Please point out where anyone complained about their feelings? I know I certainly didn't. And rest assured I don't want to be your friend. You are consistent in your opinions and it is not worth arguing with you since I can not recall a single instance in the last many years when you posted that anyone had changed your mind or even had a valid opinion that didn't coincide with your own.
It's not size. It's alertness. Watch Carzola for Arsenal, Silva for City and Mata and, especially, Oscar for Chelsea. Even when not on the ball, they are always turning their heads, always aware of what is happening or who is around them In the case of a breakdown, they are very quick to the transition. Most of our players, except for Suarez (yes him), Suso and Lucas switch off once they release the ball or, even more criminally, when not on the ball. Gerrard, when in the final third is very aware but seems to sleep-walk in the defensive part. Unfortunately, he's been playing in the latter as opposed to the former part of the field. Another thing which has been issue since the departure of Benitez, and starkly demonstrated yesterday, was that most players considered their duty done once they releases or attempted to release the ball to Suarez, and stopped moving. That is a coaching issue; Benitez, on the sidelines, kept cajoling players to move and led to a later complaint by Pennant that Benitez was a control freak who wanted him to keep moving and pressing all the time Well, that malaise is back.
This game went exactly as I feared it would. We are so predictably unpredictable that I am not sure how to feel. As a club right now, we are firmly mid-table. Mid-table results, arguably mid-table squad and sadly, seemingly mid-table level of focus or desire. We all know that this is going to take time, but it doesn't make these results against teams like Stoke any easier to stomach. We are so up and down, I am beginning to suffer from whiplash. What concerns me is how we seem to struggle with our focus. This seems the lynch pin (byind clinical finishing, I mean, how many chances can you miss??) Reina had every right to be livid on goals 1 & 3. The defense let him down, time and time again. I grew so tired of seeing Walters in loads of space on the wing. My only hope right now is that the injection of some goals into the squad will turn some of these matches into wins and draws, but I still think we are a good year or so away from being a team to take seriously. I just feel it does me mental harm to have any expectations from the club right now outside of showing progress. We are just so far from polished and the results are very telling of a club in transition. I believe we will get there, but we can't fool ourselves in the present.
And that is my concern. While, undoubtedly BR is telling the players to remain focused, and to cover, and to react, is he setting the team up to do that? Are we currently far too open in possession? Are the wide players encouraged to move too early into attacking with less emphasis on covering the back? And if so, is it because we lack attacking options? The answer to these questions would go some way to predicting whether we are a team in transition learning a new style, or whether the team is being misguided. Paradoxically, I wonder why we don't see more players attacking the eighteen? Are they lazy, hesitant, or not being directed to make runs?
Mate, you're just fine. And so is the rest of this forum. I actually find it quite tame here and for that reason I like it a lot more than most forums I visit. If you really want to see flames and trolls visit a video-gaming forum, a philosophy forum or a science forum. I remember I was reading about abiogenesis once and there were these two angry, atheist nerds who were going at it. One was claiming that life originated from gas and the other from liquids. The verbal violence in that discussion was profound, and on such an marginal issue nonetheless. It was as if each one had fcuked the others' mom and then murdered his sister.
My take is Rodgers is implementing the "system" without the players needed to make it successful, and he's not compensated tactically for the talent shortfall / mismatch. As others have observed we're way too open in possession for these players - and teams now know they can sit back while we flartz around with our passy - passy stuff until we lose the ball, then they can cut us open with ease. Needs to get fixed.
'twas ever thus. I have seen Lucas stand up to and then dominate Yaya Toure, for example. Too much fascination with size, I think, and not enough with craft and creativity. '
This game has probably been discussed to death. I do not want to focus on the negatives and I will try to post something that can be more useful. Stoke won promotion in the 07-08 season and joined the premier league from the 08-09 season. 1. 08-09 season Benitez At this point we drew with them 0-0 both home and away. 2. 09-10 season Benitez We beat them at home 4-0 (Johnson, Kuyt, Torres and Ngog). The away game finished 1-1 with our only goal by Kyrgiakos. 3. 10-11 season Hodgson We were beaten 2-0 by Stoke in the away game. Leiva got a red card. 4. 10-11 season Dalglish We won our home game 2-0 with Meireles and Suarez our goal scorers. 5. 11-12 season Dalglish We lost the away game by 1-0 and in the Carling cup beat them at their own patch by 2-1 both goals courtesy of Suarez. The home game that followed was a draw 0-0. 6. 12-13 season Rodgers We lose 3-1 at the Britannia. Benitez P:4 W:1 D:3 L:0 Hodgson P:1 W:0 D:0 L:1 Dalglish P:4 W:2 D:1 l:1 Rodgers P:1 W:0 D:0 L:1 The statistics do show that we have never shown any consistency against Stoke. Bearing in mind each manager had a different team on the pitch at the time and the resources each had are different in terms of squad size and most importantly quality. What is it that Stoke do that has clearly given us a mixed bag of results? They have a game plan season plan in approaching each team. They do not change their tactics according to the teams they face, and they rely on their strengths (literally). From 08-09 to 12-13 they have finished 12,11,13,14,10 and Liverpool 2,7,6,8,8. With all due respect they are clearly a mid table club. This season they have not been lucky with decisions going against them which Pulis has raised concerns about but his team and the owners have given him their full support. He does not have a large account to dip in for transfers but he has been generally successful in adding players that suit his style and that of the club. The way they play is more like a mix of house music with hard rock. In your face. They push and shove, grab, fight, headbutt, launch tackles, do everything that according to some is the opposite of football i.e. Rugby. But, this has brought them success they are known to take on the bigger teams (us included) and can fight till the end. The manager will do all in his power to shower the referees with verbal abuse and he can be extremely confrontational. Their advantages are their set pieces, throw ins and the lanky build of each and every player accompanied by 2-3 skillful players. They will chase down lost causes, pressure you in your own box and their fans have played a big part in their success with their impressive support. Are Stoke the best team in the world, no they are not. They have found a method, a system that is working for them and for the lack of defensive skills they have they make it up with an all round effort. What was evident in this game they pressed us. Rodgers has instructed our defenders to play the ball out of defense and numerous times there will be exchanges of the ball between Reina, Enrique, Skrtel and Agger. They had us pinned back and that led to a mistake by Enrique who cleared the ball over our own box and we were lucky not to concede at that point. The team spirit Stoke showed was one we can take a good look at. When they fouled our players they surrounded the ref, equally when we fouled their players they surrounded the referees. Not from the United book of Harassing Referees but they do it effectively. Even though it pains me to say this, Stoke played to their strengths and had us "panic" in most cases. This is why our decision making was poor we would pass when we should shoot, we would move back when we should go forward, we would play a poor through ball when there was a channel on the wings. Apart from Reina, Suarez (bless his soul for working till the end) and Enrique the rest had a poor day by their standards. Yes both the veterans and the rookies, were at fault. If Agger/Skrtel messed up in defense that was costly, there were minor mistakes all over the pitch that if we avoided we would have possibly had a few more opportunities to score. And if those who forgot Suarez did hit the post in the second half. I do not blame Rodgers, for this loss because it could have happened to any of the last three managers with or without a good squad. Rodgers most certainly must be preparing a visual aid (dvds, presentations etc) that discuss the strengths and weaknesses of Stoke and any other team we face and it is up to the players to take something out of it. The high pressure, volatile atmosphere, physical roughing up etc must have all been mentioed by Rodgers but unfortunately after they scored the equaliser we were on the back foot. Rodgers is very keen for his system to work the pass and move, but with Stoke sometimes we need to modify it. Fire with fire, they say but I am more of Fire and a douse of extinguisher to their fire. Carroll might or might not have been suitable for this game, but over time the players and the team will begin to have more confidence in their own ability. They are humans after all and this loss must have been more painful then that against Villa. When we do face Stoke again at home, what do we need? A 4-5-1 system, high pressing by the midfielders, closer 1-2s. We will not have any time for skills but our wingers will be key. We need two defensive mids to protect any counter attack, and if the players are faithful to Rodgers they will pass and move and trust each other. If we do get under pressure by all means pressure them even more. We concede, then put the pedal on the floor beat them on 1 v 1 situations, every foul and challenge should be whole hearted and for the love of god do not fear getting injured as that is what they want. There were times when their players have that fire in their eye that they are going to injure someone twice I counted Shotton going in on reckless challenges from the back on Enrique yet Enrique got punished for an earlier soft foul. The owners of Stoke have bestowed faith and trust in Pulis. I do not know what his records has been in the championship in terms of position, but he has managed to get the team playing his own football and with the limited funds he has he is making buys for the team. (Similar to what Martinez is doing at Wigan). When Stoke loses its not because he does not have a good squad, it is because either they were found out or according to Pulis it was the referees fault. We can be better than them. We are better. We have a manager with a positive philosophy a young squad and importantly in the early stages of our re-birth. It is painful to lose and to lose in the manner that we do, but it can all turn around. I am looking ahead and seeing that we should give Rodgers some time because we have the utilities, the players, the revenue, the support and the spirit of the city and the fans behind the club. Pulis got his support, he has taken them where they deserve to be. Rodgers needs his support, to get us where we rightly should be in.
I'm not really sure why Suarez and Reina get a pass for this game. Sure the centre backs made some mistakes but Reina is not in the team to purely make up the numbers. All he had to deal with was 5 shots on target and he let 3 of them in, similar to the Villa game where they had 6 shots on target and he let in 3. In many of our close games he is one of the mitigating factors in why we are getting beat as although we have the 5th best defence when it comes to conceding shots we are 11th for goals scored against. Reina is a far, far better keeper than he's recently been performing. Suarez too wasn't great either, 7 shots and only 1 on target is just not good enough. In fairness to him he needs at least one player in attack with him who can regularly put the ball in the back of the net to take the pressure of him. Suarez, himself has took 109 shots in the league(more than any other player) with only 33 on target. Anyone who's played football at any level knows there are some guys who are just greedy and only think of glory(i share these afflictions), but the downside is that the other players become frustrated and rather than pass, instead start to take unrealistic shots themselves. The attack currently does not work as a team, last year we scored quite regularly in the 11 games Suarez missed and this season we've done OK in the cups and against West Ham without him. His previous coaches at Nacional, Uruguay, Ajax and Groningen have figured out how to play him hopefully Rodgers can too before its too late.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Well played. The last time we were up in the table, we had a chemistry with Gerrard and Torres surrounded by other players who'd been in the side a while and knew tendencies, runs, spacing, timing in attack. The team gelled, then produced. We're far from that. We have a genius second striker playing sublime balls to....kids in their first season of grinding out Prem games. We've got a new metronome in the MF in Allen, a returning from injury Lucas, and Gerrard are the right side of the career bell curve. We have Enrique playing a new position almost. And most importantly, we have our third brand manager in 18 mo. Of course we're going to go to Stoke and fail to make that incisive pass then fail to exactly properly defend a corner. We'll go to other places and do the same thing. Then we'll win impressively. It's not really inconsistency, because that implies a finished product. Let the boys get to know each other, mature individually, and gel as a team. You can't manufacture team chemistry. It's like a wine, takes time, improves with age.
It seems they do the same thing Tottenham have done to us and the same thing Blackpool did to us. They run at us full-speed ahead and in both the attack and defense and our players can't handle it. I don't think it's a coincidence that since Mascherano stopped playing for us we haven't played as well. I'm a huge fan of Lucas. He's got outstanding intelligence and reads the game well. But he is lacking in the hard tackle department. Didn't KK use the 3-5-2 against Stoke?