Match Day Thread 2016/17 Premier League, Cups & Euro Watch

Problem with Fa cup and other cup games is they stick them at horrible times. Shove an fa cup at weekend and league games which are always a priority 2/3 days later. Teams are only ever going to use them as a chance to rest players because most don't have a squad to be able to make wholesale changes and remain similar level to play 2 games a week.

 

Dalglish was done the minute he was appointed, FSG never wanted him, they were VERY reluctant to put him in for Hodgson and only did so after things turned to proper **** and they were desperate. The Suarez stuff had nothing to do with it.

PS - I didn't say they got sacked for winning a cup, I said winning these cups wasn't enough to stop them getting sacked, which reflects the trophies current value in football and not the sentimental value that pundits who played in them in the 70s/80s when they were big place on the trophies.

 

I realise everyone is going to cite the Chelsea game as an excuse, and there is obviously an element of truth in that, but do you honestly think we'd have fielded a much stronger team even if we weren't playing for another week afterwards? Because I don't.
Also, your A/B choice is another false dichotomy, because there's no guarantee that playing a strong team in the first game is necessarily going to make them worse in the second, and there's no guarantee that saving players in the first will make them play better in the second.
It's just creating imaginary scenarios to try to make a point.

 

I remember there was a study once into international tournaments and they actually found that the teams who had to play their strongest team in 3 group games rather than the teams who won the first two then were able to rest their team for the 3rd game tended to do better than the ones who rested their players for the last game. I think it shows that 'resting' players isn't as simple as rest X for game 1 and he'll be able to run more in game 2.

 

I'm no sports scientist, but there's been a lot of research done into the effects of physical exertion and the best ways to recover and keep at optimum fitness. As long as players are kept within the guidelines (and surely it's a big part of the medical staff to ensure that?), then I see no reason to rest players just for the sake of it.
We need to improve, and you don't get better at something by not doing it.
There's a big psychological component in tiredness - if a team is winning and enjoying their game then they're far less likely to feel "tired".
I do expect us to play better on Tuesday, but only because we up our game against better teams, not because of any resting of players over the weekend.

 

Mate you've had no European footy and you've got 16 games left in the 4 months left of the season! How hard can it be, really?

 

Yes. If whole team had week to recover we'd have played a strong team.

We played strong team
on Wednesday, another on Saturday and then another on Tuesday? 3 games in less than a week for a team that has hardly changed over a busy xmas period. Really reckon that would have been best thing for the team? One of those games needed to have changes made it's not possible to play same 11 in all 3 and the Wolves game was obviously the one to rotate. Not because it was fa cup but because the team we played should have been enough as we had the quality of players.

Of course theres no guarantee they'd be worse, but players get tired especially after numerous games in short period. I'm sure the fitness coaches used previous data and info to look at what might happen if play same team in all 3 games (4 if you want to include the Swansea game in that as well from weekend before)

 

we lost against Swansea and saints in previous 2 games playing strong team So are you admitting they may have therefore been tired?

 

So what is the point of trying to get into Europe then?

 

Look at our squad. Unlike you guys we don't have the depth in squad. No european football but lots of games over the xmas period playing similar players. Would Randall Moreno Lucas Ejaria Woodburn get near your reserves? No... because you have proven Prem players in the reserves to cover that.

 

Have you played a lot more games than Swansea and Saints this season? if so then it could make a difference I suppose.

 

To enjoy the experience? To attract better players to improve the first team and push current first team players to the bench (Lovren, Hendo, can, Milner). Buy 2/3 first team players and immediately improve the bench at the same time. Helps improve depth, allows you to rotate and not lose quality as much, allows you to ten compete on more levels. Ensure you become a stable European club again to get more and more used to it and be able to constantly challenge.

 

Pretty sure every team played lots of games over the xmas period, that was not limited to Liverpool.

 

So if you got into Europe which games would you rest players for, League or European? since you think they are incapable of playing twice a week.

 

I think the mancs are the example of a team which is well suited to being in many cup competitions. They have many players of the same calibre which can fit in and cover each other (unlike us) but their top 11 is nowhere near the best in the premiership ...IMO

 

Most clubs have players of similar or slightly lower quality/ability that can fit in when needed, that is why they don't have a very low or negative "net spend" year after year. You need to spend some of what you earn to build a squad.

 

You are a bugger for the logical fallacy.
I'm saying they're not playing well enough, and they won't get better by not playing. Even the best teams have bad games sometimes - the measure of your quality is how few of those there are.
I think tiredness is far too often used as an excuse for failure.

Hows about a different hypothetical scenario?
We play a strong team against Wolves, play well, enjoy the game and beat them 5-0.
Ok, 5-1. Let's not get into the realms of pure fantasy with the clean sheet thing.
The team is then energised and confident and goes into the Chav game on a high. This is speculative, of course, but no less plausible than your suggestion.

The assumption seems to be that our second-string players are always enough to beat a lower team, but this is a bit arrogant - not to mention demonstrably untrue. We don't have the resources or the pulling power (yet) to keep a second team as good as some of the other top teams atm, so either we play our best available or we risk falling out of the cups.
Which brings us round full circle, we crashed out because we didn't think the cup was worth the risk.

 

There is a big difference between changing 9 players and changing 3-4 players. With one you are saying that you really don't care if you got dumped out but of course you'd like to go through. With the other in trying to keep your team's strong spine you are saying that you are taking the competition seriously and you want to win it. Huge difference which our team and the opposition can sense.

One other point, is it better to have more tired players but on a high and with plenty of confidence or is it better to have less tired players low on confidence?

 

I must say - the players Are very lucky. The experienced players put in a diabolical performance but it's Klopp who is bearing the brunt.

 

they are all out.

randall won't play for us again.
lucas is toast
origi will be benched
sturridge is toast
klavan is there to be a cheap option and we see what a cheap option does as per
gomez needs 6months to get up to any sort of speed.... and klopp should not have picked him