Agree he had a pretty poor game by his standards BR had the balls to field some of the youngsters (well he had no choise injury's and so on) NOW he HAS to grow the balls to bench Gerrard. Yes there will be a small section of our fans that will say WTF is he playing at.But i think most of the fans know that our Stevie is not like he used to be And for the good of the team BR has to make that change Don't get me wrong i love stevie and want him to continue playing for us for a long time but maybe he has to learn the defensive role as he no longer can do the offensive role And that way LFC still have their captain fantastic
Henderson had a good 60 minutes. It was not surprising that he faded after that. The criticism of Gerrard is just stupid
Gerrard was one of our stand out performers, some of his passing and link up play in around the box was top class. sure he is not the box to box midfielder of a few years ago, but is still a good player to have, especially in a three man midfield.
He may or may not have the legs to play in a deeper midfield role, but what I can say is that he definately can't do it for two matches a week
Agree, as the legs age, you need more rest Inbetween games, hopefully Rodgers and the back room staff can manage this.
One thing that always annoys me is when they have the 'view from the other side' preview interviews on the club site, and the opposition fan they interview always says they fear Gerrard the most. It just reveals how little they actually know about our team. Right now, I would argue Suarez (obviously) Sterling and even Enrique are bigger threats.
Where have you been recently?! Stick around. I agree with your point fully. It's like they have just watched 'Steven Gerrard's top 50 goals' on Youtube or something.
Or maybe they just know Gerrard is one of our only players who is actually a threat and has proved over his career that he is one of the worlds best midfielders and can win a match with one moment of quality unlike people like Allen, Henderson & Enrique who will never be looked upon as match winners.
I'm trying to remember the last time Gerrard did that. Napoli November 2010? Jose scored a goal today which was wrongly dissalowed - which would of made him a match winner.
That is a very limited way of considering Gerrard''s contribution. Opposition players know that he has the ability to see and pick a pass from anywhere on the pitch and that he will always seek to surge towards the box whilst retaining the option to either pass or shoot. Additionally he is ver hrad to rob the ball off.
When was the last time he made one of these surges? His ability to see a pass is resulted him giong for Hollywood balls all the time giving the ball away. I'd love to see his completion rate %. I think he's wasted playing deep like he is and needs some competition to get his performances up.
Hattrick against Everton? He also gave us helped give us leads this season against Man Utd (goal), Man City (corner) & Everton(free kick). Not really his fault that we are absolutely clueless at defending under Rodgers and buckle under any type of attacking pressure. Its not as regular now because he's played deeper, but he still contributes to our attacking play, and he's the only one of our midfielders that does try 'risky passes'. Everyone else struggles to attempt anything resembling a forward pass and they play safe instead resulting in a lot of possession but next to no chances. Without Gerrard today I do not think we would've had a meaningful effort on goal, as he was the only one of our midfielders making a conscious effort to try & find Sterling, Suarez, Enrique or Johnson. The rest were happy to knock the ball about between themselves & the centre backs. Listen to what everyone in football says about Gerrard, its no coincidence the massive amount of respect everyone has for him. He is the ultimate professional and also a fantastic player. I do not understand why people are quick to want him out the team, when we are already short on quality, why get rid of one of our only remaining quality players?
Yeah, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about this season. It's all good and well saying what he's done for us over the years (which is loads, I know), but that can't be factored into his performances or indeed the threat he poses this season. People have a habit of saying 'well he won us the CL in '05, the FA Cup in '06, so don't you dare criticise him', but those achievements are irrelevant to his performance against Swansea yesterday, and will be irrelevant to his performance on Wednesday night against Spurs. It's not showing a lack of respect to say that he isn't the force he once was, and that, right now, he isn't our biggest threat either. Right now, he looks stiff and off the pace. Of course he's a great player and a great professional, but right now I wouldn't have him in my first XI. That may change in a couple of weeks, though. And what Lucas has said above isn't true at all. Gerrard wasn't involved in Enrique's 'goal', nor the breakaway with Suarez, nor the Glen Johnson chance. In fact, the latter was our most productive player today, and I'd currently put him above Gerrard in terms of being a threat to the opposition.
I couldn't agree more. This talk of Gerrard merely playing 'Hail mary' balls and been lazy is just so stupid. We have nobody apart from him in our midfield who actually looks to play attacking passes. Any ball of that nature is bound to have a higher risk attached to it. Sure you can have very high completion stats if you take the Allen role of merely ball shifting but your never going to actually create anything. The ONLY midfielder that has anything like his field of vision is Shelvey and he does not yet have the skill or experience.
I'm split on this one. Removing nostalgia from the equation I don't think his performances have been good enough but then I think that applies to all our midfielders. They all seem to be treading water at the moment waiting for Lucas to return so they can be played in their "proper" position. I think we need to look at it this way. When everyone is fit and available we know that Lucas & Allen will be guaranteed names on the sheet (I think anyone guaranteed a start is bad but it will happen). Lucas is DM & Allen is the player BR believes can play either as the second of the 1-2 or 2-1 triangles. Whether you rate him as such or not he's our new Alonso. So this leaves the attacking midfielder role. So who do we have? Gerrard Shelvey Henderson Sahin Suso At this moment in time nobody on that list would automatically start before Stevie. Hendo doesn't have the confidence yet (still not sure he ever will have but we'll see & anyway he'll eventually if successful be Lucas back up) and Sahin...well I've seen nothing to suggest he's anyone's replacement. Without further purchases I think Suso & Shelvey combined are Stevies eventual replacements (shows his worth when it takes two to replace him!). One has the drive & power the other will have the control & finesse. But neither is quite ready. So, if I was BR I would reduce Gerrard to part time. 45 minutes of Stevie then switched out for one of those two second half. Its not a matter of disrespecting Gerrard; its allowing him to play at his best for the length of time he is now capable; rather than have 10 minutes here & there of the 90 he seems to disappear from the game as he paces himself. Personally my problem with 90 minute Stevie is the default attitude of the players around him is still "Stevie will do something to change the game be it a pass or drive" but the days of him doing this often enough for it to get enough 3 points are getting rarer. So its time they stopped hiding behind him because it has draw written all over it.
I think you all know my thoughts on Gerrard. He did play some great passes to start attacks yesterday. But he is extremely lazy and is easily beaten. Lost the ball a number of times and I'm not talking about losing the ball by attemping an attacking pass - he lost the ball by overcomplicating a simple ball. His long range shooting is off the radar at the moment - well, it usually gets blocked these days. His corners are woeful but then again, we don't have any decent targets. To be fair to Gerrard - his corners yesterday were good and you could argue that Johnson should have done better on both occasions. My main gripe with him is his laziness and people can argue all they want but it's true. He doesn't track back, and looks extremely slow when he actually decides to do it. Furthermore, he is getting beaten far too easily. All the attacker needs to do is a take a good touch to know it past him and they're on their way to our goal. People will also argue that he's only been poor this season - he's been poor for the past 3 seasons. So who would replace him? Lucas and Allen are pretty much guaranteed. Henderson is improving - looks tidy and disciplined, and it's not coincidence that we looked more vulnerable once he came off. Shlevey is more natural replacement for Gerrard but he also has the same bad traits of laziness and being beaten easily. Suso and Sahin would be my favourites - both are attacking, tidy in possession, and good at pressing. Generally, they are more suited to this style. Sahin has gone off the boil recently so I would pick Suso. But BR will not drop Gerrard. No one will unless he becomes injured again.
If Gerrard doesn't play, the ball won't get passed forward. We would have had Allen passing in backwards all game and Henderson running around like hes in the play ground. Stevie is the only man who plays positively and why Rodgers doesn't play him in the AM role, I don't know.
