Topic: Xabi Alonso

[KingKolo]

Ah the summer of 2008...The most dreafull 3 months in modern Liverpool history, bar 2002...

Spent 38m on 2 complete failures, 2 backup players and one ok left attacking midfielders. Proceeded to waste 3 months chasing an overpriced, overrated, glorified utilty man and pissing off the classiest central midfielder we've had since Jan Molby.

Repercussions are still being felt today and will continue to be felt for a while.

Can't really argue with that.

[Lush is the best medicine...]

That was indefensible, and I remember thinking then "uh oh". Whatever the reason, pettiness, annoyance, genuine desire to develop Plessis (hmmm), it was still a very bad call. Adding insult to injury.

wasnt alonso carrying a knock at the time tho?

[redannie]

PS does no one else feel that so far this season we have missed Sami more?

[Brentieke]

PS does no one else feel that so far this season we have missed Sami more?

Not really, the problems we're having at set pieces we always had last season even with Sami in the squad.

[Joe Rogans Chin]

PS does no one else feel that so far this season we have missed Sami more?

No

I'd rather Alonso just swerved any questions on liverpool from now on. La liga has strted, lets all just move on. Him and Us.

The only reason he should be speaking about us, is if Real draw an English Team in Europe.

[Ron]

PS does no one else feel that so far this season we have missed Sami more?

No. But I still like him. The other one, who is now saying how mistreated he was by our coach, can just fuck right off.

[Red_Isle_Chap]

Another thread wanking over the loss of alonso is it?

He's left, get over it. If you can't get off the forum. I'm so utterly sick of seeing people bleat on about Alonso. He's not our player anymore. I don't care if Rafa kicked him in the balls and called him a manc, it's got no bearing on the team, and no bearing on our season whatsover.

Some of you seem to actively enjoy it, whinging on about things that have "ruined what would have been our best season ever" or the buying of players in the past. Grow the fuck up would you and try getting behind the players we do have.

[lfc_bhoy]

The Gareth Barry thing is hard to defend. Bad mistake by the gaffa. Then playing Plessis instead of Alonso at Sunderland put the cap on it. Their relationship must have been fucked after that.  Fortunately Alonso is a professional and he gave us his best in his last season. Christ, if he'd played in a few of those 0-0 draws we might have won it.

For fucks sake we had a game in Belgium a few days before and a return leg a week later, which we won after 120 minutes.  He made the right call, especially because we won both matches.   If Xabi was
slightly peeved because of that then I'm glad he's gone.


http://soccernet.espn.go.com/preview?id=241854&league=ENG.1&cc=5901

"There are doubts over Xabi Alonso and Yossi Benayoun following minor muscle injuries resulting from the game in Belgium, but Fabio Aurelio and Martin Skrtel are both back in contention."

That's just a little bit pathetic if you're being serious.

Acquilani will be back, Lucas will continue to improve, and most people will have moved on, not sure why that's pathetic.  Then again my loins don't ache when ever he comes out with an interview and gives the supporters of the club that made him the player he is today a two line shout out.

[Uhoh AureliOs]

Ah, the modern game....

Where modern supporters allow certain players to be bigger than the manager.

To any sane football person, no Liverpool player should be more important than Rafa Benitez so it certainly is time to stop whinging about whose fucking fault it is and remember that you actually support Liverpool FC.

Yep. 100% agree - the manager made a call which was his to make. He may or may not have got it right or wrong, I think it's too early to tell.

But Rafa is human, and he does/is capable of making a mistake. Nobody can get everything right, especially considering the mitigating circumstances in this case.

[red_Mark1980]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHF5OvjAxgU

That's the main thing that I miss when thinking about Alonso.

Really? I was glad about this when he left, finally we can stop singing it. Then some smart arse puts Albert Reira in to replance Alonso..

[uni]

To those who accusing Xabi of a mercenary or hiding behind excuse, grown up and reflect yourself.
You are just bitter toward Xabi, because OUR decisions have seemed work in his favor not ours at the time.
Be honest you just aren't happy with current situation and miss Xabi.

Don't forget that the decision was made by Rafa, clubs and Xabi, on the mutual consent after long consideration over many things not only money. I understand their decision and accepted it however don't like it.
Each one should be responsible for their own decision and should have only themselves to blame for.
So as a Liverpool supporter if you aren't happy I think you can blame club not ex-player.
And if you trust Rafa Benitez you shouldn't be bitter in the first place. However uncomfortable it looks now, in  Rafa's view that is step forwad in long term future. New team are being built in his desired way.
But to be honest I must admit it is getting more and more difficult to trust Rafa recent years though.

Anyway I'm glad Xabi still speak highly of us and Rafa. I would just thank our lucky for having such wonderfull person as our player 5 years and won precious trophies with him.

[PanchDeBurca]

Ah the summer of 2008...The most dreafull 3 months in modern Liverpool history, bar 2002...

Spent 38m on 2 complete failures, 2 backup players and one ok left attacking midfielders. Proceeded to waste 3 months chasing an overpriced, overrated, glorified utilty man and pissing off the classiest central midfielder we've had since Jan Molby.

Repercussions are still being felt today and will continue to be felt for a while.

Minds gone completly blank, Keane, Riera, who else??

Agree entirely with the post by the way

[Brentieke]

Minds gone completly blank, Keane, Riera, who else??

Agree entirely with the post by the way

Keane and Dossena- complete failures, Cavalieri and Ngog as backup and Riera as a mild success story.

[red_Mark1980]

Utimately the Rafa-Xabi thing, it was like having a gorgeous and talented wife at home and yet you still get tempted by some slapper at work, out of boredom mostly. You don't follow it through as it turns out said slapper is a real bitch and a wallet vampire (what the fuck were you thinking?!) and is also having it away with that tosser in Accounts not to mention god knows who else, but it's too late....your wife has seen 'that' text, and before you know it, she's at her parents, there's a solicitor's letter on the doormat, the joint account is frozen and you're fucked. Even the slapper won't give you the time of day anymore, she's moved on. And for what? A bizarre unfulfilled fetish that you must have been insane to pursue in the first place.

Really? So you know Gareth Barry wouldn't have worked well for us last season and how we might have had that little bit of quality to turn those draws we saw (yes, apparently when Alonso plays we were known to not win every game 4-0) into wins.

I'm not saying it would have happened, or that I think Barry is a better player than Alonso is. Merely trying to say that football is not a known quantity.

We pay Rafa (quite well as it happens) to make a gamble on a player, how he'll fit in with the system, players, fans and culture. Sometimes it works (Torres, Reina et al) sometimes it doesn't (Josemi, Degen et al) but for the most part I trust Rafa 100% -see its his job. I  might not agree and think "why the fuck are we signing him" but unlike Rafa I'm a marketing analyst- Not a football manager.

You take a gamble on a player and hope that it works, if it doesn't then you can only hope Rafa moves the player on as quickly as possible.  I wouldn't want Rafa's job - for me he has the hardest job in the league - he does brilliantly and I can honestly say I can think of no manager currently in the game who'd I would rather have.

He'd hate the comparison I'm sure but Rafa reminds me of Shanks ever so slightly

[Livid]

Delighted he's left, as now I can get on with enjoying watching him play.
One of my favourite non-United players around.
I've said it before on here, to me he was the best passer of a ball in this league since Scholes was in his prime.

[red_Mark1980]

Ah the summer of 2008...The most dreafull 3 months in modern Liverpool history, bar 2002...

Yeah, it was awful wasn't it? We went on our best league campaign for years.

Beat the mancs at Old Trafford 4-1, stuffed Madrid 4-0 and made Taggart crack up.

Yeah certainly the most dreadful 3 months in modern Liverpool history.. I can think of a few worse times - but then again I do remember things for a long time, like about twenty years

[rossipersempre]

Acquilani will be back, Lucas will continue to improve, and most people will have moved on, not sure why that's pathetic.  Then again my loins don't ache when ever he comes out with an interview and gives the supporters of the club that made him the player he is today a two line shout out.

It's pathetic because you said "won't even remember him in a months time anyway". Of course we need to move on now but saying that above is just fickle and bitter.

[PanchDeBurca]

See, changing Mascherano to another defensive midfielder would not alter your game plans, even if that replacement isn't as good as Mascherano. Mascherano is a pure destroyer. Rafa should have known that changing Alonso means changing game style.

Its like you saying what if Barca had to get rid of Toure or Xavi. Toure is a great player, younger than Xavi, but Xavi is 10 times more important to Barca. Same is true with Mascherano, a great player, younger than Alonso, but far less crucial, IMO.

I feel for Liverpool, because I thought last year Liverpool was superb. With 1-2 additions in crucial areas, which are wings for me, Liverpool could win the league. Robben, even if he's a massive c*nt, is much better than any wingers LFC has. May be even without additions, LFC could have won title. But the day I heard Alonso to Madrid transfer, I said that LFC has no chance. It is not even question of Xabi's individual qualities, it is just the fact that Liverpool will have a painful period of transition from one style to another. And points will be lost... crucial points.

Great post and sums up exactly how i feel, Masch is a great player but Alonso was the man in midfield who was unsaleable.  You've also highlighted the problem with Liverpool, we are rubbish out wide, still are if you ask me which means we are weaker in centre mid (no judgement yet on Acq) and still have poor attacking options in wide midfield. 

Also people mention our lack of goals from centre mid, for me there was a simple solution to get Alonso involved more in the box, have Masch sitting deeper and push alonso on, i.e swap them.  For me it was madness asking Masch to play in the more advanced role, can't shoot, passing average, absolutley no goal threat.  I think if we'd swaped them then we would have been much more threatening.  This combined with some true class out wide and we wouldn't have half as many 0-0's.

You have also mentioned the 1 man who i think could have solved this following Alonso's sale, idiot that he is he is still a true world class winger.  Question for people, would we have been better splashing 20m on Robben, moving Gerrard back and not signing the Roman??

Alonso was a brilliant player, my favourite since Fowler and without a shadow of doubt he will be sorely missed this season by the team and not just me.  this ridiculous fascination that Benitez has with Barry has cost us dearly as i said last year at the time

Can people honestly say that we are stronger starting this season than starting last season??  I can't and I really don't think we are strong enough to win it this year. 

[Art Vandelay]

Players come, players go.  It doesn't really matter why he's left the club, he's gone and we move on.

[Brentieke]

Yeah, it was awful wasn't it? We went on our best league campaign for years.

Beat the mancs at Old Trafford 4-1, stuffed Madrid 4-0 and made Taggart crack up.

Yeah certainly the most dreadful 3 months in modern Liverpool history.. I can think of a few worse times - but then again I do remember things for a long time, like about twenty years

We had an excellent season in spite of last summer not thanks to it. God knows what we would have achieved had we actually strenghtened the side significantly.

And mate, honestly, there's no need to bring Hillsborough into this. I was obviously talking about on the field matters in general about summer transfer windows in specific, hence the comparision to 2002

[PanchDeBurca]

Keane and Dossena- complete failures, Cavalieri and Ngog as backup and Riera as a mild success story.

Sorry of course, I remember last August i was speaking to an Italian colleague who knew his soccer and he said that Dossena was an excellent player, a real attacking wing back with good delivery.  I was so excited.  Isn't it funny how it sometimes just doesn't work out for a player. 

[AlanK]

PS does no one else feel that so far this season we have missed Sami more?

I don't think we've missed Alonso that much at all this season. Other than the first half at Spurs,( when we were truely wretched), we have, at worst, shared midfield dominance but overall bossed every midfield since and dominated possession.
I think we've missed the ability to defend set-pieces

W

[red_Mark1980]

We had an excellent season in spite of last summer not thanks to it. God knows what we would have achieved had we actually strenghtened the side significantly.

And mate, honestly, there's no need to bring Hillsborough into this. I was obviously talking about on the field matters in general about summer transfer windows in specific, hence the comparision to 2002

Well if we had brought in other players (Barry? Not sure who was feasible and available) who's to say the season would have turned out better? No-one knows thats why we watch football every year.

And I dont think it was obvious you were talking about on the field matters. Sorry for any offence but if you dont say it how can people be expected to know?

[rossipersempre]

Sorry of course, I remember last August i was speaking to an Italian colleague who knew his soccer and he said that Dossena was an excellent player, a real attacking wing back with good delivery.  I was so excited.  Isn't it funny how it sometimes just doesn't work out for a player. 

I think you're being unfair writing off Dossena there. He was in a new country, a new league, a new language, very little pre-season so ended up unfit and overweight, and on top of that an in-form Aurelio ahead of him.

Even disregarding those two glorious fourth goals, I think he's improved a lot since the turn of the year, looked sharp and lively when he's played and shown real signs of becoming a very useful left mid for us. And on top of that, has always been very respectful even when it looked like Juve would come in for him. Never moaned or whinged. And so I'm glad that he's stayed in the end.

[PanchDeBurca]

I don't think we've missed Alonso that much at all this season. Other than the first half at Spurs,( when we were truely wretched), we have, at worst, shared midfield dominance but overall bossed every midfield since and dominated possession.
I think we've missed the ability to defend set-pieces

W

villa played pretty well in centre mid even without barry, but there is no doubt that our defense needs a good kick up the ass to sort itself out

I also think that Gerrard will be the biggest loser in alonso going, the amount of quality ball that he was picking up from Alonso last year made it easy for him.  Will that supply line exist this year??  Alonso Masch for me was one of the best midfield partnerships in the world, they dominated in nearly every game they played together. it will take some doing for us to be able to replicate their dominance of games given the current players

[Brentieke]

I think you're being unfair writing off Dossena there. He was in a new country, a new league, a new language, very little pre-season so ended up unfit and overweight, and on top of that an in-form Aurelio ahead of him.

Even disregarding those two glorious fourth goals, I think he's improved a lot since the turn of the year, looked sharp and lively when he's played and shown real signs of becoming a very useful left mid for us. And on top of that, has always been very respectful even when it looked like Juve would come in for him. Never moaned or whinged. And so I'm glad that he's stayed in the end.

Well the fact remains, we bought him to become our first choice left back.

He's now our 3rd choice left back, behind a kid, and our 4th choice left midfielder.

All in all, of all our senior players, he's most probably the least important member of the squad.

[The Red artist.]

Rafa fucked up and as a result we've lost one of the best players in the world. This blind love for our manager is just incedible. I dont blame Xabi one bit, good luck to him.

[rossipersempre]

Well if we had brought in other players (Barry? Not sure who was feasible and available) who's to say the season would have turned out better? No-one knows thats why we watch football every year.

And I dont think it was obvious you were talking about on the field matters. Sorry for any offence but if you dont say it how can people be expected to know?

You completely missed my point about Barry. Easy to say "oh he could have been good" when to be honest, he wasn't fit to lace Xabi's boots, as we all saw when England played Spain last autumn. The gulf in class was shown to be Grand Canyon-sized. But whatever, I was talking about Rafa's total misreading of Barry's character. He essentially fucked off a Spanish midfield maestro who loved the club in a bizarre and clumsy pursuit of an inferior player who it turned out in the end, really couldn't give a shit about LFC and was just interested in money as many of us suspected all along. Not Rafa's finest hour it must be said.

[Brentieke]

Well if we had brought in other players (Barry? Not sure who was feasible and available) who's to say the season would have turned out better? No-one knows thats why we watch football every year.

And I dont think it was obvious you were talking about on the field matters. Sorry for any offence but if you dont say it how can people be expected to know?

End of the day, we did not improve our squad despite spending 38m gross.

We lost Crouch and Riise and replaced them by inferior players, Riera was an improvement on Kewell but that's about it.

We lost out on Rafa's first choice target which in turn led to one of our most important players deciding he wanted to leave.

It was a terrible summer mate, and like I said it's repercussions are still being felt today.

As for the second point, I maybe should have explained it better, I agree.

[red_Mark1980]

You completely missed my point about Barry. Easy to say "oh he could have been good" when to be honest, he wasn't fit to lace Xabi's boots, as we all saw when England played Spain last autumn. The gulf in class was shown to be Grand Canyon-sized. But whatever, I was talking about Rafa's total misreading of Barry's character. He essentially fucked off a Spanish midfield maestro who loved the club in a bizarre and clumsy pursuit of an inferior player who it turned out in the end, really couldn't give a shit about LFC and was just interested in money as many of us suspected all along. Not Rafa's finest hour it must be said.

No it wasn't and I was glad last summer when we didn't get Barry - but its unfair to judge the lad on one international game..

As for his character, yes I agree with you - he's displayed this summer what he is about money.
But I know how hard it is to know what goes on in peoples head's - Rafa got it wrong he moved on and its a shame Alonso couldn't

[AlanK]

End of the day, we did not improve our squad despite spending 38m gross.

And yet there we were in May, just about to finish with our highest points total EVER in a 38 match season and still in with a chance to win the league. Strange that.

[PanchDeBurca]

I think you're being unfair writing off Dossena there. He was in a new country, a new league, a new language, very little pre-season so ended up unfit and overweight, and on top of that an in-form Aurelio ahead of him.

Even disregarding those two glorious fourth goals, I think he's improved a lot since the turn of the year, looked sharp and lively when he's played and shown real signs of becoming a very useful left mid for us. And on top of that, has always been very respectful even when it looked like Juve would come in for him. Never moaned or whinged. And so I'm glad that he's stayed in the end.

Perhaps a little unfair and i accept everything you say, new league etc but you have to admit that the very best you could say about his last season was that he was average and i think thats being kind.  I have no problem with Dossena just saying that i was very disappointed in how he turned out considering he'd cost what nearly 7m and my italian friend had good things to say about him, but he's still here so he could imporve this season, he'll need to improve a lot though to get a place in the team

[PanchDeBurca]

And yet there we were in May, just about to finish with our highest points total EVER in a 38 match season and still in with a chance to win the league. Strange that.

Nearly never caught the bus, we nearly won it but didn't (and being honest with ourselves as soon as Man U overtook us in Jan we were never going to win it, or should i say they were never going to loose it)  It really was a title that we should have won

The question is if we had spent the 38m better would we have won it??  we'll never know of course but questions can certainly be asked of that transfer windows goings on

[PanchDeBurca]

You completely missed my point about Barry. Easy to say "oh he could have been good" when to be honest, he wasn't fit to lace Xabi's boots, as we all saw when England played Spain last autumn. The gulf in class was shown to be Grand Canyon-sized. But whatever, I was talking about Rafa's total misreading of Barry's character. He essentially fucked off a Spanish midfield maestro who loved the club in a bizarre and clumsy pursuit of an inferior player who it turned out in the end, really couldn't give a shit about LFC and was just interested in money as many of us suspected all along. Not Rafa's finest hour it must be said.

Agree completly with this, it was madness by Rafa last summer, there was absolutley no justification for it whatsoever.  For me that could turn out to be a pivotal moment in Rafa's tenure at Liverpool, will he be able to adapt his teams style quickly now that he has sold alonso??  Its going to be a very interesting season for Liverpool I think but in a way that may surprise a few

[GinuWhine]

So, it DOES come down to bad man-management afterall.

You're having a laugh. Rafa's job is to determine how to improve the team. If his professional opinion is we needed more goals from midfield because Xabi and Masch both had very poor goal returns, he made an executive decision. He is paid to make those though decisions. At that time Xabi was 2 years or so away from 30, while Masch was younger. You guys have to get over your wankfest for Xabi - it's truly pathetic. And not only that, we got 30m rising to 34m for a player who'll be in his 30s in a year. Give me a break.

[G1 Jockey 4(betfair)]

That is precisely why i have no ill-feeling towards Xabi, don't blame him one bit for wanting to move. Not having at go at Rafa either btw.

ive come across this type of player before.
they perform in their comfort zone and you have to keep needling the fuckers to do other things you want.

imo rafa lost a  bit of patience and wether it be xabis ego or being unable to follow instructions it turned his mind to leaving.

the "tough " decision is bollocks.

he may be a great passer but something clearly stinks here.
whether it be a typical primadonna ego or a lack of love for the club?


i could be wrong and it could be alonso realising that his linitations were getting found out in our ever developing style.

[PanchDeBurca]

You're having a laugh. Rafa's job is to determine how to improve the team. If his professional opinion is we needed more goals from midfield because Xabi and Masch both had very poor goal returns, he made an executive decision. He is paid to make those though decisions. At that time Xabi was 2 years or so away from 30, while Masch was younger. You guys have to get over your wankfest for Xabi - it's truly pathetic. And not only that, we got 30m rising to 34m for a player who'll be in his 30s in a year. Give me a break.

I think you'll find that last summer he was 26 not 28, he won't be 28 till later this year.  Age was not a factor in Rafa's stupidity (anway Barry is a year older than Alonso so i don't see why your bringing age into it)

You call it exectuvie decision, I call it stupid decision.  you simply cannot say that Barry is a better player than Alonso (not fit to tie his boots in my opinion) and for me we would have taken a big step back last year had the transfers occurred.  Lets just wait and see what happens to us

[lfc_bhoy]

It's pathetic because you said "won't even remember him in a months time anyway". Of course we need to move on now but saying that above is just fickle and bitter.

I'm one of the few people on this forum, if not the only one who wasn't bothered about him leaving.  I'm not going to change tune now that he's gone and say what a wonderful player he was and how his departure has had such an impact seismographs went off all over Europe, houses shook, plates were broken, men, women and children screamed "why" at the heavens.  He's gone, we'll be fine, better even, without him, and I honestly think in a month this won't even be an issue, by all means though, continue your self-flagellation.

[djphal]

Alonso had done fuck all for 2 seasons when we tried to sell him and Rafa was right to try and sell him at the time
Its not bad man management trying to sell a player who is not performing
funny how no one would pay 18 mil for him after he had been playing shit, it shows how much he improved last year as his price nearly doubled, people who blame Rafa for Alonso wanting to leave are fucking clueless

Agree completly with this, it was madness by Rafa last summer, there was absolutley no justification for it whatsoever. 

This is absolute bollocks

[Stussy]

Never heard of this guy, who is he.