by Ciggy » Sun Nov 14, 2010 8:16 pm
From Garstonette on RAWK
Carragher's Career Extension Symptomatic Of Deep-Rooted Problems
Expectations before the 2002/2003 season were high. In the years leading up to it, we had finished 4th, 3rd and 2nd. It was meant to be our year. Going fourteen games unbeaten at the beginning of the campaign had spirits running sky high. Nobody could have predicted that when Liverpool travelled up to Middlesbrough on November 9th – sitting top of the table - it would be twelve games and over two months before we would record our next league win. Gareth Southgate’s winner at the Riverside Stadium would be a defining moment in Houllier’s tenure. Had we come away with even just a 0-0 draw that day, who knows how things might have turned out?
Fast forward just under five months from the trip to Middlesbrough that sucker-punched the camp’s morale and I’m sat in a pub around Anfield. It’s around five o’clock and the passion from the stands has spilled out on to the Walton Breck Rd. Liverpool had just been beaten 2-1 by Manchester City. Nicolas Anelka – the man Houllier snubbed in favour of El Hadji Diouf – had just scored a last minute winner that made Champions League qualification improbable.
As is always the way when alcohol is involved, people were very opinionated. From being a side that was ready to end our long, long wait and bring home the league title at the beginning of the season, we were now apparently a team in need of a serious overhaul. “Remove the deadwood” was the buzz phrase. Diao, Biscan, Diouf, Cheyrou, Traore and… Jamie Carragher. All of them should have been on the next bus out of Liverpool in the summer rebuild.
Gerard Houllier had always seen Jamie Carragher as a full-back and fans were frustrated at how limited he was in that position. The illness to Markus Babbel saw Carragher shifted to new right-back position. Previously, he had spent his time on the left of the back four and while everybody involved in the “treble season” deserves credit, my lasting memory of Carragher in that position was him looking forward, surveying the scene that lay ahead of him, before swinging round like a protractor and playing a safe ball back to the goalkeeper. And sometimes that was when he was forty yards up the pitch.
The narrow midfield that Houllier insisted on fielding made an attacking full-back a priority, but Carragher wasn’t that person.
The days of a “defender defends” were numbered. Arsenal opted to replace the great Lee Dixon and Nigel Winterburn with Lauren and Gio Van Brockhorst: two players with a greater sense of adventure. I think Houllier recognised this trend and in the 2003/2004 season, attempted to adjust his tactical approach. But I think when a manager goes against his own philosophies, it spells danger.
Somewhere between trying to add some flair and creativity to the side in Houllier’s final year, we lost our shape and defensive discipline. Players like Diouf and Kewell were brought in, but I don’t think Houllier ever achieved the all-important balance. We may have outwitted Arsenal in the 2001 FA Cup final, but I remember sat at the Millennium Stadium in 2002 for the Community Shield just over a year later, seeing Arsene Wenger’s men absolutely run riot against us. They had speed, ability, strength. Simply put, they were a different animal (even if the score at the end only read 1-0).
Even in his final season, Houllier retained the same centre-back pairing that had served him well throughout 2000-2002 though: the “SH partnership”, Sami Hyypia and Stephane Henchoz. While they were both excellent readers of the game, neither had the pace to keep up with the ball over the top or in behind. Every success we had under Houllier was when we asked sides to play through us. It’s a negative tactic, but one we executed brilliantly at times.
Jamie Carragher was shifted out of the side as Steve Finnan was brought in at right-back and John Arne-Riise on the left. Whatever way you look at it, Houllier failed to realise Carragher’s potential. But Benitez didn’t. When he arrived in 2004, one of the first things he did was bring in Carragher and plant him alongside Sami Hyypia.
Benitez’s tactics were very different to Houllier’s. He wanted the side to push much further up the field. He wanted to squeeze the opposition and pressurize them when they were in possession. He did so at Valencia, even though Roberto Ayala and Mauricio Pellegrino also suffered from the same problem Henchoz and Hyypia did.
Over twenty yards, neither of them would keep up with your average striker, which goes to show the effectiveness of their midfield. Possession is the greatest form of defence and controlling the ball is Benitez’s ideal. But the back-up plan is to have every one of his players pressing, pushing the opposition back. You can almost picture it like a rugby scrum. Everyone working individually would lose, but together you can outmuscle the other team.
On Benitez, Carragher said: "I am a bit more mature. I have had a great deal of help off Rafael Benitez as well. He has certainly helped us as a back four and he is a big student of the game.
"He studied the Milan team of the late 80s and early 90s and showed us videos of them and he is determined for us to be as solid and tight as possible.”
Benitez showed that you don’t necessarily need to have fast centre-halves to play higher up the pitch. Players like Sissoko, Mascherano and even Kuyt were key in closing the spaces in high areas of the pitch. It was said that his sides “defended as a team and attacked as a team”.
The importance of closing down defenders before they could distribute the ball was as important as closing down a striker to him. With that said, he was known during his time at Valencia to use Miroslav Djukic for the pace he brought to the defence. The players he earmarked for the future at centre half at Liverpool – Skrtel and Agger – were also quicker over the deck than their predecessors. Perhaps a coincidence, but more likely it was Benitez’s reaction to adapting to the Premier League.
Rafael Benitez brought a lot to Liverpool Football Club, but the decision to move Carragher into the centre was clearly a masterstroke. There is no denying it. His performances in the Champions League campaign of 2004/2005 were simply stunning. The sight of Carragher with “cramp in both his groins” as Andy Townsend put it, stretching to knock out an AC Milan cross into our penalty area deep into extra time will live long in the memory. Admittedly, he was part of the backline that was torn apart by the genius of Pirlo, Kaka, Crespo and Shevchenko that night, but by the end, his contribution was every bit as vital as the goals scored by Gerrard, Smicer and Alonso.
So then, what has changed? Well, first of all, Rafa Benitez is no longer here. We’re now under the leadership of Roy Hodgson, whose approach to the game is reminiscent to Gerard Houllier – the man who overlooked the talent of Carragher. The difference now of course is that Jamie Carragher’s reputation is very different.
Roy Hodgson’s job was to “steady the ship”, rather than “rock the boat”, but the whispers on the stands and among those that have watched us closely is that the latter is closer to what we require.
Another candidate for the position of manager in the summer was Manuel Pellegrini who did an awful lot of good for Real Madrid, despite not managing to win any silverware.
If Jose Mourinho goes on to win a major honour with Madrid– and who would bet against him? – then what Pellegrini brought to the table shouldn’t be overlooked. You can’t forget that he recorded a magnificent 96 points total in his only season there and he did so playing a great brand of football. His side scored over 100 goals. More importantly though, he went against the grain.
Real Madrid have had over a dozen managers since the turn of the Millennium, but few of them have gone against Madrid’s accepted conventions. Capello did and won them the league. He ignored the boos to Emerson and persisted with him for what he brought his side. Similarly Manuel Pellegrini pinpointed a real burden and dealt with it emphatically, by curbing the ludicrous influence that Guti and Raul had on the dressing room. I can’t help but feel that it’s the sort of “rule with an iron fist” that we so desperately require.
What any manager needs to say when he first walks into a club is that nobody’s position in the side is secure. There should be no comfort zone. What Hodgson has done is almost the polar opposite. He told Gerrard he can practically play wherever it is he feels most comfortable. He told Joe Cole he can play in his favoured, central position and he’s awarded Jamie Carragher a two year contract even though his performances have been on the wane for a good eighteen months.
Giving a player whose pace and acceleration has deteriorated an extension on his contract sent out all the wrong messages. With that said, under Hodgson and the system he plays, Carragher can squeeze out a few more years. Sat deep and inviting pressure onto us requires defenders with a good reading of the game, with the ability to win their own personal battle, players with strength and determination.
(Incidentally, part of why Glen Johnson is struggling is down to the fact that he is being asked to play along a deep backline that doesn’t push up the field. Daniel Alves and Maicon would struggle playing with such tactics and they are regarded as the best right-backs in the world.)
The fact that Carragher excels in Hodgson’s tactics is symptomatic of what is wrong with us at the moment. Jamie Carragher’s days were numbered playing as a centre-half in a side that presses the opposition high up the field, because his legs have gone and his distribution is poor. Even before news broke of Daniel Agger’s injury, it was clear that Roy didn’t fancy him. The comments that Agger came out with and then quickly retracted had every Liverpool fan nodding their head in agreement. Centre-halves in the modern game need football ability. Vermaelen, Pique, Ferdinand, Lucio, Carvalho. The “if in doubt, hit it out” mantra is dying out.
I found it interesting that John Henry spoke about Arsene Wenger as a man who has delivered to Arsenal his ideal for how a sports team should be run. When Wenger first arrived at Arsenal, he bought players with experience and relied on the old heads like Adams and Keown. But as the Premier League developed, so did Wenger’s philosophy. There is little room for players over the age of 30 and, the few that do make it, are given short contracts, with the emphasis being on who is going to replace them in the long-term. I don’t think extending Carragher’s contract was a terrible idea, I just thought the timing of it was bizarre.
It’s vital now that we look into the future and begin to phase players like Carragher out. Use him more on the training field than the team sheet, to help the progress of the younger players.
There is no-one anywhere in the world at any stage who is any bigger or any better than this football club.
Kenny Dalglish 1/2/2011
REST IN PEACE PHIL, YOU WILL NEVER BE FORGOTTEN.
