Liverpool FC Forum

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Mon May 15, 2017 12:59 am wrote:
There's no way on earth Van Dijk is worth £50m, if we pay that we must be soft.

Football Agents must be having the time of their lives. So many of their clients having a half decent season and suddenly they're the MUST HAVE addition to your squad.

12 t0 18 months ago how many of us had rated or even heard of this fella ?

Van Dijk is the kind of defender who would look great at a Chelsea. Protected and a more conservative style of play. I don't think he is a particularly great reader of the game and in our system think it is imperative the defenders read and anticipate danger and snuff it out early. I remember watching him in a game after we were linked with him and I thought he was very poor. Granted only one game, but can anyone confidently say he is that much better than what we already have?

How does Tottenham do it? They play proper attacking football with marauding fullbacks and yet they have the best defense in the league. Really wonder what we're doing wrong. Is it really possible that Skrtel, Lovren, Sakho, Matip are all just sh*te?

kartiek » Tue May 16, 2017 2:41 am wrote:How does Tottenham do it? They play proper attacking football with marauding fullbacks and yet they have the best defense in the league. Really wonder what we're doing wrong. Is it really possible that Skrtel, Lovren, Sakho, Matip are all just sh*te?

They have 2 big, strong DM's in Wanyama and Dier who are very good at filling any holes left by their marauding full backs.
One caveat I'd like to add though is as good as Spurs are we played them off the park 3 times last season. We are not a million miles away from having a very good side ourselves.

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Tue May 16, 2017 9:06 am wrote:

kartiek » Tue May 16, 2017 2:41 am wrote:How does Tottenham do it? They play proper attacking football with marauding fullbacks and yet they have the best defense in the league. Really wonder what we're doing wrong. Is it really possible that Skrtel, Lovren, Sakho, Matip are all just sh*te?

They have 2 big, strong DM's in Wanyama and Dier who are very good at filling any holes left by their marauding full backs.
One caveat I'd like to add though is as good as Spurs are we played them off the park 3 times last season. We are not a million miles away from having a very good side ourselves.

Agree with you on that however where Spurs are miles superior than us is that they have a world class keeper, we have Mignolet, they have Kane upfront banging in 25 a season, we have Firmino who struggles to get double figures, in the holding positions they have power and quality in Wanyama and Dembele, we have a huff and puff work horse in Hendo and a horribly inconsistent Emre Can. If we can improve these areas we could easily compete next season.

Fowler_E7 » Tue May 16, 2017 9:35 am wrote:

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Tue May 16, 2017 9:06 am wrote:

kartiek » Tue May 16, 2017 2:41 am wrote:How does Tottenham do it? They play proper attacking football with marauding fullbacks and yet they have the best defense in the league. Really wonder what we're doing wrong. Is it really possible that Skrtel, Lovren, Sakho, Matip are all just sh*te?

They have 2 big, strong DM's in Wanyama and Dier who are very good at filling any holes left by their marauding full backs.
One caveat I'd like to add though is as good as Spurs are we played them off the park 3 times last season. We are not a million miles away from having a very good side ourselves.

Agree with you on that however where Spurs are miles superior than us is that they have a world class keeper, we have Mignolet, they have Kane upfront banging in 25 a season, we have Firmino who struggles to get double figures, in the holding positions they have power and quality in Wanyama and Dembele, we have a huff and puff work horse in Hendo and a horribly inconsistent Emre Can. If we can improve these areas we could easily compete next season.

To be fair to Mignolet, he has been pretty good this season. Yes he isn't a De Gea, lloris, but can't really knock him for this season to be honest and I've been a big critic of him in the past. I also think spurs centre backs are two of the best in the league and even better as a partnership. They are also losing Walker to Man CIty in the summer so that will disrupt them a bit but I've heard from a bitter that Barkley is off to them.

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Tue May 16, 2017 9:06 am wrote:

kartiek » Tue May 16, 2017 2:41 am wrote:How does Tottenham do it? They play proper attacking football with marauding fullbacks and yet they have the best defense in the league. Really wonder what we're doing wrong. Is it really possible that Skrtel, Lovren, Sakho, Matip are all just sh*te?

They have 2 big, strong DM's in Wanyama and Dier who are very good at filling any holes left by their marauding full backs.
One caveat I'd like to add though is as good as Spurs are we played them off the park 3 times last season. We are not a million miles away from having a very good side ourselves.

Yeah I forgot about the importance of a good DM. And we haven't invested in one in a long time now. Henderson is not super-consistent in that role and Emre is usually too slow to really do the job. I really wonder if Grujic could develop into the DM role next season. He's shown glimpses of some DM traits: strength, height, heading ability and an occasional good shot, not sure how his game intelligence and stamina rate.

Fowler_E7 » Tue May 16, 2017 9:35 am wrote:

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Tue May 16, 2017 9:06 am wrote:

kartiek » Tue May 16, 2017 2:41 am wrote:How does Tottenham do it? They play proper attacking football with marauding fullbacks and yet they have the best defense in the league. Really wonder what we're doing wrong. Is it really possible that Skrtel, Lovren, Sakho, Matip are all just sh*te?

They have 2 big, strong DM's in Wanyama and Dier who are very good at filling any holes left by their marauding full backs.
One caveat I'd like to add though is as good as Spurs are we played them off the park 3 times last season. We are not a million miles away from having a very good side ourselves.

Agree with you on that however where Spurs are miles superior than us is that they have a world class keeper, we have Mignolet, they have Kane upfront banging in 25 a season, we have Firmino who struggles to get double figures, in the holding positions they have power and quality in Wanyama and Dembele, we have a huff and puff work horse in Hendo and a horribly inconsistent Emre Can. If we can improve these areas we could easily compete next season.

People need to stop obsessing over a 25 goal a season striker, yes Spurs have Harry Kane and Deli Alli but we have actually scored more goals them, we are still the second highest scorers in the league even now despite our front 4 being ravaged by injuries for months.
We have had teams in the recent past which were built around prolific goal scorers like Fowler, Owen, Torres, Suarez, Sturridge etc and didn't win the league or the CL. It's easy to forget now but when we won the CL our forwards were actually Baros and Cisse!
I'm much more interested in improving our defence and midfield than our attack. Yes let's beef up our squad so we can cope with injuries to our front four but I believe our focus should be on our defence and midfield.

Yes we are Second highest goalscorers in the league, however Spurs, Man City, Arsenal and Chelsea have practically scored the same amount, the difference is we concede considerably more than our rivals apart from Arsenal which is a given considering our style of play, if we had someone who put the ball in the back more regularly we could get away with conceding goals, though i agree we must improve defensively i cant see us ever having a water tight defence as our style of football is far too attacking not to concede goals. However I have never seen a team win a league title without a striker who scores at least 18 league goals, its impossible.

Inter might be forced to sell top players due to beach of UEFA rules...Get Perisich I say

Fowler_E7 » Wed May 17, 2017 10:37 am wrote:Yes we are Second highest goalscorers in the league, however Spurs, Man City, Arsenal and Chelsea have practically scored the same amount, the difference is we concede considerably more than our rivals apart from Arsenal which is a given considering our style of play, if we had someone who put the ball in the back more regularly we could get away with conceding goals, though i agree we must improve defensively i cant see us ever having a water tight defence as our style of football is far too attacking not to concede goals. However I have never seen a team win a league title without a striker who scores at least 18 league goals, its impossible.

The most League goals Kevin Keegan ever scored for us in a single season was 15 yet we dominated that era and he was widely regarded as the best player plying his trade in English football during the 70's.
Keegan spent 6 seasons at the club -

In 72 we finished 3rd, 1 point behind the champions and had a perfectly good goal ruled out for offside in the last game away at Arsenal which would have won us the title. One of the most controversial moments in our history.
In 73 we won the League title and UEFA Cup
In 74 we won the FA Cup (which was a big thing back then)
In 75 we finished 2nd
In 76 we won the League title and the UEFA Cup again
In 77 we won the League title, the European Cup and reached the FA Cup final.

All that with a 15 goal a season striker leading the line for us!
To be fair Kevin was bought as a winger to replace Ian Callaghan but he caused so much havoc in pre season Bill Shankly just threw him up front as an experiment in the opening game of the season against Forest, he scored within 8 minutes, never played on the wing again and we never looked back.

Fowler_E7 » Wed May 17, 2017 11:37 am wrote:Yes we are Second highest goalscorers in the league, however Spurs, Man City, Arsenal and Chelsea have practically scored the same amount, the difference is we concede considerably more than our rivals apart from Arsenal which is a given considering our style of play, if we had someone who put the ball in the back more regularly we could get away with conceding goals, though i agree we must improve defensively i cant see us ever having a water tight defence as our style of football is far too attacking not to concede goals. However I have never seen a team win a league title without a striker who scores at least 18 league goals, its impossible.

Mate I think you're arguing with yourself here. On the one hand you say

Yes we are Second highest goalscorers in the league ..............the difference is  we concede considerably more than our rivals apart from Arsenal which is a given considering our style of play

Surely that's saying our problems lie not in our ability to score goals but in our ability to deny them ?  You then go on to say

if we had someone who put the ball in the back more regularly we could get away with conceding goals,

That suggests your solution is  we can't fix the defensive side of our game so lets just sign a brilliant striker who will enable us to just simply outscore the oppo ! Dream on sunbeam.

Our biggest problems despite massive possession of the ball has been down to our inability to break down the massed defence that so many "lesser" teams have employed against us and when pressing up to defend against a long ball over the top breakaway.

IMO we need more creativity from our midfield to unlock a packed oppo defence allied with an upgrade in our DM and CB positions, AND given our "style" of play the effectiveness of our current fullbacks when attacking is something that seriously needs to be addressed.

I did state the we need to improve defensively and i agree we should reinforcements in both defence and midfield, however whoever we buy due to our style of play we will always concede goals, we play a very open game with up to 7 players in the opposition half when we attack, we are always going to concede. My point was by buying a better striker we would score even more than currently do and outscore the opposition on a more regular basis, a lot of fans seem to think just sorting the defence will solve our issues but despite our large amount of goals scored we still struggle especially at home against deep defences i beleive a better quality forward would help with that, i do agree with you that we need more creativity in midfield and at full back but i brought up the striker issue as most fans I speak to seem to be fine with starting next season with what we have upfront which would be a huge mistake IMO.

They are difficult positions to fill but in this system our full backs are massively important pieces so that would be a priority to me, a right and left back that can cover the ground and contribute big in all areas of the pitch. Height and physical presence would be my choice, and of course pace.

That would really help us in defence, midfield and attack so if we could recruit the best around the team already looks upgraded and you go from there, a quality DMF player and forward so thats 4 and if it takes £200m just do that and claw funds back on sales.

Fowler_E7 » Wed May 17, 2017 3:50 pm wrote:I did state the we need to improve defensively and i agree we should reinforcements in both defence and midfield, however whoever we buy due to our style of play we will always concede goals, we play a very open game with up to 7 players in the opposition half when we attack, we are always going to concede. My point was by buying a better striker we would score even more than currently do and outscore the opposition on a more regular basis, a lot of fans seem to think just sorting the defence will solve our issues but despite our large amount of goals scored we still struggle especially at home against deep defences i beleive a better quality forward would help with that, i do agree with you that we need more creativity in midfield and at full back but i brought up the striker issue as most fans I speak to seem to be fine with starting next season with what we have upfront which would be a huge mistake IMO.

Every fan wants to see a clinical striker brought in mate, but ideally what we need to prioritise is a quality DM so that when we lose the ball up front there's protection for the back four against the counter, I mean your argument with regards to scoring more goals just doesnt hold water as having such a phenomenal finisher as Suarez spearheading our attack made little difference to the defence shipping goals by the bucketload.