Time for Benítez to give Gerrard a wide berth

[tomasjj]

That is a great article. I must have missed it first time.

Also, Zimbo makes some good points.

I wonder what is the problem with SG. Does he need that arm around his shoulder manager?

[Shaggy]

That is a great article. I must have missed it first time.

Also, Zimbo makes some good points.

I wonder what is the problem with SG. Does he need that arm around his shoulder manager?

I’m only surmising, but I’d guess yeah…something like that.

Under Houllier, he played like a man possessed. Houllier regularly indulged Gerrard, and our whole way of playing was geared towards SG and Owen.

Benitez, as we all know, has very different methods and it appears SG doesn’t like being seen merely as a cog. I think he wants to be Billy Big Bollocks (“I’m the man, I’m the ****ing man” ) and under Rafa that’ll never happen.

[bobbyfallon]

i will hold my hands up and admit, i was one of these "gerrard has to play in the middle"

but i have to say he is just not doing the job there right now, imo move him to the right, if he sulks about it..... drop him!!!

has been well below par of late

[Neil Young]

I don't see what's wrong with Gerrard playing on the right even if he was on top form in the middle.

1. In Alonso and Mascherano we have a potentially excellent midfield pairing.
2. He may be our best central midfielder but he is definitely our best right midfielder.
3. You need discipline and solidity to play in central midfield. Gerrard can do that but so can others (see 1).
4. He can do things those other central midfielders can't and in that he reminds me of a winger - not in terms of how he plays but in how he can change a game. Most of all he reminds me of Barnes (before he got slow) - capable of making defenders sh*t themselves. He doesn't do it the same way of course but he can have the same effect.
5. You don't have the freedom to do that when you're in central midfield (see 3).

Sorry, I realise I've probably said the same thing a few times in slightly different ways but I can't be bothered rewriting it.

[tomasjj]

I’m only surmising, but I’d guess yeah…something like that.

Under Houllier, he played like a man possessed. Houllier regularly indulged Gerrard, and our whole way of playing was geared towards SG and Owen.

Benitez, as we all know, has very different methods and it appears SG doesn’t like being seen merely as a cog. I think he wants to be Billy Big Bollocks (“I’m the man, I’m the ****ing man” ) and under Rafa that’ll never happen.

Hmm. I still wonder if Rafa wouldn't have minded selling SG at the time of the SG sagas.

[Parm]

one thing I remember Rafa saying a year or 2 ago was that if you looked at Zidane at Real, he was often stared wide left, but that didnt stop him from being brilliant. Just because ZZ started wide left, didnt mean he was restricted there.

[Los Rojos]

It will be every interesting to see how well Gerrard plays for England in the next two matches where he will, without doubt, be played at CM.

[Sir Bob]

To blame SG for our recent poor run of form is nonsense.
Take the spurs game for example. Was he at fault in any way for their two goals. No. They were 2 long balls which our defence should have coped with but didn't. Who was our most potent attacking player, SG. His free kick led to the goal and another hit the post.

Sure he's not at his best at the moment but to suggest he plays wide right is wrong. not only that the author of the original piece obviously doesn't watch us much. He calls for alonso & Masher to play CM. Now I like Alonso but he hasn't been at his best for 18 mths in my view.

[Jan Molby]

I’m only surmising, but I’d guess yeah…something like that.

Under Houllier, he played like a man possessed. Houllier regularly indulged Gerrard, and our whole way of playing was geared towards SG and Owen.

Benitez, as we all know, has very different methods and it appears SG doesn’t like being seen merely as a cog. I think he wants to be Billy Big Bollocks (“I’m the man, I’m the ****ing man” ) and under Rafa that’ll never happen.

Agree with all that..
but i think SG can play in the middle really well, only if he has two other central players doing the donkey work, winning the difficult balls, and feeding him easy balls so he can do his thing, releasing the strikers and/or bombing forward.
I dont think he has the dicipline to be one of two midfielders, so people see him play poorly in the middle when he is one of the two.
Then when he's on the right they see him play poorly because he is always cutting inside, not the discipline to be a right sided player, like pennant has hugging the touchline when the need arises.
This is why I think our best formation is 4 - 1 - 4 - 1 if gerrard is to play and excell......with xabi and masch doing the grind, they have the discipline.
reina
finan carra agger whoever
mascha
pennant SG xabi babel/who ever
nando

[El Jefecito]

But for his first few years as a regular Gerrard had all of those things in spades. I remember one game at Old Trafford where he totally dominated the whole Man U team, Keane included. He'd be unquestionably Man of the Match week in, week out, was scoring 30 yard screamers from all over the park, and invariably provided the telling through ball to slice open the opposition defence (typically for Owen to feed on).

In Houllier's last season his efforts were close to unnatural, as if it was a personal mission to achieve Champions League qualification regardless of the sometimes questionable quality of some of his teammates. He didn't just dictate the play, he controlled the game from start to finish, so any suggestion that he is not capable of carrying this off is palpably untrue.

However, we've seen this less and less over the last year or so. Which is odd. Because I'd have thought that playing alongside better players would have inspired Gerrard to greater heights. But his impact has been reduced to sporadic bursts of genius rather than prolonged, walking-with-the-gods, inspiration.

I've not given up hope that the Gerrard of old can re-emerge. Whether it's in the centre or on the wing is, in a sense, academic. It's more important that he plays as we know he can, then we can have the debate as to where he can be most effective.

I don't think we'll ever see it again. But only because Rafa will not allow SG to play in that fashion. Rafa's tactics are far too rigid to accomodate someone playing the way SG did.

[fred_plasticine]

To blame SG for our recent poor run of form is nonsense.
Take the spurs game for example. Was he at fault in any way for their two goals. No. They were 2 long balls which our defence should have coped with but didn't. Who was our most potent attacking player, SG. His free kick led to the goal and another hit the post.

Sure he's not at his best at the moment but to suggest he plays wide right is wrong. not only that the author of the original piece obviously doesn't watch us much. He calls for alonso & Masher to play CM. Now I like Alonso but he hasn't been at his best for 18 mths in my view.

he wasn't a fault for the goals, that's right. but he and mascher failed to take control of midfield after the second goal went in. that's what you would expect of a cm - to regain control, keep possession, get everyone organised again and drive the team on. he didn't do any of that. whether it's down to his poor form or not remains to be seen.

[badpiggy]

This is all bollocks.

It's a drop in form that players suffer from occasionally?
Did the tit that wrote it watch the FA and CL finals?

A little while ago Xabi was ****.
Pennant is on/off like a whores knickers
Crouch is crap but Benitez plays him still - is Rafa right there too?

Fact is when SG is on form he scrares the bejaysus out of defenders when he's ruuning at them down the middle.

couldn't agree more butthis proves HE ISN'T A CENTRAL MIDFIELDER FOR ****'S SAKE!!!! AAAAGGHHHH!!!!

[tomasjj]

To blame SG for our recent poor run of form is nonsense.
Take the spurs game for example. Was he at fault in any way for their two goals. No. They were 2 long balls which our defence should have coped with but didn't. Who was our most potent attacking player, SG. His free kick led to the goal and another hit the post.

Sure he's not at his best at the moment but to suggest he plays wide right is wrong. not only that the author of the original piece obviously doesn't watch us much. He calls for alonso & Masher to play CM. Now I like Alonso but he hasn't been at his best for 18 mths in my view.

So the author of the article clearly doesn't watch us much since he reaches conclusions different from your own?
Besides, I don't think the point was that SG was responsible for our loss of form.

You say Alonso hasn't been at his best for 18 months, well you could say exactly the same of SG, but that is not the main issue here. They both belong in the starting line up in my opinion.

From a viewpoint based on both tactical considerations and footballing ability - why shouldn't SG play on the right?

I think the author of that article puts across some excellent points regarding the LFC talisman Gerrard, points that especially many a local fan find hard to swallow.

A typical response is "FFS he is our best player, and should play where he wants/has the most impact/in his best position".

Well, what ever SG likes to think himself, I don't think he has the most impact from the middle, neither do I think that centre midfield is his best position. It might have been a couple of years ago, but he has changed. Now he is even more of an instinctive impact player than he used to be, and needs to be unshackled from his defensive duties in centre mid - especially since he doesn't have the same level of positional discipline and tactical nous as Mascherano and Alonso.

Play him on the left or right in a more free role, like ZZ or Ronny Buckteeth does. Then he can do what he does best, follow his attacking instincts and influence the game best.

But this has been said 1000 times on here, and still many bang on about SG in the middle, so I will stop barking up the same tree.

2 years ago, he was our best player, now I am not sure anymore. The cliché says class is permanent, but it has been a while now.

[AFII]

Mascherano is our best holding midfielder
Alonso is our best central midfielder
Gerrard is our best right sided midfielder

That is why Gerrard should play on the right.

[badpiggy]

So the author of the article clearly doesn't watch us much since he reaches conclusions different from your own?
Besides, I don't think the point was that SG was responsible for our loss of form.

You say Alonso hasn't been at his best for 18 months, well you could say exactly the same of SG, but that is not the main issue here. They both belong in the starting line up in my opinion.

From a viewpoint based on both tactical considerations and footballing ability - why shouldn't SG play on the right?

I think the author of that article puts across some excellent points regarding the LFC talisman Gerrard, points that especially many a local fan find hard to swallow.

A typical response is "FFS he is our best player, and should play where he wants/has the most impact/in his best position".

Well, what ever SG likes to think himself, I don't think he has the most impact from the middle, neither do I think that centre midfield is his best position. It might have been a couple of years ago, but he has changed. Now he is even more of an instinctive impact player than he used to be, and needs to be unshackled from his defensive duties in centre mid - especially since he doesn't have the same level of positional discipline and tactical nous as Mascherano and Alonso.

Play him on the left or right in a more free role, like ZZ or Ronny Buckteeth does. Then he can do what he does best, follow his attacking instincts and influence the game best.

But this has been said 1000 times on here, and still many bang on about SG in the middle, so I will stop barking up the same tree.

2 years ago, he was our best player, now I am not sure anymore. The cliché says class is permanent, but it has been a while now.