West Ham post-match

[Bender]

Sterling is only about 3 stone and 3 ft 4" paperweight

i understand the point your making but the only way to find out is to give him a few minutes in a game preferably at the end 80/85 minutes to start....won't happen but lord knows our 11 is in need of some skill and speed .......unless we sign maybe young in the summer allowing sterling to develope at his own speed.......

[Lecter]

i understand the point your making but the only way to find out is to give him a few minutes in a game preferably at the end 80/85 minutes to start....won't happen but lord knows our 11 is in need of some skill and speed .......unless we sign maybe young in the summer allowing sterling to develope at his own speed.......

I've high hopes for a few from that youth side (Sterling included)

Just dont think we should be pushing him, its an enormous step from that level

I mean lets face it Spearing looks half decent at reserve level

I think we are nearly maxed out on the number of youth players fattening out the squad

Its always better to bring a kid into a winning side rather than one struggling. think we are somewhere in the middle of that so its a massive risk

I think Coady is the next to push on (next season) and then I think it will be the two fullbacks Flanagan/Robinson then Suso & Sterling

How many of them will make it depends on a lot

[McDermotX]

Questionable tactics / team selections?

Bearing in mind who is available I think you are being well harsh on Dalglish

Perhaps a little harsh, but some of changes/team selections in recent weeks bear scrutiny, especially in a period where a manager should be straining to imprint a character in the side.
I realise the short amount of time in charge means that this is difficult, but relatively wholesale changes from team-to-team at a midpoint in the season crossing across a league campaign and, lets face it, a competition we should be grateful to be in at this point, are not helpful. Plus the changes in formation (and not just the relatively enforced one of the today) are no secret to success either.

I don't want it to sound like I'm coming down hard on Kenny, as there have been a number of factors at work such as Suarez ineligibility in Europe, Traitor ****ing off etc, but there have been some hard to explain choices that would raise more than a few eyebrows under a different man in charge.

Besides, the overall lack of quality/depth at work in the squad is at this point is a far bigger concern, so don't take it as a purely unwarranted Kenny-bashing observation.

[PaddyPool]

Only seen a little of Suso on LFC TV . Lots of good comments
on him in text etc . Hope he comes through - sooner the better .

[Lecter]

Perhaps a little harsh, but some of changes/team selections in recent weeks bear scrutiny, especially in a period where a manager should be straining to imprint a character in the side.
I realise the short amount of time in charge means that this is difficult, but relatively wholesale changes from team-to-team at a midpoint in the season crossing across a league campaign and, lets face it, a competition we should be grateful to be in at this point, are not helpful. Plus the changes in formation (and not just the relatively enforced one of the today) are no secret to success either.

I don't want it to sound like I'm coming down hard on Kenny, as there have been a number of factors at work such as Suarez ineligibility in Europe, Traitor ****ing off etc, but there have been some hard to explain choices that would raise more than a few eyebrows under a different man in charge.

Besides, the overall lack of quality/depth at work in the squad is at this point is a far bigger concern, so don't take it as a purely unwarranted Kenny-bashing observation.

I've read nothing into the changes

Bulk of them have been enforced

Last weeks we've had sporadic injuries to Gerrard, Agger, Johnson, Aurelio, Kelly, Meireles

We've had Carragher coming back from injury and Cole coming back and to much lesser extent Spearing

Last few games have highlighted how little there is to work with once you get a few injuries

[el matador]

i think today showed the deficiencies in our squad that the past few results have covered up.

i think you have to question the purchase of a 35m forward when we've just signed suarez when there are so many other areas of the team that need adressing.

for me our biggest problem is midfield. the team that controls the middle of the park controls the game. we have not dominated the central third since masher left and we all know that lucas is a decent squad player but no more.

we need more agression, bite and tenacity in midfield. when we dont have the ball it takes an age to get it back. gerrard doesnt have the tools to play centrally because at times on the counter we looked totally exposed.

meireles was a waste of 11m. every time he was tackled today he lost the ball. he ducked out of some challenges and is too soft for this league. he does virtually nothing in games other than score. yes its a good habit but like today if he doesnt score he's a passenger and sometimes a liability.

we have serious problems at centre back both skrtel and carra arent good enough. agger is good for one game in three.

our wide players kuyt, cole, maxi, jovanovic are a joke. kuyt tries hard but joe cole is an embarrasment to professional players. he is a player who has no end product and his whole repetoire of tricks are centred around cutting back onto his right and then laying the ball off to someone a full five yards away. wow, he really earns that 90 grand a week with his limp 3 yard passes.

people harp on about pacheco but dani has no chance in a team that struggles to get the ball in the first place, that slows the game down when they finally do have it, and are unable to get their creative players on the ball, at the right times in the right kind of areas.

our best player this season has been a 19 year old kid who pulled his hammy today and might be out for 6 weeks.

yeah as for reina, he looks overweight to me. he needs to lose at least half a stone. his ****ing arse looks bigger than james cordons.

[McDermotX]

I've read nothing into the changes

Bulk of them have been enforced

Last weeks we've had sporadic injuries to Gerrard, Agger, Johnson, Aurelio, Kelly, Meireles

We've had Carragher coming back from injury and Cole coming back and to much lesser extent Spearing

Last few games have highlighted how little there is to work with once you get a few injuries

Like I said, quality depth in the squad is lacking, but that's not news and certainly injuries etc at this stage of the season are nothing to cry about for any manager.
That's to be expected, and Kenny knows that more than anybody, and while he is coping as best as can be expected with those enforced changes, I personally don't believe the some of the overall changes are to the benefit of a settled side. You play your best side...always. That has not been happening across the league and Europa League divide.
The changes in formation for example, while looking good down on paper, only benefit intelligent players who can cope and fill in where needed..................Kenny has not got that luxury. I honestly believe he should be aiming for a straight die here at the moment and work with what he has, we have neither the flexibility or intelligence in certain parts of the field to do anything else.

The bad/unimaginative (not the same BTW) performances since Kenny took over are now outweighing the positive ones for me, and while we were patting ourselves on that back for the run of clean-sheets etc, I feel we've been growing into a rut of our own creation. Not all of this is Kenny's doing of course as we are carrying far too much dead-weight that can't be resolved right now, but it would be foolish to dismiss everything as just down to the **** in the squad.

Kenny is the front-runner for the permanent job in the summer, all signs point to that without doubt (in spite of what we've heard of FSG's track record), but he still has earn it between now and the end of the season in their eyes I feel..........and end-of-season positive run with a firm focus on the Europa League win will for me anyway.

[Lecter]

Like I said, quality depth in the squad is lacking, but that's not news and certainly injuries etc at this stage of the season are nothing to cry about for any manager.
That's to be expected, and Kenny knows that more than anybody, and while he is coping as best as can be expected with those enforced changes, I personally don't believe the some of the overall changes are to the benefit of a settled side. You play your best side...always. That has not been happening across the league and Europa League divide.
The changes in formation for example, while looking good down on paper, only benefit intelligent players who can cope and fill in where needed..................Kenny has not got that luxury. I honestly believe he should be aiming for a straight die here at the moment and work with what he has, we have neither the flexibility or intelligence in certain parts of the field to do anything else.

The bad/unimaginative (not the same BTW) performances since Kenny took over are now outweighing the positive ones for me, and while we were patting ourselves on that back for the run of clean-sheets etc, I feel we've been growing into a rut of our own creation. Not all of this is Kenny's doing of course as we are carrying far too much dead-weight that can't be resolved right now, but it would be foolish to dismiss everything as just down to the **** in the squad.

Kenny is the front-runner for the permanent job in the summer, all signs point to that without doubt (in spite of what we've heard of FSG's track record), but he still has earn it between now and the end of the season in their eyes I feel..........and end-of-season positive run with a firm focus on the Europa League win will for me anyway.

The problem is I dont think there is one formation at present we can play week in week out with the players hes had available

We cant play 4-4-2 as we have no wide players with pace

We cant play 4-3-3 because then you have the headache of Gerrard and Meireles being the same type of player

We cant play 4-2-3-1 because we dont have one decent holding player (nevermind two!)

3-5-2 isnt ideal because of the Gerrard / Meireles problem again

Look at how we finished

Johnson on the right, Skrtel, Carragher & Wilson on the left (Wilson isnt a fullback) and Johnson aint great defensively

Its very very difficult to say we should keep a system, the fact we havent probably shows that the coaching staff are trying different systems in games to paper over the cracks in the squad itself

Even if we had ALL our best players available I'm not convinced there is a specific system that we wouldnt look seriously deficient in more than one department

Formation and systems to me go out of the window its intent that should be our main goal

By intent I mean pressing high up the pitch and actually trying to attack teams

Today it was severly lacking our biggest problem was again fundamentals such as not pressing higher up the pitch and not competing for 2nd balls from that point of view it was a very Hodgson-esque performance

However I do question the fitness of some of the players today because Gerrard didnt look fit at all, and neither did Cole and that doesnt help if you are trying to press teams and keep a tempo going

[wiw]

Agree with all that Lec, you have to wonder what system we will aim for in the future though (?)

You would assume we have a plan for the summer

We seemed to start with 4-3-3 which I liked the look of. If we were after Ashley Young and Adam then you would think that's the future

Above anything I think we need 2 or 3 top quality left-footers. We're very imbalanced

[Lecter]

Agree with all that Lec, you have to wonder what system we will aim for in the future though (?)

You would assume we have a plan for the summer

We seemed to start with 4-3-3 which I liked the look of. If we were after Ashley Young and Adam then you would think that's the future

Above anything I think we need 2 or 3 top quality left-footers. We're very imbalanced

To play 4-3-3 we need 4 players for me (MINIMUM)

Leftback, holding player, playmaker/dynamo/box to box player and a wide attacking player

To play 4-4-2 we need 5 players (two wingers, holding player and a box to box midfielder and a leftback) and this will almost certainly mean selling Gerrard AND Meireles because they cant play those central positions for me

To play 3-5-2 we'd need at least another one (possibly two) centrehalves one comfortable on the ball, left wingback (might get away with Johnson but we'd need a back up) a holding midfielder & a playmaker

4-3-3 makes the most sense to me

[wiw]

To play 4-3-3 we need 4 players for me (MINIMUM)

Leftback, holding player, playmaker/dynamo/box to box player and a wide attacking player

To play 4-4-2 we need 5 players (two wingers, holding player and a box to box midfielder and a leftback) and this will almost certainly mean selling Gerrard AND Meireles because they cant play those central positions for me

To play 3-5-2 we'd need at least another one (possibly two) centrehalves one comfortable on the ball, left wingback (might get away with Johnson but we'd need a back up) a holding midfielder & a playmaker

4-3-3 makes the most sense to me

We still need a new centrehalf no matter what we go for imo. Sell Skrtel and get someone more dominant in the air

[barnes10]

i blame john henry. talk about the kiss of death going on about clean sheets...

ok clearly the honeymoon period has come to an end. formations/tactics etc need sorting out soon tho as our squad is better than the last 2 performances.

[Lecter]

We still need a new centrehalf no matter what we go for imo. Sell Skrtel and get someone more dominant in the air

Thats why I put MINIMUM in my first line

[Lecter]

i blame john henry. talk about the kiss of death going on about clean sheets...

ok clearly the honeymoon period has come to an end. formations/tactics etc need sorting out soon tho as our squad is better than the last 2 performances.

Most disappointing thing for me has been the lack of tempo, desire and pressing on teams

Thats my major worry (as it was under Roy)

Tactics / formations / team selections they are all up in the air as our injured list bites deep

But effort, passion, desire, tempo and pressing need to improve like they did for the first half a dozen or so games

[barnes10]

agreed lec. i was convinced the change in desire/attacking intent and 'bodies pushing forward' were down to new tactics and instruction.

after the last to 'woy speacials' i seriously doubt how much we genuinely will be going for the jugular. prague and west ham and we set out like we're facing real and barca. cant understand that one. is clarke off sick or something?