Benítez says he needs fresh investment to compete for title

[Lecter]

top managers with a winning mentality make positive changes and pile the pressure on the opposition. When we need a winner, we stick to one striker, we dont put any real pressure on the opposition, we dont put bodies in the box and we find ourselves defending our own box in injury time, instead of piling on the pressure at the other end, breaking our backs to win.

I could have sworn we missed a stack full of chances against Birmingham in the last 20 minutes or so

Equally against Fulham we put them under a huge amount of pressure late on

Still stick to your argument and ignore the freight train coming by all means

[Craig_H]

Aside from the Spearing in for Mascherano bit, that was a very decent first post. Welcome to the asylum

[Lecter]

I could have sworn we missed a stack full of chances against Birmingham in the last 20 minutes or so

Equally against Fulham we put them under a huge amount of pressure late on

Still stick to your argument and ignore the freight train coming by all means

Oh and as for winning mentality I think this is an area Benitez does fail on

Not because he doesnt have it / instill it but because its my belief that he buys very few players who actually have that

To me hes bought 4 that definitely have / had that in his entire Anfield tenure Torres, Mascherano, Reina & Alonso much of the rest either havent had that desire enough or had none of it whatsoever

[Craig_H]

I could have sworn we missed a stack full of chances against Birmingham in the last 20 minutes or so

Equally against Fulham we put them under a huge amount of pressure late on

Still stick to your argument and ignore the freight train coming by all means

Brum, yeah i'll go with you on it.

Fulham - come on mate, how many ACTUAL chances did we create? Very little.

I love the 'freight train' comment, because every independent observer AND even about half of Liverpool fans i speak to all seem to concur that we dont play with enough of an attacking mindset - the ONLY people who think we do, are the (roughly) half of Liverpool fans i encounter who still firmly believe Rafa's the man to take us to glory.

90% of people with little or no personal vested interest in the fortunes of LFC, all seem to concur that we're too conservative, too slow and too cautious in our general play.

So you can keep focusing on your freight train and try to ignore the T-28 Super Heavy Tank that's passing by.

[Red Chilli]

I don't know whether this club will ever be able to satisfy Rafa's transfer requests. FWIW I think we need a manager who looks to build a team, not buy one over 6 years then dismantle it again.

[SERVO2]

Fans like you make me sick and ashamed to be Liverpool fan. FFS we've had one bad season under Rafa and the world is about to end. Yes like all Liverpool fans I'm not happy with how this season has gone but not all of this is down to Rafa, how many key players have been out injured? How many key players (and you know who I mean) have looked disinterested? You think it's bad now, remember back to when Souness was in charge now that was bad and it wasn't just one season.

In my opinion our problems stem from the big change he made at the beginning of the season when he tried to make us more attacking from the back (which most fans were asking for and applauding at the time) and it didn't quite work out and we shipped goals for fun. Taking this into account, the form of Carragher at the start of the season, the form and attitude of Gerrard when he plays, Mascherano's form at the start of the season the ongoing Torres saga with his injury. Therein lies the problem. If you have issues with the core spine of the team then that will impact on the performance and the confidence of those around them.

I do not believe this is how he saw that the season was going to pan out and there is probably plenty that he would do different, but to shift all of the blame onto him is not right. Don't get me wrong, Rafa is to blame for some of the problems but not all the blame for our performances should be dropped on him. When he is able to put out his first choice lineup, we play good attacking football, unfortunately this season he has not been able to do that due to injuries and trying to stop us shipping goals for fun.

Maybe I'm looking at this differently to you, but out on the pitch there are 11 players who are given a job to and are more than capable of doing the job, but more often than not they have looked disinterented and out of form, the two main culprits being Gerrard and Carragher, but then I guess it's wrong to blame two of the local boys isn't it?

Instead of blaming one person, step back and look at the bigger picture. Getting rid of Rafa is not a guarantee to instant success and I for one am not interested in another 5 year plan under a new manager, I've had enough of them. I'd rather see where Rafa is going to take us now that he has control of the academy etc. New owners is what we need not a new manager.

Sorry for going off topic, **** morning at work and that comment pissed me off. Hicks and Gillett out.

Couldn't agree more

You should post more often

Cheers

Rach

[Lecter]

Brum, yeah i'll go with you on it.

Fulham - come on mate, how many ACTUAL chances did we create? Very little.

I love the 'freight train' comment, because every independent observer AND even about half of Liverpool fans i speak to all seem to concur that we dont play with enough of an attacking mindset - the ONLY people who think we do, are the (roughly) half of Liverpool fans i encounter who still firmly believe Rafa's the man to take us to glory.

90% of people with little or no personal vested interest in the fortunes of LFC, all seem to concur that we're too conservative, too slow and too cautious in our general play.

So you can keep focusing on your freight train and try to ignore the T-28 Super Heavy Tank that's passing by.

Ahh every independant observer.....

Forgive me for laughing at using Andy Gray, Stan Collymore and Richard Keys et al to back up your argument

Honestly thats ****ing hysterical you really should try the Albert Hall with crackers like that

I'll again point towards Wengers lack of success over the last 5 or 6 years despite a very attacking policy

[Lecter]

In my opinion our problems stem from the big change he made at the beginning of the season when he tried to make us more attacking from the back (which most fans were asking for and applauding at the time) and it didn't quite work out and we shipped goals for fun. Taking this into account, the form of Carragher at the start of the season, the form and attitude of Gerrard when he plays, Mascherano's form at the start of the season the ongoing Torres saga with his injury. Therein lies the problem. If you have issues with the core spine of the team then that will impact on the performance and the confidence of those around them.

I said something very similar to this a couple of weeks ago

To me Rafa changed too much too quickly and hes been caught badly

Some things havent helped his situation like injuries / the owners etc... but to me his slight shift in tactic to another has hurt him badly

The difficult thing for him now is hes stuck between a rock and a hard place because he no longer has the players to play his old system and he doesnt have the quality to play his newer system either

Signing Johnson would have been ok if Alonso had stayed. He didnt so we either put in Lucas who offers some protection to the back four but little or no creativity OR we play Aquilani who gives more creativity but leaves us very exposed

Signing Aquilani might have been better had we better fullbacks than Johnson & Insua at defending

[MrMichael]

<snipped>

If Rafa was to really take a leap of faith he would sell Mascherano, install Spearing as our defensive midfielder and use the funds to buy some flair, Eden Hazard perhaps. If only I was paid a few million quid a year to manage the reds.

lol. If only management were as easy that. Personally I think you'd get us relegated pretty fast

Seriously though, you make some points about the midfield I agree with, although I do think you're slightly over-emphasising the role Alonso played. Our lack of genuine cutting edge and goal threat from across the attacking positions has made us predictable, and we have no plan B, I'm not at all sure retaining Alonso alone would have fixed this season. Although it might have made a big difference to our mentality and momentum back in August.

As for your proposed changes to the squad, you're really underestimating the cost of genuinely proven talent I think, and totally forgetting about the money our rivals are likely to be spending which will improve them further. As for a £20m budget? I'm afraid we'll be lucky to be breaking even this summer. I imagine some of those players you name, Aurelio and Degen and Plessis for sure will be on their way, but making us genuinely competitive again will be some job, not easily fixed by buying 2 left backs and a winger, especially for relative peanuts.

Oh, and Lee Cattermole for Lucas, Spearing for Mascherano, and Nemeth being Torres' only cover? Really?

Welcome to the site btw

[Lecter]

Brum, yeah i'll go with you on it.

Fulham - come on mate, how many ACTUAL chances did we create? Very little.

I love the 'freight train' comment, because every independent observer AND even about half of Liverpool fans i speak to all seem to concur that we dont play with enough of an attacking mindset - the ONLY people who think we do, are the (roughly) half of Liverpool fans i encounter who still firmly believe Rafa's the man to take us to glory.

90% of people with little or no personal vested interest in the fortunes of LFC, all seem to concur that we're too conservative, too slow and too cautious in our general play.

So you can keep focusing on your freight train and try to ignore the T-28 Super Heavy Tank that's passing by.

Reading back our debate has gotten to a level that I dont like which has frankly debased the general discussion so I apologise for my part in this

I want to ask you a genuine question and basically there are two options for you to choose - nothing other than that

IF you had a choice between the following which would you choose??

A) Sacking Rafa and appointing whoever BUT on the proviso that the current owners remain for 3 years and any incoming manager is to breakeven in the transfer market over that period.

B) Getting entirely new ownership who would back the manager to at least the same levels as pre-Gillett & Hicks BUT Rafa is to stay in charge for at least 12 months

Which option would you choose??

[Craig_H]

Ahh every independant observer.....

Forgive me for laughing at using Andy Gray, Stan Collymore and Richard Keys et al to back up your argument

Honestly thats ****ing hysterical you really should try the Albert Hall with crackers like that

I'll again point towards Wengers lack of success over the last 5 or 6 years despite a very attacking policy

But i didnt even mention those names.

It's not as if i speak to people in everyday life, or anything.

Would i honestly be wrong in saying that anyone who agreed with me on this topic, would be deemed as having an opinion that's perhaps slightly less than 'worthy' ?

[Craig_H]

Reading back our debate has gotten to a level that I dont like which has frankly debased the general discussion so I apologise for my part in this

I want to ask you a genuine question and basically there are two options for you to choose - nothing other than that

IF you had a choice between the following which would you choose??

A) Sacking Rafa and appointing whoever BUT on the proviso that the current owners remain for 3 years and any incoming manager is to breakeven in the transfer market over that period.

B) Getting entirely new ownership who would back the manager to at least the same levels as pre-Gillett & Hicks BUT Rafa is to stay in charge for at least 12 months

Which option would you choose??

That's like asking which bollock i'd wanna keep

Reluctantly, in the thinnest, most vain hope that rafa would somehow start trying to win games in a more proactive manner, (and on the proviso that these new owners were proper, non-whopper ****s), i'd choose option B.

Ideally, i'd want new owners AND a new manager too, just start from scratch, no european football next season and just use the campaign to settle everything down and work our way back upto where we were a year ago.

[Lecter]

That's like asking which bollock i'd wanna keep

Reluctantly, in the thinnest, most vain hope that rafa would somehow start trying to win games in a more proactive manner, (and on the proviso that these new owners were proper, non-whopper ****s), i'd choose option B.

Ideally, i'd want new owners AND a new manager too, just start from scratch, no european football next season and just use the campaign to settle everything down and work our way back upto where we were a year ago.

I dont believe we will replace both

It will be either or in my opinion

[Kenneth]

I don't get it. I posted a Monopoly analogy, yet debate continues. WTF people?

[The Birdman]

Craig the question you should be asking is if Wenger is such a god and has had free reign over Arsenal for over 10 years now why has he build a side that is so relient on 1 player??
That 1 player is Fabregas, even Arsenal fans wouldn't agree with you when claim RvP is more important than him.
Fergie has been at Utd over 20 years, has spent god knows how much money yet he has team that is soley relient on 1 player - Rooney. If you can't see that after Fergie picked a 50% fit Rooney playing with injections over Berbatov (who cost £30m) against Bayern then yet again this is just an arguement for arguing sakes from you.

Posters try to have reasoned debates with you but 9 times out of 10 they decend into tit for tat arguments.