I noticed the Suarez thing too. "Damn it, no one is celebrating with me... " ... second yeah and fist pump . It's so hilarious.
should have kept the 3 points from this one. Really hope JT is alright and wish him a speedy recovery. That picture does not make it look pleasant at all. uhh As for Torres, the past few games have had me wishing we had a striker that actually scores consistently. Perfect example by Jeddi in TOTT how everyone else's forwards are scoring important goals but our torres. BUT i have noticed him running at defenders a whole lot more, just still lacking that end product. We may have no choice but to dip into the Jan market. Its not gonna be cheap but it may get the team back on track.
Thanks for sharing, Bruck. When I saw that strange bend on TV, I thought it was his lower leg and a compound fracture. They didn't show the replay more than once (maybe twice) because it was so bad. Relatively good news in the injury thread for those who haven't seen it yet. Anyway, there's a lot of blame being put on Torres here. And I totally agree that he hasn't been good enough in the last month or so. But outside of that one that shot that he couldn't quite curl around Jones, what other opportunities did he have? He's become a real threat on set plays, as evidenced the the very smart reaction save Jones made against him from a corner in the 2nd half. Oscar, Mata, Hazard are all terrific players and it's a joy to watch them work, but at times we are looking Barcelona-esque, and not in a good way. They love to exchange little five-foot passes, but when there's not an easy opening and the opponent defends well, they quickly knock the ball back to Mikel/Ramires. None of them are running at defenders in the final third enough. At least Torres is willing to do that (won the corner for JT's goal). And how many of our attacks ended up at the feet of Azpilicueta? Seriously like half of them. And we are not going to score many goals with our RB crossing to our tiny attacking trio. I'm not trying to knock Cesar, either. He and Bertrand had terrific games. But there's still very little width, and there's not enough unselfish movement to drag and draw defenders away from the 18-yard box. The fullbacks were picking up the ball and everyone was running away from them! All in all, credit to Liverpool. They defended extremely well and hardly allowed a clear-cut chance all game. I still think we deserved a clean sheet and three points (****ing Suarez cheat), but they stymied our attack well enough to stay in the game and ended up getting the all-important goal. Fair play.
See now im curious what happened with this mentality? Hazard and Oscer were running at the defense in the first few weeks winning some PKs/fouls around the box. Seems as if now they aren't getting the calls anymore so they don't run at the players as much.
IMO its not that we lack hunger, its that defensively and offensively we're A) tired B) have been figured out. And i think thats largely at Robbies fault, he doesn't rotate enough. Moses should be starting over Oscar, same goes for Danny and Nando, and it really didn't help that Marin, Lamps, and JT were unavailable injured. Not just the bigger sides, but decent teams like Swansea have figured out the chinks in our armor and have capitalized on our attacking mistakes. I know this is a transitional year, and if it really is its been a fairly good one. But the mistakes that have been made on the managerial level could have easily been avoided. We should have had a better string of result, granted the manure debacle, if Robbie would just let some of fecking subs get some starts in more important games and not just league cup fixtures.
I totally agree with the rotation point. However, I feel for Robbie. When you have all of your best players available, it's difficult not to select them. Di Matteo has a lot of room to grow as a manager. He's only 42. He doesn't even have 5 years in the business, and far less than that at the top level. It's even more confusing considering his willingness to rotate last season, even if it was because of our unique situation.
Compared to last season im surprised at the lack of rotation RDM has done this year. I know if its not broken don't fix it but that mentality can not last the entire season.
I dont think it will. I *hope* we look back at this period , as one where the manager showed appropriate patience - through some fair and unfair results. I also hope that RDM makes the right changes, integrating Moses, Sturridge, Marin, Azpilicueta, and Romeu into the squad starting now. It does seem like some January additions will be necessary. Giving Roman and the board time to see where reinforcements are needed is best done when are flaws are truly exposed. We can all argue about what those are (Torres, thin D, etc), but as a manager you'd be a fool to flip your squad around just for the heck of it when CFC had been playing quite well for 2+ months. Is it a shame that Romeu, Azipluceta, Bertrand - when they played, we're at the very least rusty and certainly didn't objectively "impress", of course it's a shame. But when Cole wasnt injured, JT available, Lampard available, Ivan playing at RB; as RDM why the hell would you mess with not only a nice chemistry through the starting 11 but also replace a veteran "spine" of the team. A "spine" that also played MUCH better defense, not only through possession alone. As for now, i'll judge RDM by the way the team responds and plays, their mentality which have been a tremendous improvement over this time last year.