Liverpool FC Team Talk/Gossip/Rumours Thread 2014 - Mod Note in OP, 1/09

MD1990 wrote: »

http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/jon-flanagan-facing-extended-absence-7793499

Flanagan out for a number of months. Seems to get injured quite often. I hope he doesn't go on to have a similar career to Martin Kelly.

Ah I'm gutted for him, I hope he recovers.

Ah crap, Allen is still out too.

In that case I'd probably prefer the following line up for Saturday.

---

Mignolet

---

Manquillo Lovren Sahko Moreno

---

Gerrard

---

---

Henderson Lallana

---

---

Sterling

---

---

Borini Balotelli

---

I am pie wrote: »

I dont want to give up on Coutinho just yet, I'd be tempted to throw Sterling up beside Mario and give Coutinho another go in behind.

We have enough players around now that we can give him a week off, take him out of the firing line. He was not good the last 2 games.

gafferino wrote: »

Ok well how about you enlighten me as to why since he has come back to Liverpool he is a headless chicken with poor ball retention and bad decision making?

I can only go by what my eyes see.

When he left us, I saw a player who was a lot calmer, who could knock the ball around, who didn't lose possession trying silly passes and expose his team to counter attacks. I watched about half his games at Almeria, and he looked a different player, they moved him into a wider winger type role and had him trying to beat players and put in crosses. It was a style of play that did not suit him, and from what I could see in pre-season, he returned to us, was put in a similar role and was doing the same things as he did at Almeria.

His career here is obviously over and I think Milan will be a good club for him. They will play with a lot more patience, they will probably tuck him into a central role a bit more to utilize his excellent one touch play and give him more support.

D'Agger wrote: »

This Francie - how you can state he's still a good player or a bad player based on hardly seeing any of him this season - and even at that we've only seen him in friendlies, nothing competitive.

If you go back to all the under 21/Almeria games, you'll see I report on most. I have watched a lot of Suso. He should have remained with us last season and not been sent on loan. I am not saying he would have been another Sterling, but I think he could have been a good squad player for us. Certainly better than Aspas/Moses though.

Boom_Bap wrote: »

It would be a bit counter productive if we let the opposition see how we are going to set up.

I get that, I really do. But at the same time stop releasing pics of the lads messing around when clearly we have issues to address, you know?

J.

Francie Barrett wrote: »

I can only go by what my eyes see.

When he left us, I saw a player who was a lot calmer, who could knock the ball around, who didn't lose possession trying silly passes and expose his team to counter attacks. I watched about half his games at Almeria, and he looked a different player, they moved him into a wider winger type role and had him trying to beat players and put in crosses. It was a style of play that did not suit him, and from what I could see in pre-season, he returned to us, was put in a similar role and was doing the same things as he did at Almeria.

His career here is obviously over and I think Milan will be a good club for him. They will play with a lot more patience, they will probably tuck him into a central role a bit more to utilize his excellent one touch play and give him more support.

Ok well we will have to disagree then because I also watched him at Almeria and saw many good things. I think the couple of games he played with us in pre-season he did well. But we havent seen him since so to say he is a headless chicken and whatever other stuff said is complete hyperbole on your part.

Francie Barrett wrote: »

If you go back to all the under 21/Almeria games, you'll see I report on most. I have watched a lot of Suso. He should have remained with us last season and not been sent on loan. I am not saying he would have been another Sterling, but I think he could have been a good squad player for us. Certainly better than Aspas/Moses though.

That's a fair point but we've seen nothing of him this season to compare it to. I get that you've seen alot of him but you have very little to compare that to which significantly weakens your point imo

I thought the loan would be good for him but he isn't pushing into the first team which you'd have expected upon his return so it's obviously not stood to him.

I think Ibe is different though, I always make the comparison between Walcott & Ox to Sterling & Ibe - I think he has the talent to be a very good player for us

The Mig wrote: »

Stop being narky. It's obviously a little end of session game. I'm sure they were practising how to *defend* prior to that picture!

You're right, sorry, just giving out a bit in general today...

J.

u ok hun?

Rodgers described Manquillo as being like a "rash" today. I think he meant it as a compliment.

Sir Gallagher wrote: »

A heavy flow day? We all have them luv x

MonkeyTennis wrote: »

u ok hun?

The Mig wrote: »

Cheer up babes xxx

You're all saps...

J.

In fairness now.. Manquillo has already shown he can offer a lot more than Johnson of the last 2 years and I'd be hoping his crossing gets a bit more consistent soon.

Ok as promised, back by popular demand, the infamous Alternative League Table 2014/2015 brought to you by Morzadec.

Sorry for the delay. Might not be quite as active this year, so if anyone feels like they know how it works and wants to update on a Monday if I'm a bit delayed feel free.

First of all, some people think this idea is stupid. That's grand, just ignore it/don't read it. The 'how it works' and the 'point' of it is all explained below, so give it a read and it should answer all your questions.

If you have no idea what this is all about, it's explained here: http://erwinmorzadec.blogspot.com.es/2013/11/how-to-get-into-top-4.html

A lot of people found it interesting/insightful/revelatory or whatever you want to call it, so I'll keep going with it. Also, my initial 'crude' assumption about the league being split into a top 7 tier and a bottom 13 tier is becoming more and more relevant, so if anything this table could be even more accurate this year.


Here's how the table is looking so far:

1. Chelsea: +4
2. City: -0.5
3. Liverpool: -1
4. Spurs: -1.5
5. Arsenal: -1.5
6. Everton: -3
7. United: -4

So this basically confirms how well Chelsea have started, but also how every other team has underachieved so far, even by what would be modest standards for some like City (CL qualification).

Despite the doom of gloom of losing to Villa, our points total is only 1 less than it should be if we were looking for CL qualification as the target, and the other teams have been so poor too that really we're not badly placed at all at this early stage.

United are only one point behind us in the real table, but this table shows that they're probably worse off than just 1 point in the long run given their easy opening 4 fixtures.

Early days yet, but this probably give an accurate enough reflection of where the only teams who have realistic CL aspirations are placed.