Turkish Delight

Lucas has excellent movement and while I'm unsure of his overall ability it means that other players have an option to pass too as he acts as a good link man for the rest of the team. I've been saying it for ages but when Mascherano and Alonso play together the movement isn't there and against good teams we end up with players getting isolated and conceding possession. This is what happened against Arsenal and prior to the Masch sending off against United.

:lol: I'll be having a few pints tonight and might try to get a bit frisky with the missus later if we win but there's no way I'd go that far! I mean who'd allow themselves to be videoed like that...:whistle:

I've gone for a bit of a stab in the dark one tonight and had a tenner on Babel first goal at 27/1 on Betfair mainly because the odds were ridiculously high. I fancy Chelsea to win over two legs but think they'll struggle in Turkey tonight. The atmosphere will be immense and I just don't think Chelsea are particularly good either. Good luck anyway!

I actually like him and think the movement and link up play in our midfield is better with him alongside Mascherano than it is when Xabi is there. He makes himself available for the ball both in front of the defence and when we're going forward. He ain't no superstar but at least he regularly makes himself available for the short pass which unfortunately can't be said of all our midfielders and certainly wasn't happening across the whole midfield at Old Trafford on Sunday.

Skrtel ran away with Tevez for the second goal instead of attacking the ball at the near post. If he'd attacked it then the ball wouldn't have reached Ronaldo. That's surely an individual mistake rather than a fault of the system.

I say.. Liverpool v Mancs Fenerbache v Schalke Barca v Arsenal Chelsea v Roma With semis being match 1 v match 2 and match 3 v match 4

I think they both have some truth in what they say. Gerrard is a fantastic player but if i have one criticism it is that at times he can play with his heart and not his head particularly when the team is struggling. I think that is what Rafa was suggesting when he said he was playing with too much passion in the derby as he wanted it so much he was trying to do everything himself. The team then improved massively with the introduction of Lucas as we started playing as a team and stretching their ten men. Having said that there is not one player in the world I would swap him for.

I agree with every word but sadly I guarantee that they will be twisted by "those in the media that don't like Liverpool" tomorrow to suggest that he's impatient and wants out.

Am I right in reading that he effectively believes that if we win the European cup again this season and Arsenal win nothing then Wenger has achieved more with his current team because his young team are full of potential with nothing to show for it while our young-ish team have less potential but are winning trophies? Don't get me wrong, Arsenal are a long way ahead of us this season and there is no doubting that they have the potential to be awesome but their ultimate goal is the Champions League and if we won that this season how can this article be treated as anything other than a load of shite. It effectively says "So what if Liverpool win Big Ears? Arsenal might win it one day so they have far more to be excited about". As a side note, if we got wanked over every time we played well but failed to take our chances and ended up with a draw we'd have drowned in the worst possible way a long time ago.

A manager's job isn't to be his employees' best mate. Gerrard has openly said in his biography that two of his favourite managers were Keegan and Houllier because they gave him the arm round the shoulder stuff but neither brought the best out of him as a player in the way that Benitez has. The same way in that it was Rafa who brought the best out of Carra as a player too. The media will bash Benitez all they can now as they smell blood but that article is just shite.

It's posts like this and people who have no idea of the big picture that make me made up that I'm fucking off to Florida for two weeks to forget about this shit. Peace out people.

I said this in another thread earlier. We only started playing proper pass and move football when he came on last night and because of his good movement he offers something that neither Alonso or Mascherano do and that is an attacking threat. If you are playing against a team who is going to sit deep and lump long balls forward I would play him and Gerrard together in the middle every time.

I'm happy with my day's gambling. Used a 15 quid free bet to do a £7.50 each way on AsK The Umpire at 6/1 in the 2 O'clock at Towcester and then had a tenner on the nose on Kings Euro in the 4 o'clock at 7/2. My only losing bet was doing a £7.50 each way double on Kings Euro with Bentley in the 3:50 at Southwell.

You're almost certainly right but when 90% of the teams we play are intent on by-passing the midfield by playing the ball over the top anyway does anybody else feel there isn't any real requirement for having an out-and-out defensive midfielder unless we're playing a top side?

This is slightly off the topic of the thread (I didn't see any bad reaction anyway so I don't really care) but did anybody else notice that we only started playing proper pass and move football when Lucas came on? I thought the same in the derby as well despite all of the uproar about Gerrard going off. I don't feel that Mascherano or Alonso are capable of playing in the way that Lucas does in that neither of them will get into an attacking position as their movement just isn't as good. Both have a tendency to slow the game down too much when they are in possession as well. We may lose something defensively without one of the two of them there but I do think we should try Gerrard and Lucas together against all but the best teams as I'm sick of getting frustrated by slow football that ultimately ends up going nowhere.

No but I didn't imagine them being forced into replays against Exeter City and Burton Albion who are also non-league in recent seasons either.

I know you're trying to be positive but I just can't share that outlook at the moment. Leeds spent their money on players and goldfish but we're spending it on 2 cowboys who are fleecing us. As terrible and unbelievably naive as Ridsdale was he did it with the intention of the club having a great team. Our owners are fleecing us to line their pockets. The only future I can see is one with a patsy of a manager that they'll bring in and no money for transfers. How on earth could any team with that set up challenge? If these two remain in charge then then days of us laughing at Everton will fast become a distant memory and since the only language they speak is money then mine is staying in my pocket. When they've fucked the club up and the day trippers stay at home instead of watching shite then they will regret the time when they alienated the regular match goers.

It will be it for me too. I've made my decision on that. The club I've loved for my whole life has turned into a fucking monster and I'm not gonna have some cunt like Hicks compare my devotion to it to somebody eating fucking Weetabix for breakfast. If I heard that cunt or his runt of a co-owner had dropped dead I'd celebrate it like a European cup win.

Totally agree. I'm sick of hearing how we need the new stadium to compete as well. With football people in charge I would completely agree but with these cunts it will be them reaping the benefits in terms of extra profits and not us in terms of there being more money for the team.

If DIC bought out just Gillett surely that would give Moores and Parry the control of decisions that neither agreed on. Or am I mistaken in that? If that was the case and they are anti-Hicks he'd have no real control over anything so his position would become very weak.

Do you mean in promising one thing (i.e not leveraging the club up) and then doing the complete opposite?

I'm not going to defend myself as I was ashamed of my actions that night. I was naive back then and took my job too seriously as opposed to seeing it as something that gives me money while I go on internet forums.

I once took home a mum of 5 who worked for me after a Christmas party a few years ago when I was wasted. She was pure filfth but it was like shagging a bucket. I woke up the next morning and she'd scratched me and bitten me so much it felt like I'd gone 10 rounds with a fucking lion. She also screamed so much she woke up all of my 3 housemates. After having a shower, I'd decided there were definitely going to be no repeats and made my way to work (in some pain) where I thought nobody would know what had gone on the night before. Unfortunately, we'd been seen jumping in a taxi and everybody did. Cue my boss giving me loads for it and warning me that there best hadn't be any repeats. The end result of that was at another works do a month later I stayed sober and ended up turning down the cutest 18 year old fittie you're ever likely to see who was throwing herself at me. She then got upset and everyone started talking about that instead. So ultimately, that one shit shag ended up costing me one I believe would have been far better and caused me loads of hassle.

I've been critical of my boss at times but he's big enough to take it with no problems and even if he was the type who would try to sack me I'd be suing the company's arse for wrongful dismissal anyway. In my opinion, yes men are of no use whatsoever in normal business and certainly not in football. As far as I can see they only want to sack him because he's trying to demand that they spend money on us and that's the last thing they want to do. I think your post misses the point anyway. This isn't just Rafa v American gobshites. It is a battle for the whole future security of the club and any player who has the balls to say something that doesn't tow the party line whether it be by backing Rafa or being critical of the way that these lying cunts are running the club will go up massively in my estimation. Just as John Arne Riise has there even if I'm not that big a fan of him as a player.

What a quote that is.