Rodgers dropped Henderson and started Allen instead? i thought Henderson had been playing well in our last couple of games, linking well wih Gerrard and Lucas then gets dropped. why?
Spend millions on him. Has to use him to show he was worth buying. For a guy low on confidence this was not a game to throw him in. Henderson gets hounded by critics (myself included) but has worked hard and found form. He should have started as a result in my opinion.
Sturridge should not have started. Had he done so with the attacking performance we gave in the 1st half he would have lost all confidence. Plus the United defence would have got a grip on him. As it was he came on and allowed Suarez to act as the provider. One of the better shouts by Rodgers today. But Hendo should have stated!
I think part of the problem in the first half was that we sat back in a defensive formation with Suarez being the only one venturing forwards... we gave their defence room to move up and support their attacks. If we had a slight offensive cadence they would have to be wary of our counter and not be allowed to put every man forward.
I agree with you that our lack of offence in the first half allowed their midfield to move further forward. However the reason for that was not our forwards but the way that our midfield was set up and the personnel employed. For me Allen, at his best, is a ball shuffler ie he keeps the ball moving - nothing more and nothing less. However, in this match we needed far more energy than Allen could/would ever provide. Hendo would have added that energy and allowed Gerrard more scope to move forward and influence play more positively. This mistake was compounded by playing Downing!
I know Shelvey has been in poor form recently but I felt even he could have started as he seems to get fired up for these games and bring a bit of passion. Henderson should have definitely been ahead of Allen though.
It quite encouraging to see them all together. The inter changing and link up play was pretty decent. And for once, we had a player who pounced on a loose ball in the box!!
I thought it was encouraging yesterday that for the last half hour, whenever we built an attack we had more than one person in the box!
It was quite unusual to see! But I have to say, I know some people were sceptical about the Sturridge deal but I was pretty excited. We finally have another player who can provide some output (goals or assists) other than Luis. Downing does sod all and Sterling is promising but doesn't have a great return (understandable considering his age). Our front 3 looks a lot more threatening
ironic then that donwing refused to put the ball in bar one single occasion he did go to the byline (no doubt becasue he had no pass back on)
