Wanted to write my piece before a ball was kicked, but I overdid it in the Benteke thread and… well… Let’s just say I missed this place!
Here goes anyways.
First of all, I find it absolutely shocking that having wasted the money we did last year the transfer committee has survived. How the coaching staff took the blame for our utter ineptness in the transfer market, I have no clue. I said at the end of last season that if the committee wasn't changed, then we'll have a similar or worse season than last year. And I stand by that now- even though, as I write this, we have 6 points out of 6.
For What makes us stand out? Absolutely nothing. What position of our team can you say is “very strong”? Not one. We don’t have “the best midfield in the world”of the Rafa years, the miserly defence of Houllier peak or the Mouth watering goal threat of the 18 months of peak Brendan Rodgers. We don’t have the world class individual players that won us trophies or pushed us to top 4 in the past.
I can always remember thinking under Evans “We’need to fix the defence and we’ll win everything”. Under Houllier and Rafa it was “We need more creativity”. Now? We need the defence fixing, the creativity improved and the attack strengthened. Every single part of the team has issues.
For me, this is the worst side we’ve had for 23 years.
I look around the side and think to myself: how many world class players do we have? None. How many great players do we have?
At an absolute push, we have 2 of them. Sturridge, when fit (which is basically very rarely) and Coutinho (who remains very inconsistent). That’s it.
We have a bunch of good players (Clyne, Milner, Henderson, Benteke) and lot of Ok ones (Moreno, Skrtel, Mignolet, Sakho, Lallana, Allen, Lucas) and a shitload of potential (Gomez, Ibe, Can, Markovic, Origi). We also have loads of average players (Toure, Enrique, Lovren, Ings, Borini, Balotelli etc…).
Everything is much of a muchness. I can’t recall a time when it’s been like this. At our worst under Hodgson, we still had Torres and Gerrard. What do we have now?
I just do not understand how this is possible after spending so much on players. We have 5 players in our squad who cost 20m or more. The manager has had 7 transfer windows and 3 years working for this club under his belt.
I just cannot fathom how he wants to play this year. I was at Anfield Monday to see long balls pumped to Benteke who was knocking it down to no-one or to Coutinho to run after. What an absolute waste of Coutinho’s talent that is. If that’s how Rodgers wants to play this year, he should have gone and found the next Jermain Defoe and Stewart Downing.
He’s had 3 years with this team coaching them to play a certain style. Why, if his plan to fix the team was to buy Benteke and go more direct, did we not spend last season getting the players used to playing that way? We had 2 target men strikers in the squad. He never used them- on the contrary, he preferred playing a midfielder in attack in order to keep our “style of play”consistent with what he had coached before. And now everything has been thrown out of the window.
Basically, last season was an absolute waste from start to finish. It didn’t get us used to playing a certain style. It didn’t get us used to a new formation. It was just an absolute waste. The young players that got game time (Can, Markovic, Ibe) got the minutes playing in positions they won't be playing in this season. Just a waste.
The change of style for me is extremely worrying and sums up where Rodgers is at. He has basically completely compromised his principles- which for me is the number 1 sign that a manager is under pressure. If this style persists (and with Benteke in the side it will be folly not to go more direct) then the work he's put in in his 3 years at the club means nothing anymore. It is quite staggering to say that this is basically year Zero of a new project.
The midfield is too similar. Rodgers was quoted once as saying that we lost the league because Jordan Henderson was suspended and we had no one to replace him. Well, you look at our midfield now and all there are are Jordan Hendersons.
Milner, Can, Henderson, Allen… Exactly the same player. Run around a lot, put a shift in, tackles here and there, press and that’s your lot. You can play 2 out of any of those 4 and you'll get basically the same thing.
Where’s the creativity? Where’s the goal threat? Where’s the variety? They all do the same job and we are desperately lacking creativity, penetrative passing and goal threat from there.
My feelings on Benteke are well documented and got me a ban. I’ll pass on that. To resume it, we’ve signed someone who demands a shift in philosophy in our team. It’s been the plague of Liverpool for 2 decades and we’ve seen already how that style is changing.
The attacking midfield revolves around Coutinho. I have completely lost all hope in Lallana, who neither has the physicality or pace to make that much difference. Ibe and Markovic both have talent- and are both very young. We can’t depend on them. We are greatly lacking in pace in midfield. The fact that Moreno ran very quickly in a straight line was the highlight of Monday says absolutely everything.
Firmino is the big unknown- but all reports on him is that he’s more German than Brazilian- i.e. good tactically, disciplined and works hard. Creativity and pace doesn’t seem to be his forte. I will happily admit that he is an unknown quantity but we really need him to be as good as people hope and his price suggests because if he isn’t we are at the mercy of Coutinho’s fitness and form for our creativity all season.
The defence is what it is. There are problems within it and they are not helped by the fact there is no defensive midfielder ahead of them. Hyypia and Henchoz had Hamann, Agger and Carragher had Mascherano. These poor fuckers have no-one- and they’re not the best defenders in the world to begin with. Clyne looks good though.
Mignolet is Mignolet. We know he ain’t the best around.
All in all, there’s absolutely nothing there for me to suggest we’ll have a good season. We’ve won 6 points out of 6 so far but could have had no complaints if we’d had just 2 points or even none. We’ve played 2 of the most boring games of football since the Roy Hodgson era.
For me, this is a Gerard Houllier side without a defensive midfielder and Michael Owen- just Emile Heskey up front. I will be extremely surprised if we come back from behind to win a game once all season. This team has struggled to create chances for a full year now and there are no signs pointing to that changing. The moment we go a goal behind I think that’s all she wrote.
There is one thing that can make us have a good season (And by good I mean sneaking top 4 and winning a cup)- that’s Sturridge coming back and hitting peak form straight away (a la Suarez 2 years ago) and Firmino making the impact of a Sanchez last year. That’s what I’m clinging to.
Otherwise, this season could very wellbe the end of Brendan Rodgers.
Personally, I see us finishing between 6th and 8th. Out of the cups early too. Benteke won’t hit 12 league goals from open play, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see Rodgers gone before the season ends.
Obviously completely conscious of the fact I'll be called a miserable and negative twat. But that's how I see it.