LFC have dropped 12 points from winning positions this season. Defence and midfield have completely let us down this season.
Yeah none. We came from behind to draw at home to Villa, away at Newcastle (they had one sent off) and away at Everton, although we were leading that most of the game. Basically if we're losing at any point, we're almost certainly not going to win.
What sums it up for me coincides with not buying anyone in the transfer window, bringing on Joe Allen at 74 mins, this fella's coming back from injury, I would rather have had moses on or.....wait we've nothing for impact on the bench because we didn't buy anyone, ****ing clueless, oh and this is what happened last season, we seem to be up for the big games but any of the "lesser" teams and we struggle.
Possibly my first optimistic post of the day but in those cases you mentioned above, at least we fought back and fought for a point. It's not perfect but we are showing a bit more fight this season. Going back to my original point of us dropping points from winning positions - to put it into context, only West Ham have dropped more points. And the other stat, we've made 29 errors which have led to shots or goals.
when you have a trio of donkeys passing it about within or just on our penalty area (skertl toure mingolet) there is a very high chance their pass to the next guy puts him under pressure (see coutinho and suarez losing it in our half today).... let alone the trash they served up. on one occasion we passed it 5 times before it ended up back on the goal line with mingolet on his wrong foot who hacked it away... this is crap basically. we had zero movement for a pass today. nobody dropped in, gerrard was between the two cbs, all three never found a pass, none of the cbs felt capable of striding forward and looking for an option so they f'd about with it then passed back. everytime it wnet out to cissohko OR flanagan they did nothing. the first 5mins set the tone for the game. we never got going. we were one nil for one shot on target and that was it for the first half. I think it would have been robbery to take all 3 points though they were absolute trash. only hull at anfield IMO were worse this year v us. Was also disappointed but not shocked at our subs. we have zero faith in aspas, alberto and moses. here's a game that needed changing. perhaps our faith in in SAS is so strong we won't take one off with a game in the balance but i have seen us well up in games and its quite rare (see everton for one rare occasion) where these guys come on. Sterling and gerrard for me put themselves about. henderson started in the second half. our full backs offered absolutely nothing at all to add our needed width and that for one thing hurt. sturridge was average and suarez was quite poor.
I think a lot of people are being harsh due to us (in the eyes of most) dropping points here. We were much better defensively but for one major **** up but our attacking play was somewhat lacking for a change. Sterling had his best game yet IMO but SAS where not firing for once, it happens. The stick Cissokho is getting is uncalled for too IMO. I think he is a poor player that shouldn't be wearing the shirt but I also thought he had his best game yet for the club today and not only stood up defensively but actually made a good couple of attacking runs too. Personally, I think he is the modern day Kuyt, Lucas, Downing; aka scapegoat.
I thought their forwards were tosh myself.. they were really poor. sterling did look up for it as i said. Cissohko.. he did ok agaisnt trash too, they were serious relegation candidates to my mind. fulham look done, cardiff look terrible at times and swansea and west brom might be fighting for the 4th form bottom spot. Cissohko is a really poor player, to put lucas and kuyt i na category with the likes of him is insulting. sorry but it is. this guy is really weak. we need both full backs bombing up and down. we need the two cbs passing forward and not having guys who get it too afriad to send it back thier way for fear they'll f up. We just need way way better effort and application and urgency. we just back passed most of the day, nothing stuck up front for most of the game and so... honestly we let one of the worst sides i've seen this season take a point. simply put the players deserve a slap of stick for it just as they get run away praise for hammering everton and making us feel good. the middle ground should see the flaws in the side on good or bad days. today was a bad day.
A lot of us expected a flat performance today and thats exactly what we got. Players should be ashamed. We have been d!cking a lot of teams, including our closest rivals the bitters last week. We should be getting 4th and on a weekend where results went our way, we managed to actually lose ground.
They're forwards weren't the greatest but you can only play what you come up against. What their forwards did do was press the ball and put our defence under pressure which, until Toure's **** up, I thought we'd managed well. I thought Gerrard played well in the middle too and we were able to deal with most things that came at us. not sure why they are getting so much stick as a result apart from Kolo's error. I put Cissokho in a box with Lucas, Kuyt and Downing because I was talking about scapegoats. Cissokho IS a poor player and doesn't deserved to be mentioned in the same breath as them (including Downing) BUT he wasn't that bad today. He certainly wasn't to blame like a lot are suggesting. Fair point about the FBs getting forward. That's not Cissokho's, Kelly's or Flanno's game TBF though so surely that's down to injuries?
Our bench wasn't particularly strong but surely bringing on Allen was a mistake. Was he really more likely to create or score a goal than Coutinho? I could understand taking him off for an attacking player. I think Rodgers needs to improve with his substitutions, good attacking subs are the difference between drawing and winning in a lot of games. Fair enough there isn't a lot of quality there but Rodgers signed them so he should use them.
I agree on the whole Cissokho was ok. His best showing for us, especially in the first half. Although his passing was shocking again. He's no more responsible than anyone else for the result. We had a really bad game all round. Call it Everton hang-over, fatigue from having such a small squad, pressure of must win game, whatever the reason we should have a had enough to see off a really poor West Brom. Keep hearing it's a improvement on last year, but if we'd played like that against last year's West Brom we'd have been spanked. Sterling was bright spark. Looked great taking on players but did absolutely nothing with the ball after beating 2 or 3. In fairness to him his options were limited as there wasn't much movement from anyone around him but he really does need to work on his final ball. Gerrard did pretty well, and didn't abandon duties even at 1-1 which is a credit to him. He made more tackles than anyone in Red. That said West Brom were dire on the ball so he didn't have too much trouble today. Let's see how he does against Arsenal in that deep role.
With us needing a goal, we needed to change something but yeah, Allen was a strange one. It was almost a negative move since Allen isn't as attacking or creative as Coutinho. I was expecting Moses to come on. Fair enough, he's not been great but least he's an attacking player that can (when he wants to) offer something different. He is more direct with a bit more pace, with Sterling causing them so many problems on the right, why not put a similar style of player (obviously not as good) on the other flank?
Wish people would stop making fatuous comparisons with how we've improved since last season. Whopee, we're on course for sixth....
Out of curiosity, what did you want prior to the season starting? What did you expect? What did you think was a realistic target?
Think this a really good point. Rodger's is a big advocate of playing out from the back, but when Skrtel is your best ball playing defender you're in for a long day. I think Migs is a good shot stopper, but his control and distribution is brutal, he's so uncomfortable every time he gets the ball. It's only a good concept when you have players that can execute. Toure is just dreadful on the ball. Don't think I need to go into that...
no, its just.... well... ok he's on the left side so might feel uncomfortable but he's not great either side and frankly skertl is doing well going an attacking the ball in the air.. its something he's let himself down on in the past... I think skertl and sahko right now are the onyl way to go...
I think Skrtel's possession game has improved a lot over the last eighteen months. I also think Toure just had a stinker today, remember he was part of the Invincibles at Arsenal that were one of the best passing sides we have ever seen, you don't just forget how to pass. I also think we've been spoilt with Reina which is why Migs is getting abuse. He is able to kick with both feet and wants to pass it out whenever he can, he's even pulled a trick or two out the bag when being closed down because he's wanted to pass. Sure his ability could be better but he's far from the worst! Agger and Sakho are our best two CB's when in possession but Skrtel has been our best CB this season and, IMO, he is our second / third best players of the season so far (some of you may have noticed I said the same for Hendo yesterday. Suarez has obviously been the best but I can't make my mind up for second and third between these two) so I agree with MITO that it would have to be Skrtel and Sakho. The sooner we get Enrique and Lucas back the better IMO
If you look at the fixture list, how many of the results from the season thus far would you say have exceeded your expectation? Stand out results for me would be: Tottenham away - predict loss actual win (+3) Man Utd home - predict draw actual win (+2) Stoke away - predict draw actual win (+2) Everton at home - predict draw actual win (+2) Maybe Villa away win too? - predict draw actual win (+2) So about 11 points gained from unexpected results (depending on how confident/optimistic you are) Dropped points (ie matches you'd expect to win before start) would be Southampton home - predict win actual loss (-3) Newcastle away (after 6-0 last year?) predict win actual draw (-2) Hull away predict win actual loss (-3) Villa home predict win actual draw (-2) West Brom away predict win actual draw (-2) So about 12 points dropped in unexpected losses/draws. So on the whole we've probably picked up about as many points as I would have expected/hoped so far, but we're higher up the table than I anticipated because the fourth place challengers especially Tottenham and Man Utd have picked up less points than expected. We've done well to beat most of the sides you'd expect us to beat at home, but nearly all the easy points (ie smaller sides at home) were in the first half of the season. We need to beat them in the reverse fixture to maintain any chance of finishing fourth.
