Liverpool FC Forum

Posted: **Sun May 04, 2008 6:23 pm**

I am confused which pro's are playing in the English team in the Olympics???
Olympics are a joke anyway, are there any sports not represented these days? :talktothehand

Posted: **Sun May 04, 2008 6:34 pm**

heimdall wrote:I am confused which pro's are playing in the English team in the Olympics???
Olympics are a joke anyway, are there any sports not represented these days?

England aren't in the olympics. Italy, Belgium, Holland, and Serbia are the UEFA teams

Posted: **Sun May 04, 2008 6:38 pm**

Also, I think that at the olympics, isn't it Great Britain that competes, and not the home nations, I think thats why England can't be in the olympics, and Great Britain doesn't have a football team. They are thinking about it when GB automatically qualifies for every event when London hosts, to get together a rag tag team of U23 players, but N. Ireland, Wales, and Scotland are afraid that FIFA would take it as a sign of weakness or something and take away their standing as independent soccer nations.

Posted: **Sun May 04, 2008 6:49 pm**

In 2012, England should play at the Olympics and just call themselves "GB"

Posted: **Mon May 05, 2008 12:57 am**

destro wrote: Club before Country.

That is a matter of opinion.

Posted: **Mon May 05, 2008 7:15 am**

I can understand him wanting to play for his country, but I think this over-age rule thing should be revised if they are going to run the Olympics into the start of a football season. And why do they need to? I can only guess they want to make sure the Euros don't clash with the Olympics, but since most of the Olympic football teams should not be automatic choices for their countries, and I know Argentina aren't playing in the Euros but some European teams are, then clashing shouldn't be an issue.

And as I understand it Mascherano has already won Gold with Argentina (?) and plays for the full international team, so does he need to play every single game possible? Has he not, 'been there, done that, bought the t-shirt' ? Of course we won't know the full impact until we see the early season schedule, shouldn't be a problem for the CL qualifiers, but knowing our luck we'll get a big gun early doors.

First of the big four faced in the season (Community Shield excepted)

2004/5 Man Utd 20/09/04 (game 5)
2005/6 Man Utd 18/09/05 (game 4)
2006/7 Chelsea 17/09/06 (game 4)
2007/8 Chelsea 19/08/07 (game 2)

So we've faced on of the big four well before the end of September EVERY SEASON, in fact by the fifth Premiership game of every campaign so far under Rafa. No great shock that our starts weren't so great. In fact last season we'd played the mancs, bitters, goners and Chelsea all AWAY by mid-November. The fixture generating computer is housed in old trafford I'm convinced. And I reckon they get the s*y to move and televise games to favour fergie. Chelsea have had to wait over 48 hours to try and catch up their game in hand to suit s*y. And all that shenanigans with playing the bitters on a THURSDAY, maybe it didn't cost them that game but they would have been thinking about it when drawing with Wigan.

Posted: **Mon May 05, 2008 12:34 pm**

Owzat wrote:So we've faced on of the big four well before the end of September EVERY SEASON, in fact by the fifth Premiership game of every campaign so far under Rafa. No great shock that our starts weren't so great. In fact last season we'd played the mancs, bitters, goners and Chelsea all AWAY by mid-November. The fixture generating computer is housed in old trafford I'm convinced. And I reckon they get the s*y to move and televise games to favour fergie.

I reckon it all evens out in the end mate. We had an absolutely p!ss easy start this season but "styled" ourselves into an unbeaten run riddled with draws. we then convinced ourselves we were doing pretty well when in truth we should have been off to an absolute flyer and capitalising on the fact that Man Utd were slow out of the blocks.

We managed to pick up one point from our opening three Champions League games (though goodness knows how as we were in a pretty easy group) and then a combo of having to rest players at the weekend to make sure they were fit for midweek Champions league qualifiers, a dodgy refereeing decision here and there and failure to beat any of the big four at Home in the first half of the season meant we were out of it by Christmas. Tell the truth since Christmas we've done pretty well, without setting the World alight with fluent football we have been very efficient in grinding out results. I don't in all honesty think that this season we can moan about our shedule though.

Even the season before, when we played all the hard away games in the first six or seven weeks of the season didn't necessarily mean we should be out of it by October as we were. You didn't have to Einstein to realise when looking at our fixture list to see that we were going to need to hit the ground sprinting, never mind running. If we could have done so, then nearly all the difficult games were out of the way and we could have really launched a challenge. Despite that though, we decided to go for fairground rotation in all the pre-season games ("don't worry FFS, it's only pre-season") which was followed by a baffling team selection at Home to Macabi Haifa in the Cl qualifier, then the debacle at Bramhall Lane where only a penalty every bit as odd, in fact probably odder than the one which gave Chelsea a point at Anfield this season rescued us. Five weeks of excessive styling later it was all over rover for another season.

Tough games are inevitable. You need to field your strongest available team in them, and do your best to ensure that when you go into the fixtures you have a modicum of momentum, understanding and rhythm. We gave it a bit of a bash in the second half of this season and only at Man Utd did we come unstuck. If we do the same next season I don't really mind when we play the hard games, but if we don't do the business it's no use blaming it on a computer.

Posted: **Mon May 05, 2008 12:54 pm**

Maybe the fact that England haven't qualified for the Euro' is one reason why Rafa is apparently going after English players Bentley and Barry, and has offered Crouch a contract?

I remember the pre-season before last, and it was an absolute disgrace, as Rafa tried to "ease" the first team players back after the World cup rather than taking advantage of the situation by making sure we hit the ground running.

Hopefully Spain will make an early exit (sorry Sabre) and our players wont come back tired or even worse injured.

If we are to make progress next season we really need to start well as once the mancs and Chelsea get a lead they don't tend to let it slip, and seem to grind results out week in week out.

I just hope we don't throw our chances away with a crazy money making pre-season, travelling around the globe.

Posted: **Mon May 05, 2008 1:53 pm**

worry not, we won't reach further than quarter of finals, you can quote me on that

Posted: **Mon May 05, 2008 1:59 pm**

Sabre wrote:worry not, we won't reach further than quarter of finals, you can quote me on that

I'll stick a tenner on them to win it then right

Posted: **Tue May 06, 2008 12:06 pm**

now Lucas..............

RAFA BENITEZ’S Olympic headache worsened today after Lucas became the second Liverpool player to declare his intention to take part in this summer’s Beijing Games.
May 6 2008 by Tony Barrett, Liverpool Echo

The Reds’ Brazilian midfielder has followed in the footsteps of Argentinian team-mate Javier Mascherano by confirming that he is determined to play for his country in the Olympics.

With the tournament taking place between August 8-24, Benitez will be left short of midfield cover at the start of the new season should both players get their wish.

And the situation is made even more impractical for Liverpool by the fact that should they be selected to represent their respective countries, both Lucas and Mascherano would be required to take part in training camps for a fortnight before the Olympics begin.

That would cause severe disruption to Benitez’s pre-season planning and leave the Liverpool boss with only two senior central midfielders to choose from in Steven Gerrard and Xabi Alonso, although they will be supplemented by Gareth Barry should the Reds’ pursuit of Aston Villa’s England star prove successful.

But Lucas insists he has to answer his country’s call – even though it would result in him missing out on Premiership games and a Champions League qualifier for Liverpool.

“Hopefully I will be picked,” he said. “That would mean I would start the pre-season here with Liverpool and then later on I would go to the Olympics.

“I need to wait for the squad to be picked but hopefully I will go.

“I know that would mean me missing some games for Liverpool and that is not good, but when you talk about your country you always want to play for them.

“And for Brazil the Olympics is like the World Cup because Brazil has never won the gold medal.

“It is also important for my future as an international player because the World Cup qualifiers are coming up and obviously I would like to be in the squad for those.

“So now I need to think about the Olympics and I will speak with Rafa about this.”

Meanwhile, speculation linking Liverpool with a move for Barcelona left back Eric Abidal is wide of the mark.

Benitez is in the market for a new left back with John Arne Riise likely to depart Anfield during the summer but Abidal is not on his shortlist and has not been watched by Liverpool’s scouts.

tonybarrett@liverpoolecho.co.uk

Posted: **Tue May 06, 2008 12:15 pm**

Does anyone know which countries are taking part? Must be no safe nation from either the olympics or the summer Euros/WC, the ACN and sometimes more/all/some.

Someone observed on 606 that apparently the mancs are having a magnificent season and yet Grant gets criticism despite being level on points and in the Champions League final just the same. The ACN affected Chelsea, why Grant struggles to get credit I'll never know. I know I'd swap our place with Chelsea's no question

Posted: **Tue May 06, 2008 12:18 pm**

ITs fair enought with me if players wish to represent their countries - I dont see the point in moaning about it myself like.

Its like buying African players and then moaning about them going the African Cup of NAtions in January/;Feb

Posted: **Tue May 06, 2008 12:59 pm**

I'm p1ssed off that he is picking up about 50k a week and won't be playing for us. Can FIFA force him or is it his own decision.

about a quarter of league games are over by the end of September - I don't want to hear bu11shit stories from him about tiredness,jetlag etc.

I'm so fuc*king :censored:

off about this :angry:

I defo don't have the temperment to be a manager I'd have sold him straight away after that announcement (but then again I've had shot Risse after that header). I'll stick to the day job.

Posted: **Tue May 06, 2008 1:15 pm**

won't lucas be going aswell?

Liverpool FC Forum

Little chief to miss start of next season ? - Stuff the olympics masch