Gerrard: I was 'devastated' when Alonso left Liverpool

[Kenneth]

I think everythings gone wrong since the start of the season. No question that without Alonso we have lacked creativity in midfield, but with a more defensive minded midfield we should not be conceading this many. And I think that area is where injuries have cost us.

Hopefully our injury crisis is nearing the end and with the arrival of Aquilani I am hoping he will solve our lack of creativity in midifeld.

A defensive minded midfielder is great at cutting out through balls and pressuring players with the ball, however, posession of the ball is what protects the back four the most. I think our CM lacks the quality and composure that it had with Alonso and this invites teams to put pressure on our box.

[the rev leeroy brown]

Ahhhh... The memories....





YouTube - Alonso And Gerrard Bonding

anyone else get wood watching that?

[Roboklopp]

I think most people have been sucked up in this 'Alonso made us tick' theory, mostly because newspapers have reported it. Whilst he was an influential player for us, and one I'd have loved to have kept (based on last season's performances), he is by no means responsible (well his absence) for all our ills this season.

We have had to field an unsettled defence for most of the season, chopping and changing with players getting injured etc (Agger, Skrtel, Aurelio), plus we had a new player (with a more attacking mentality) playing as right back and if you add the fact that Insua is relatively new and has become a regular only this season, then you can safely see where have been our problems.

Add to that the fact that we had all our best players coming back at different times in pre-season, all of them with different levels of fitness hasn't helped.

Now if fans start getting on Rafa's back, based on unsubstantiated arguments (the one most fickle of fans normally do), it will not help. At the end of the day if it gets to the majority of us, Rafa won't be in the job for long.

We have to get behind him as I'm sure we'll get better as the season progresses. It will be tough to win the league, but November is not the time to be throwing any towel yet.

Cannot agree with the bit in bold mate- a lot of it were saying it looong before the press got that idea. Agree with the rest of it pretty much though, although I think the league is a very long shot now.

[Havors]

A defensive minded midfielder is great at cutting out through balls and pressuring players with the ball, however, posession of the ball is what protects the back four the most. I think our CM lacks the quality and composure that it had with Alonso and this invites teams to put pressure on our box.

Yep that is exactly what we have missed this season. We have nobody with the composure of xabi anymore so our CM panic and lose possesion... a lot.

[peekay]

Alonso - Great Player and thanks for the memories. I think it is regressive thinking to keep on wondering what it might have been if Alonso was here. Truth of the matter is that if he loved as as much as he claimed - he would still be here. He wanted to go back home to the most prestigious club in his home country at higher wages. I understand that !!!

Bottom line is this - Rafa is still here and working his nuts off trying to move this club forward. Alonso is not. Once Aquilani is fit, I am fairly confident we wont miss Alonso that much.

Anyway, some time in the next few years, we are going to meet this expensively assembled Madrid team. And we are going to whoop their asses, I am sure of that

[Roboklopp]

Snot ideal timing by Stevie, it it true.

[Pablo]

Ahhhh... The memories....

http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/1360/gerrardalonso.jpg

YouTube - Alonso And Gerrard Bonding

The moment Stevie cheated on him with Torres, his days at LFC were numbered

[red g]

Snot ideal timing by Stevie, it it true.

if its on 4-4-2 not sure he knew the exact day when it came out!

[BG1973]

With all your 'true red LFC' talk that makes you bigger then me Birdman, I'm sure you were around cheering and backing Souness on at every turn in the season. Infact if a manager leads us into second division youll still cheer because thats what we do, we excuse everything a manager does because of some stupid code that says we must wear red tinted glasses. If you show any kind of passion for the team you are relegated as a madrid fan. **** off.

xabi would have gone anyway.
we got 30 million
we have aquilani who may turn out to be better

Lets ride out the storm and see what emerges. Our title challenge depended on both gerrard and torres staying fit and instead worst case scenario has happened. They have both been out. Results have suffered and now confidence is rock bottom. Everyone needs to get behind the team and the manager. With everyone fit we are still a very good side, Alonso or no Alonso.

[Redspin]

I see the myth of Gerrard and Torres suffering because of Alonso no longer being behind them is alive and well in this thread.

Alonso was a defensive midfielder, so rarely did much in the final third and certainly provided very little in support of Torres and Gerrard as is shown by his very modest three goals and three assists out of 77 goals last season clearly shows.

He only featured in 20-odd league games last season as I recall, so missed about a third of league games, after missing a lot of the previous two season with injury.

Rafa wanted to replace him with someone who would do more in support of the attack. I'm no fan of Gareth Barry but I can see why Rafa wanted him over Alonso.

Let's face it, as anyone who's watched Real Madrid on TV will see, he's hardly been tearing up trees in Spain. In fact he's been decidedly average in the games I've watched.

Anyone looking at him on current form would hardly think he was worth spalshing £30m on so, given that he wanted to go anyway, it will prove to be a great piece of business in time

[Guest]

I see the myth of Gerrard and Torres suffering because of Alonso no longer being behind them is alive and well in this thread.

Alonso was a defensive midfielder, so rarely did much in the final third and certainly provided very little in support of Torres and Gerrard as is shown by his very modest three goals and three assists out of 77 goals last season clearly shows.

He only featured in 20-odd league games last season as I recall, so missed about a third of league games, after missing a lot of the previous two season with injury.

Rafa wanted to replace him with someone who would do more in support of the attack. I'm no fan of Gareth Barry but I can see why Rafa wanted him over Alonso.

Let's face it, as anyone who's watched Real Madrid on TV will see, he's hardly been tearing up trees in Spain. In fact he's been decidedly average in the games I've watched.

Anyone looking at him on current form would hardly think he was worth spalshing £30m on so, given that he wanted to go anyway, it will prove to be a great piece of business in time

Selling him for that amount of money was a master-stroke.

[dww]

I see the myth of Gerrard and Torres suffering because of Alonso no longer being behind them is alive and well in this thread.

Alonso was a defensive midfielder, so rarely did much in the final third and certainly provided very little in support of Torres and Gerrard as is shown by his very modest three goals and three assists out of 77 goals last season clearly shows.

He only featured in 20-odd league games last season as I recall, so missed about a third of league games, after missing a lot of the previous two season with injury.

Rafa wanted to replace him with someone who would do more in support of the attack. I'm no fan of Gareth Barry but I can see why Rafa wanted him over Alonso.

Let's face it, as anyone who's watched Real Madrid on TV will see, he's hardly been tearing up trees in Spain. In fact he's been decidedly average in the games I've watched.

Anyone looking at him on current form would hardly think he was worth spalshing £30m on so, given that he wanted to go anyway, it will prove to be a great piece of business in time

Hmm. Alonso wasn't a direct influence on our attack but at the same time he did direct the way we played and hence the way we attacked. I also think that to divorce any team (and especially ours) into separate attack and defense sections is probably over simplistic. The way you transition from one to the other is key and last season Xabi was phenomenal at doing that well and quickly as well as keeping attacks going.

He played 31 games in the league last season according to wiki which is a fair chunk.

Added to the technical aspects the fact he was clearly a leader and someone who made other players feel comfortable keeping the ball simple and could create doing it was key to the way our team gelled as a unit.

[DannyMan2006]

Anyone looking at him on current form would hardly think he was worth spalshing £30m on so, given that he wanted to go anyway, it will prove to be a great piece of business in time

It's only a great piece of business if you spend the money wisely. So we will have to see how well Aquilani does. Bigger players in the past have left and been replaced by better - Keegan for Dalglish.

[BrianF80]

Baresi said this in an interview with El Pais.

Q. One thing I do not fit. Why have hired Xabi Alonso? Xabi Alonso is a good player but serves the same profile that Gago, Granero and Mahmadou Diarra. They had to sign Felipe Melo [Juventus midfielder]. Is technically and physically superior. He can give another dimension to the midfield. Lass, Xabi and Barn are on the same plane. It is a mistake to put them together. A template Madrid, the only one who breaks the line is Guti. Right, with and without the ball.

And that was our mistake last year all possession and no penetration. We don't have Ronaldo so we need production from CM. We were not going to reach our potential by passing the ball around in front of the opposition back 4, playing 60 yd cross field balls and increasing the pressure until a mistake happens. You need a midfield with a final ball too, one that can create chances.

[dww]

I take it that is a caricature of our style of play, as obviously we barely won a game the second half of last season ......

We needed a plan B then and we need one even more now, I accept that, but at the same time that style of pressure/possession based football can be very successful. Especially if you play the team high up the pitch so that 'the line' is close to the attack. One problem we currently have is that we play too deep and struggle to get the ball out quickly from the back - hence any mistake puts the opposition in a decent position to attack.

The fact is that I also think that is a poor analysis of Alonso who can and did often play balls into attackers to create chances. He didn't run past players but with him in the side the idea has to be for the fullbacks to help out doing this. This season the same tactical argument holds with the fullbacks pushing forward balancing Lucas and Mascherano breaking less than, say, Lampard.