Liverpool Football Club 08/09

COTR wrote:

DS wrote:Babel hasnt had a chance as a striker , has he ?

No

He could not be any worse than Keane, in fact he would be a hell of a lot better

Just watch him at the Olympic football tournament. Babel sucks big time as striker. Babel is a great supersub & might be useful if you play away v a very good team (who attack). Apart from that he's useless.

Another solid 0-0 will see us soar one point clear.

Night Night

Good news

I finished my first season as Liverpool on FM09 and won the title

Bad news

I didn't do it with our current squad.

Sold Pennant, Benayoun, Itange, Aurelio, Hyppia and El Zhar for considerably more than you might expect.

Signed De Silvestri, Marcelo and Marchiso in August as well as taking Martín Cáceres and Lautaro Acosta on loan.

In January I signed Jo from Man City on a free and took van der Vaart on loan.

Plessis scored a remarkable number of long range strikes during the season.

I have emailed a list of my findings to the club so fingers crossed we will see some or all of my suggestions implemented in January.

what was your best XI?

how did you do in the cup competitons?

i have not got the new fm09, so i cannot quote it in my arguments.

Batman wrote:what was your best XI?

how did you do in the cup competitons?

i have not got the new fm09, so i cannot quote it in my arguments.

My daddy said you will get it for Christmas

COTR wrote:

DS wrote:Babel hasnt had a chance as a striker , has he ?

No

He could not be any worse than Keane, in fact he would be a hell of a lot better

Rafa's the one playing a 5'9 2nd striker, who's not physical nor fast at nthe head of a 4-2-3-1.

Batman wrote:what was your best XI?

how did you do in the cup competitons?

i have not got the new fm09, so i cannot quote it in my arguments.

defence was rotated between the 8 available.

then a DM - Mascherano, with Lucas and Plessis as backup

then a CM - Alonso with Marchiso and Lucas as backup

then a sort of AM 3 with Riera and Babel as AML

Gerrard as AMRC also playmaker with a free role, Keane and Acosta as backup.

Lennon as AMR with Kuyt and Acosta as backup, eventually VDV

Torres as SC with Keane and Ngog as backup and eventually Jo

I didn't take the cups or the CL group stages at all seriously, fielding my least used XI in all but my final CL group game (when I needed to beat Fiorentina at home to qualify)

my least fielded XI reached the League cup final where they lost to a full strength Man Utd and were knocked out by Wigan in the 5th round of the FA Cup

The HuddFather™ wrote:

COTR wrote:

DS wrote:Babel hasnt had a chance as a striker , has he ?

No

He could not be any worse than Keane, in fact he would be a hell of a lot better

Rafa's the one playing a 5'9 2nd striker, who's not physical nor fast at nthe head of a 4-2-3-1.

He has played plenty of games in 4-4-2 and looked equally $h!t, most notably against fulham when we really needed him to step up

If he wants credit he is going to have to earn it. At least crouch was playing well even when he wasn't scoring

COTR wrote:

The HuddFather wrote:

COTR wrote:

DS wrote:Babel hasnt had a chance as a striker , has he ?

No

He could not be any worse than Keane, in fact he would be a hell of a lot better

Rafa's the one playing a 5'9 2nd striker, who's not physical nor fast atnthe head of a 4-2-3-1.

He has played plenty of games in 4-4-2 and looked equally $h!t, most notably against fulham when we really needed him to step up

If he wants credit he is going to have to earn it. At least crouch was playing well even when he wasn't scoring

Is his movement poor/is it finishing that's a major problem?

How's his link-up/awareness?

I still cannot bring myself to watch a full 90 minutes of Berbatov or Keane this season

Keane needs to make the pitch smaller for himself. At the moment he is dropping too deep or peeling off too wide and is not a threat since his crossing/passing is nothing special, even if he does have decent vision.

The HuddFather wrote:

Is his movement poor/is it finishing that's a major problem?

How's his link-up/awareness?

I still cannot bring myself to watch a full 90 minutes of Berbatov or Keane this season

Everything about his game stinks

It's as if when he gets the ball he has no idea what he should be doing with it. He has no natural instinct for what he should be doing in the team so often ends up slowing down the attacks, wandering into no man's land or the major problem for many of our players, looking only to torres or gerrard and forgetting about the rest of the team.

I would love to have seen signs of progress but I just cannot see how he is going to fit in and it's beginning to bug the hell out of me that babel had such a great start to the season and now his confidence is being shredded away on the bench

COTR wrote:

The HuddFather wrote:

Is his movement poor/is it finishing that's a major problem?

How's his link-up/awareness?

I still cannot bring myself to watch a full 90 minutes of Berbatov or Keane this season

Everything about his game stinks

It's as if when he gets the ball he has no idea what he should be doing with it. He has no natural instinct for what he should be doing in the team so often ends up slowing down the attacks, wandering into no man's land or the major problem for many of our players, looking only to torres or gerrard and forgetting about the rest of the team.

I would love to have seen signs of progress but I just cannot see how he is going to fit in and it's beginning to bug the hell out of me that babel had such a great start to the season and now his confidence is being shredded away on the bench

From the "Keane signs for Liverpool" thread.

The HuddFather wrote:From a practical standpoint - As long as we get good money I'm not too bothered about Keane leaving. I think we have had the best years from him and I doubt he'll do as well somewhere else. I can hardly see Torres, Babel, Kuyt & Gerrard, with their direct approach based on Speed, drive and work-rate, wanting to mess around playing cute one-two's, dummies & flicks with him.

Well gerrard is forever playing one twos, dummies and flicks and he spends most of his time on the left playing with two very good footballers in Riera and aurelio so he has no excuse at all aside from the way rafa uses him when he is playing 4-2-3-1

I really thought the fulham game would be his chance with no gerrard behind him and torres keeping the defenders deep but he was still anonymous



What an awful signing by benitez

I said it before and i will say it again, you should have never sold Crouch and signed Keane.

Crouch:

1. Gives you a plan B.

2. I can never remember him missing sitters like Keane for Liverpool.

Whilst there is some element of truth in that, I would counter that

1) Crouch f***ed up our plan A by being too slow to keep up with (counter)attacks; and furthermore can be kept quiet by strong, tall defenders, which seriously limits the impact of plan B (if you look at his best games it's no coincidence that they tended to come in Europe or against Arsenal)

2) He did.

I think that Kuyt has complicated things by suddenly proving (with Holland) that he could play on the right... which is where I suspect Rafa had intended Keane would start, assuming Torres was fit.

But, too early to judge yet I think.

If I remember correctly, Kuyt played at the right of a 3 man attack for Feyenoord, as well as for Holland before this year too. It's hardly been sudden...I think the change is not that he plays better in a position, but his overall form.

No that was Castelen!

didn't he play in a wide role for Hollerlands in WC06?

Not giving up hope for Keane yet to be honest. You don't just lose your ability as a player, look at Michael Owen, he's still scoring goals.

I know Keane is older (is it by much?) but some of the football he's played over recent years has been amazing, his game intelligence will always make him a good player - yes he hasn't shown too much of it for Liverpool but I think this Christmas period coming up may be a vital period for him, if he can manage a goal (hopefully tonight) or two then he may go on a little run which will give him confidence.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh

it's on fucking Setanta

anyone got a lovely stream?

http://www.myp2p.eu/broadcast.php?matchid=24937&part=sports

Find your own.

Batman wrote:I said it before and i will say it again, you should have never sold Crouch and signed Keane.

Crouch:

1. Gives you a plan B.

2. I can never remember him missing sitters like Keane for Liverpool.

WHAT?

(Not defending Keane but Crouch has missed bucket loads of clear cut chances/sitters when he playe for us.)

Glenn... channel 48608 is a quality Setanta stream.

Just look at our bench tonight.

Lucas - shite
Ngog - who?
Babel - looked lively when he came on but is just so hot and cold
Agger - not going to change a game
Mascherano - see Agger

Dont even know the other one, was it Spearing? Plessis?

At the end of the day that just highlights our problem, no quality depth.

How can Gerrard say he wants the title and then put in a performance like that? seriously, i love the guy but that wasn't good enough.

The crowd was good as well so no excuses.

Luis wrote:Just look at our bench tonight.

Lucas - shite
Ngog - who?
Babel - looked lively when he came on but is just so hot and cold
Agger - not going to change a game
Mascherano - see Agger

Dont even know the other one, was it Spearing? Plessis?

At the end of the day that just highlights our problem, no quality depth.

How can Gerrard say he wants the title and then put in a performance like that? seriously, i love the guy but that wasn't good enough.

The crowd was good as well so no excuses.

Crowd was $h!t in my opinion. Of course I wasn't there and it so it could have sounded different in person but going by my experiences of going to Anfield in the last year or 2. It has been utter shite espically in terms of getting behind the team. Tonight was average at best. Saying that, the team was likewise sadly. Still... when I go to Anfield. I go home having screamed/sung my voice till it's in pain. The KOP feels like it is dead. Have the ppl in the KOP barely know the lyrics to YNWA FFS
Only thing that is really known is the Torres bounce but that's easy to learn.

Anyway, top of the table and it's Dec Only 4 and a bit months to go The bastards better pull their fingers out and put in a performance and a result on the weekend againist Hull I believe.

Hull is the week after

Blackburn away at the weekend.

Has anyone else decided that Babel is $h!t yet?

If a player is brilliant creatively and intelligent on the ball it doesn't seem to be something they've learnt as they've developed as a footballer, but rather something they've been born with.

Babel is strong and direct, but he's dumb. We have enough strong and direct players in the team in Gerrard and Kuyt, and they are both better than Babel. Sure, sometimes he makes a difference when he comes on for the last few minutes, but you don't expect a player you paid £11million or whatever for to be invisible every time he starts a game.

I don't think Babel will ever be the player his price tag suggested he would be, he can't learn intelligence. I think we should cash in before everyone else realises he's not all that.

I didn't watch the game, looking at the line-up, did you play 4-4-2 today?

Is Pennant injured? if you did play 4-4-2 today then wouldn't it have been better to play with 2 wingers?

On the radio they said Keane looked pissed about being taken off and didn't shake Rafa's hand.

Babel is strong? I don't think he is.

We need someone like Crouch/Berba/Heskey up there to win the balls in the air, hold the ball up and play in Gerrard/Keane/Torres

Batman wrote:I didn't watch the game, looking at the line-up, did you play 4-4-2 today?

Yes, your cous should be able to confirm this.

Batman wrote:Is Pennant injured? if you did play 4-4-2 today then wouldn't it have been better to play with 2 wingers?

No. Rafa just hates him and is clearly on his way out of the club.
Babel by the looks of things as well is on a similar route.

Batman wrote:On the radio they said Keane looked pissed about being taken off and didn't shake Rafa's hand.

I've seen him more pissed off at being subbed. Missed the non-shaking of hands, probably because I was tucking into some curry and naan. It was MAGNIFICO

Crouching Tiger wrote:Has anyone else decided that Babel is $h!t yet?

A looooooooooooooong time ago already