ConnO'var wrote:big al wrote:At the risk of offending some people here I think it is a wise move for Xabi Alonso to leave Liverpool. I say this because I side with Xabi and his future rather than Liverpools need to keep him. Alonso is the most fouled against player in the premiership higher even than Ronaldo ( and mostly genuine fouls) Last year he had six players red carded against him including the idiot tackle of Joey Barton. Xabi could very easily get an injury that would put and end to his career. Every team knows that to stop liverpool you need to close Alonso down so they foul him and tackle him. Either Liverpool buys another creative player like Xabi who takes pressure of him or let the guy go. He won't get half as many bad tackles in La Liga. I know its hard not to be selfish because without him we'll struggle to play as well as we did last year. The other option of course is to gave him a wage equal to Gerrard which might be enough to persuade him to continue risking a carrer ending injury in the premiership.
I don't see anything at all to be offended about your post. In fact it's a very good one and the concern does you credit.
There is merit in what you say.... however, i do think that Xabi is tough enough to handle it. Taking some heat off him does make sense. I tend to differ from your proffered solution of getting another creative player though.
For me, in our current team set up, the only way that'll happen is if we re-convert Stevie back to a box-to-box central midfielder and drop Mascherano. In which we case we will need to obtain the services of the much vaunted and longed for "creative second striker". Very few of them out there which are of sufficient quality and also of reasonable affordability.
I would still advocate getting proper right and left wingers. With good outlets on the wings, Xabi will be able to wreck havoc from deep and still fullfill his duties as a defensive midfielder.
If we change formation however..... it becomes a different kettle of fish.... quite a few personnel changes would be required imo.
As is, we have a very stable spine..... Reina , Carra , Agger, Mascherano , Xabi , Stevie and Torres.
I don't really rate Glen Johnson but am happy to give him the benefit of the doubt..... Aurelio is good when fit and Insua has impressed me a lot so I'm not too worried about the leftback position.
That's a total of 9 1st team positions sorted out. Leaving us with 2 wingers required..... Kuyt does the job but imo does not have any pace, creativity to be a threat against the weaker teams but I feel that against the stronger teams, he's a valuable member...... more like a defensive right midfielder. Reira flatters to deceive but has done well enough for me.
Leaving Skrtel, Doss, Kuyt and Reira on the bench. With the (hopefully) emergence of Nemeth.... The bench looks good.
If Xabi does go, than we'll need a replacement if we want to keep the formation. If we get KWALITY wingers..... a player like Scott Parker could do the job well enough..... If we don't, we'll need real creative quality in the middle to replace him.
If push came to shove and we cannot raise funds for wingers..... than the choice is more difficult..... Keep Xabi or get Silva/Robben (for example)??
Plus all this will he / won't he is doing me head in. We are running out of TIME. Any new players will need bedding in time and if we don't do it in pre-season, the early results may suffer for it.
Time to fish or cut bait Rafa..... Set a dateline and be done with it. We need to set our plans in motion and not be hanging off the coattails of Real Madrid.
We're 2 players short and that needs sorting asap.
as a team whereas we finally jelled against Singapore. I saw absolutely nothing from Eggnog in the Singapore game or any other game I have ever watched him play to suggest he has enough talent to make it, just for once agree with me because i will keep arguing about this as long as you insist he is a good player. 
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