Liverpool VS Fulham Match Thread

[Roboklopp]

I started to have serious doubts about this season when we were so so poor in our pre season games. You could see that the team was not working well together and we had regressed.

It was obvious we need to keep Alonso and add top quality to the top to help G&T.

The manager planned his transfers around a promised budget, a budget that was cut by 20mill..who knows who he would have bought, or wanted to buy till that happened, had he even already done the deal for Aquilani.....and then suddenly he was left with only enough cash for Kyriagos.... who knows, but i imagine Rafa would have liked to buy more players too...including a top class striker...like Berbatov for 30mill, who when needed most...can't score. (hehe)

Aye, the fact that Rafa had his budget pulled from under him seems certain. He had to gamble and it's not paid off.

[Exiled_red]

The manager planned his transfers around a promised budget, a budget that was cut by 20mill..who knows who he would have bought, or wanted to buy till that happened, had he even already done the deal for Aquilani.....and then suddenly he was left with only enough cash for Kyriagos.... who knows, but i imagine Rafa would have liked to buy more players too...including a top class striker...like Berbatov for 30mill, who when needed most...can't score. (hehe)

Aye, the fact that Rafa had his budget pulled from under him seems certain. He had to gamble and it's not paid off.

Just think what difference a £20m striker could have made

[Leyton388]

Anybody been on the Echo forums lately? The abuse directed at Rafa is just way over the top and quite frankly disgusting

[Bender]

Liverpool manager Rafael Benitez:
"I am a little bit disappointed, normally when you control the game and have chances you can score. We know the fourth position is a little bit far away.
"They were deep, they were well organised and we had to score. We had one or two chances, their keeper was good, but it's not easy to find space when they have players behind the ball.
"We needed to be patient and it was not easy to find the final pass in the final third.
"I am disappointed because I feel that we had plenty of possession."

Fulham boss Roy Hodgson:
"There is no doubt Liverpool dominated the game and we were forced on to the back foot but at the same time we stood our corner very well and fought very hard.
"We stopped them getting clear-cut chances and it was really when we just lost Daniel Agger for a corner at the end that I was concerned the ball was going to go in the back of the net.
"On the occasions when they got good strikes in Mark Schwarzer was equal to it. It is another excellent clean sheet.
"I have got to be very satisfied with what the team has done because Liverpool are a very difficult team to take points off home or away."

[MrMichael]

To be fair there were people being just as bad for games last season.

Indeed there were, especially in the pre-Christmas period. There is a difference though, last season they were going massively overboard; in the end we came as close to winning the league as we have in almost 2 decades, and although some would have it as Benitez fault we didn't win it, if he's responsible for this season's failures then he must have been for last season's successes.

This year however we have, by and large, been pretty **** since the first kick of the first game. The team has looked disjointed and disinterested and our attack has been amongst the most predictable in the entire league. Don't get me wrong, some people still over-react to specific situations, but taken as a whole I can generally understand the average level of dispondency most people have shown. Especially as, given the politics etc off the field at our club, this doesn't look like a blip that will easily be turned round after a good summer, it looks like the beginning of what could be a long-term malaise.

Anybody been on the Echo forums lately? The abuse directed at Rafa is just way over the top and quite frankly disgusting

Probably Everton & ManU fans. Thinking Rafa should go is a justifiable stance in my eyes (not necessarily correct, but that's another debate). Outright and excessive abuse of our manager by our own fans is never acceptable though imo.

[Craig_H]

To be fair its been realistically gone for some time now. We're going to finish about where we deserve to in this league this year, 6th or 7th.

Sad thing is that is Torres had been fit most of the season we'd have got fourth just because of him. Shows how average the others have been perhaps.

Without him however we just don't have any goals in the team.

Dont agree with that at all mate. If we'd won at Brum and today, it'd be a very different story - with City still to play United, Arsenal, Spurs and Villa. And Spurs still to play United, Arsenal, Chelsea and City.

I said all along if we'd done our bit, we'd get 4th. I said all along that we simply HAD to stay in the mix, until city and spurs hit their run of hard games. That starts this wednesday night. Unfortunately, we didnt do our business and didnt stay in the mix. We've handed it to them, chucked it in, died away with a whimper and blown it due to **** performances and cowardly spineless tactics. That's the worst thing of all - the least we could've done is made them earn it. But no. We've quietly ducked out of the challenge like ****houses.

Being out of the CL for next season will make Rafa focus on the league next season if he is still here. It could be one of the best things to happen to us.

If we're in the Uefa Cup next season, i think he'll prioritise that.

Somehow people will still argue that we need more creative midfielders than added to the squad rather than quality finishers............

Think we need both mate. Memory might be playing tricks on me, but how many ACTUAL proper chances did we create today?

[Craig_H]

Not happy with our season at all, I just think there is dramatic over reaction commonly on here.

Just out of interest mate, what is your reaction to it (if the reaction on here is an overreaction?)

How do you feel about finishing 5th, 6th or 7th?

[Exiled_red]

Dont agree with that at all mate. If we'd won at Brum and today, it'd be a very different story - with City still to play United, Arsenal, Spurs and Villa. And Spurs still to play United, Arsenal, Chelsea and City.

I said all along if we'd done our bit, we'd get 4th. I said all along that we simply HAD to stay in the mix, until city and spurs hit their run of hard games. That starts this wednesday night. Unfortunately, we didnt do our business and didnt stay in the mix. We've handed it to them, chucked it in, died away with a whimper and blown it due to **** performances and cowardly spineless tactics. That's the worst thing of all - the least we could've done is made them earn it. But no. We've quietly ducked out of the challenge like ****houses.

I've said in all the predictions threads for results etc, that the other teams would drop enough points for us to clinch 4th, my biggest fear all along has been that we wouldn't do what we had to, and that seems to have been the case

[Craig_H]

Can someone tell me why, when we're chasing a goal, we dont put another striker on and go two up front?

Why, when we need a goal, does N'Gog come off?

And more than anything why, in a must win game, we start the match with only ONE genuinely consistent goal threat? Just one. You've got Aquilani & Maxi pedestrianally toiling, while players with proven records of scoring/creating goals in the PL sit on the bench for an hour or more. It beggars belief.

[destinydude]

Can someone tell me why, when we're chasing a goal, we dont put another striker on and go two up front?

Why, when we need a goal, does N'Gog come off?

And more than anything why, in a must win game, we start the match with only ONE genuinely consistent goal threat? Just one. You've got Aquilani & Maxi pedestrianally toiling, while players with proven records of scoring/creating goals in the PL sit on the bench for an hour or more. It beggars belief.

Dear Craig H,

"Rafa Benitez school of Management" is disappointed to tell you that you've been demoted from the coaching classes.

If after six years you still dont have a clue as to why the manager does that, then the school thinks it's best to put you in probation for the immediate future and will let you know whether you can pursue your next levels here.

Thank You.

[Craig_H]

Honestly though mate, as soon as i saw our starting lineup today, i wondered where the goals were coming from. It occurred to me that unless Gerrard bailed us out (and his form hasnt indicated that this was too likely) we'd struggle to score. It's not rocket science, our starting XI had ONE player in it with any proven record of scoring or creating goals on a consistent basis in the PL (and he's woefully out of form).

I honestly dont know where, in Rafa's plan, was the the likely source of goals to win us the game today.

[destinydude]

People say we've finished second and scored the highest no.of goals in the League last year.

But we've had FIVE 0-0's last yr in the 38 games. Would you believe it? Despite being the top scorers we failed to score in FIVE games and Fulham at home was one of them last year.

We do have lots of possession most of the times, we just dont know what to do with it. It's just the way we are coached, like Arbeloa said in the press a couple of days ago.

A bit robotic and a bit like "It's 1 2 3 in the training and that's all we should do in the games."

We need to be innovative when we have possession. We just dont know how to run a game when we have the ball.

We just pass it around the box and then either take a speculative shot or pass it back to Carragher when under pressure only for him to hoof it back to their GK.

[Craig_H]

That's the rafa way. Going on for 6 years, and that's the extent of our footballing development. Just dire.

[destinydude]

That's the rafa way. Going on for 6 years, and that's the extent of our footballing development. Just dire.

That's why people are asking for his head. If we were really unlucky with injuries and decisions and had we still played good football coupled with that people would have forgiven him.

We just dont play decent footy either and with him in charge next season with no significant funds it's going to be abysmal watching us.

Pls get in some one who can make us play with what we have than moan all the season about "lack of funds" or "mistakes" or "injuries".

[Taxi]

Can someone tell me why, when we're chasing a goal, we dont put another striker on and go two up front?

Why, when we need a goal, does N'Gog come off?

And more than anything why, in a must win game, we start the match with only ONE genuinely consistent goal threat? Just one. You've got Aquilani & Maxi pedestrianally toiling, while players with proven records of scoring/creating goals in the PL sit on the bench for an hour or more. It beggars belief.

This is what really fecks me off about Rafa's tactics, when we're chasing a goal he almost never puts two strikers on. Just like last week with Torres, swaps for Ngog, why not play both up front?

Keane...people say he's **** and needed to go, I say he's a lot better than his replacement. Rafa has continuously depleted our strike force, that to me says more about the man's football mentality than anything else.