Liverpool FC Forum

by **Owzat** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 10:18 am

Apparently Rafa is still trying to make out we are making 'progress'. A reporter asked him if Liverpool were, he didn't give exactly a straight answer, using the old line about players coming back etc, but he was trying to avoid giving the impression the answer was no.

He claimed "our season starts now" before the game yesterday, funny how the season proper started with a 1-2 defeat to a North London club and Rafa's new season start began with a 1-2 defeat to a North London club................................... Every corner we turn it seems we end up looking down exactly the same street.

Here's an interesting set of stats, the bottom line of which is how little difference there is between our 04/05 league campaign and 09/10 - Rafa's first season in charge vs his current season. Our start is now as bad as in Rafa's first season in charge when the squad was predominantly Houllier's

Worst starts to Premiership (Liverpool FC)

1. 92/93 Souness : P16 W6 D4 L6 F25 A24 PTS 22 (GD +1)
2. 03/04 Houllier : P16 W6 D4 L6 F23 A18 PTS 22 (GD +5)
3. 98/99 Houllier : P16 W6 D4 L6 F27 A21 PTS 22 (GD +6)
4. 04/05 Benitez : P16 W7 D3 L6 F24 A18 PTS 24 (GD +6)
5. 09/10 Benitez : P16 W7 D3 L6 F32 A22 PTS 24 (GD +10)

Progress? Well we are +4 GD better off and have scored more goals, but otherwise it is practically identical - so much for 'progress'. Six defeats in the first 16 Premiership games is our joint worst record, after 16 games last season we'd lost only once. Sure Rafa has the best three 16 game starts in terms of least defeats, but he has two entries in the joint most as well - same as Souness and Houllier.

Of course 04/05 was memorable for our glory in the Champions League when we had to come back from 0-1 down against Olympiakos to win 3-1 and go through to the knockout stages of the Champions League on our way to Istanbul and number five. This season we were so poor it was all but over by the fifth round of games, with us hoping Lyon could keep us in and the embarrassment caught on camera of our players crowding round a TV to watch the dying moments in the game we needed Lyon to win. Ah well, never mind, there's always the Europa League as a route to 'glory' - or further ignimonious humiliation.

In 04/05 we reached the League Cup final, this season we went out in the 4th round. We did go out in the 3rd round of the FA Cup in 04/05 thanks to bambi on ice's display of silky skills, but we've gone out in the 3rd, 5th and 4th rounds since winning it on penalties in 2006 so the chances of having a run in that competition are not great either.

Sure we've had some highs inbetween, put on some good points records, but are we not now back staring firmly at square one? I guess we are closer to Chelsea now than we were in 04/05, they had 39 points from 16 games then compared to 37 now so we are only 13 points behind after 16 games compared to 15 points behind back then!

But the league comparison should worry people on here, in 04/05 we missed out on fourth spot and we won't get any reprieve this time by lifting any second rate European trophy

by **bunglemark2** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 10:24 am

Mate, I don't care for stats...you can read them a million ways.
Quite simply - we are going backwards, end of !

by **tubby** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 10:25 am

Yet another anti thread. Don't worry statto, soon you will Klinsman at the helm. A fresh start and a raft of new stats to get lost in.

by **JohnBull** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 10:34 am

I will be surprised if anyone thinks that Raffa will be leading us next season.
The rest of this season could end up a real nightmare because we are floating along without a rudder.
Stevie is playing at the moment thanks to injections before every game. If he doesn't have the hernia op soon he will not make the World Cup. The boy doesn't deserve that.
Without him for a large part of the rest of this season spells big trouble for us.
The players we have are not "bad" players and I've no doubt that in different teams, under different managers, playing different systems, they would do a good job.
Raffa has lost the plot. He is a good honest man but he is well out of his depth now. We need a man doing the simple things well rather than these complicated gameplans that bemuse the players.
All the stats in the world will not change the look on the players faces, the body language, the acceptance of defeat. The players no longer believe in the system and all the chalk boards/videos/statistics in the world won't change that.
Time to get the board duster out lads.

by **bigmick** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 11:17 am

That's kind of how I see it too mate I must be honest. All the "science" stuff is all very well, as is monitoring the "details" and the like, but you have to get the basics right. The basics are that when you are infront you are fecking hard to score against, and when you are behind you swarm all over em like a cheap suit. You have to have a collective presence, a desire to win matches, win the next one and win again. Our perofrmances so far in what IMHO is a desperately poor Premiership are nothing short of a disgrace.

Step one for whoever is our manager (and it's currently Rafa so it might as well be him) is to learn how to defend set pieces properly. Arsenal were also awful at it against us, Chelsea can't do it for love nor money, City are very ordinary at it and we are absolutely clueless at it. Just about the only team in the Premiership which defends set pieces effectively currently is Aston Villa it seems to me. They have a good goalkeeper who commands his penalty area, and a couple of beefy centre halves who attack it, backed up by defenders who mark properly.

Once we've got that sorted, lets work out how we're actually going to try and play. If we are going to persist with the Lucas/Masherano axis (I don't think we should but our manager loves it) then lets properly invest in the system. Lets pull Gerrard back 10 yards and leave Torres properly up on his own. Hit him from range and nick lots of 1-0's. Lets encourage agger to step up much more often as he's a better footballer than either of our holders. I wouldn't do it, but at least it's a plan which would have a bit of method behind it. Failing that, lets bite the bullet and play Aquilani. If we go down that route, lets consider playing Gerrard wide right again. No team in the World would handle him and Johnson in tandem. we could play Benayoun or Kuyt in behind Torres (I'd probably go for Kuyt out of what we have available). We might even take a chance and play Babel in there, give us a bit of pace and unpredictability.

Mostly though, we need to free things up a bit. Put a smile back on the faces of the players, the odd one looking like he's actually enjoying himself wouldn't go amiss. If rafa is to stay as manager in the short term, get him up in the stands and let the players play. Stop instructing them where to stand, how to run, who to watch. Sit down fella and let them play, we've got some good players.

by **Sabre** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 11:45 am

He claimed "our season starts now" before the game yesterday,

Well Rafa knows this is not correct.

He probably means that with Agger, Fabio Aurelio recovered, and the Gerrard-Torres partnership together, and if we add Aquilani, and injuries respect Liverpool a bit, we'll improve a lot.

I also think that.

But unfortunately the season started in September Rafa. And we came from a title challenge so the expectations are naturally high.

Until the summer Rafa made this club progressing, and the discussion was about how slow or how much was this progress. No amount of revisionism will change that.

by **shawnk** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 12:32 pm

In the Arsenal game
+
+ Rafa did start with Aurelio instead of Insua
+ The team played well during first half.

-
- Rafa doesn't seem to have an answer during the 2H and the team couldn't really respond after conceding the second goal.
- Result could've been better if Torres didn't miss the great chance in first half and if the referee gave us the penalty. Oh well, lets move on as we have bigger problem at hand...

by **mart** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 12:49 pm

JohnBull wrote:I will be surprised if anyone thinks that Raffa will be leading us next season.

I dont think Rafa will be manager next year, but i dont think the fans will be happy with the way things turn out next year either.

by **Madmax** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 4:48 pm

bigmick wrote:That's kind of how I see it too mate I must be honest. All the "science" stuff is all very well, as is monitoring the "details" and the like, but you have to get the basics right. The basics are that when you are infront you are fecking hard to score against, and when you are behind you swarm all over em like a cheap suit. You have to have a collective presence, a desire to win matches, win the next one and win again. Our perofrmances so far in what IMHO is a desperately poor Premiership are nothing short of a disgrace.

Step one for whoever is our manager (and it's currently Rafa so it might as well be him) is to learn how to defend set pieces properly. Arsenal were also awful at it against us, Chelsea can't do it for love nor money, City are very ordinary at it and we are absolutely clueless at it. Just about the only team in the Premiership which defends set pieces effectively currently is Aston Villa it seems to me. They have a good goalkeeper who commands his penalty area, and a couple of beefy centre halves who attack it, backed up by defenders who mark properly.

Once we've got that sorted, lets work out how we're actually going to try and play. If we are going to persist with the Lucas/Masherano axis (I don't think we should but our manager loves it) then lets properly invest in the system. Lets pull Gerrard back 10 yards and leave Torres properly up on his own. Hit him from range and nick lots of 1-0's. Lets encourage agger to step up much more often as he's a better footballer than either of our holders. I wouldn't do it, but at least it's a plan which would have a bit of method behind it. Failing that, lets bite the bullet and play Aquilani. If we go down that route, lets consider playing Gerrard wide right again. No team in the World would handle him and Johnson in tandem. we could play Benayoun or Kuyt in behind Torres (I'd probably go for Kuyt out of what we have available). We might even take a chance and play Babel in there, give us a bit of pace and unpredictability.

Mostly though, we need to free things up a bit. Put a smile back on the faces of the players, the odd one looking like he's actually enjoying himself wouldn't go amiss. If rafa is to stay as manager in the short term, get him up in the stands and let the players play. Stop instructing them where to stand, how to run, who to watch. Sit down fella and let them play, we've got some good players.

By doing all that i could see us playing much better but mr stubborn will never make massive changes like that.

by **puroresu** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 5:03 pm

we aint finishing in the top 4. rafa needs to go. no excuses 4 this season. awful stuff

by **redbeergoggles** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 9:24 pm

bavlondon wrote:Yet another anti thread. Don't worry statto, soon you will Klinsman at the helm. A fresh start and a raft of new stats to get lost in.

literally drowning in a sea of statistics that would give an aspirin
a headache

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