Liverpool FC Forum

If we win tonight, and Udinese don't beat Anzhi we are through to the next round. This is the first of four games in 10 days, so it will be interesting to see what sort of a team Rodgers picks. I've read that "Brendan Rodgers has confirmed his intention to field a strong team" and that "Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers will resist the temptation to turn to his established stars", so who knows what sort of a team it'll be - or are those two statements actually saying the same thing?

Young Boys are on a good run in the Europa League, defeating Udinese 3-1 and 3-2 in their last two games after losing to us and Anzhi, so they have everything to play for, and must come into the game with a lot of confidence. I guess most of us wouldn't have expected a table like this after 4 games:

Anzhi - 7 points
Liverpool - 6 points
Young Boys - 6 points
Udinese - 4 points

However, they've only won once in their last five games in Swizterland - perhaps because they've been focusing on the Europa League?

We are at home and if we win this we've a good chance of making the next round, so it's going to be a better team than the one that beat Young Boys 5-3. Something like this I'd guess:

                           Reina
Wisdom       Coates     Cara      Enrique
           Henderson       Gerrard
                          Suso
Downing                               Assaidi
                        Suarez

Subs: Jones, Johnson, Agger, Shelvey, Sterling, Yesil

I'm picking a narrow and nervous win, 1-0 or 2-1 in a scrappy game that probably won't be worth getting out of bed for. And Udinese will win by two or three away to Anzhi, so we'll have to go through it all over again in a couple of weeks time!

Positive enough for ya?

we need the win. full team out please, get the 4 goal lead and then take 3 players off. no excuses, no experiments, no resting everyone.

we need this Brendan, crack on lad.

Not full strength but near full strength.

I would play Shelvey Henderson and Sahin. Instead of Gerrard Allen and Suso. Assaidi instead of Suarez and Pacheco instead of Sterling. Keep in Johnson Wisdom and Skrtel but Rest Agger so Coates to partner Skrtel.

                      Reina
Wisdom   Skrtel      Coates    Johnson

                  Sahin   Henderson
                      Shelvey
Assaidi                               Enrique.
                       Pacheco#

Enough quality to beat Young boys and if not bring on Stevie and Luis. Need to start looking at the bigger picture and not one game at a time as we have 4 games in 10 days. 2 of them away Spurs and Swansea. Win is very important though

Play fringe players, rest key men. Win match.

Swansea is more important (given our limited squad).

-------------------------------Pepe

--------Wisdom-----Coates------Carra-------Robinson

-----------Henderson------Allen-----Shelvey

-----------Assaidi-------Pacheco/Yesil--------Cole

That will do.

Kenny Kan » Thu Nov 22, 2012 11:11 am wrote:Play fringe players, rest key men. Win match.

Swansea is more important (given our limited squad).

-------------------------------Pepe

--------Wisdom-----Coates------Carra-------Robinson

-----------Henderson------Allen-----Shelvey

-----------Assaidi-------Pacheco/Yesil--------Cole

That will do.

If the club are serious on progressing they will play a stronger side than normal tonight, because winning at home will be far easier than travelling to Udinese on the final game needing a result. If the competition is not overly important to the management team then play a weakened side against both Young Boys and Udinese, and hope the second string improve enough to get the required points for qualification.

ITV 4 tonight for those of us who can't get to Anfield.

Played some decent stuff but undone by two great strikes from the Swiss, but for fk's sake, 2-1 up with just a few minutes on the clock and we're apparently incapable of closing a game down.

Naive in the extreme, made you wonder who exactly were the "young boys".

woof woof ! » Fri Nov 23, 2012 12:19 pm wrote:Played some decent stuff but undone by two great strikes from the Swiss, but for fk's sake, 2-1 up with just a few minutes on the clock and we're apparently incapable of closing a game down.

Naive in the extreme, made you wonder who exactly were the "young boys".

At 2-1 we were playing like a 3 goal was necessary for qualification. I was shouting at them to slow it down!!

So frustrating.

On a positive note, Joe Cole had a good one, as did Shelvey. However I thought we were really missing a defensive role in the midfield, Sahin is a good player but he isn't Lucas - the tackle he attempted that lead up to their second equaliser was a joke.

Such a frustrating end to the game.  All we needed to do was hold the bloody ball and we could have then sent a team of kids to italy.
We need to progress in this competition I feel.  It won't look good on Rodgers if we're out of the Carling Cup, out of Europe and midtable come Xmas period.

The Lineup clearly stated One Sahin was supposed to play ,anybody seen the lad? Post some pics of the guy as he is  MIA in the last month.

I thought Sahin did well, to be honest. No idea why he took Suso off though.

Should have really won this if we wanted to go trough. But we only have ourselves to blame because we missed a few sitters.

only me » Fri Nov 23, 2012 8:04 pm wrote:The Lineup clearly stated One Sahin was supposed to play ,anybody seen the lad? Post some pics of the guy as he is  MIA in the last month.

Sahin won possession back 9 times. More than any other Liverpool player in any Liverpool game this season. He played as the deepest of the midfielders and was boss.

Our approach in the last 10 minutes was full of naivety boarding on stupidity.

jacdaniel » Fri Nov 23, 2012 2:17 pm wrote:Such a frustrating end to the game.  All we needed to do was hold the bloody ball and we could have then sent a team of kids to italy.
We need to progress in this competition I feel.  It won't look good on Rodgers if we're out of the Carling Cup, out of Europe and midtable come Xmas period.

There is nothing to suggest that we will still be mid-table or out of the Europa League by the Christmas period. Even if we are, I don't see any need to hit the panic button and as much as I want to see us winning trophies, I don't want us to win the Europa League at the expense of making real progress in the league. Beat Swansea and we will have 18 points. 2 points off Arsenal, 3 points off Everton and 6 points off Chelsea. It's game on from then on in.