Four Players that Roy is already losing faith in

Liverpool manager Roy Hodgson apologised to Reds fans after the abject display against Northampton Town last night:

“I don’t think we came anywhere near what I hoped to see apart from in the last 15 minutes of extra-time when we made a superb effort after going 2-1 down.  All I can do is congratulate Northampton and apologise to everyone; the fans came expecting to see us win and I expected us to win but it wasn’t to be. These players have to accept responsibility. I accept responsibility for changing a lot of players in the team, I did it because I honestly thought the players I put on the field were good enough to win the game and they weren’t.”

Although there are many things that Roy Hodgson could be blamed for in the last night’s display, his team selection should not be one of them. The starting eleven that played against the Cobblers should have been more than enough to see off the League Two side easily; something that Roy was very clear to say after the match. It would be hypocritical of me too to criticise the selection, after all I, like many other fans, have talked about the inclusion of youngsters in more first team matches. The inclusion from the start of Dani Pacheco, Jay Spearing, Martin Kelly and Danny Wilson as well as Jonjo Shelvey, Tom Ince and Nathan Eccleston, coming off the bench in extra time, shows that Roy was showing faith in youth. That the ploy backfired won’t get criticism from me, but more of a concern, is the lack of performance from four of Liverpool’s most experienced players. It was a concern Roy also had when speaking after the game:

“The obvious conclusion to that was I shouldn’t have changed that many players but we should have been strong enough to get a result. We must all take our responsibility. I am just bitterly disappointed that the team I had so much faith in did not repay that faith this evening with the exception of one or two performances. . . They (the players) will have to do a lot of work to get themselves back into favour, but it’s early doors for some of them. Some of the players who played tonight are still quite young. But it’s enough for me to say I am very disappointed and you can see that on my face. . .I will learn an awful lot from this defeat tonight about an awful lot of people. It’s not just myself who will be disappointed and upset that things didn’t go our way – there are lots of players who played tonight who will be disappointed as well.”

So who was he talking about specifically? It is probably unlikely that he was speaking about Milan Jovanovic or David Ngog who scored the two goals on the night. The most likely candidates are:

Continue reading on page 2

EA Sports’ New MMA Game!