Man of the match - Game 42 - Lille - Away - EC

[Morse]

Liverpool

 

* 25 Reina

* 02 Johnson

* 05 Agger

* 22 Insua yellow card

* 23 Carragher

* 08 Gerrard

* 20 Mascherano

* 21 Lucas

* 09 Torres yellow card

* 18 Kuyt (El Zhar 88)

* 19 Babel (Riera 73)

 

Substitutes

 

* 01 Cavalieri,

* 16 Kyrgiakos,

* 34 Kelly,

* 04 Aquilani,

* 11 Riera,

* 24 Ngog,

* 31 El Zhar

 

 

 

1.

2.

3.

 

 

Thanks.

[Mr Nando]

Er...

 

Um....

[Hooch]

Mascherano - Main man again, puts Gerrard and Torres to shame with his attitude.

Babel - Dangerous till the manager pulled him off, anyone know why?

Reina - Meh.

[Arl arse]

Mascherano

Reina

Johnson

[Trumo]

While not quite as shambolic as the Wigan match, we still missed a few guilt-edged chances, whilst also being given the runaround at times. We are not showing enough desire to win games, whilst at the same time being punished for mistakes at the back. At the same time as all this, the opposition keeper has at least one fortunate moment. while his defence's rushed clearances have an uncanny habit of finding a teammate. Our rushed clearances are just finding an opponent.

 

As a side lacking confidence, it would serve them better to go out and try to win games by creating chances, rather than holding onto what they've got and leaving the attack feeding off scraps. I know that sounds simple, but the players' body language and pre-match talk is almost always about "showing character, showing fight" etc rather than "we're gonna go out there and give it a good go." When it fails to work it's much harder to turn round, and creates a vicious cycle that we are stuggling to recover from.

 

What makes it worse is that the media wankfest over an admittedly in-form striker from down the road seems to imply that he is outscoring our entire team. He's probably close to be fair, as his total so far matches our top 3 combined this year.

 

Anyway, onto the players.

 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Reina - a couple of nervy moments, and was caught standing for the goal. Very similar to numerous occasions earlier in the season in fact.

 

Johnson - got forward well at times to link up with Kuyt, and set up a good chance for Torres in the first half. A few wayward passes however.

 

Carragher - several shanked clearances aside, he didn't do much wrong tonight. I haven't seen enough replays of the goal to ascertain whether he could do anything about the ball in. Had he got to it, it probably would still have ended up in the net somehow, such is our luck.

 

Agger - another who handled Lille's attack well in general. Got caught under the ball for the goal, which meant twe had no-one to deal with the threat.

 

Insua - how many times do his direct opponents get the better of him? The blueprint to attack our left flank has been copied by EVERY other manager and it's harming us, because our alternative is injury-prone and lacks pace. He also offers little aerial presence in defence so perhaps could be best utilised guarding a post instead. Still, he did better than against Wigan, whatever that means.

 

Lucas - is slowly becoming a symbol of our team's current fortunes, as my points above seem to sum him up to a tee. He's not offering enough going forward, and yet our opponents' midfield kept running through ours. He has in his game the tools to do what Gerrard was doing 10 years ago, but he seems unwilling or unable to do so.

 

Mascherano - the only player I felt deserved better tonight, as against Wigan. He keeps going, closing down opponents, and starting our breaks. It's just unfortunate he lacks Xabi Alonso's eye for a pass, as tonight left him in that position. He was the only midfielder to get to grips with the state of the pitch.

 

Kuyt - we need our attacking four to each offer a goal threat, and he just didn't. When the team is down on form, it really hurts his game as it reduces him to simply chasing the ball like a puppy in the park. Even he's starting to look fed up of it all.

 

Gerrard - when Rafa changed his position in 2007 to utilise his attacking strengths and free him from some of his defensive duties, it was because he was a player who would still give opponents a tough time with his energy and determination. This allowed his finesse to come through. He now looks laboured and disinterested, especially when he loses possession. It's all very well to conserve your energy a little, but he appears to be trying to save himself for those moments when we do attack, and then sitting back when it comes to nothing. He's not seeing nearly enough of the ball as a result.

 

Babel - struggled the most with the pitch, losing control and possession at regular intervals. He did keep his head up however rather than slacking off. Was also involved in our best moment of the match, the delightful interchange with Torres that he should really have buried.

 

Torres - did very well when often faced with two opponents, although they didn't really rough him up. When he started to lose the ball in the second half, his petulant side started to show, again affecting his composure, resulting in a yellow card for dissent. Unlucky with his header, which if it were Rooney on current form, would still have gone in even if misdirected. Thems the breaks at the moment. The positive from him is that he is looking sharper.

 

Riera (sub for Babel) - extremely wasteful display from him, especially that limp cross near the end. Was brought on add width but spent more time infield. Also hit a poor free kick.

 

El Zhar (sub for Kuyt) - baffling substitution in the circumstances, and I can only assume he was on to add yet more width. Not enough time to get involved.

 

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All in all, we are toiling to ridiculous levels to get just the one goal. I feel, rather than bring the players in and analyse everything to the nth degree once again, as seems to be the case before and after every game, we need a change of tack in training. Drumming the same tactical and defensive messages to the players time and again will inevitably make them switch off, which is of no benefit.

 

I have more to say on this, but cannot find the words in my current agitated state. I will do so when I find the right time and a more appropriate thread.

[dennis tooth]

Er, is this a joke?

If I was a manc I'd be enjoying this thread out of all the others.

Who fucking cares who the manager of the match, we lost, that's it.

We're out and we haven't even played the 2nd leg, guess what will happen, the scenes have already been filmed it's just awaiting the editing, we will sit on a 1-0 deficit and they will get a late goal after Kuyt misses a sitter at the other end. Got it?

[bigal]

I'm tempted to go for El Zhar, WTF?

 

However, Mascherano deserves some credit

[Guest Pistonbroke]

Mash and that's it.

[Crazyhorse7778]

Aquilani

Masch

Reina

[Guest PurpleNose]

El Zhar

[PaulMcC]

Mascherano

Torres

Johnson.

 

 

Gerrard was the worst player in our team.

[piscinin]

Mascherano

[Lurtz]

Masch

 

He should be given the armband next season. Gerrard simply doesn't look arsed any more.

[TopMod]

Mascherano- played well.

Babel- played better than usual.

El Zhar- did OK when he came on.

The rest were poor or worse except Reina who did OK but got caught out for their goal.

[aws]

Mascherano

 

Torres

 

Johnson

[Monster Masch]

Maschernao

 

Johnson

 

Reina

[keysaint]

mascherano

babel

reina

 

Makes me laugh. I know ryan babel's been a disgrace in some games this season but in recent weeks its like he's had the kick up the arse needed. just play the lad and leave him on. As the game gets stretched his pace is going to be more beneficial on counter attacks with torres and gerrard, instead of the laboured shit we get most of the time

[RedinSweden]

Mascherano

Babel

Torres

[Fowlers God]

Babel

Masch

Agger

 

Everyone else awful apart from maybe jamie, but his pace his a big problem at the back

[Delmar]

Johnson

Torres

Babel

[Morse]

Result: Game 42 - Lille - Away - EL

 

 

1. Mascherano...............................................151 votes.........................................5 points

2. Babel.............................................................92 votes.........................................3 points

3. Reina.............................................................37 votes..........................................1 point.

4. Torres............................................................34 votes..............................................Zero.

 

 

A Low scoring match.

All sites had the top 2 as above.

YNWA and Est1892 had Reina 3rd.

6CM and TLW had Torres 3rd.

ST had Lucas 3rd.

 

 

Current table:

 

 

1. Mascherano...................9 first..........7 second.......5 third.........71 points

2. Lucas.............................4 first...........5 second.......5 third.........40 points

3. Reina.............................6 first...........1 second........6 third.........39 points

4. Johnson.........................5 first...........2 second...........................31 points

5. Torres............................4 first...........1 second.......2 third..........25 points

6. Gerrard..........................1 first...........5 second.......3 third..........23 points

7. Benayoun.......................2 first...........2 second.......6 third........22 points

8. Ngog..............................2 first...........4 second............................22 points

9. Kyrgiakos......................3 first...........2 second............................21 points

10.Kuyt................................2 first...........2 second.......1 third........17 points

11.Skrtel.............................2 first...........1 second...........................13 points

12.Carragher......................2 second......5 third...............................11 points

13.Babel.............................3 second......1 third................................10 points

14.Degen............................1 first...........1 second............................8 points

15.Insua.............................2 second......2 third...............................8 points

16.Kelly...............................1 first.......................................................5 points

17.Aquilani.........................1 second........1 third.............................4 points

18.Agger.............................4 third......................................................4 points

19.Dossena.........................1 second..............................................3 points

20.Riera..............................1 third.......................................................1 point.

 

 

 

Thanks for taking part.