LFC - You'll Never Walk Alone

[Cheesecake]

Liverpool controlled the game!

and Everton destroyed man utd! i wonder if i should feel happy...???

anyway, Everton won't have it any easier. man utd self destruct. :thumbsd:

 

[Cheesecake]

i can't believe everton outplyaed man utd.

i know the toffee boys have a high disregard towards the reds from manchester, but i still can't believe man utd being out played by everton.

man... they do look worthy for the 4th place. but i thought, so do we! winning 2-1 away convincingly at portsmouth!
com'on u REDS!!! make it another victory this saturday!!! :thumbsup:

 

[laugh]

everton looks value for money eh....

good thing we won, or it is all over.

Its tough facing teams battling against relegation... crystal palace next :sweat:

 

[Cheesecake]

3points away with everton holding a game in hand.

wow... the road ahead is really tough. its never easy nor cheerful to support Liverpool nowadays. more darkness than there is light. can't take a well-exposed photo if there isn't that much light!!! haha!

let us jus enjoy this run for as long as we could and hope that everton slip up...

 

[MichaelLee]

to be fair with my our critics on Pelle...here I provide the stats.
Pellegrino started in 8 EPL matches,

Liv-Man U (0-1)
Soto-Liv (2-0)
Newcastle-Lpool (1-0)
Liv-Blackburn (0-0)
Liv -Everton (2-1)
Liv - Bolton (1-0)
Man City -Liv (1-0)
Liv - Tot (2-2)

I tio Traore, Dudek and other players when they screwed up. But at
times, these players are played becos they are at least better than the
alternative..

If u don't play Traore, u only got the inexperience Warnock there. Or
Kirkland is so injury proned that Dudek is still playing. Even if I dun really
appreciate Baros much, I dun moan the fact Rafa was playing him, becos he's the best we have got, even if it's not good enuf.

The issue is we have an outstanding player in Hyppia, yet he was being
replaced by Pellegrino.



Give some challenge on Hyypia is good. But not in the expense of Liverpool losing ...

Soto-Liv (2-0)
Newcastle-Lpool (1-0)
Liv -Everton (2-1)
Liv - Bolton (1-0)
Man City -Liv (1-0)

Liverpool 2 - Portsmouth 1.

Another game last night add in to the stats/fact that Hyppia should always play as Liverpool CD if he is not injured or tired. Pelle should sit on the bench.

Hope Rafa would not start anymore game with Pelle ahead of Hyypia and Josemi for Finnan..

 

[giddygoat]

can't blame rafa for starting pelle sometimes. even if hyypia is not tired, to always play with 2 CD means that if one injured, you end up with a replacement short of match practice. and pelle as a new signing need games to settle.
i really wonder what problem rafa has with henchoz though, that he completely froze him out of the team the moment he arrived at LFC. our other CDs like whitbread are too inexperienced.

still, i agree with you as now we have only a few more games and we need to put the best possible team out in the field and try to get all the points on offer.

as for josemi, i hope he would get a chance next season to prove himself. but i also hope it's the last we see of him this season.

we can only hope for the best. if everton and bolton slip-up, it would be a relief. but both these teams do deserve it if they make it to the CL. they really performed above themselves.

 

[MichaelLee]

can't blame rafa for starting pelle sometimes. even if hyypia is not tired, to always play with 2 CD means that if one injured, you end up with a replacement short of match practice. and pelle as a new signing need games to settle.

If u are arsene wenger..u start 1 game with henry playing and he scored 2 goals...and would u keep him aside for the next game and only to play him for the next following game as to keep him fresh (if he is not injured or tired ) ?

so..if a player is on form/fire..u should rest him to keep him fresh ?

Even S league coach will have the knowledge that this is not the way.

So far..the recent results tell us all....(as mentioned previously,) where on earth this day..u can see a Central defender who scored a volley with his left foot, and again with his right foot within a week ?

not even 30m -the most expensive had managed to do that...but our Anfield legend hyypia showed that he is the best finisher among all EPL CD.

I think we should keep playing Carra-hyypia week in week out..if they are injured..then no choice, have to play Pelle. if either Carra or Hyypia are not fully fit...just like Alonso when he returned from injury..play him 70th and sub out.

So far...we have 3 combintions between 3 of them,
a) Carra-Hyypia (the best)
b) Carra-Pelle
c) hyypia-Pelle(the worst)

We all know that Carra-Hyypia is the best partnership for playing CD. Why do we want to break it when we have found the best ?? Every EPL game since Jan was an important for us..Mind u that we had been playing a catch-up role..not sitting comfortably at 4th. Why dun we use the our best available source to approach all the important games.

Again the stats are ..

Pellegrino started in 8 EPL matches since Jan, the results of the team are much poorer than we would have expected.

Liv-Man U (0-1)
Soto-Liv (2-0)
Newcastle-Lpool (1-0)
Liv-Blackburn (0-0)
Liv -Everton (2-1)
Liv - Bolton (1-0)
Man City -Liv (1-0)
Liv - Tot (2-2)

Pelle also did not start any Champion League game...also co-incidently with hyypia playing..we had gone so much further than we expected.

Again dun get me wrong..I am not really making Pelle as scapegoat. I dun think he is a bad player either. I welcome him to be liverpool player.

It is just that...if we have the better alternative who had been our 1st choice CD since Houllier era...why Pelle should play for all those important EPL matches ahead of Hyypia ?

We won 2-1 last night without Pelle !!! again co-incident ?? may be.

if it has been so "co-incident"..why not we just keep on this trend playing hyypia for a game either a win or a draw..rather than playing pelle..mostly ending a game losing or a draw..

as for josemi, i hope he would get a chance next season to prove himself. but i also hope it's the last we see of him this season.

He had shown us his full potential. He is the da best to let the defender run past him..then he waived his hand to the lineman &realise the flag is not up...then he started to jog slowly. he had done his numerous of time..

he is definately a liability to the team.

 

[totofile]

Only Rafael will know why he chose Pelle to play

 

[giddygoat]

like i said lor, i agree that hyypia and carra should start almost every match but in modern football, you sometimes need to rest players whether or not they were tired. i imagine rafa is a little daunted by the luck we had with injuries and would sometimes be tempted to rest one of his most important players in order to avoid injury to him, especially with a big match in a few days time. imagine if hyypia had been injured in one of the matches, then we'll have pelle in every match after that..... i think most managers these days would practice team rotation anyway, and try out some bench warmers in matches they believe to be less taxing. and even fergie and wenger do sometimes rest key players if they have a big match in a few day's time.

anyway, while pellegrino is not fantastic, i do think that it is unfair to only blame him. in many of the matches he played in, we were second best in almost all departments. we kept losing possession and that puts pressure on the backline. admittedly, maybe if we had hyypia and carra, they may do a better job but let's not just blame one player.
i think the most important thing about our recent improvements is the fact that alonso is back. if you look at our possesion, we rarely have more than 50% even in matches we won when xabi is not around. with alonso around, we hold possession better and the team ticks better.

btw, i'm not disputing with you that hyypia and carra should play every match but i'm looking from rafa's point of view, he had his reasons to field pelle, though the gamble ultimately backfired. in a perfect world, pelle should not have even been signed as we should have had enough defensive cover to not need a last minute short term signing.

i think we can only say hyypia is the second best finisher in CD. don't forget terry. he's got 8 this season. anyway, i think it'd be pretty sad if rafa had to always field hyypia becos hyypia scores the goals for us. this is not right. i blame our attackers. they have muffed too many chances and have not been able to link up too well with one another. there are times when we should have scored or even killed off the game early but we did not and let the other team back in. injuries to the forwards too, of course, are another problem.

 

[Cheesecake]

i suggest a straight swap of pelle for woody or john terry. hahahahaa!

pelle is too slow and he can't adjust to the rigours of the EPL.



com'on u REDS!!! let's win the last remaining games!!!

 

[giddygoat]

We won 2-1 last night without Pelle !!! again co-incident ?? may be.

it's a bit like the stats which said we played better without gerrard. there are too many variables to be sure. but looking at the last game, it would seem that we had control of the game, we had almost 3 times the shots that portmouth had and the pompeys didn't get much opportunities to even get a cross in. i'd say our success was a team effort. and forget not that we did conceed a goal. if it was not for the fact that we scored 2........and steve stone apparently missed a sitter......

anyway, as long as a player wears our jersey, i will continue rooting for them and hoping they can improve and do well. while i would wince if i ever see josemi's name on the team sheet, i would still go on hoping that he's better than we give him credit for. that's all we fans can do.

 

[giddygoat]

i suggest a straight swap of pelle for woody or john terry. hahahahaa!

pelle is too slow and he can't adjust to the rigours of the EPL.



com'on u REDS!!! let's win the last remaining games!!!

throw in biscan for lampard too ;p

 

[Cheesecake]

throw in biscan for lampard too ;p

erm... it should be Diao for Lampard!! haha!

he's being loaned out to sad birmingham, din't he? and he ain't get a chance to start for them??? hahaha

 

[giddygoat]

erm... it should be Diao for Lampard!! haha!

he's being loaned out to sad birmingham, din't he? and he ain't get a chance to start for them??? hahaha

i completely forgot diao existed :bsmilie: yah man. diao for lampard!! or joe cole! well, for most players i can think of

 

[laugh]

wait long long ah!!!

 

[giddygoat]

wait long long ah!!!

waiting :bsmilie:
and while we're at it, i also want them to move anfield to bukit batok. easier for me to watch live matches. and i want a pony too :angel:

 

[MichaelLee]

pelle is too slow and he can't adjust to the rigours of the EPL.

I fully agree on this. he is slow in EPL football..not his fault, we all know he is 33 and he is not used to such a high tempo game in EPL.

Giddygoat..I understand your point. I am not blaming Pelle. I am only trying to explain my view there should be no reason I can see that Pelle should start ahead of Hyypia. In modern football..player salary is so much...thus ..they all fully utilise the player.. If Ferdinard is not injured...he would play every game for MU.

If henry is scoring every match, he would play all match. Only he is playing poorly, then the maneger will keeop him for a match or 2 to get him refresh.


Coming back to Biscan..this guy had improved so much under Rafa...at least he is playing at his position..not as CD where Houllier played him.

His contract is coming to an end..read that there is no contract offer to him. Sad to see he is leaving when we just started to see what he can do for us after being bench warmer for last few seasons.

 

[giddygoat]

yah man. i am hoping that eeeegor stays too. he's looking better with each game and he filled in well when hamann is out. certainly rafa had been giving him opportunities to play and he did not let us down much. he doesn't look like he'd ever be top class but he would still be a very good player to have in the side. unless we can have a chance of getting a much better player, i hope we can keep biscan.

the most important thing now is to build a team worthy of the jersey, clear out the deadwood like diao, and maybe sell some less important players to bring in some real quality.

 

[giddygoat]

Giddygoat..I understand your point. I am not blaming Pelle. I am only trying to explain my view there should be no reason I can see that Pelle should start ahead of Hyypia. In modern football..player salary is so much...thus ..they all fully utilise the player.. If Ferdinard is not injured...he would play every game for MU.

i know what you mean also. not really disputing what you said cos i do agree. just wanted to say that rafa probably has his reasons too.

and let's face it, if we were real title challengers and a top team, some of those games we lost or drew could have been won with a team with some bench warmers. man city, blackburn, southampton etc, while i don't look down on them, are smaller clubs which we should be able to beat even if we fielded our third choice defender. i guess what i mean is that the team underperformed. the lads we depended on to come in a prove themselves when the first choice players are out just couldn't cut it. and often the first choice players didn't live up to expectation as well.

lack of confidence? no motivation? not enought talent? i don't know but till we can have a strong team with enough depth in the squad, i fear for the club.

 

[MichaelLee]

yah man. i am hoping that eeeegor stays too. he's looking better with each game and he filled in well when hamann is out. certainly rafa had been giving him opportunities to play and he did not let us down much. he doesn't look like he'd ever be top class but he would still be a very good player to have in the side. unless we can have a chance of getting a much better player, i hope we can keep biscan.

the most important thing now is to build a team worthy of the jersey, clear out the deadwood like diao, and maybe sell some less important players to bring in some real quality.

ya loh. hope we can keep biscan too. he is 26. Get him 1-2 more years..he needs games to back on his experience. Hamann will be good to stay with us 1-2 season. I guess he will leave us by end of next season to Munich. Get biscan study under Hamann and to eventually replace his role.

sell some other less important player...yes especially josemi.

and I do hope rafa do give chance to promote the Youth, ie Warnock, Welsh etc to senior squad if they can make it. Rather than release them and let other club to turn them into a most promising player, ie Nolan with bolton.