Portsmouth (H) Post Match Reaction

[BG1973]

Didnt Chelsea win their first 9 games in one of their tite-winning seasons?

in a word...no.

[Craig_H]

yeah I agree - it was importan to get that win, as i said to a mate before the game, you just know the media have already wrote their articles if we draw or lose - u could almost sense it with the players as well, esp the last five mins they just wanted the whistle to go, three points and **** off home.

Can't complain about the three points but didn't like the do the bare minimum to win - seriously i hardly ever criticise Liverpool, esp when we win - we never looked like losing yesterday but until gerrard scored the penalty I know i wasn't the only one who was thinking it was heading to a draw.

Thing is though, we're in a spell right now where we have 6 games in 3 weeks - so there are gonna be games like last night, where we do very little and just about get the win. With the lineup we fielded, i'm satisfied to just win.

[Craig_H]

in a word...no.

fair enough. Someone on radio said it last night, i think. They must be mistaken.

[SB]

I didn't see the match so I am interested in peoples views on players ratings.

So I saw this on COS and wondered if anyone agreed with this and if anyone else was willing to give their ratings . Cheers

anonymous - October 30th, 2008 at 9:21 am

Reina 6
Arbeloa 6
Hyypia 7
Carragher 8
Aurelio 5
Pennant 6
Alonso 7
Leiva Lucas 7
Babel 7
Gerrard 8
Kuyt 7

[donpisci]

I think the fact that it is the best start in this years PL is what counts and we have played both Chelsea and United which makes it a pretty fair sampling of teams. Arsenal must be worried by their start with all the big teams to come. If they don't buy a defensive midfielder and or an aerially dominant centre half I think they are aiming for fourth at best.

We have ridden our luck at times but have had tough games and injuries and have survived both in a way we never could have before this season. We still have a lot to do though to challenge all season though as we need someone other than Stevie and Torres to chip in with goals over a sustained period.

Watching last nights highlights I think against the lesser teams we need to play Benayoun who last season terrorised the ****e teams and weighed in with goals.

I also think Lucas was getting into some good positions in the box ahead of Gerrard - I really hope he gets some games this season as I think he has something about him (no matter what anyone else says). I feel he is learning things and will be a very good player for us but needs games to develop. I think what will happen is that like Flamini one year he will get confidence and blossom.

I think the problem is that people want us to give youngsters games, but aren't prepared to give them time to develop. If they're not world class from the first minute of their first game- people want them out.
We just need to be patient.

[Craig_H]

I think the problem is that people want us to give youngsters games, but aren't prepared to give them time to develop. If they're not world class from the first minute of their first game- people want them out.
We just need to be patient.

It's a tricky balance because if you're going for the title, you have virtually no margin for error.

[Marky]

A 'did enough' performance if i ever saw one.

Dont care about how we played, the win was the only important thing after the Chelsea game.

'did enough' performance like **** sir. we created about 5 or 6 great chances. could easily have won by more.

[PTP]

I was crying out for Babel to go up front and Riera to come on for Lucas.

442 with Gerrard next to Xabi and Babel up with Kuyt.

And if Babel MUST play on the wing, stick him on the right for heaven's sake - he ALWAYS goes on his right foot so when he plays wide left, he NEVER gets to the line and crosses, he always cuts inside and runs into traffic - so predictable.

god we were screaming at babel in the second half - it's why he frustates me as sometimes he just looks like he has switched of and becomes dosile. He has the ability - ive seen it

Maybe I am being harsh, he isn't an out and out left winger - but at times during the second half he had just stopped - so much so that aurelio was playing as the left winger - what annoys me with babel is he can beat a man on the outside - i have seen him do it, once every now and then(say once in 15 games ), he will be outside the box left handside, shapes to cut inside on his right, step over and he goes left - every ****ing time he has done it he rapes his man, granted 9/10 he gets passed them and falls over trying to kick it with his left (which is another annoying thing) but it works and causes problems - he just doesn't do it enough - he only has to try it once or twice in a match and then the next time he gets the ball the defender won't know which way to go - at the moment as you say it's to predictable - in fact I don't know whether i am critisicing babel, or rafa for playing him there or the tactics/coaches in training but....we are playing babel as a left mid/winger, no questions asked, yet there is a whole area of the pitch he never uses, never even gets too - so much so i have gone to the trouble to show the area with a nifty little diagram - but for a left winger it's bad - but we literally never get in the area.
The yellow shaded area just doesn't get used - babel gets to where i have placed him and then either cuts inside or stops. If ur a right back marking babel you can more or less forget about that area

[calvoboy]

i'm still cold, don't know what u guys saw on the telly but we were lucky to leave with the 3 points. we were awful.

no idea what formation we played 4411 maybe but it didn't work. today showed why we need agger in the team as neither hypia or carra can really bring the ball out well enough, they tried mind as portsmouth just played for the draw.

attack wise we were far to narrow, kuyt whilst having improved will never succeed as a lone striker and pennant and lucas were awful. i'd go as far as to say lucas is worse than diao!

i agree that portsmouth offered virtually no threat but i expect most teams to line up this way against the league leaders and we need to come up with a bit more creativity if we are to remain at the top

That's what I saw from the Kop too. OK, we were comforatbly the better side, and were never really in danger of losing the game, but we weren't creating many clear chances either. Some of our passing was abysmal after the first 10 mins when we started really well.

I was fuming when I saw the bench. To me, either a player is injured, in which case leave them out altogether, or they are fit, in which case they are fit to start. If we had dropped two points with Keane, Riera, Agger and Mascherano on the bench I'd have gone ballistic.

I thought the issue with Hyppia and Carra was that we were defending deeper to counter Sami's lack of pace, so there was too much of a gap between them and the midfield at times. That's why you saw Alonso dropping deep second half, and Carra going on the occasional run forward.

Lucas did a disciplined job of sitting deep, but offered nothing more. He might just be thinking that he needs to impress Rafa by sticking to his task and doing the unglamorous work, but that should be the starting point, not his whole game. He's not a bad player, and certainly not as bad as Diao, but he needs to start showing the full range of what he can do (if anything).

Overall then, not a great performance, and I thought Papa Bouba Diop got Rafa out of jail with his moment of madness, but you can't complain at three points with an under-strength side and at least we should have our first choice team nicely rested for Spurs away on Saturday.

[Marky]

god we were screaming at babel in the second half - it's why he frustates me as sometimes he just looks like he has switched of and becomes dosile. He has the ability - ive seen it

Maybe I am being harsh, he isn't an out and out left winger - but at times during the second half he had just stopped - so much so that aurelio was playing as the left winger - what annoys me with babel is he can beat a man on the outside - i have seen him do it, once every now and then(say once in 15 games ), he will be outside the box left handside, shapes to cut inside on his right, step over and he goes left - every ****ing time he has done it he rapes his man, granted 9/10 he gets passed them and falls over trying to kick it with his left (which is another annoying thing) but it works and causes problems - he just doesn't do it enough - he only has to try it once or twice in a match and then the next time he gets the ball the defender won't know which way to go - at the moment as you say it's to predictable - in fact I don't know whether i am critisicing babel, or rafa for playing him there or the tactics/coaches in training but....we are playing babel as a left mid/winger, no questions asked, yet there is a whole area of the pitch he never uses, never even gets too - so much so i have gone to the trouble to show the area with a nifty little diagram - but for a left winger it's bad - but we literally never get in the area.
The yellow shaded area just doesn't get used - babel gets to where i have placed him and then either cuts inside or stops. If ur a right back marking babel you can more or less forget about that area

WTF is that ****e man?

[PTP]

Thing is though, we're in a spell right now where we have 6 games in 3 weeks - so there are gonna be games like last night, where we do very little and just about get the win. With the lineup we fielded, i'm satisfied to just win.

don't get me wrong - i'd be ****ing estatic if we played like that every game from now till the end of the season and scrapped a 1-0 and i appreciate we will have games like that and players wre rested or tired etc.

I'm trying to not have a go and it's unusual for me to be negative - i just think 99% of us would be ****ing livid this morning if it wasnt for superdioupman's handball and gerrard converting the penalty.

[dww]

It now emerges that PTP is a mutant hybrid between Andy Gray and Tony Hart.

[Craig_H]

'did enough' performance like **** sir. we created about 5 or 6 great chances. could easily have won by more.

We scored one goal via a late-ish penatly = we did just enough.

[PTP]

That's what I saw from the Kop too. OK, we were comforatbly the better side, and were never really in danger of losing the game, but we weren't creating many clear chances either. Some of our passing was abysmal after the first 10 mins when we started really well.

I was fuming when I saw the bench. To me, either a player is injured, in which case leave them out altogether, or they are fit, in which case they are fit to start. If we had dropped two points with Keane, Riera, Agger and Mascherano on the bench I'd have gone ballistic.

I thought the issue with Hyppia and Carra was that we were defending deeper to counter Sami's lack of pace, so there was too much of a gap between them and the midfield at times. That's why you saw Alonso dropping deep second half, and Carra going on the occasional run forward.

Lucas did a disciplined job of sitting deep, but offered nothing more. He might just be thinking that he needs to impress Rafa by sticking to his task and doing the unglamorous work, but that should be the starting point, not his whole game. He's not a bad player, and certainly not as bad as Diao, but he needs to start showing the full range of what he can do (if anything).

Overall then, not a great performance, and I thought Papa Bouba Diop got Rafa out of jail with his moment of madness, but you can't complain at three points with an under-strength side and at least we should have our first choice team nicely rested for Spurs away on Saturday.

spot on

i too pointed out to the fella sitting next to me re Alonso dropping deep - thats what happens if say agger isn't playing - alonso had dropped to practically centre half to get the ball, he's not needed there, he shouldn't be there and thats what agger adds - if he was playing he would have done that job for alonso allowing us to hopefully push forward more

agree with lucas, yeha he was tidy, did a few decent things but didn't overally impress - it was like he made sure he got say 7/10 and was happy with that

as i said above, and you seem to agree - today could have been a very different atmosphere on here had we drawn

[PTP]

WTF is that ****e man?

read the post - it explains that ryan babel, as a left winger hardly ever gets into the highlighted yellow area, which imo is the are you want your left winger to try and exploit