Liverpool FC Forum

by **JC_81** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 12:38 am

rafa09 wrote:hi guys it,s 3rd of dec and guess what? WERE STILL TOP OF THE PREM

Glad someone else is staying optimistic. Too many miserable :censored:

on the forum these days.

We've dropped 4 points we shouldn't have in the past 2 games. Big deal. Chelsea dropped 5 points they shouldn't have in their last two games.

Top of the league at this stage without a fit Torres for the majority of games and comfortably through to the CL knock out phase should be more than enough to satisfy fans.

We are all disappointed at Torres' injuries, Keane's form and the last two results, but don't let that take away from the facts. At this stage of the season the league table doesn't tell too many lies, and we are right in the mix this season.

by **Kharhaz** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 12:47 am

john craig wrote:
rafa09 wrote:hi guys it,s 3rd of dec and guess what? WERE STILL TOP OF THE PREM

Glad someone else is staying optimistic. Too many miserable on the forum these days.

We've dropped 4 points we shouldn't have in the past 2 games. Big deal. Chelsea dropped 5 points they shouldn't have in their last two games.

Top of the league at this stage without a fit Torres for the majority of games and comfortably through to the CL knock out phase should be more than enough to satisfy fans.

We are all disappointed at Torres' injuries, Keane's form and the last two results, but don't let that take away from the facts. At this stage of the season the league table doesn't tell too many lies, and we are right in the mix this season.

Absolutely right. As poor as things have been we are top of the league. But for me as many who have doubts are those "nigglies" you know the ones, the united drawing equal with us with regards to league wins. All LFC supporters are proud of our past record and pretty dissapointed in our premiership attempts. We have been amazinly lucky to draw upon our league position this season. Scholari hasnt done as well as many thought, injuries have stalled man utd and arsenal simply havent spent on established players to provide some form of stability to there team.

We have done poorly as have the others, but the difference is, Chelsea have been struggling against the big teams, this is down to scholari, United have struggled, Arsenal have struggled, but we have struggled, with a more or less full strength team, and its not the big teams we have struggled against, and this is my concern.

by **Rush Job** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 1:47 am

If we are the forth best team in the league then Rafa`s doing a good job, isnt he?
The only man who can polish a turd.

by **LegBarnes** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 3:40 am

Its hard to trust a manager who looks like he just ate half his team.

by **maypaxvobiscum** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 3:51 am

LegBarnes wrote:Its hard to trust a manager who looks like he just ate half his team.

i just found this funny. but i do feel rafa kills the creativity and flair off our players with the system. its too rigid. and there doesnt seem to be a planB when A fails.

im pleased at being top. but considering our performances, i dont think it'll last.

by **Toffeehater** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 9:20 am

bigmick wrote:Tony there is a bit of a contradiction here on the goals front. You can't on the one hand say you don't care if we score goals by Torres beating four blokes or it going in off kuyt's erse, and then bang on continuously about our flukey goals against the other "big four" teams. I think you make many good points in your posts and I understand both your frustration and your concern, but just occasionally there is a point which doesn't make sense to me.

I totally agree with your point about the flowing football and the "classy" appearance of the respective teams in motion, but I am less concerned by it than you. I remember Arsenal winning the title under George Graham for the first time in years and grinding their way towards it, while Man Utd's team under Ferguson which broke their drought was workmanlike for long periods. Only the arrival of Cantona as my memory serves really gave them that "fantasy" ingredient which elevated them above the norm. We too are going to have to win it the hard way if indeed we are capable of winning it at all (which I think we are). We will no doubt hit a purple patch at some point and roll teams over 3 or 4 nil for a few games in succession, but my feeling is that we're going to win a lot of games by the odd goal, almost inevitably as a result of the captain or Torres carrying us over the line.

Did we learn anything against West Ham? Not really I don't think. We saw that we find it difficult when teams sit in, we saw that without Torres we find goals hard to come by. We knew both of those things anyway though surely? We know for instance that if Torres was to be out for three months or so we will be extreme outsiders for the title. No news there though surely.

If we do ultimately come up short, then as I've said earlier we will probably look back on the last three weeks and come to the conclusion that that's where we lost it. People will probably look at signings such as Keane for 20 million, Babel for 11 million, Lucas for 5 and Dossena for 7 and wonder if it could have been different. Everyone will have a theory for sure, but now is not the time, I don't think anyway.

Now is the first time for eons that we've been involved in the title race and I'm absolutely loving it TBH. I couldn't give a sh!t that we don't look pretty, I couldn't care less that we could be accused of being a two man team. We are Chelsea in reverse, they can relentlessly roll over smaller teams but have one point in nine, AT HOME, against the big four. We struggle against the smaller teams but have won two fom two against the big four. Same as Man U, one point in nine against big four oppo this season so far. Now if, and it's a big if, we can keep on getting results against the smaller clubs to hang in there, it'll then come down to our performances against the bigger clubs. It won't be easy, and I'm not sure by any means that we'll do it, but I'm going to enjoy the attempt anyway. Feck me it's been long enough coming that's for sure.

Top top post there .

by **JamCar05** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 12:06 pm

maypaxvobiscum wrote:
LegBarnes wrote:Its hard to trust a manager who looks like he just ate half his team.

i just found this funny. but i do feel rafa kills the creativity and flair off our players with the system. its too rigid. and there doesnt seem to be a planB when A fails.

im pleased at being top. but considering our performances, i dont think it'll last.

Really

I found it a rather stupid comment tbh.

by **Owzat** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 2:13 pm

bigmick wrote:
neil wrote:I'm under the impression that we continually finish the second half of the season stronger than any of the other top 4 and have done for quite a while(obviously someone will prove me wrong here) thats why I'm pretty confident of the title this time. We're always cr4p at this time of the year.

Bit of an urban myth that Neil which pro-rotationists used to cling to in order to justify the "delayed gazelle" theory. What normally happens, or has happened before this season, is that we rotate ourselves into dizziness for the first dozen or so games of the season, before selecting relatively sensibly for a while and going on a run. This usually brings us within 14 or so points of the leaders, and from then on we normally hold our own give or take a little.

Last season for instance Chelsea came from well back off the pace (behind us even) to get within a whisker of winning it. In so doing they ran past us and Arsenal without any problem, and in the meantime found enough energy to outrun us in extra-time in the Champions League. All that after a couple of days previously beating Man Utd in the league, and all done with next to no rotation.

Rafa around that period was selecting fairly sensibly for us as well and had been for some time. Seeing Chelsea's sustained run into joint leadership of the Prem, and within a John Terry spot kick of the Champions league win without really rotating, may just have been the final illuminatory factor in his "seeing of the light" period.

I agree the suggestion we have the best second half of a season of the big four has to be a myth. I don't recall any late charges, we probably hold our own in the second half of the season.

We normally fall short through two paths - a poor start meaning we're struggling very early, or we start well, stutter too much after a dozen or so games and can't put together a strong enough run to make a late or sustained title challenge.

Fact is you need to win 27 or so games to win the league, if you double our current position of P15 W10 D4 L1 to 30 games and 68 points then we'd still need another seven wins from the last eight games to get to 27 wins. It's not a sprint, it's not even a marathon but a sprint over marathon distance. You need to win, win and keep winning.

by **Owzat** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 2:24 pm

john craig wrote:At this stage of the season the league table doesn't tell too many lies, and we are right in the mix this season.

yeah cause the mancs will definitely finish third. The table can be misleading, until everyone has played 19 games then some sides can have had an easier run than others. The way the fixtures have fallen the mancs have played Chelsea, Liverpool AND Arsenal AWAY (1 point from 9) while we've played just Man Utd (h) and Chelsea (a)

Yes we're in a great position at the moment, but we don't need "positivity" and the (ought to be) carried away brigade forcing it down our throats any time someone ANALYSES the situation with a balanced and impartial view. Ok it may seem negative, but we have gone 18 years without a league title because we're past masters and sustaining a challenge. Or perhaps we should just say "yay we're top of the league" all over the boards and not discuss individuals or match performances. It is only 15 games into the season, I'll be a lot more confident if we're still up there around February when the CL resumes and the pressure is really on.

Chelsea have dropped points, to Liverpool, Man Utd, Arsenal, Tottenham and Newcastle - three of those are their title rivals. We've dropped points to Tottenham, Stoke, Fulham, villa and West Ham - none of those are title rivals and you play six games a season against 'big four' rivals while you play the sides like those we've dropped points again THIRTY-TWO games a season.

I hope we do win the league, I am hopeful but have cautious optimism which comes from years of disappointment after disappointment with a few great triumphs in cups for Liverpool. If the season lasted only fifteen games we'd be celebrating winning the title already, it doesn't and so there is no sense in getting carried away. Quite why there needs to be all this antagonism over positive and negative attitudes I don't know, if people would stop bitching about negative people and just discuss the players, games, HJC, the owners etc then maybe this place wouldn't resemble a battleground so much. We're all Liverpool fans, we all want the league title but why should some dictate the 'best way' to support Liverpool?

EDIT : I've seen mods close threads saying they've "run their course". Since this discussion seems to have moved on from the match I'm surprised this one hasn't been deemed to have "run it's course"

by **maypaxvobiscum** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 2:38 pm

JamCar05 wrote:
maypaxvobiscum wrote:
LegBarnes wrote:Its hard to trust a manager who looks like he just ate half his team.

i just found this funny. but i do feel rafa kills the creativity and flair off our players with the system. its too rigid. and there doesnt seem to be a planB when A fails.

im pleased at being top. but considering our performances, i dont think it'll last.

Really I found it a rather stupid comment tbh.

yeah well it is stupid. stupidly funny. im not surprised rafa is getting loads of stick from some posters here though. i guess its mainly due to his non-starting 11 and subs.

by **JamCar05** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 3:10 pm

maypaxvobiscum wrote:
JamCar05 wrote:
maypaxvobiscum wrote:
LegBarnes wrote:Its hard to trust a manager who looks like he just ate half his team.

i just found this funny. but i do feel rafa kills the creativity and flair off our players with the system. its too rigid. and there doesnt seem to be a planB when A fails.

im pleased at being top. but considering our performances, i dont think it'll last.

Really I found it a rather stupid comment tbh.

yeah well it is stupid. stupidly funny. im not surprised rafa is getting loads of stick from some posters here though. i guess its mainly due to his non-starting 11 and subs.

Each to their own I guess. IMO it's just rather childish to insinuate that your own teams manager is fat, just because you're unhappy with the work he's doing. Maybe it's just me having a cranky day though.

by **supersub** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 4:19 pm

Owzat wrote:EDIT : I've seen mods close threads saying they've "run their course". Since this discussion seems to have moved on from the match I'm surprised this one hasn't been deemed to have "run it's course"

on that note

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