Liverpool FC Forum

by **roberto green** » Sun Aug 09, 2009 5:38 pm

woof woof ! wrote:Totally off the wall BUT, could Lucas play the Gerrard role in support of Torres ? .

Off your head more like it!!!!

:laugh:

by **woof woof !** » Sun Aug 09, 2009 5:55 pm

roberto green wrote:
woof woof ! wrote:Totally off the wall BUT, could Lucas play the Gerrard role in support of Torres ? .

Off your head more like it!!!!

, I blame the Vodka.

by **woof woof !** » Sun Aug 09, 2009 6:05 pm

aCe' wrote:
woof woof ! wrote:Totally off the wall BUT, could Lucas play the Gerrard role in support of Torres ? .

Maybe with little defensive responsibilty and the license to get forward, putting in some short give and goes with Torres and our wide men we might see more of wht the lad has in his locker ?

Meanwhile Gerrard drops back to CM alongside Mash, lets not forget, before Alonso it was Stevie supplying the raking 40yd passes and bursting through from a deep position.

Just a thought, whadya reckon ?

dont think it would work... Gerrard wouldnt really be scoring half of what he did last season unless given the freedom to roam around which he obviously wont get if played down the middle... Which brings us to Lucas... Not good enough to put it simply... That side would lack goals and the over reliance on Torres to score would definately cost us in terms of points...

If we had someone better than Lucas it might have been a decent shout for a few games but still not a solution over the course of a few months or a season...

Gotta agree with the other part of your post regarding Lucas though... i said it the match thread and i think i mentioned it in this thread aswell.. Lucas' best work always comes when hes given the freedom to move without the ball... hes good at moving into spaces and getting himself in dangerous positions and is also good at arriving in the box and attacking crosses... seems more like a box-to-box midfielder than a holding midfielder to me... doesnt seem to be any good (in all honesty) at bringing the ball out from the back and is too conventional in his style of play to be creating anything from deep... given space though he looks a decent prospect and a much better player... Will be interesting to see how Rafa plays him because from what i've seen of the Lucas-Mascherano partnership so far, it doesnt seem to be any good tbh..

I hear you aCe' but still think there's a case to be made for pulling Gerrard back to CM until at least our latest £20 mill signing is fit to play.

Maybe sticking Lucas in behind Torres isn't the answer, but I wouldn't object if Rafa gave it a go ('course I might change me mind at half time

)

by **aCe'** » Sun Aug 09, 2009 8:35 pm

woof woof ! wrote:
aCe' wrote:
woof woof ! wrote:Totally off the wall BUT, could Lucas play the Gerrard role in support of Torres ? .

Maybe with little defensive responsibilty and the license to get forward, putting in some short give and goes with Torres and our wide men we might see more of wht the lad has in his locker ?

Meanwhile Gerrard drops back to CM alongside Mash, lets not forget, before Alonso it was Stevie supplying the raking 40yd passes and bursting through from a deep position.

Just a thought, whadya reckon ?

dont think it would work... Gerrard wouldnt really be scoring half of what he did last season unless given the freedom to roam around which he obviously wont get if played down the middle... Which brings us to Lucas... Not good enough to put it simply... That side would lack goals and the over reliance on Torres to score would definately cost us in terms of points...

If we had someone better than Lucas it might have been a decent shout for a few games but still not a solution over the course of a few months or a season...

Gotta agree with the other part of your post regarding Lucas though... i said it the match thread and i think i mentioned it in this thread aswell.. Lucas' best work always comes when hes given the freedom to move without the ball... hes good at moving into spaces and getting himself in dangerous positions and is also good at arriving in the box and attacking crosses... seems more like a box-to-box midfielder than a holding midfielder to me... doesnt seem to be any good (in all honesty) at bringing the ball out from the back and is too conventional in his style of play to be creating anything from deep... given space though he looks a decent prospect and a much better player... Will be interesting to see how Rafa plays him because from what i've seen of the Lucas-Mascherano partnership so far, it doesnt seem to be any good tbh..

I hear you aCe' but still think there's a case to be made for pulling Gerrard back to CM until at least our latest £20 mill signing is fit to play.

Maybe sticking Lucas in behind Torres isn't the answer, but I wouldn't object if Rafa gave it a go ('course I might change me mind at half time )

yea i see the logic in what you're saying...
think the only way we could perhaps consider moving Gerrard a few steps back is if Benayoun and Riera can hit top form early on and chip in with the goals (kuyt scoring is a given :lookaround

)...

Besides that i dont really see any other options besides maybe playing Babel behind or beside Torres and hoping he steps up his game.. For now though im sure Rafa would be willing to give the Lucas-Mascherano pairing a go and i cant really say i blame him given the options we have... lets hope it works because if it doesnt then we'll have a bit of reshuffling to do until Aquilani is back...

Again, all comes back to the lack of quality in depth... looking at our bench we seem desperately short in quality in pretty much all positions atm..

SanJose, Ayala, Kelly, Dossena, Plessis, Spearing, Babel *, Ngog, Nemeth, Voronin...

hardly any player you can bring on to change the game or to even be a good enough replacement for whoever it is you bring off.. Maybe Spearing and Lucas the gap in quality (or lack of ?!) isnt that big, maybe Babel could do a job coming off the bench (those days seem long gone now), but we really need that other attacking options to bring on to help change games around..

by **baldricks_cunning_plan** » Sun Aug 09, 2009 11:02 pm

aCe' wrote:Again, all comes back to the lack of quality in depth... looking at our bench we seem desperately short in quality in pretty much all positions atm..

Yep totally agree, complete lack of quality of depth.

I mean just look at this possible 18 man squad we could have for the Spurs game.

Reina - best keeper in the league by far.
Johnson - not world class, long way from it, but certainly good enough.
Carra - been the best centre half in England for a long time.
Agger - top quality, once he works on putting the ball in row z on the odd occasion he'll be world class.
Insua - best young left back in the world, best left back we have as well.
Kuyt - undervalued and every club would love somebody who worked as hard as Dirk in their side.
Masch - quality central midfielder, just needs to work on his attacking play.
Lucas - improving all the time.
Benayoun - always comes up with the goods when needed.
Gerrard - world's best player.
Torres - world's best forward.

But you didn't seem to mention our first XI too much, so maybe we should look at a more realistic bench than what you've put.

Cav - not a world class keeper but there's not many second choice keepers who are better.
Darby - captain of the reserves for a reason, he's quality in the making.
Skrtel - Carra's ready made replacement, one of Rafa's best buys.
Dossena - disappointed last year but came good towards the end.
Riera - disappointed towards the end of last year but has proven he's quality.
Spearing - pitbull who can pass, quality in the making.
Babel - one of the most saw after players in world football.

Then if you want to look deeper you can look into the reserves and see that we won the reserves league only two years ago and the reason last year was so poor was because El Zhar and Insua had been pushed more into the first team as well as Nemeth's injury.

Then the under 18s who've made three youth cup finals in five years.

We have a quality starting 11, quality bench and quality coming through which is why we pushed United so close last year including wins such as demolishing them 4-1 at Old Trafford, 5-1 at St James' Park, 1-0 at Stamford Bridge (first team to win there for 80 odd games), as well as 2-1 against United at Anfield as well as 2-0 over Chelsea at Anfield.

But hey, what a lack of depth we have. Christ lets all push the panic button before the season has even started. Lets all get ready for a hard fought fourth finish in the league and then slaughter the manager for only getting fourth with a squad that is "lacking in depth".

Or stop expecting every player to be Steven Gerrard and see the quality they have. The quality that has been proven or will be proven over the season. Get behind the lads and Rafa and take them to the title.

by **bigmick** » Sun Aug 09, 2009 11:44 pm

baldricks_cunning_plan wrote:
aCe' wrote:Again, all comes back to the lack of quality in depth... looking at our bench we seem desperately short in quality in pretty much all positions atm..

Yep totally agree, complete lack of quality of depth.

I mean just look at this possible 18 man squad we could have for the Spurs game.

Reina - best keeper in the league by far.
Johnson - not world class, long way from it, but certainly good enough.
Carra - been the best centre half in England for a long time.
Agger - top quality, once he works on putting the ball in row z on the odd occasion he'll be world class.
Insua - best young left back in the world, best left back we have as well.
Kuyt - undervalued and every club would love somebody who worked as hard as Dirk in their side.
Masch - quality central midfielder, just needs to work on his attacking play.
Lucas - improving all the time.
Benayoun - always comes up with the goods when needed.
Gerrard - world's best player.
Torres - world's best forward.

But you didn't seem to mention our first XI too much, so maybe we should look at a more realistic bench than what you've put.

Cav - not a world class keeper but there's not many second choice keepers who are better.
Darby - captain of the reserves for a reason, he's quality in the making.
Skrtel - Carra's ready made replacement, one of Rafa's best buys.
Dossena - disappointed last year but came good towards the end.
Riera - disappointed towards the end of last year but has proven he's quality.
Spearing - pitbull who can pass, quality in the making.
Babel - one of the most saw after players in world football.

Then if you want to look deeper you can look into the reserves and see that we won the reserves league only two years ago and the reason last year was so poor was because El Zhar and Insua had been pushed more into the first team as well as Nemeth's injury.

Then the under 18s who've made three youth cup finals in five years.

We have a quality starting 11, quality bench and quality coming through which is why we pushed United so close last year including wins such as demolishing them 4-1 at Old Trafford, 5-1 at St James' Park, 1-0 at Stamford Bridge (first team to win there for 80 odd games), as well as 2-1 against United at Anfield as well as 2-0 over Chelsea at Anfield.

But hey, what a lack of depth we have. Christ lets all push the panic button before the season has even started. Lets all get ready for a hard fought fourth finish in the league and then slaughter the manager for only getting fourth with a squad that is "lacking in depth".

Or stop expecting every player to be Steven Gerrard and see the quality they have. The quality that has been proven or will be proven over the season. Get behind the lads and Rafa and take them to the title.

That is one very positive post. Nothing wrong with that and it's all opinions etc, but there are huge tracts of that which I don't agree with. That said I have a feeling there is little for either of us to gain by getting involved in a discussion about it, so I'll swerve the option.

I will say though that I'm also a little worried by the depth or lack thereof in the squad, and even more concerned that the manager isn't being sufficiently backed in the transfer market. It's absolutely clear to me that we are a MINIMUM of two players light and probably three, and I can't believe that Rafa is choosing not to fill them if he has the money available.

We absolutely desperately need a credible centre back. If they are all fit (and they aren't) we have three. That isn't enough, if one gets suspended or injured you are going into every game down to the bones. Rafa is obviously aware of this, and I know we've sniffed around the kid form Hull (or at least there's speculation we have) but we NEED someone here. It's not a "we could do with", we actually need someone.

We really need credible cover for Gerrard/Torres. We don't have any sort of cover for Gerrard, and arguably we don't have anyone credible for Torres either (Babel is just about the only possibility I would have thought, and based on what we've seen so far it's stretching the point a bit).

I also think we need credible cover for right back.

My main concern is as I say that the holes are as obvious as they are gaping, and that we aren't filling them. Is it the case that we have a strict hold on the purse strings in place? If it is, it could well cost us any chance we have/had of winning the title.

by **aCe'** » Sun Aug 09, 2009 11:51 pm

baldricks_cunning_plan wrote:Cav - not a world class keeper but there's not many second choice keepers who are better.
Darby - captain of the reserves for a reason, he's quality in the making.
Skrtel - Carra's ready made replacement, one of Rafa's best buys.
Dossena - disappointed last year but came good towards the end.
Riera - disappointed towards the end of last year but has proven he's quality.
Spearing - pitbull who can pass, quality in the making.
Babel - one of the most saw after players in world football.

...........

We have a quality starting 11, quality bench and quality coming through

Cav - backup goalkeeper...
Darby - couldnt even get a game at preseason dont know why you expect him to even be on the bench, not that hes good enough to make a difference anyways,,
Skrtel - injured and is a doubt
Dossena - yea, enough said...
Riera - injured, doubt for the starting game
Spearing - hardly someone who can come in and make a difference is he?! not good enough.
Babel - "one of the most saw after players in world football." .. the one player who has the POTENTIAL to be a game changer coming off the bench...
Voronin, Ngog, Plessis...etc - not going to make a difference imo..

You have your opinion and fair enough but if you think our reserves winning their league and our youth side getting to cup finals means they're ready for the stepup then you're up for a harsh reality check buddy... looking at 'reserve' and 'youth' players from other top sides ours really look average in comparison.. im talking about the likes of Wilshere, Macheda, Traore, Mancienne, Rafael, Fabio..etc etc but anyways that has little to do with the first team squad...

My point was with regards to the starting fixtures in the league, we are likely to miss Agger, Skrtel, and Riera for the Tottenham game so if that happens one of your starting 11 + your 2 best substitutes are out of the picture... but heck go on argue just for the sake of it...

Looking at some of the other subs the top clubs can bring on..

ManUtd:

Rafael, Fabio, Oshea, Evans, Nani, Anderson, Scholes, Fletcher, Tosic, Owen

Chelsea:

Belleti, Ferreira, Mancienne, Alex, Ivanovic, Zhirkov, Mikel, Deco, Joe cole, Kalou, Sturridge

Arsenal:

Traore, Gibbs, Silvestre, Djourou, Senderos, Eboue, Song, Diabi, Rosicky, Ramsi, Walcott, Vela, Eduardo

and thats just the more established players not the youngsters with no first team experience ... We need a CB and a backup FW for now.. When it comes to the starting 11 with all the players fit and ready we're a match to any other side in the league imo.. Chelsea perhaps have a better squad and starting 11 but they havent been able to click since Mourinho left, hopefully that continues under Ancelotti...

Agree about the quality starting 11, but not too sure about the "quality bench" and "quality coming through" bit...

by **baldricks_cunning_plan** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 12:08 am

bigmick wrote:I will say though that I'm also a little worried by the depth or lack thereof in the squad, and even more concerned that the manager isn't being sufficiently backed in the transfer market. It's absolutely clear to me that we are a MINIMUM of two players light and probably three, and I can't believe that Rafa is choosing not to fill them if he has the money available.

We absolutely desperately need a credible centre back. If they are all fit (and they aren't) we have three. That isn't enough, if one gets suspended or injured you are going into every game down to the bones. Rafa is obviously aware of this, and I know we've sniffed around the kid form Hull (or at least there's speculation we have) but we NEED someone here. It's not a "we could do with", we actually need someone.

We really need credible cover for Gerrard/Torres. We don't have any sort of cover for Gerrard, and arguably we don't have anyone credible for Torres either (Babel is just about the only possibility I would have thought, and based on what we've seen so far it's stretching the point a bit).

I also think we need credible cover for right back.

My main concern is as I say that the holes are as obvious as they are gaping, and that we aren't filling them. Is it the case that we have a strict hold on the purse strings in place? If it is, it could well cost us any chance we have/had of winning the title.

Well this squad, minus three players (two of which have been replaced) went ever so close last year. Now there's many reasons why we didn't win the league last year, my stance on that is we didn't take enough points from Anfield although obviously if a few decisions went in our favour like Rob Styles having the ability to see, then we may well have won the league.

But as I said it was this squad, which is apparently lacking in depth, that went so close. We've lost Arbeloa and replaced him with Johnson, some would argue we've got better there. I wouldn't because I thought Arby was one of the most consistent players we had last year. We've lost Alosno and replaced him with Aquilani. Xabi was our player of the year and almost impossible to replace but Aquilani is probably as good as a replacement we could have got, just need him to get fit.

So the only player we haven't replaced is big Sami. Although we've been linked with Turner, Distin and now Shawcross. So the manager is spotting where we need strengthening.

Do we have money to throw away? No, we all know we don't. We're skint because of two Americans who wouldn't give this club the steam off their p**s. But are we short on quality in depth? No of course we're not, I've already explained why which you've decided not to discuss which is of course your right.

We don't need to throw huge amounts of money away. We're not rebuilding a side like Arsenal need to or trying to build our first side like City. Yes the bench could have more quality on it, but we're not gonna get world class players to sit on our bench. We're not gonna get, for example, David Silva to sit on the bench and Riera isn't gonna be too chuffed sitting there either while Silva makes the left wing his own.

So we have to be realistic in our targets. And since you believe we need somebody who is better back up to Torres, who realistically is gonna come and play second fiddle to the world's greatest forward? Villa? Gudjohnsen? Robinho? Van Persie? No, the ones who would are players like Ricardo Fuller, David Nugent, Jonathon Stead, Michael Mifsud and Lord Percy Percy. Are they better than what we have? No, which is why we're not looking at them.

The most realistic target we could go for, out of the Premiership, is Kenwyne Jones. With the arrival of Bent, he may decide now is a time for a move and if we act quickly might be able to persuade him to join us at Anfield. Is he better than Ngog? Possibly. But then, even an average player like Jones is going to be setting us back a fair bit in price, something we don't have.

So I'll go back to where I started and say this squad, with one or two alterations, went so close last year and are more than capable of doing so again. Dossena, Riera and Ngog have all had 12 months in England now, Lucas and Babel have had another year of first team football. Insua is settled in the left back position.

This squad doesn't lack quality in depth.

by **baldricks_cunning_plan** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 12:19 am

aCe' wrote:ManUtd:

Rafael, Fabio, Oshea, Evans, Nani, Anderson, Scholes, Fletcher, Tosic, Owen

Chelsea:

Belleti, Ferreira, Mancienne, Alex, Ivanovic, Zhirkov, Mikel, Deco, Joe cole, Kalou, Sturridge

Arsenal:

Traore, Gibbs, Silvestre, Djourou, Senderos, Eboue, Song, Diabi, Rosicky, Ramsi, Walcott, Vela, Eduardo

and thats just the more established players not the youngsters with no first team experience ... We need a CB and a backup FW for now.. When it comes to the starting 11 with all the players fit and ready we're a match to any other side in the league imo.. Chelsea perhaps have a better squad and starting 11 but they havent been able to click since Mourinho left, hopefully that continues under Ancelotti...

Just highlighted one or two of those with bags of Premiership experience.

And you'd rather see an Alex Song come on ahead of Jay Spearing?

And you'd rather see a Paulo Ferreira or Belletti come on ahead of Ste Darby?

And you'd rather see a Nani come on ahead of Albert Riera?

I mean come on lad. O'Shea, Evans, Nani, Anderson, Scholes, Fletcher and Owen are hardly world class or even top four quality. Scholes was world class as was Owen but both are way over the hill. The others are average who just happen to fit into a very good United side, the same way our "bit part" players would. You put Lucas into that United side other than Anderson and you'd have the same result - United win because Ferguson's mentality wouldn't let his team lose, that along with the fact that they have world class players around them.

The same thing is happening at Anfield. Rafa hates losing and won't allow his players to lose anymore, very rarely will you see a Liverpool side give up the fight. And we have world class players all over the park.

But I'm not gonna bother with Chelsea's and Arsenal's because the ones you listed are s**t, with the exception of Joe Cole who is a good player but hardly world class and Sturridge is a good player, just young.

by **account deleted by request** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 12:25 am

One player you seem to have left out of your post mate......... Robbie Keane. The fact that if we had bought someone more suitable with our £20million, or maybe once having bought him we had tried to get him playing to the level he can rather than destroying his confidence may have had a little something to do with us falling just short.

by **Tim LFC** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 12:33 am

Personally we should of got Sturridge. For 3m he was a bargain!

by **aCe'** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 12:38 am

baldricks_cunning_plan wrote:
aCe' wrote:ManUtd:

Rafael, Fabio, Oshea, Evans, Nani, Anderson, Scholes, Fletcher, Tosic, Owen

Chelsea:

Belleti, Ferreira, Mancienne, Alex, Ivanovic, Zhirkov, Mikel, Deco, Joe cole, Kalou, Sturridge

Arsenal:

Traore, Gibbs, Silvestre, Djourou, Senderos, Eboue, Song, Diabi, Rosicky, Ramsi, Walcott, Vela, Eduardo

and thats just the more established players not the youngsters with no first team experience ... We need a CB and a backup FW for now.. When it comes to the starting 11 with all the players fit and ready we're a match to any other side in the league imo.. Chelsea perhaps have a better squad and starting 11 but they havent been able to click since Mourinho left, hopefully that continues under Ancelotti...

Just highlighted one or two of those with bags of Premiership experience.

And you'd rather see an Alex Song come on ahead of Jay Spearing?

And you'd rather see a Paulo Ferreira or Belletti come on ahead of Ste Darby?

And you'd rather see a Nani come on ahead of Albert Riera?

I mean come on lad. O'Shea, Evans, Nani, Anderson, Scholes, Fletcher and Owen are hardly world class or even top four quality. Scholes was world class as was Owen but both are way over the hill. The others are average who just happen to fit into a very good United side, the same way our "bit part" players would. You put Lucas into that United side other than Anderson and you'd have the same result - United win because Ferguson's mentality wouldn't let his team lose, that along with the fact that they have world class players around them.

The same thing is happening at Anfield. Rafa hates losing and won't allow his players to lose anymore, very rarely will you see a Liverpool side give up the fight. And we have world class players all over the park.

But I'm not gonna bother with Chelsea's and Arsenal's because the ones you listed are s**t, with the exception of Joe Cole who is a good player but hardly world class and Sturridge is a good player, just young.

okay... yea mate this is going nowhere obviously... we'll just leave it at that...

by **baldricks_cunning_plan** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 12:39 am

s@int wrote:One player you seem to have left out of your post mate......... Robbie Keane. The fact that if we had bought someone more suitable with our £20million, or maybe once having bought him we had tried to get him playing to the level he can rather than destroying his confidence may have had a little something to do with us falling just short.

Quite possibly but Robbie Keane never suited the 4-2-3-1 formation and we shouldn't have changed it just to accommodate him.

People said let him play off Torres but he isn't a supporting midfielder, he's a forward who drops off. They are different roles. Bergkamp, Zola, Gudjohnsen, Keane that sort of player works with their back to goal rather than the Gerrard, Lampard, Scholes (in his hayday) who work latching onto the lose ball.

We tried the 4-4-2 with Torres and Keane but then Torres' injuries started to hit and we were back to square one. And Keane will never be a lone forward.

So possibly if the £20 million had been spent better or Torres stayed injury free so he and Keane could have linked up more often, we may have won the league.

by **Nando26** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 12:51 am

roberto green wrote:
woof woof ! wrote:Totally off the wall BUT, could Lucas play the Gerrard role in support of Torres ? .

Off your head more like it!!!!

Maybe in the future who knows mateits diffenately his best position because ive always noticed hes at his bet playing check short one twos. But the fact that certain world class Gerrard will be here for atleast another 4 years dominating that role & by the time he hangs up his boots i reckon well have a certain Kun i cant see it mate

by **bigmick** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 1:01 am

baldricks_cunning_plan wrote:The same thing is happening at Anfield. Rafa hates losing and won't allow his players to lose anymore, very rarely will you see a Liverpool side give up the fight. And we have world class players all over the park.

Sometimes you just get the feeling that you're too far apart with somebody to have a meaningful discussion

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