Liverpool FC Forum

by **Raffmaker** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 1:14 am

sgs wrote:The truth is that Keane has ALWAYS missed a few amount of chances throughout his career. But he is a talented player who brings a lot more to the team's attack than goal scoring. Secondly, he is a big and experienced player, not the delicate emotionally fragile player he is being made out to be. I am confident that in time he will come good. Meantime, we have a title to win; period!

More than Peter Crouch or Craig Bellamy B4 Him?

Suddenly, you like Rafa, Feel very silly !!! lol

by **sgs** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 1:18 am

Raffmaker wrote:
sgs wrote:The truth is that Keane has ALWAYS missed a few amount of chances throughout his career. But he is a talented player who brings a lot more to the team's attack than goal scoring. Secondly, he is a big and experienced player, not the delicate emotionally fragile player he is being made out to be. I am confident that in time he will come good. Meantime, we have a title to win; period!

More than Peter Crouch or Craig Bellamy B4 Him?

Suddenly, you like Rafa, Feel very silly !!! lol

YES

by **Ciggy** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 9:30 am

Dropping him against newcastle dented his confidence, had he played against newcastle i think he probably would have scored them two goals last night.

by **dawson99** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 9:58 am

Ciggy wrote:Dropping him against newcastle dented his confidence, had he played against newcastle i think he probably would have scored them two goals last night.

He's been aproffessional long enough to know that he wont play every game. If something like not playing against Newcastle dented his cofidence that much then he aint the type of player we need. More than likely he didnt prepare properly for the game

by **Owzat** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 10:18 am

Surely up against lower league opposition his confidence shouldn't have been an issue? He had at least three good chances to score, once he started missing those his game went to pot and he didn't know whether to twist or stick (shoot or try to play Riera in - he went for the latter)

One up front works best for us, if Keane didn't know that we'd adopted that system and that was our most effective system BEFORE he joined then he should have. As such it is difficult to play two strikers (in position) and he must have been mad if he thought he was better than Torres. So it was fairly obvious he wouldn't be first choice before he signed, if he couldn't cope with not playing every game then he should have stayed put. I guess his own desire to play for Liverpool and the mad amount of money offered went on to seal the deal.

He should have netted at least once, whose fault is a lack of confidence if he doesn't take his chances? He can't expect Rafa to keep playing him until he finds good enough form so that the misses don't get to him and cost us. Bigmick is right that you can't conclude playing him against Newcastle would have meant he'd score against them or PNE and that is was wrong to leave him out. You equally can't conclude that if he'd scored against PNE that it was correct to leave him out, he should have scored against PNE and so the decision to leave him out against Newcastle was immaterial. We won both games, the players in the Newcastle game justified their selection and the chances Keane et al got against PNE justified Rafa's selection. In a perfect world Keane would have scored, he can blame only himself for not tucking away one of his chances. If he's left out next game then he can only blame himself

by **milou** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 10:21 am

[quote="dawson99"][/quote]
I posted something similar in "Torres" thread but didn't get the answers I was looking for. Anyway it is more "Keane" related, so I will post here again and hope to get some opinions.. :;):

With Torres coming back, I expect Rafa to play this line-up quite regularly, esp since gerrard has been red-hot playing behind the lone striker lately...

.................reina
arbeloa..skrtel..carra..aurelio
..........masch..alonso
kuyt.........gerrard...reira
...............torres

Apart from reira.. this is effectively our line-up from last year.

That triggers some questions in my mind.. what was Rafa thinking when he bought Keane.. since he is CLEARLY not a lone-striker? SURELY he bought Keane with the intention to play him behind Torres right? Perhaps he was considering this line-up before season started (therefore alonso was "allowed to go")?

.................reina
arbeloa..skrtel..carra..aurelio
..........masch..gerrard
kuyt.........keane...reira
...............torres

This maybe controversial.. I think Keane has been unlucky with how events were turning out for him, IRONICALLY with Torres' injury. Having been bought for that particular role... he has had no lone-striker (a brilliant one, no less) to play-off. Instead, he has to assume the lone-striker role himself.. one that he wasn't bought for and simply can't excel in!

Even with Alonso injured now (hopefully not too long), I can't see Rafa breaking (and rightly so) "Gerrard-Torres" partnership to accommodate Keane. So I can see Lucas (considering that he has been doing alright) starting ahead of Keane TBH.

I just feel the current situation doesn't look very optimistic for Keane but we will see.

So was Rafa wrong for buying Keane in the first place?

Any thoughts anyone? :blush:

by **bigmick** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 10:36 am

Well if he wasn't going to give him the opportunity to find his feet, wasn't going to leave him on the pitch for thr full 90 minutes, and intended dropping him each time he scored two goals then yes he was wrong to buy him I think.

Pretty much everyone thought we had paid at the very least top dollar for Keane, and most thought we had overpaid by at least 25% or so. I'd be inclined to agree with that to be honest, as I would the feeling that Keane isn't as good as a second striker/advanced midfielder as Gerrard is (mind you there's not many that are to tell the truth). All that said though, he does play for us now, he is our only fit striker, we did pay 20 million quid for him, and we really could do with him just occasionally being able to hit a cows erse with a banjo.

Given all of that, once he starts/started scoring it was silly to leave him out against Newcastle. IMHo of course.

by **roberto green** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 10:44 am

If we do sell Keane in the summer we will be taking some loss on the player by at least half the price and Also Babel about half his price and Benitez is defo gonna have to sell before he can buy so i think these 2 will be the first 2 out the door.

by **Owzat** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 11:05 am

Keane became worth about £9m max the second we signed him, mainly because he was worth maybe £10m-£12m to start with. I find it funny that people are saying he was never a quality finisher, no Ian Rush, so it makes Rafa paying £20.3m for him (at 28 years old) even more baffling. Rafa is never the most patient, Keane's reaction to being subbed a few times won't have done him any favours.

But don't worry, he'll 'come good' like we've been told many times on here

by **banana** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 11:13 am

Keane has to go.

Negatives
He is weak
soft,
slow,
no upper body strenght,
no airial presence,
no penetration,
no goal treath,
can't shoot

Positives
He has a good understanding of the game,
his runs (although he makes few and makes them slow) are intelligent,
he is british (CHL quota)

This is not enough for me. Bye bye Keane.

by **Emerald Red** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 11:22 am

banana wrote:Keane has to go.

Negatives
He is weak
soft,
slow,
no upper body strenght,
no airial presence,
no penetration,
no goal treath,
can't shoot

Positives
He has a good understanding of the game,
his runs (although he makes few and makes them slow) are intelligent,
he is british (CHL quota)

This is not enough for me. Bye bye Keane.

Seriously, do stop talking bollox.

To reiterate how much sh*t you just wrote, I've highlighted something in bold, not to be controversial of course.

by **Effes** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 11:32 am

Getting rid of Keane would be madness, what if Torres' hamstring goes again?

by **Emerald Red** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 11:34 am

Owzat wrote:Keane became worth about £9m max the second we signed him, mainly because he was worth maybe £10m-£12m to start with. I find it funny that people are saying he was never a quality finisher, no Ian Rush, so it makes Rafa paying £20.3m for him (at 28 years old) even more baffling. Rafa is never the most patient, Keane's reaction to being subbed a few times won't have done him any favours.

But don't worry, he'll 'come good' like we've been told many times on here

To point something out, Keane has netted 7 times for us, and should have scored at least another half dozen. He's been missing his strike partner, and as such has been forced to play as the lone striker more times than he'd liked, a position of which is not suited to his game. He is NOT a battering ram, lightening fast front man ala Drogba or Torres. He does not fit that role, but what he has been asked to do, he has done well performing that duty. He proved that at Arsenal. You say he wasn't worth 20 million and that it was too much. What so of Berbatov? Scored 4 goals, is a lazy b@stard on the pitch, and offers little to no goal threat for the Mancs. Oh, and he cost a full 10 million more. Fact is, if you want a proven quality EPL player, you pay the cash these days. Simple as that. The fella has had 6 months of pressure playing as a lone striker for the team currently sitting at the top of the PL. I think he deserves some slack. The criticism of Keane as a player are way over the top IMO. Some people just love to see a player fail because he costs X amount of money. He deserves a full season or more before the kind of abuse that's been hurled at him is justified. And BTW, I'm one of Keane's staunchest critics when it comes to his finishing. He frustrates, but more often than not, he always seems to produce something that vindicates him in one way or another.

by **milou** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 11:40 am

bigmick wrote:Well if he wasn't going to give him the opportunity to find his feet, wasn't going to leave him on the pitch for thr full 90 minutes, and intended dropping him each time he scored two goals then yes he was wrong to buy him I think.

Pretty much everyone thought we had paid at the very least top dollar for Keane, and most thought we had overpaid by at least 25% or so. I'd be inclined to agree with that to be honest, as I would the feeling that Keane isn't as good as a second striker/advanced midfielder as Gerrard is (mind you there's not many that are to tell the truth). All that said though, he does play for us now, he is our only fit striker, we did pay 20 million quid for him, and we really could do with him just occasionally being able to hit a cows erse with a banjo.

Given all of that, once he starts/started scoring it was silly to leave him out against Newcastle. IMHo of course.

I think we are done discussing whether resting Keane in the Newcastle game affected his performance yesterday. There is and there will be no conclusion

But I can at least conclude that Keane is simply not good enough, not as a lone striker anyway. I also know we can't be going around trying to look for anybody & anything to blame except Keane himself.. and I am certain he knows it too. Some of the chances he missed have been EASY, form or no form, lone-striker or behind the hole.

Just look at Torres.. He came back after a lengthy period, given 20mins and scored! It is as if he hasn't been away at all! That's the class we need :nod

But I do question Rafa for the way he has been playing Keane "out of position"... bcos it is pretty clear to me Keane was bought to be played behind Torres, and not as a lone-striker. Even if Rafa did buy Keane to play him as the "all-lethal" lone-striker (as much as it is unlikely), SURELY he can't continue believing so after seeing Keane struggled so badly ?

It remains to be seen if playing Keane as a lone-striker was just an "emergency" solution.. bcos with Alonso's injury, I think Rafa has the perfect opportunity to play the formation he had in mind when he bought Keane.

I wait in anticipation what starting line-up Rafa will put out for our next match. It will make clearer what future holds for Keane. But I am afraid Gerrard's red-hot form behind the lone-striker MAY have marked the end of Keane TBH.

by **akumaface** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 11:58 am

It doesn't matter whether Keane is a lone striker or second striker. The point is that his finishing is dead poor. How many chances had he missed this year (not just talking about the game from last night.) I think we need to start Torres virtually every game and use Keane as cover. Whether we sell him or not really depends on how we finishes. I think if we win the league, then maybe we can keep him for one more year as cover. If not, try to get what you can and move on.

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