Where in that team is there goals? Even if we buy one, two or three strikers in January (and we have to buy at least one) we still have the undeniable problem that, an ageing Gerrard and a mercurial Suarez aside, who else chips in? Johnson, occassionally? The two centre-backs from set pieces? Rarely. Lucas and Allen? No...... (Btw, when Rafa played two deep midfielders at home he was crucified....). Sterling - not yet. Shelvey? Flatters to deceive. Henderson? Doesn't get a chance. In short, three quarters of our team are Kuyt-like close-your-eyes-and-hit-the-ball-as-hard-as-you-can when a chance arises. No point dominating posession if other teams know we're toothless. Not panicking or pointing fingers, as i don't know what the answer is. These playes in this squad are either young and inexperienced or simply don't have the technique and temperament to take chances. Depressing, but we just have to endure. But in future Brendan, don't sound like a prat. Though there's nothing special in this league apart from the two Manchesters, we're hardly in a position to challenge for top four, let alone top two, for several seasons to come.
Dirk Kuyt scored 10 goals every season he was at Liverpool bar the last one where he was rarely played as a starter. A very poor comparison. Unless you are saying that all of our squad has 10+ goals in them a season, which would somewhat contradict your own opinion.
Kuyt was a forward/ forward midfield player. Think ten goals from him was what we should have expected. But if you take the name Kuyt out of it then, and just ascribe the actions of hit-and-hope my point is valid. We keep talking of goalscorers (rightly), but even if we had Messi in that team you'd have to ask who else would chip in with goals. If and when we get this 'magic' forward I can see opponents just marking them out of the game knowing there's few others in the team who can score.
So Kuyt got the number of goals he was expected to score but you're comparing him to players who don't score as many as expected. Bit of an odd comparison. But apart from the strange Kuyt-bashing, you obviously have a point. But I think everybody who has watched Liverpool over the last few years has spotted this too. Not exactly the most insightful of threads here.
But it's precisely at this point that everyone seems to be pinning our hopes of turning 'good' football and posession into scoring and winning. All the talk is of forwards, but I raise the point again that we could go out and get ayoung Torres (I wish), but only a few seasons ago we had midfielders like Alonso, Benayoun, Kuyt, a young Gerrard and even Reira, occasionally, chipping in. Allen, Lucas, Shelvey, Downing (!) , Henderson and the young kids don't. And just thrashing at the ball may well pump up our shots on goal statistics, but bugger-all else. Just not expecting any miracles from january onwards no matter whom we buy. And Kuyt? Popular player, great tryer, etc, etc. Very, very underrated crosser too. But I remember the days when Liverpool midfielders like Whelan, Souness, Case, McDermott, Barnes and so forth would not only get that amount without having to play occasional main striker like Kuyt, but you had confidence they'd convert 75% of half chances that came their way. The current squad don't.
I think with the system we play though you can't expect Lucas, Allen or Henderson to pop up with too many goals. Just like you don't see many goals from Carrick, Anderson, Mikel, Tiote, Parker etc. However we should be expecting goals from the wide forwards and that is what has really let us down I think. If each wide forward chipped in with around 10 goals a season then I think we'd be flying. Rodgers appears to be trying to remedy the situation with some of the reported transfer targets we've been linked with too. In all honesty the wingers we have at the club just are not good enough. Sterling's inexperience has been there for all to see in the last few matches, and we're risking stunting his development if we insist on utilising him as a first team starter. The goal tallies of Downing and Enrique speak for themselves. Assaidi can't be judged too harshly due to his lack of involvement, though I do think he's a bit of a headless chicken. Suso, like Sterling, is too young to be expected to score 10 goals a season. Sign one or two strong wide forwards and a left back in January and I really do think we'll be flying.
Agree, but my pessimism is that Brendan signed Borini to do that, and he makes Kuyt look like a young Robbie Fowler. God knows who we've got lined up for January.
There is absolutely no doubt that Rodgers will be looking to add goals from the wide positions. Plus, if we have two or three that score a decent amount others will suddenly start finding the net too. This is due to less pressure to score and team confidence.
Borini has started slowly in the last two seasons. I wouldn't worry about it yet, let's look at him in 2 years and how he's doing then. Needs time to settle and get used to the league and his team mates before we judge him. I agree he hasn't looked great so far but he's only just come into the league and sadly not everyone hits the ground running in this league. See Lucas for details.
