Liverpool FC Forum

[Sabre]

Just watched the game after coming from a local match. I came in a good mood, but certainly watching this has been hard for the mood.

I'm ready to accept almost any criticism on Rafa (I'll start reading completely the threads after posting this). I'd just like to read the footballing reasons to criticise him rather than insults. IMHO some of the reasons to explain this debacle are up to Rafa, some others are not.

Rafa should have learned last season that the goalie position is important. Yesteryear he explained us that he put Dudek because of a promise. He should have learned the lesson. It's just not yet another position. If you want to gamble in cup games with another keeper, this should be a experienced and secure one. Not that Itandje is bad, but he has no comprenetration with team mates, and he's very unexperienced at this stage despite he's one year older than Reina. Reina is one year younger but already got mature at a top level failing in Barcelona. Itandje is still learning at this level. Rafa brought this young keeper, Rafa has lined up him, and Rafa has gambled. This decission is up to Rafa.

Another decission up to Rafa is how you prepare corners. Sorry, corners and set pieces are important, and fixed corner takers should be in a team. It was an awful show to watch our attacking corners. It was quite weird to me to see Babel taking corners. This decissions are up to Rafa aswell.

But there are other things that are not up to Rafa. The absolute passive attitude and lack of aggresivity, the lack of concentration, is not up to Rafa (especially in their goals). That's up to the players.

I'll mention for instance my "beloved" Alonso. He needs to be looked by Carra to the eyes, and be told to wake up. The quality is there. The posters who don't see it is because they choose not to. But he was far from concentrated and reached late in many occasions. Come on Xabi, you know doing better.

I'd save Kuyt from big stick this game. I can't blame a player who tries hard in every game.

Hard to watch this game. I trust the manager but I've explained why he has to be partly blamed for this debacle. But focusing it all in the manager is unfair, although understandable, as everybody knows that football fans when angry slag their least favourite personel. Right now the scape goat is Rafa. So be it, he is paid to live with this kidn of pressure aswell.

[redrover]

listen mate its quite obvious that you will back rafa no matter what ,and your entitled to your opinion. i just wonder what it would take to make you change your mind, like most fair minded fans have about him. hes a smashing bloke ,who loves this club, and would do anything in his power to bring us the success we crave (namely the premiership), but hes using methods that worked for him in spain to great effect ,that simply arent working here. i wouldnt blame the guy for that ,but would blame him for his stubborns and his unwillingness to accept these facts ,and make the changes neccessary. he hasnt even hired a number two to work with him. this smacks of arrogance ,and may i even suggest dictatorship, which is all very well when your methods are bringing results ,but they are not bringing results where it really matters. i would never resort to personal insults against a man who has put such effort and has had to put up with such pressures, but enough is enough and at the end of the season regardless of how we do in the champions league ,he simply has to go.

[Dundalk]

listen mate its quite obvious that you will back rafa no matter what ,and your entitled to your opinion. i just wonder what it would take to make you change your mind, like most fair minded fans have about him. hes a smashing bloke ,who loves this club, and would do anything in his power to bring us the success we crave (namely the premiership), but hes using methods that worked for him in spain to great effect ,that simply arent working here. i wouldnt blame the guy for that ,but would blame him for his stubborns and his unwillingness to accept these facts ,and make the changes neccessary. he hasnt even hired a number two to work with him. this smacks of arrogance ,and may i even suggest dictatorship, which is all very well when your methods are bringing results ,but they are not bringing results where it really matters. i would never resort to personal insults against a man who has put such effort and has had to put up with such pressures, but enough is enough and at the end of the season regardless of how we do in the champions league ,he simply has to go.

Fair enough but are you saying that at the end off the season if we win the Champions League he should be sacked??

Listen Wenger had a bad bad season last year we all know how that is panning out!!

[redrover]

when you put it like that it does sound daft to sack a manager who has just won the champions league.( we're not real madrid after all ) but it comes down to how we define success. we have tasted champions league success and boy did it taste sweet, but we are making no progress in the premiership after 4 years and thts really what did club is about. competing on level terms in every competition not just 1 because the manager places more emphasis on that competition.
on a side note when are dundalk finally going to join the big boys in the premier league eh.? you must be gutted watching all the johnny come latelys up the road in drogheda.

[Big Niall]

I've said for ages that Rafa wasn't up to it and got all sorts of abuse for it.

I'm not that concerned about going out of the FA cup aslong as we get 4th in the league (low expectations - very sad ) A good run in the CL would also be good.

Thankfully more LFC fans now realise that rafa cannot do it - I think he should stay until the end of the season and then be off loaded

Thanks for Istanbul but time to go.

[Big Niall]

Well my outlook has changed. After reading the NOTW,

hard to respect the view of somebody who consumes sh!te you f*cking traitor.

[KennyisGod....still]

If one person out there can say the poor lambs on the pitch had no real idea how to beat mighty barnsley, then yes, Rafa should take every single ounce of criticism........

Thats a big silence I'm hearin........

The players on that pitch should hang their heads in shame. How many times do you have to knock on a door before you break the damn thing down? We essentially played against a one man defence in their keeper. (Who perhaps we could look at as Itandje would barely make my kids standard for goalie) I'm sure almost every player that stepped out in red was an international capped player, either currently or previously, but they failed to break down a mid table championship side......

It's embarressing. Plain and simple.
FACT - you SHOULD NOT need your very best front line players to beat a team like barnsley.
FACT - once again our lesser players prove that without leadership they aint got a clue.
FACT - Torres and Gerrard cannot play every game, we have to be able to perform without them


End of my little rant, I'v waited til now cuz all you'd see would be those little censored signs, and I'v had chance to cool down.

[NANNY RED]

Thank you

[Bammo]

If one person out there can say the poor lambs on the pitch had no real idea how to beat mighty barnsley, then yes, Rafa should take every single ounce of criticism........

Thats a big silence I'm hearin........

The players on that pitch should hang their heads in shame. How many times do you have to knock on a door before you break the damn thing down? We essentially played against a one man defence in their keeper. (Who perhaps we could look at as Itandje would barely make my kids standard for goalie) I'm sure almost every player that stepped out in red was an international capped player, either currently or previously, but they failed to break down a mid table championship side......

It's embarressing. Plain and simple.
FACT - you SHOULD NOT need your very best front line players to beat a team like barnsley.
FACT - once again our lesser players prove that without leadership they aint got a clue.
FACT - Torres and Gerrard cannot play every game, we have to be able to perform without them


End of my little rant, I'v waited til now cuz all you'd see would be those little censored signs, and I'v had chance to cool down.

Sssshhh!! You can't make sensible posts on here.

You're in trouble now 

[Big Niall]

Who assembled all those players not good enough to beat Barnsley?

[Judge]

this thread is starting to turn, so mods please lock it now!

[KennyisGod....still]

Who assembled all those players not good enough to beat Barnsley?

The same man that gave this club its biggest night for 21 years.

NEVER FORGET IT

You won't wipe out 18 years of waitin by changin the manager, Utd and Arsenal win things thru patience - have some son.

At my age I'v been lucky, I'v seen all 5 Euro Cups, alot of the championship wins, many other cups come our way and some great football. If you aint seen it then I have sympathy, but you support a team for itself, not its glory or its past. Liverpool IS the greatest club in the world, some day soon it'll reflect that and hopefully Rafa'll still be at the helm.

Where would Utd be now if they'd ditched Ferguson? Or Arsenal if they fired Wenger? I wonder how long Grant can keep Chelsea goin.

Barnsley was a let down yes - by the players on the pitch.
Those players were put there by Benitez, fair enough, but do you believe they were good enough to beat Barnsley or was it plainly obvious we were gonna suffer a humiliatin defeat?

And be honest wi yourself as well mate, not jus knee jerk reactions plz.

[JohnBull]

I've been there for every manager since Shanks and everyone of them have experienced shocking defeats, some of them 10 times worse than saturdays. I still get a shiver from Swansea in 1964. Their keeper Noel Dwyer was even poxier than Barnsley's.
The difference in those shockers was that we played our best teams and still got beat. Sometimes by shocking bad luck and sometimes by terrible performances by the team. Last saturday we were beaten because our best team was not put out. That was Barnsley's Cup Final and even if they get stuffed 10-0 in the next round they will still have had a great cup run. It mattered that much to them. It just didn't seem to matter to Raffa.

[Sabre]

listen mate its quite obvious that you will back rafa no matter what ,and your entitled to your opinion. i just wonder what it would take to make you change your mind

Listen mate, it's not really my fault this forum has gone from the "Rafa can't be criticised" to the "Rafa can't be defended" in a couple of months. Probably some people making fair points of criticism the last two years got unfair stick, but people are trying to make valid points defending Rafa now, and it's a sin as we speak. Probably the right balance is somewhere in the middle, as always.

Unlike most of my fellow members, who have some component of "love" to Rafa, I don't care much about Rafa as a person, he comes from Real Madrid after all. I defend him because I'm sure that if he's left to work until his project is ended, he'll leave Liverpool in a the best situation of the last 10 years. If that time comes (2 years more?) and the situation is like it is right now, I won't keep my trust on him. I do change my mind with time, it's just I do it slowly.

[lakes10]

Well my outlook has changed. After reading the NOTW,

hard to respect the view of somebody who consumes sh!te you f*cking traitor.

SG had his book in that paper is he a f*cking traitor? ?