The misery and negativity on here right now is too much. In fact, it's just stupid when you look at things logically.
We are 10 games into the season. We also started last season a bit slowly and look at the run we went on. Hell, look at Suarez - he took 2 seasons to become a goal machine. It's not going to happen overnight. It might not happen at all. But you've got to have some faith.
Go back to the boot room days and we used to have new signings sit on the bench whilst they settled in playing for the reserves. The expectation was not for players to be an overnight success.
I'm not meaning to be a superfan - I get down too after a bad performance. But things need to be looked at in context, and of course that's very boring as instant success and entertainment is what it's all about today. And that's why football is so shite these days.
I agree. To a degree.
Last season we squeezed out wins. We weren't free-flowing. Suarez was still banned. But sturridge was scoring the goals needed to win us games and the team looked competent, if not explosive.
This season we are dropping points, we don't look competent (aside from Spurs, maybe), there is no Suarez, and Sturridge is out.
The argument of "its early, we're just 3 or 4 points off third" is of course very valid, and the points total for 3rd and 4th are going to be much lower this season. Everyone else is tripping over themselves, too.
But!
While we can agree to keep our cool, the argument shouldn't be pulled out to sweep everything under the carpet. Another five games like this, and suddenly we're digging a hole we'll spend the rest of the season fighting our way out of, just to scrape 4th or 5th. For now, we're getting away with it, but the concern from many is that the football is just turgid, turgid stuff.
And unlike your previous post Vishy, this has nothing to do with Lambert or Balotelli or our attack in my opinion.
The back four and midfield are the concern here, and not defensively, at least not for me; it's when we're in possession that these 6-7 players, no matter who they are, just look totally off the boil. Sloppy touches, sloppy passes (Lovren had so many stinkers yesterday it was incredible), not making the right movements, not being intelligent and proactive on or off the ball.
The result of this is that our attacking players never even get a whiff, an when they do its when they've dropped back in our own zone to make something happen. How many big chances has the squad generated for Lambert, Balotelli, etc? Almost none!
Coutinho and Sterling when he's played centrally have helped carry the ball forward - but their success has come just like that - not with passing, movement, but picking up the ball in the middle of the pitch and running with it into the 18yard box, using skill and tricks to get past the defense. When these two aren't in position or aren't in form, we look very, very poor.
Now as for summer signings, it's understandable to see knee-jerk reactions at this time of the year given how we're playing and our history with signings, spending big sums, and the 'committee', whatever it is; in a word, disastrous?
But here I think we need to chill out. Balotelli doesn't seem to fit us well, at least he isn't being used to his strengths one could argue. But can we really complain about any of the others? As individuals they've all had good performances - Lallana, Manquillo, Moreno, Can have all looked very good and what you'd have expected from them. Lovren... has had two poor games in QPR and Newcastle, but while he may not be the 20m-rated player we hoped for, he certainly isn't as shit as some on here would argue. And he's young and there's time to improve and be at his best. Lambert is a fine 3rd or 4th striker to have on the bench and one that is happy to play that role. Markovic is an unknown at this time and we just have to be patient - our poor form and performance this year so far shouldn't be used as a rope to hang the poor kid with, it's not his responsibility to save us!
So that's a pretty good amount of deals done, a few maybe over paid, and perhaps we can argue just missing the one quality signing - a striker, probably - which maybe in Origi we DID make but just don't have at Anfield just yet.
As for Rodgers, I share the same fears as some of the others here.
Perhaps the fear of regression dashes any hope for a purely objective view of our situation, but this season reminds me of his start to his first season, not last season: the ball gets pinged between the back four and one or two midfielders, the players look scared to make decisions or take risks, they are taking way too much time to move the ball on, and no one is running and making space (hence the struggle to move the ball on).
It also seems like there's acres of pitch between the back 4 and Gerrard/hendo or whoever drops back when Gerrard is under pressure, and the front 4. Which I recall being an issue during his first season - though that had more to do with the back four dropping too deep with the rest of the squad caught up field, with huge gaps for the opposition to exploit (which they did). I don't know if the causes are the same this time around.
So, from my armchair, it looks like Rodgers is trying to make his original ideas work again, and with the same type of results. It doesn't help that sturridge is out, but that can't be an acceptable response: "Oh, when sturridge is fit we'll be fine" - we can't have one player that's injury prone be the scapegoat and that is given the sole responsibility of shouldering the burden.
To summarize...
The team is underperforming, but so is everyone around us, so it isn't time to jump off the ledge just yet; however, we can't go on like this and we're not seeing improvement between games so far, which is very concerning.
Summer signings were good or all right.
Hurts that Suarez is gone and Sturridge is out, but its not our attack thats responsible for this malaise. The defense and midfield, in possession, just aren't playing well at all (and without the ball things are arguably worse from them).
Nothing we can do but hope Rodgers can solve the problems he has, be they ones he were given or he created. Whether that is going to involve a more pragmatic tactical approach, changes in training and preparation, changes in rotation and how personnel are selected, I don't know and frankly I don't care how he solves them just that he does.
But this is Rodgers dilemma and he'll rightly be judged by how the team performs going forward, and that's how it should be. The buck stops with him, that's why he makes the big bucks. He was pragmatic with Suarez and Sturridge last season, and we didn't just perform well we performed exceptionally well and that's credit to him (that is to say, it isn't all thanks to Suarez). Hopefully this season, with a much more difficult set of problems and without as sharp a set of tools (no suarez), he can work things out again.
