Liverpool v Stoke - Post match anguish thread

[Joe King]

Christ mate.

Most of us, while perhaps having criticisms, are feeling anguish at today and Kuyt's effort hitting the post.

You seem to revel in it.

Yeah, I enjoy dropping points...

[Craig_H]

Whether you mean it to or not, or whether you realise it or not, your posts come across as if you enjoy being given reason to slag off players or the manager.

[Joe King]

Whether you mean it to or not, or whether you realise it or not, your posts come across as if you enjoy being given reason to slag off players or the manager.

You're exactly right. I do enjoy slagging the manager and players off. Thanks for that.

[Craig_H]

Well that's very insightful stuff.

[billd]

You see, the guy is a ****ing legend. It's about how we stick together during bad times AS WELL as good times mate. Fans not sticking with him during such times are a disgrace, no matter how bad it is and how hard it is for us at the moment.

Is correct!

[squaddie]

[CJ]

i have only read the last page of this. my thoughts are

compared to recent games,

we played well enough to win
a good deal of commitment
certainly one penalty decision turned down
a miss at the end should have scored
the greek did well
reina is much better at crosses than he was a year or two ago
lucas did well
mascher wasnt bad at all

good to see maxi make his debut
good to see aquaillani come off the bench
good to see riera on the bench

Ngog didnt have his best game
Kuyt didnt have his best game

i think that riera needs to start when fit to give us balance.

was amused to hear the commentators critisising rafa for not starting aqua man or maxi.

overall was more pleased than i have been recently. but compared to last year we are v poor. but we arent suddenly going to play like last year it will take a number of small improvements and it looked like we had made a step today.

[pezzzer]

Whether you mean it to or not, or whether you realise it or not, your posts come across as if you enjoy being given reason to slag off players or the manager.

christ on a motorbike craig!! no one could of ever of accused you of that before!!

[aa4f4fsd47]

aquaillani made a very big difference to our play when he came on in the last few moments.. there was more flow to our passing.

[herpritmann]

I would agree, we looked better on the ball. apart from the period we decided to defend for a long time we good ok. normall watching pool we try going throught the middle a lot, but today we used the wide men available. we were unlucky, when you luck is out it is out

[Craig_H]

christ on a motorbike craig!! no one could of ever of accused you of that before!!

Where are these posts of mine, where i've slagged off players?

I think you might be thinking of posts where i've said players werent good enough. Which are two different things.

[MrMichael]

I think that was a lighthearted comment, might as well let it be imo

To be fair, Stoke away is a hard place to win. Very hard. So that makes any win there a good result.

With the players we're missing, it would've been a great result, so in the circumstances, i agree with pete. Yes, we lacked creativity and werent offering tonnes of threat, but with the kind of game Stoke made it, it was never going to be full of chances. Of course we're going to lack in the final third, with the players we were missing.

Our woeful season hasnt been down to performances like today, not by a long shot.

Hmmm. Having had some time to take stock since this afternoon, I think I can appreciate the viewpoint the likes of Pete, Shaggy and yourself have been expressing a bit more, and perhaps I was a bit harsh earlier.... but I still think that was an appallingly dire game of football. For a neutral watching that would have been like having teeth pulled slowly. You're right, Stoke isn't an easy place to go, and it was never going to be a "good" game, but I honestly thought we could have played for three times as long and still never looked like creating chances. Stoke were very poor, perhaps that was down to good defending on our part, but what struck me watching that was just how little a sense of our own footballing identity and style we are playing with these days. Yes the team showed a bit of grit and determination, but its a sad state of affairs really when that is considered an improvement.

Us struggling upfront without Gerrard, Torres, Benny etc isn't really that much of a surprise, but personally I didn't think 1 shot on target in the entire game was really good enough even without them. Stoke had 10 corners. We had none.

Lucas was indeed, once again, one of our better performers. Kyrgiakos had a very strong game in the air, and some of the other defenders played reasonably, abet against possibly the least subtle attack in the league. Degen and Aurelio (what's happened to him?) were very poor though, and upfront I just felt really sorry of Ngog, feeding off scraps doesn't even come close. The initial team selection I could live with, but i felt we missed a big opportunity to take the game by the scruff of the neck after we rather fortuitously scored, bold substitutions on our part could have killed the game off rather than allowing Stoke to regain the impetus and pressurise us the way the did in the closing stages - our defence has just been too brittle this season to get away with it, as they once again proved. I think that's what left me with a bad taste in my mouth, if we'd pushed on after we scored that would actually have become an excellent performance, instead our predictable capitulation in the final minutes lost us more points we simply cannot afford to do without.

[Craig_H]

I think that was a lighthearted comment, might as well let it be imo

I had let it be. It had been and gone

Hard to tell when people are joking when they reply to me. Happens in real life. People at work always telling me to '**** off' as well. The wild bunch of jokers!

[sitoca]

Last night's game sum up our performances this season. While last season we were scoring goals at the last minute, we are conceding them this season. Funny game football! The luck does even itself out over the course of 1-2 seasons.

In any case, I'm still behind Rafa. The fighting spirit last night was immense and certainly commendable. Whether that has to do with Gerrard not in the team, i don't know. But the team does shown glimpses of slick passing especially the move right up to Kuyt's header hitting the post. More of such performances last night please.

[Pablo]

I had let it be. It had been and gone

Hard to tell when people are joking when they reply to me. Happens in real life. People at work always telling me to '**** off' as well. The wild bunch of jokers!

I'd never have guessed Joking, welcome back Craig