tactics or poor subs blah blah blah its was because the players out there didnt take their chances.

And off course there was the normal individual error which cost us a game .

Was rafa to blame for the error and the players not taking their chances ?

2006/7 after 30 games we were 21 points behind the leaders. After 38 games we finished......... 21 points behind the leaders. I am afraid that your argument doesn't hold up. 

s@int wrote:

GYBS wrote:

s@int wrote:

Emerald Red wrote:I think it had more to do with mentality than buys. Bellamy isn't a sh*t player. Neither is Pennant. Both have quality and both have abillity. It's their mentality that's lacking. Unfortunately Rafa made that mistake. Regardless, I don't really believe that's what dented our progress.

The simple truth is we went from 82 points down to 68 points the following season. I am sure Houllier still says that Diouf and Cheyrou were good players and that they just lacked the mentality (Notice how I sidestepped Diao    )

The season we got 82 points we t knocked out of the CL in first round of the knockout so the squad wasnt stretched.

The next season we were doing well in the league and also reached the final of the CL but during the last 8 games of that season Rafa rested and prioritized the CL so dropped a fair number of points by playing the back up team while we went for CL glory .



Down - Yes .

Out - Never .

We actually played ok yesterday and no way to chelsea out play us - we had the chances to score - torres two , gerrard, yossi but didnt take them and that was the difference between the two teams - if we had taken our chances we would of won the game - so we didnt loose becuase of poor tactics or poor subs blah blah blah its was because the players out there didnt take their chances.

And off course there was the normal individual error which cost us a game .

Was rafa to blame for the error and the players not taking their chances ?

2006/7 after 30 games we were 21 points behind the leaders. After 38 games we finished......... 21 points behind the leaders. I am afraid that your argument doesn't hold up. 

GYBS wrote:

s@int wrote:

GYBS wrote:

s@int wrote:

Emerald Red wrote:I think it had more to do with mentality than buys. Bellamy isn't a sh*t player. Neither is Pennant. Both have quality and both have abillity. It's their mentality that's lacking. Unfortunately Rafa made that mistake. Regardless, I don't really believe that's what dented our progress.

The simple truth is we went from 82 points down to 68 points the following season. I am sure Houllier still says that Diouf and Cheyrou were good players and that they just lacked the mentality (Notice how I sidestepped Diao    )

The season we got 82 points we t knocked out of the CL in first round of the knockout so the squad wasnt stretched.

The next season we were doing well in the league and also reached the final of the CL but during the last 8 games of that season Rafa rested and prioritized the CL so dropped a fair number of points by playing the back up team while we went for CL glory .



Down - Yes .

Out - Never .

We actually played ok yesterday and no way to chelsea out play us - we had the chances to score - torres two , gerrard, yossi but didnt take them and that was the difference between the two teams - if we had taken our chances we would of won the game - so we didnt loose becuase of poor tactics or poor subs blah blah blah its was because the players out there didnt take their chances.

And off course there was the normal individual error which cost us a game .

Was rafa to blame for the error and the players not taking their chances ?

2006/7 after 30 games we were 21 points behind the leaders. After 38 games we finished......... 21 points behind the leaders. I am afraid that your argument doesn't hold up. 

And how many points in total did we collect during those games ? i remember defeats to teams like fulham etc coming in the last couple of games when we played youngsters and back ups while the main players were rested for the CL -

look at the facts -

Best two seasons in the prem - worst results in the CL

Best seasons in the CL - worst points in the prem.