Anyone still think Gerrard and Torres should have started on Sat?

[wiw]

Surely the whole point of 'a big squad' is being able to inter-change similar quality players, who know their role and can do a job no matter the opposition? i understand it was Pompey away but the team we played was our usual back 5, plus

momo - perfect for breaking play away from home
xabi - a spain international
pennant - our best winger this season
benayoun - the israel captain and seasoned premier league player
crouch - english international
voronin - ukraine international

we had the ability to win we just played ****

[Craig_H]

The team we put out on Saturday was good enough to win but didn't play well enough. End of

Yeah but title winning sides DO win when they dont play well - usually by virtue of a bit of class from a top player. Players like Gerrard & Torres, for example...

[Craig_H]

Same tonight,blaming Rafa for player failure is the easy way out.

Blaming Rafa for dropping players that make a difference is perfectly valid.

[CAD]

Yes I CAN explain!

First of all, he knew Porto had quick players and gave a chance to slow Sami Hyypiä. Why he didn't play Daniel Agger is beyond me ... If he played, maybe we wouldn't have conceded a penalty. On the other hand, he couldn't have known that the whole squad (Kuyt excluded) would be ****e today!

Porto were playing mainly through the flanks and we have had difficulties with clearing and stealing the ball, yet nothing was done to prevent this. Porto broke every attack we tried in the middle and were we trying to get to them down the flanks? No, we kept losing the ball in the middle of the park. Then here is Pennant: in the first half, he looked like he was going to grab that red card, but Rafa did nothing. And BAM! Pennant gets sent off. How unpredictable eh?

And not to mention this ****ing high balls from defence to our forwards that are getting us nowhere! Rafa ****ed it tonight again and he is making too many mistakes lately! He is still a TOP MANAGER and all that, but he needs to acknowledge that he too makes mistakes! I think he is full of himself after two CL finals in three years and takes everything for granted.

Voice of reason! I agree with a lot of this.

Playing Hyppia was beyond strange. The team look rattled from the start. I'm sure toying with the CB positions didn't help. Mascher couldn't find Gerrard with a 2 yard pass. Don't even mention Finnan. Carra throwing airball in the box - and that's just the first 5 mins!

What we accomplish away will define us this season, as per usual. I'm sure we will have the quality to win most matches at Anfield.

Rafa already fielded 22 different players this season. He needs to be sharper when it's there for the taking. It was Saturday against Pompey. He froze again tonight with the substitutions. Athens revisited.

I just don't get it. I thought it would be a no brainer to play Momo against Porto. We saw what he did against Barca away. We needed him today!

Less Rotation and more Formation, please. That's all I'm asking for.

[Craig_H]

But there was no guarantee we would have won the match had we fielded them on Saturday, especially when they were not match fit. You're talking like it would have been "in the bag" had they played when it clearly wouldn't, considering Pompey have one of the best home records in the league.

There's no guarantee in anything. But it's a no-brainer that a side with SG and FT in it is going to be more threatening than a side without them.

It wouldnt have been in the bag, but given the impact they both had in a short space of time, had they played an hour or so each, it's highly likely that they would've produced something somewhere along the way. That's beyond question.

[Craig_H]

Surely the whole point of 'a big squad' is being able to inter-change similar quality players, who know their role and can do a job no matter the opposition? i understand it was Pompey away but the team we played was our usual back 5, plus

momo - perfect for breaking play away from home
xabi - a spain international
pennant - our best winger this season
benayoun - the israel captain and seasoned premier league player
crouch - english international
voronin - ukraine international

we had the ability to win we just played ****

The point is, there are some games you can rotate in and still have a strong chance of winning. Derby, Brum, Wigan at home, etc. Pompey away isnt one.

[Red_Polo]

Why do people have to be so black and white? Coming out with bull**** like "IKBTR brigade", what a load of ****ing bollocks. If you only ever agree with Rafa then there's no point you giving an opinion on more or less anything.

People jump to really stupid conclusions at times. I thought we played a weaker team at Pompey than we needed to. It's got next to **** all to do with rotation. Rotation can actually have some balance to it, you keep a core of players in most of the time and rest them seldom and on different occasions barring perhaps the easiest, least important games. On Saturday we suddenly rested a number of first choice attacking players in one go and we lacked a cutting edge as a result. The idea that these key players all coincidentally happened to be incredibly out of condition is a bit of a strecth. It was a deliberate decision, and the observations on team selection made by people are not going on this one selection alone in any case. Is it so despicable to have a reasonable and constructive opinion of your own which differs from Rafa's? How sad. It's not like hoardes of people are calling for his head or wildly denigrating him.

Using the supposed poor fitness of players like Gerrard and Torres today to have a go at people who thought they should have started on Saturday is pretty ironic. On one hand it's saying Rafa's perfect and always chooses the right players based on factors only he could be aware of, so he was right to drop them vs Pompey. On the other hand it says they were poor today because they were still in such poor condition. Well then given Rafa's perfection, why the **** did they start?!

The bottom line is that you have to strike a balance to ensure you keep BOTH the quality and condition of the team at a reasonable level. That's something that can be argued without having to sling about stupid phrases like RCDNW, IKBTR. What the **** happened to making an argument based around actual football?

You want perspective, here's mine and it's based on football rather than churlish mudslinging on either side (and both are as bad as each other):
Portsmouth - we played a weakened team placing too much emphasis on conditioning in the team selection, and couldn't quite get the breakthrough in part as a result of that. Got a bit of a disappointing result.
Porto - up against a tougher team and selected a stronger team ourselves, but failed to exert any real pressure on them because we were outpassed by a reasonably classy outfit and our game was strewn with the most basic of errors. Bad day at the office but fortunately we escaped with a pretty decent result.

[wiw]

They had pace down the wings though, more than up front? They play down the wings...at the end of the day it was a fantastic ball and Hyppia, while slow, was also caught flat footed. BESIDES the pen, and the jammy rebound chance, they didn't create alot to be fair

[wiw]

The point is, there are some games you can rotate in and still have a strong chance of winning. Derby, Brum, Wigan at home, etc. Pompey away isnt one.

Thats the point though...perhaps we aren't there yet, but this is Rafa's idea..he wants a squad that will be able to rotate and STILL beat Pompey away. I still think we could have won, we just didn't play very well.

[JohnDoe]

There's no guarantee in anything. But it's a no-brainer that a side with SG and FT in it is going to be more threatening than a side without them.

It wouldnt have been in the bag, but given the impact they both had in a short space of time, had they played an hour or so each, it's highly likely that they would've produced something somewhere along the way. That's beyond question.

Not if they weren't match fit, which is my point in this thread.

If Rafa thought they weren't fit to start, he made the right decision.

Had he played them resulting in performances similar to tonight's game, maybe even worse since they wouldn't have had a few days' rest, you'd have complained. Had we won the match by a freak goal, nobody would have talked about this.

It's all about the result. The result always justifies the criticism to some.

[Craig_H]

Thats the point though...perhaps we aren't there yet, but this is Rafa's idea..he wants a squad that will be able to rotate and STILL beat Pompey away. I still think we could have won, we just didn't play very well.

Mate, the reigning champions DIDNT rotate and STILL couldnt beat Pompey away. It's a tricky place. Very rarely will someone go there and win, let alone do so by dropping the best two attacking options.

[wiw]

They scored an O.G and had the chances to win didn't they?

They looked tired at that point in the season IMO...i wonder why?

[Craig_H]

Not if they weren't match fit, which is my point in this thread.

If Rafa thought they weren't fit to start, he made the right decision.

Had he played them resulting in performances similar to tonight's game, maybe even worse since they wouldn't have had a few days' rest, you'd have complained. Had we won the match by a freak goal, nobody would have talked about this.

It's all about the result. The result always justifies the criticism to some.

If they werent match fit, they wouldnt have been sat on the bench.

What would've happened if a CM or striker got injured with 3 mins on the clock? Would we have played with 10 men, instead of putting on SG or FT? Course not. If they're on the bench, they're capable of being used whenever.

Had he played them resulting in performances similar to tonight's game, maybe even worse since they wouldn't have had a few days' rest, you'd have complained

No i wouldnt.

It's all about the result.

It's about dropping two points, almost willingly, in a game we were well capable of winning. And the fact that doing so, even just a few times, will see us out of the title race.

[Craig_H]

They scored an O.G and had the chances to win didn't they?

They looked tired at that point in the season IMO...i wonder why?

What are you talking about?

[wiw]

plus im pretty sure the Mancs DO rotate? I remember reading an article recently saying that they do just as much as we do...although to be fair i think they do keep sides consistent more than us. I don't know...everyone has their opinions of rotation..at the end of the day the result matters most of all