The Liverpool Thread

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To be honest theres a good chance liverpool and united will both finish top 4. With united not in europe cant see any reason why they wont finish 3rd|4th.
 
ChrisBones1990 said:
To be honest theres a good chance liverpool and united will both finish top 4. With united not in europe cant see any reason why they wont finish 3rd|4th.
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The league is the most open it has ever been.

City and Chelsea almost guaranteed to be challenging for the title. A revitalised United? How will Liverpool cope without Suarez and wholesale changes? Arsenal will always be competing for top 4

Everton may be there abouts again and Spurs IMO will surprise a few as well... good manager and the likes of Lamela who i rate very highly can only improve as can many of their signings last year
 
Its shaping up to be most interesting season in years for sure. All the usual contenders have made great transfers.
 
dannydonnelly97 said:
LFC, it started from me fishing for bitter United fans, it worked, LEL.
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LFCMarshall said:
Fantastic article on why Liverpool 'wont do a Spurs'. Some very good points mentioned..

LIVERPOOL ARE GOING TO ‘DO A SPURS’ AREN’T THEY? // The Anfield WrapThe Anfield Wrap
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That's a lot of words for essentially not much content.

His main points seem to be:

1. Rodgers doesn't have to deal with backroom politicking: That's a fair point, albeit one that I believe has significantly less weight than he's giving it. AVB's backroom situation was dire, Rodgers' isn't, but I doubt that translates directly to a massive improvement on pitch. A happy backroom is very helpful, but not as much as he says.

2. Sturridge is a fine replacement for Suarez, and with the team focused around him he can score even more: I'd say that a large part of Sturridge's success was because of Suarez, with his inventiveness and intelligence in positioning and selfishness. As for the team being set up to take advantage of Suarez, I'm not entirely sure that's the case. The team was set up to play to the strengths on the counter, which suits Sturridge very well, but doesn't aid him any more than it did last season. Not to mention, of course, teams won't take Liverpool quite so lightly this time around. I'm expecting to see plenty more low blocks of the sort Liverpool (and specifically Rodgers) failed to adapt to against Chelsea, as lower teams mimic Mourinho.

3. The goals can be spread around between new players: Yes, fine, that makes sense in theory. Lambert's a handy striker, Remy's a better one, and Lallana chips in with goals. That's fine. Whether it works in practice is another whole matter. If Sturridge gets injured, is a strikeforce of Lambert and Remy going to suffice? I'm not certain it can.

4. "Liverpool don’t look ready to crack, fall or collapse any time soon. They’re too good for that; the manager’s too good for that and the players are too good for that.": I don't believe that for a second. AVB's a very good manager too, and he failed. Liverpool's squad is, I'd say, about on par with what Spurs were wielding on paper after Bale left, and they failed. Liverpool aren't special. This time round they don't have the third best player on the planet, and I honestly think that whilst Liverpool were less reliant on Suarez than Spurs were on Bale, Suarez now is a superior player to what Bale was then, and his effect creatively, offensively and as a talisman cannot be overstated. Too few people now are realising this.
 
GodCubed said:
That's a lot of words for essentially not much content.

His main points seem to be:

1. Rodgers doesn't have to deal with backroom politicking: That's a fair point, albeit one that I believe has significantly less weight than he's giving it. AVB's backroom situation was dire, Rodgers' isn't, but I doubt that translates directly to a massive improvement on pitch. A happy backroom is very helpful, but not as much as he says.

2. Sturridge is a fine replacement for Suarez, and with the team focused around him he can score even more: I'd say that a large part of Sturridge's success was because of Suarez, with his inventiveness and intelligence in positioning and selfishness. As for the team being set up to take advantage of Suarez, I'm not entirely sure that's the case. The team was set up to play to the strengths on the counter, which suits Sturridge very well, but doesn't aid him any more than it did last season. Not to mention, of course, teams won't take Liverpool quite so lightly this time around. I'm expecting to see plenty more low blocks of the sort Liverpool (and specifically Rodgers) failed to adapt to against Chelsea, as lower teams mimic Mourinho.

3. The goals can be spread around between new players: Yes, fine, that makes sense in theory. Lambert's a handy striker, Remy's a better one, and Lallana chips in with goals. That's fine. Whether it works in practice is another whole matter. If Sturridge gets injured, is a strikeforce of Lambert and Remy going to suffice? I'm not certain it can.

4. "Liverpool don’t look ready to crack, fall or collapse any time soon. They’re too good for that; the manager’s too good for that and the players are too good for that.": I don't believe that for a second. AVB's a very good manager too, and he failed. Liverpool's squad is, I'd say, about on par with what Spurs were wielding on paper after Bale left, and they failed. Liverpool aren't special. This time round they don't have the third best player on the planet, and I honestly think that whilst Liverpool were less reliant on Suarez than Spurs were on Bale, Suarez now is a superior player to what Bale was then, and his effect creatively, offensively and as a talisman cannot be overstated. Too few people now are realising this.
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1. I agree with this. Although it will help, it's not disastrous

2. When Suarez was not available Sturridge had his most fruitful period scoring 11 goals - He will miss being alongside Suarez but he was still the second top goalscorer in the Premier League last season and could flourish further being the main man... For years lower sides have defended at Anfield and that was the case last season as well so nothing will change in that aspect

3. We have a lot better squad depth. Last season we had nothing off the bench at all, this year we will have 2 or 3 who could make a difference. More goal scorers have been brought in and those are Premier League proven which always helps. Even if Sturridge gets injured, we play one up top with a strong midfield presence behind Remy/Lambert... Good enough IMO

4. It would be naive to believe it cannot happen to Liverpool, it can. However, i do think its highly unlikely to happen. Tottenham's squad was unbalanced with a lot of new players, all of which had never played in the Premier League. Liverpool have a side that finished in 2nd place and have added huge amount of squad depth, even if our best player has been sold.

Suarez's influence was huge, no doubt. But the results show we actually did better when he was not in the team points wise. It's not doom and gloom like some are suggesting

The Spurs link is coming from the fee's paid for their star players leaving. There is hardly any other similarities so far to how Liverpool have gone about their business compared to Spurs last season
 
LFCMarshall said:
2. When Suarez was not available Sturridge had his most fruitful period scoring 11 goals - He will miss being alongside Suarez but he was still the second top goalscorer in the Premier League last season and could flourish further being the main man... For years lower sides have defended at Anfield and that was the case last season as well so nothing will change in that aspect
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How much further? Are we realistically expecting Danny Sturridge to score what, 27 league goals this coming season? I say this as a person who's always advocated Danny Sturridge and enjoyed watching him play, but I don't think he's good enough (yet? perhaps) to score 27 goals. And bear in mind 27 is only 6 more, that leaves a shortfall of 25 still to be made up from Suarez.

Lower sides haven't defended at Anfield against this team like this before. To say "oh well we've been good before" is massively overlooking the main thrust of the argument, which is that this Liverpool team thrives on the counter and ripped people apart with it last year. If the opponent leaves one up top and two banks of four in their own third, this Liverpool side's main weapon is massively neutered. We saw it with Chelsea last year, I bet you we'll see it again this year. Essentially, your own success had wised people up. This Liverpool side is quick and industrious, but still lacks an artist to pick teams apart from deep, and that's where it'll hurt you the most.

3. We have a lot better squad depth. Last season we had nothing off the bench at all, this year we will have 2 or 3 who could make a difference. More goal scorers have been brought in and those are Premier League proven which always helps. Even if Sturridge gets injured, we play one up top with a strong midfield presence behind Remy/Lambert... Good enough IMO
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Very true, but I'm not sure it's enough. I know it's a supposition to 'what if', but if City have a main striker out - like indeed they do with Negredo - they can get by because they have such depth in quality, with Aguero and what not. United likewise: if RVP gets injured, they'll play Rooney there and draft in Shinji to fill the gap. With Arsenal's new signing of Alexis, they've sorted their depth problems up front and secured two starter quality in every position. I'm just not sure Liverpool have that. A player goes down and the dropoff in quality is reasonably big. Gerrard goes down, who replaces him? Emre Can? Lucas? Joe Allen? Likewise, Sterling turns his ankle, who takes up the mantle? Suso? Jordon Ibe? You get my point. Where Chelsea can replace Eden Hazard with a high quality Prem left winger like Schuerrle, Liverpool could replace Coutinho with Oussama Assaidi. That's the real problem with Liverpool's depth.

4. It would be naive to believe it cannot happen to Liverpool, it can. However, i do think its highly unlikely to happen. Tottenham's squad was unbalanced with a lot of new players, all of which had never played in the Premier League. Liverpool have a side that finished in 2nd place and have added huge amount of squad depth, even if our best player has been sold.

Suarez's influence was huge, no doubt. But the results show we actually did better when he was not in the team points wise. It's not doom and gloom like some are suggesting
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That's something of a fallacy though. Without Suarez you won more games than with him, but your chance creation was way lower (like half lower) and you scored fewer goals. Seemingly the only major thing that changes for the better statistically when Suarez isn't in the team is your win rate, which all stinks of a low sample size throwing off correct results.

The Spurs link is coming from the fee's paid for their star players leaving. There is hardly any other similarities so far to how Liverpool have gone about their business compared to Spurs last season
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Replacing star player with a handful of not as good ones, building depth but not necessarily depth in quality (arguably Spurs did more of the latter, in fact), bringing in no defensive reinforcements (again, Spurs actually did bring someone in, and needed to less). There's more than a few ways in which it's similar business, really.
 
Right now the lineup definitely doesn't look good enough. Still plenty of time left before window closes though. I get the feeling that transfers so far were mostly planned upfront without the knowledge the Suarez will be leaving. Selling was a good call but it probably caught Rodgers and the board a bit off guard. Liverpool would never sell him if Chiellini wasn't so tasty. Its onlly been 2 weeks, they're going to need more time to readjust the strategy for the season.
 
GodCubed said:
How much further? Are we realistically expecting Danny Sturridge to score what, 27 league goals this coming season? I say this as a person who's always advocated Danny Sturridge and enjoyed watching him play, but I don't think he's good enough (yet? perhaps) to score 27 goals. And bear in mind 27 is only 6 more, that leaves a shortfall of 25 still to be made up from Suarez.

Lower sides haven't defended at Anfield against this team like this before. To say "oh well we've been good before" is massively overlooking the main thrust of the argument, which is that this Liverpool team thrives on the counter and ripped people apart with it last year. If the opponent leaves one up top and two banks of four in their own third, this Liverpool side's main weapon is massively neutered. We saw it with Chelsea last year, I bet you we'll see it again this year. Essentially, your own success had wised people up. This Liverpool side is quick and industrious, but still lacks an artist to pick teams apart from deep, and that's where it'll hurt you the most.



Very true, but I'm not sure it's enough. I know it's a supposition to 'what if', but if City have a main striker out - like indeed they do with Negredo - they can get by because they have such depth in quality, with Aguero and what not. United likewise: if RVP gets injured, they'll play Rooney there and draft in Shinji to fill the gap. With Arsenal's new signing of Alexis, they've sorted their depth problems up front and secured two starter quality in every position. I'm just not sure Liverpool have that. A player goes down and the dropoff in quality is reasonably big. Gerrard goes down, who replaces him? Emre Can? Lucas? Joe Allen? Likewise, Sterling turns his ankle, who takes up the mantle? Suso? Jordon Ibe? You get my point. Where Chelsea can replace Eden Hazard with a high quality Prem left winger like Schuerrle, Liverpool could replace Coutinho with Oussama Assaidi. That's the real problem with Liverpool's depth.



That's something of a fallacy though. Without Suarez you won more games than with him, but your chance creation was way lower (like half lower) and you scored fewer goals. Seemingly the only major thing that changes for the better statistically when Suarez isn't in the team is your win rate, which all stinks of a low sample size throwing off correct results.



Replacing star player with a handful of not as good ones, building depth but not necessarily depth in quality (arguably Spurs did more of the latter, in fact), bringing in no defensive reinforcements (again, Spurs actually did bring someone in, and needed to less). There's more than a few ways in which it's similar business, really.
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I dont expect Sturridge to do much better than he did, but i expect more contribution from midfield rather than overly relying on Suarez

I still dont agree with the teams 'wising up'. When lower sides comes to Anfield, they defend. It has always been the case and again, will continue and not change - Chelsea were the only side that were good enough to keep us out by doing it. Liverpool's main strength is counter attacking but it is far from the only way of winning games

Lallana, Markovic, Sterling, Coutinho, Remy, Sturridge can all be used as our attacking options and the transfer window isn't shut. I would still expect a another attacker. Ibe, Suso there as back-up in terms of youth as well

Of course the depth it's not as good as the other sides, it hasn't been for a long, long time but it wasn't last season and we have improved our depth hugely.

I'm not saying we wont miss Suarez, anybody would but we did score an incredible amount of goals - lose Suarez's goals and we still scored more than 17 other Premier League teams. Although its a loose point with his creativity as well, we can afford to potentially score less and still succeed.

There is time for that, but we have never really replaced players left with star signings - Defensive reinforcements will come. Expect Lovren, Manquillo and a LB (Moreno, Bertrand?)

Manquillo, Glen and Flan - Sakho, Skrtel, Agger, Lovren - Enrique, new LB

suddenly looks a lot stronger all round
 
When people say "Liverpool will do a Spurs" they really aren't taking into account the fact Spurs really weren't that good.. Even with Bale. And if I remember correctly 12 months ago people on here were singing Tottenham's praises about how well they've done to secure some of Europe's top talent in exchange for an overrated winger. What a difference a year makes, eh?

At the end of the day Suarez scored 8 more goals last season than he did the year before, Liverpool finished 23 points higher last season than the year before. He's a huge loss but if you put a 23 point increase solely on the shoulders of one man's extra few goals and assists then you're denying Liverpool any credit for what has been a huge improvement in not only individual performances (Suarez, Sterling, Sturridge, Gerrard, Coutinho) but also a vast improvement in our approach and tactical play. Rodgers didn't win Manager of the Year because of Suarez, he won it because people recognised the improvements he's made to a Liverpool side that haven't looked confident on the pitch for at least the past five years.

Suarez is irreplaceable, no denying that. Anybody who tries to say it won't be hard without him is almost as deluded as the man who says we can't compete at all without him. We need to wait and see what sort of transfer dealings we do from now until the end of August, there's a long way to go before you can even begin towrite us off.
 
Aannddyy said:
When people say "Liverpool will do a Spurs" they really aren't taking into account the fact Spurs really weren't that good.. Even with Bale. And if I remember correctly 12 months ago people on here were singing Tottenham's praises about how well they've done to secure some of Europe's top talent in exchange for an overrated winger. What a difference a year makes, eh?

At the end of the day Suarez scored 8 more goals last season than he did the year before, Liverpool finished 23 points higher last season than the year before. He's a huge loss but if you put a 23 point increase solely on the shoulders of one man's extra few goals and assists then you're denying Liverpool any credit for what has been a huge improvement in not only individual performances (Suarez, Sterling, Sturridge, Gerrard, Coutinho) but also a vast improvement in our approach and tactical play. Rodgers didn't win Manager of the Year because of Suarez, he won it because people recognised the improvements he's made to a Liverpool side that haven't looked confident on the pitch for at least the past five years.

Suarez is irreplaceable, no denying that. Anybody who tries to say it won't be hard without him is almost as deluded as the man who says we can't compete at all without him. We need to wait and see what sort of transfer dealings we do from now until the end of August, there's a long way to go before you can even begin towrite us off.
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Tottenham almost had the same amount of points and goals in both season's with and without Bale - it was just the other sides improved and they didn't

It wasn't like they changed performances dramatically, they stayed at a similar level
 
Mig, Johnson, Lovren, Sakho, Moreno; Gerrard, Hendo; Markovic, Coutinho, Sterling; Sturridge.

Probably be our opening line up, either that or take Cou out and chuck Remy or Rickie up along with Studge.
 
LFCMarshall said:
Interesting stats comparing Henderson and Herrera...

View attachment 650329
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I didn't really get anything from this comparison if I'm honest.... Herrera played as mainly no.10 last year, whereas Henderson always played in the deep CM role alongside Gerrard.

However this season would be better to compare as they will most likely both be playing in the same position.
 
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