Liverpool Team Talk/Gossip/Rumours Thread Summer 2014 - Mod Warning post #6893

NukaCola

This may sound silly but if possible i would rather spend 15m on Lamela before i would spend 20m+ on Lallana. Not sure how possible it is but your getting a quality player with bags more potential and will never be valued as low again in Lamela for cheaper than a quality player that is overpriced and will never be valued higher in Lallana.

If BR wants him that badly then you got to trust him anyway, I'm sure he's done his homework etc Its easy to see how Lallana would slot in to our team, and do a good job.

Dickerty

NukaCola wrote: »

To be fair, thats not the standard a player should be judged against :P

We should CREATE a standard, where we judge players by what they brought to the club. How many levels, 7?

Hyypia
Berger
Finnan
Cisse
Kewell
Cole
Voronin

??

Dickerty

NukaCola wrote: »

This may sound silly but if possible i would rather spend 15m on Lamela before i would spend 20m+ on Lallana. Not sure how possible it is but your getting a quality player with bags more potential and will never be valued as low again in Lamela for cheaper than a quality player that is overpriced and will never be valued higher in Lallana.

If BR wants him that badly then you got to trust him anyway, I'm sure he's done his homework etc Its easy to see how Lallana would slot in to our team, and do a good job.

But it doesn't matter what they are worth on paper later. Only matters what they bring to the team. Lamela is a winger, which we don't really use. He's not flexible positionally, has no track record of being a great worker and team player. So he already fails to tick a number of boxes...

Kimbot

I thought that when we were in for Kono in Jan the price was 15mill, and i remember reading that he only has a year left on his current deal so surely the price would be less than 15 mill now.

NukaCola

Dickerty wrote: »

But it doesn't matter what they are worth on paper later. Only matters what they pring to the team. Lamela is a winger, which we don't really use. He's not flexible positionally, has no track record of being a great worker and team player. So he already fails to tick a number of boxes...

Lamela can play left right and through the centre. Can play in place of Sterling and Coutinho. He is very flexible positionally.

kfallon

rarnes1 wrote: »

Glad to see those comments from Rodgers yesterday about getting in quality.

He's obviously after guys that will slot right into the first XI and not just hopeful punts.

Does he not say that every window?

hefferboi

NukaCola wrote: »

As in 2012/2013

I just cant agree, maybe because I'm not easily impressed I suppose. How would you rate Henderson in 2012/2013. I would have said he had a decent enough season showing signs of improvement. Yet he was at least on par with Lallana in terms of goals and chances created in 2012/2013. How would you assess Jonjo Shelvey last season for Swansea? A ~5mil signing? He scored and created more than Lallana in his first season, had a better pass completion rate (and passes) also and thats him settling into a new team.

Now I'm not suggesting Shelvey is better, and obviously its not all about chances created etc, i'm just saying, if your comparing seasons 2013/14 is easily his best season by miles. His first season cannot be described as "very good" in my mind.

As you said yourself, you didn't see much of Southampton. Stats can only tell you so much. I watched a good bit of them last year and you could see he was a talent.

NukaCola

hefferboi wrote: »

As you said yourself, you didn't see much of Southampton. Stats can only tell you so much. I watched a good bit of them last year and you could see he was a talent.

I never said he didnt have talent. Just that his first season in the EPL i wouldn't rate as very good. A lot of people are saying it so maybe I'm wrong so i concede to popular opinion, I personally wasn't impressed when i seen him play in the games in his first EPL season, where i seen maybe a third of the games he played.

LuckyLloyd

Whelan was shown the door by Liverpool before he was ready to walk himself and he has always struck me as bitter about it.

redzerdrog

I actually followed Lallana a good bit when he broke into the Southampton team (because I confused him with another player initially) so I am well aware of his talents, I don't generally watch a lot of league one but the year Southampton went down initially he was excellent and I was raving about him then. He seems to improve each year as well but I just don't think he is what we need to be using a 3rd (guessing here) of our budget on.

If we get him and still have to dough to strengthen other areas I think he would be a good addition but other areas should be priority for investment

Francie Barrett

Dickerty wrote: »

But who in Italy has money to spend? They are a selling league now, they have about 1/2 big signings every window for the WHOLE of Serie A. Napoli blew a load last summer, but only after selling Cavani.

I agree they wouldn't sell to us though. I expect him to try and stay fit over the summer and hope to impress a new manager...

Whether it's Italy, Germany, Spain or whoever, Spurs will sell to just about anyone else but us. Despite the disparity in points totals, they will be viewing us as a rival for next season and selling players to your rivals is a no no.

NukaCola

redzerdrog wrote: »

He seems to improve each year as well but I just don't think he is what we need to be using a 3rd (guessing here) of our budget on.

If we get him and still have to dough to strengthen other areas I think he would be a good addition but other areas should be priority for investment

Spot on. This would be my thinking also.

gafferino

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Whelan was shown the door by Liverpool before he was ready to walk himself and he has always struck me as bitter about it.

From what I recall of it though he was verbally offered a 1 year extension (he wanted more) but on the 1st day of pre-season training (or something like that) he was told he was no longer needed. Sounds harsh if true.

gafferino

Grayditch wrote: »

Adam's not that bad! I mean I'm not looking to have him back, but he did more than Cole and Downing put together.

Not going to pass this opportunity.....

Devilman40k

Dickerty wrote: »

We should CREATE a standard, where we judge players by what they brought to the club. How many levels, 7?

Hyypia
Berger
Finnan
Cisse
Kewell
Cole
Voronin

??

Levels 8 & 9 are missing....

Poulsen
Konchesky

Francie Barrett

El Hadji Diouf - 10

gafferino

Francie Barrett wrote: »

El Hadji Diouf - 10

Salif Diao 11

Devilman40k

Francie Barrett wrote: »

El Hadji Diouf - 10

And 11 .. the special hell that is

Jimmy Carter

NukaCola

Sean Dundee? 12?

mike65

If Lallana is being signed Lamala cannot be signed - I mean imagine the confusion - it'll be worse than Reina and Riera!

IK09

murpho999 wrote: »

I like it, but il wait until someone wears it to training or up in the local cages. If they look like a tard, il leave it be.

Devilman40k

NukaCola wrote: »

Sean Dundee? 12?

13/14/15

Ferri, Kozma, Diomede

x43r0

I'll be watching France's WC games closely to see how Sakho performs in a different squad. One of the suggested reasons to his under performing has been the language barrier so it will be interesting to see how he does in a French speaking team

redzerdrog

x43r0 wrote: »

I'll be watching France's WC games closely to see how Sakho performs in a different squad. One of the suggested reasons to his under performing has been the language barrier so it will be interesting to see how he does in a French speaking team

is he a certain starter?

kryogen

As Mike would say(when posting something negative/stupid in the United thread that has already been discussed), I'll just leave this here

http://www.sundayworld.com/sport/opinion/roy-curtis/why-stevie-g-is-most-self-obsessed-footballer-of-his-generation

roy curtis wrote:

AS Liverpool buckled this past fortnight, the scale of the surrender to sentiment and the Great Myth of Steven Gerrard became apparent.

Essentially the leader who went AWOL at the decisive hour, who could offer only blubbering sobs when his troops needed direction, who abandoned his post in the heat of battle, somehow emerged with a Purple Heart pinned to his tear-stained chest.

Even the Fourth Estate chose to raise the white flag to the fairy story of Stevie G when the Football Writers’ Association arrived at the absurd conclusion that here was the second-best performer in the Premier League over the past nine months.

Straight faces were maintained at their London hooley as they deemed Gerrard’s body of work superior to Eden Hazard and, quite preposterously, Yaya Toure, the peerless touchstone against whom every midfield portfolio must be measured.

Distil the difference between Manchester City and Liverpool down to its essence, investigate why the former lifted the title on Sunday as the latter wallowed in a river of misery, and it is impossible to walk away from a pair of damning conclusions.

Firstly, the team that the Kop, in its ravenous hunger for a new age of prosperity, chose to prematurely deem soldiers of destiny, cannot defend: Liverpool leaked 23 goals more than Chelsea, 12 more than City, seven more, even, than a hapless Manchester United.

Secondly, in terms of leadership and inspiration at critical junctures from its midfield talisman, the contribution of Toure – one which goes way beyond his stunning 20 league goals input – dwarfs that of Gerrard, renders it a nothing.

These two flaws fatally merged at Crystal Palace when Gerrard, deemed Europe’s pre-eminent controlling midfielder by his manager, became the very opposite, a vision of disorganised chaos, as the Eagles landed three killer blows.

This is not to say that Gerrard had a poor season, not at all. But to deem him among the brightest stars in the season’s constellation is simply a work of fiction, a sop to saccharine-induced nostalgia.

It says much for the Englishman’s genius for self-promotion that he would garner more first preference votes than the transcendent Ivorian in the Player of the Year poll conducted by those who scribble about the game on a daily basis.

Here is a triumph of mush over substance, the creation of the greatest fable since the days of Aesop.

Perhaps the writers, like Gerrard himself against Chelsea in what has emerged as the defining image of the season and a treasure trove for parody, had suffered a cataclysmic, collective and concussive slip that had scrambled their senses.

Liverpool fans tend to rewrite history when it comes to the player who did just about everything in his power to board the Chelsea express in 2004 (Google his quotes from that time) until thuggish threats to his family persuaded him to step back.

And in the process Gerrard has become half man, half folk-ballad.

Second-best in England this season? He wasn’t even remotely close to being second best at his own club.

In truth, he ranked somewhere between the fourth and eighth most valuable player at Liverpool.

Unquestionably adrift of Luis Suarez, Daniel Sturridge and Raheem Sterling, any honest internal poll would have him jostling with Jordan Henderson, Philippe Coutinho and Simon Mignolet for the minor placings in a thrilling year of rebirth.

Gerrard was not in the top 20 performers in England.

Of those who can loosely be termed midfielders, he trailed Toure, Hazard, David Silva, Willian, Fernandinho, Adam Lallana, Santi Cazorla and, perhaps, Henderson. Aaron Ramsey in his three months of fitness was a vividly more stellar figure.

Those who observed Gerrard’s comically inept display against Aston Villa at Anfield in January could only assume Brendan Rodgers had spent the evening socialising with the ghosts of Hunter S Thompson, Oliver Reed and George Best when he recently deemed Gerrard “the best in European football in a controlling role”.

Where was the control when he keeled over like a bullet-ridden Bambi against Chelsea?

If that was a cruel taunt from the heavens, there was no outside influence as Liverpool blew that three-goal lead at Palace last week.

A holding midfielder of substance – a Keane, a Vieira, – would have stood up in the face of such impertinence from the underclasses, would have stamped their authority on the south London turf and crushed any hint of a proletariat uprising.

Gerrard – all General MacArthur in his public utterances before the game – merely dissolved into the night.

The man who has shamelessly played to the Sky Sports lens these past few weeks was suddenly pushing the camera away, railing against the very intrusions he had not only invited, but demanded after each decisive Liverpool step forward.

It is true he enjoyed a memorable afternoon as City were downed, but would that helter-skelter contest have followed the same storyline had the immense Toure not been ambushed by injury in the early minutes?

If Rodgers in that earlier quote was referring to his skipper’s capacity to “control” the perceptions surrounding him then perhaps he had a point.

Gerrard is England’s captain and he is peerless at one aspect of the modern game: Feeding the Great Myth.

Whether it is through tears or fist-pumping rallying cries or the smitten, innocent-in-love badge kissing, he creates the illusion of being the ultimate team-player.

In truth, Gerrard is a credible rival to Cristiano Ronaldo and Zlatan Ibrahimovich for the title of most self-obsessed footballer of his generation.

Yet so many fall for the great delusion of Stevie G, the unbending one-club man.

Whether it is turning on the tear-taps or morphing into Russell Crowe after the victory over City when gathering his players in a post-match huddle for his mortifying Gladiator speech, his genius is to cultivate this image as Liverpool’s bastion.

He is the selfless hero, the fearless superintendent, the upholder of standards, the solid Scouser, the forever loyal Red, the man who will keep the darkness at bay.

The only problem is when the truth intrudes upon the narrative.

Like when night fell for Liverpool supporters on Sunday as City – despite being stripped of their world-class striker for most of the season – were crowned champions for the second time in three seasons.

Led by Toure, a midfield player from a different continent to Gerrard by birth; and a different planet when it comes to leadership and achievement.

djPSB

kryogen wrote: »

As Mike would say(when posting something negative/stupid in the United thread that has already been discussed), I'll just leave this here

http://www.sundayworld.com/sport/opinion/roy-curtis/why-stevie-g-is-most-self-obsessed-footballer-of-his-generation

Roy Curtis is a d0pe.

Mr Alan

kryogen wrote: »

As Mike would say(when posting something negative/stupid in the United thread that has already been discussed), I'll just leave this here

http://www.sundayworld.com/sport/opinion/roy-curtis/why-stevie-g-is-most-self-obsessed-footballer-of-his-generation

Literally one of the worst articles I've ever seen.

Knex*

No offence to ya kryogen, but without even reading it yet, Roy Curtis has always been a plank. A plank I stopped reading when I was 14.

djPSB

The Football coverage in the Sunday World is beyond awful.

Don't know how anyone buys/reads it.

Dickerty

Devilman40k wrote: »

13

Ferri