Post match v Reading

[MARTINOZ]

To be honest I thought Sissoko was ok. Rafa knows what he gives to the team, and that's breaking up opposition attacks. He isn't there for his passing. Don't think Voronin did much wrong - just couldn't get into the game. Crouch looked isolated even with El Nino on the field. I thought the biggest problem was playing SG out wide as it left too much of a gap between midfield and attack, and neither Momo nor Mascher were ever going to be able to bridge that. We should have had Kewell out wide from the start, and SG in an attacking midfield role. But what do I know?

[Imy]

we played Ok, stupid linesman gave a stupid penalty - i wonder whether we will get an apology?

Gerrard may have scored but due to him we conceded two, the penalty because he did not track the run, and the 2nd goal for that stupid tackle.

Final ball seems to be a problem, the worse has got to be Riise who gets in to so many good positions and rarely delivers the ball - the guy is AWFUL.

Momo had a mare because he was continuously closed down which is a very good tactic as he has no ball playing skills to get out of trouble. Voronin on the left? why when you have both Babel and Kewell waiting in the wings both of whom can do a great job on that side, Voronin on the right and Crouch on the bench would have been a better option (hindsight is a good thing).

Rafa showed via his substitutions that he does look forward to other games and not just concentrate on winning the current one.

I hope this is not the start of the usual winter 'blip'

[dom9]

My take on it was that Rafa got the tactics wrong.

To play 4 3 3 with Momo, Mascher, Gerrard, Crouch, Voronin and Torres just didn't work. Yes we played OK at times, but nowhere near the level of recent games.

I think that 2 wingers (from Yossi, Babel, Kewell) would have spread the game better, and created more chances for us. It was too congested in the middle, and we lost the midfield battle.

That said, the penalty should not have been, and we hit the post twice.

Bad day all round.

Edit: I forgot to say that Momo and Voronin again proved that they are just not up the required standard.

[Infadel]

What worried me was that nobody seemed to show any sense of urgency, or even seemed too bothered - and I include Rafa in that.

[Morph]

i know it's a bit of a generlisation but it seems to me that the rafa supporters blame every defeat on external factors and every win on how spot on rafa is whereas - aside from pointless abusive style posters - there are a number of rafa-sceptics (bigfooty, DJS) whose points of criticism remain the same and are well thought out and constantly explained for the benefit of other posters to understand exactly what their concerns are.

People who 'support rafa' can have well thought out points also not just the 'rafa sceptics', i'm sure most posters see both sides of the coin but choose to go with one side rather than the other, it wouldn't make for an interesting forum if everyone agreed would it.

IMO, rafa was right to rotate some of the players, especially with the games coming up, however the players he rotated in weren't the right ones, and we still don't have a complete enough squad, so that the players we bring in are of equal or as least decent enough quality compared to the ones we take out.

Riise, Sissoko, Voronin, Crouch imo were not good enough today, however if we hadn't had injuries to Aurelio, Pennant, Alonso, Agger, Finnan then we prob wouldn't have had to play any of them.

I'm sure we played two defensive mids to cover Hobbs on his first match in, but if agger was not injured we wouldn't have had to do that. Or if Alonso had of been fit then him or Lucas could have played instead of sissoko. Aurelio in for Riise no question, or Arbeloa at LB if Finnan was fit. Pennant would have had a good day down the right were Voronin played for good parts of the game, so it's just unfotunate that we had all these injuries at one time.

I do think Rafa's tactics could have been better in parts of the game but he was working with the players he had on the pitch and things just didn't go our way. It could be the case that the pressure is on for the Marseille game money wise from the board, then maybe he was right to prioritise, but this is something we won't find out.

people aren't always thinking straight after the match and might focus on one thing that was their particular gripe, while in most cases no ones points are completely wrong, it doesn't take a lot of effort to see both sides of the coin, maybe just a bit of intelligence.

[Gazzla]

Every word spot on.

I'd also add that Rafa's 70th minute decision to give up on the game was staggering, i cant get my head around that.

He always says that he takes one game at a time, so why was he thinking of Marseille when the Reading game had 20 mins left to play?

I couldn't get my head round that one either, I'm sure that if we were winning then Gerrard, Carragher and Torres would have come off but not when we were chasing the game 3-1 down.

Realistically I don't know if we would have got back into the game but to wave the white flag and cut your losses was simply bizarre

[Morph]

I couldn't get my head round that one either, I'm sure that if we were winning then Gerrard, Carragher and Torres would have come off but not when we were chasing the game 3-1 down.

Realistically I don't know if we would have got back into the game but to wave the white flag and cut your losses was simply bizarre

it was one of those days i wouldn't have expected us to come back into it, we rarely ever do in the league, the players would have expended a lot of energy chasing the game, and even two goals would only have gotten us a point, Torres i'm sure was taken off mostly because of the knock he took to his foot when that idiot Sonko conveniently fell on it. It's not nice to give up on the game, but we have bigger fish to fry in the coming week

[The Glove]

Sometimes its better to lose a battle in order to win the war.

[Gazzla]

Sometimes its better to lose a battle in order to win the war.

How very philosophical of you Glove

[badpiggy]

People who 'support rafa' can have well thought out points also not just the 'rafa sceptics', i'm sure most posters see both sides of the coin but choose to go with one side rather than the other, it wouldn't make for an interesting forum if everyone agreed would it.

IMO, rafa was right to rotate some of the players, especially with the games coming up, however the players he rotated in weren't the right ones, and we still don't have a complete enough squad, so that the players we bring in are of equal or as least decent enough quality compared to the ones we take out.

Riise, Sissoko, Voronin, Crouch imo were not good enough today, however if we hadn't had injuries to Aurelio, Pennant, Alonso, Agger, Finnan then we prob wouldn't have had to play any of them.

I'm sure we played two defensive mids to cover Hobbs on his first match in, but if agger was not injured we wouldn't have had to do that. Or if Alonso had of been fit then him or Lucas could have played instead of sissoko. Aurelio in for Riise no question, or Arbeloa at LB if Finnan was fit. Pennant would have had a good day down the right were Voronin played for good parts of the game, so it's just unfotunate that we had all these injuries at one time.

I do think Rafa's tactics could have been better in parts of the game but he was working with the players he had on the pitch and things just didn't go our way. It could be the case that the pressure is on for the Marseille game money wise from the board, then maybe he was right to prioritise, but this is something we won't find out.

people aren't always thinking straight after the match and might focus on one thing that was their particular gripe, while in most cases no ones points are completely wrong, it doesn't take a lot of effort to see both sides of the coin, maybe just a bit of intelligence.

not really the point i was making:

those on the rafa side of the coin continually point out individual excuses for individual problems and individual poor performances/losses.

those on the other side have a more generalised set of difficulties that manifest themelves at specific times and this is not limited to when we win:

1. an overly cautious approach which seems based on neutralising the opposition as opposed to starting from our strengths regardless of who this opposition is.

2. playing players out of position.

3. our tendency to give away possession very easily

4. questions about his ability to motivate/manage personalities

5. stubborness regarding substitutions - this seems to have changed a bit but there have been lots of occasions where we obviously needed shaking up and rafa sticks on crouch with less than 10 minutes to go.

i don't know if any/some/all of these problems were evident yesterday but one thing i'm certain of and rafa can't take all the blame here - when you have players like momo and riisse who constantly give the ball away, you're starting with a double handicap and extra pressure already heaped on their teammates.

one final point - nicey has a thread called "the bootroom - no speculative tosh" which from what i've read seems to be a load of posts about best formations and partnerships around the pitch and i think a lot of the more pro-rafa posters are heading in to and giving suggestions regarding positions, formations etc. i haven't posted there as it would only lead to arguments because i think it has to be the most speculative thread ever posted on here. THERE ARE NO FAVOURED PARTNERSHIPS/FORMATIONS UNDER RAFA -IT CHANGES ALL THE TIME REGARDLESS OF HOW WELL SOMEONE HAS BEEN PLAYING. sorry nicey - this isn't meant to be a sneaky swipe at you but it just seems bizarre that those who criticise the sceptics ironically buy into this idea that rafa will have a settled side and then ignore the consequences of bizarre changes.

i've said it a lot of times before but i just don't understand rafa's approach and i think there's a lot of people on here defending him who are equally ignorant of the specifics of his methods but who never question them.

[Kopite_Colin]

Boro 1-0 up on Arsenal after 3 mins

[Sir Bob]

I support Rafa 100% but he does make some baffling tactical decisions. Now I don't just mean decisions that the average fan can't work out, I mean decisions that every pundit, ex players etc don't understand. And by ex players, I don't mean some of the half arsed donkeys Sky wheel out like Merson, I mean ex LFC players that generally talk sense.

I listen to most matches I don't go to on Radio City, where Aldo does the match summaries. I've lost count of the times he's lost for words on what Rafa's upto, with team selections and substitutions. Its not just Aldo, ex players like Hansen, Lawro etc are often confused.

Now all this doesn't mean what Rafa's doing is wrong in term of selections, tactics etc but I do wonder if sometimes the players on the pitch are confused by it all. Yesterday was typical. The teams announced, it looks a strange selection and the players play like they don't really understand the selection either.

Every ex player you listen to all say that players like to play in their familiar role, so they understand what they are supposed to do, and how they fit into the team plan. I think sometimes the players don't really buy into what Rafa is trying to do in individual matches and that yesterday was one such occasion. Although unlucky, we were half beat before we started yesterday.

[sonsofthedesert]

I am pro Rafa at all times, but yesterday I must say the formation and players chosen were shocking. He made a mistake but so did the ref with the pen decision, if he had got that right we may all be having a different conversatin today, but he didn't so it is pointless. The fact is Rafa made a mistake and so did the ref. I can to degree see why Rafa gave up on the game with 20 mins to go but I never thought I would see LFC do that.

[Sir Bob]

I am pro Rafa at all times, but yesterday I must say the formation and players chosen were shocking. He made a mistake but so did the ref with the pen decision, if he had got that right we may all be having a different conversatin today, but he didn't so it is pointless. The fact is Rafa made a mistake and so did the ref. I can to degree see why Rafa gave up on the game with 20 mins to go but I never thought I would see LFC do that.

Whilst we were unlucky yesterday, we have rode our luck a bit away from home this season. At Villa, we scored from a free kick that wasn't whilst our results at Wigan & Pompey in particular could easily have gone the other way.

Similarly, at home unlucky against Chelsea, fortunate against Spurs. Overall this season our points tally is pretty much what we deserve.

[Craig_H]

You really don't have a clue about football have you?

You can't play with your best players three games in eight days. The Marseille and Man U games are more difficult so the game Rafa could rest the players in was against Reading.

For some reason I think Rafa is a better manager than you but as usual you will think that you are the best manager in the world.

Where did i say you could play your best players 3 games in 8 days?

Which post did you even READ which made you think i said that?

I think what i said was that it IS possible to win both at Reading AND at Marseille...

So as far as 'not having a clue', perhaps it's your reading skills that are questionable...