There is a certain myth around Liverpool FC that needs to be broken, a lie that we tell ourselves as Liverpool fans that we need to stop pervading, and it is that some senior players can do no wrong. When Liverpool perform well these players are lauded; praised for their awesome influence on ordinary mortals that made these secondary players perform above their usual level. They may have provided no goals, assists or even any defence-splitting passes, or match-winning tackles, and they may, themselves, have performed decidedly averagely but it will have been them that instigated the win, nonetheless. However, when the result goes badly or the team performs badly, they are exonerated of all blame and it’s as if they weren’t even on the field when the game took place; Lucas, Skrtel, Ngog or another ‘lesser’ player will be the fall guys instead. At the moment, there are three players that are performing well, well below par on a regular basis and have so far – mostly – avoided criticism, or been dropped.
For so long, Liverpool FC fans have dreamed of a team of Carraghers. Now, sadly, seeing even one Jamie Carragher in a Liverpool side is an indication that errors may be made and the defence may be shaky. That is not to say that the defensive fragility Liverpool have shown this season is entirely Carragher’s fault; it isn’t, but he has become a shadow of himself in the past 2 months. Whether or not our vice-Captains performances are just a symptom of wider problems or not, the simple fact remains: he needs to be dropped, if not least of all for the good of the team but also for the good of his own confidence. A spell out of the first team – however much he might resent it – can only be good for Carragher’s mental state of mind. For so long he has been un-droppable, and not for a moment is that to suggest that Jamie has let his performance drop through laziness, or feeling overly secure in his position but he has become stale, irritable and when Liverpool come under pressure he is beginning to resemble a wild man; screaming at officials and blaming his team-mates for his own mistakes. He is making more mistakes than usual; showing uncharacteristic lapses in concentration and needs to be taken out of the fray, at least for a few weeks. Give Agger his place back and see what Skrtel and Agger can do together to shore up a leaking defensive line. At the age Carragher is at now, any serious drop in form could be permanent if left to deteriorate further, and if Agger is not given games soon, we could risk losing them both.
Secondly, Steven Gerrard needs to take a moment to address what is happening with his performances and his inconsistent form. One minute, he’s scoring two goals in 10 minutes against Man Utd, the next; he’s going missing for entire games at a time. I’m well aware of Gerrard’s match winning attributes, and if it hadn’t been for his goals in the past 2 league games, the results would’ve looked much worse than they did by the end but had the Captain been performing, marshalling his troops and just generally putting in a good shift himself, then it’s likely that the results would never have needed ‘saving’ in the first place. Now, this is not a slight on Gerrard’s abilities, his value to the team or his status as a genuine, rock-solid world class midfielder but at times last season was perhaps his worst in recent memory and this season has started similarly. If his goals contributions of the past couple of weeks are not to be a wasted catalyst, then our Captain needs to be the man to stand up and be counted, and give the rest of the side – lost, disillusioned and seemingly bereft of guidance as they are at the moment – an example (and one that has, all too often, not been there lately) to follow. An alternative to this would be to take the Captaincy away from Gerrard, pass it to another well-respected team-mate; who is capable of leading from the front (or back) – Reina. The freedom Gerrard would be given could enable him to concentrate solely on getting his own game back in order. As big and as hard as he may be Gerrard is one of our most mentally fragile players. Whatever the reason may be, something is affecting his form, in terms of game-to-game consistency and cannot be allowed to influence the rest of the side by proxy. Gerrard is our best player that much is fact but he cannot be allowed to escape criticism; not if we are all to remain in our belief that no man is bigger than the club.
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i think that we need to put Gerrard behind Torres.two seasons ago,these two were an unstopabble striking duo.Joe Cole can play as a winger,even though his preferred position is behind the striker.something like that:
Reina
Johnson Carragher/Skrtel Agger Konchesky
Kuyt Poulsen Meireles Cole
Gerrard
Torres
or against smaller teams in Anfield:
Reina
Johnson Carragher/Skrtel Agger Konchesky
Kuyt Gerrard Meireles Cole
N’Gog Torres
N’Gog has developed since last season a lot.i would like to see a 4-4-2 with torres and him up front.Cole should be used as a winger as we dont have a lot of wingers with pace.Kuyt is the only winger,except Cole,who plays well as a winger.Maxi and Babel should have chances,but if they keep this low performances coming,they should be offloaded.i actually expect babel to make an impact but i am afraid that Maxi will be sold fairly,due to his bad performances.
Hi David , very good article , I agree 100 % , it is time sentiments are put aside for good of our club and Carra must be droped when not performing we leaked to many goals in 6 matches, also it is time we look at another captain to inspire , I am afraid Steve G does not anymore.
Furthermore SG should please give other players the opportunity to take the set pieces and who knows we may discover a specialistho can get goals for us.
I agree Yunus – very good article. I also agree with your comments
I agree 100%.. Carragher as much as I like the guy is passed it. Torres (great player) doesnt want to be here and gerrard’s form dipped last seanson and as far as im concerned he is yet to recapture it. This would be my first team for mid week.
Reina
Kelly,Skrtel,Agger,Carragher
Johnson,Gerrard,Meireles,Cole
Kuyt,Babel
there is little wrong with our team, confidence needs boosting thats all – if we had a team of carraghers every game would end 0-0
Gerrard is still improving with each game and is the driving force in the team. Maxi needs to get sold cos he aint fast enough or skillfull enough to deal with the premireship. Use Bable on the right wing, cole on the left, push Dirk up with Fernando and have Stevie and Raul in the middle.
Sell Maxi and as I keep saying get Turan!!!!!!
Team to play;
Reina
Johnson Agger Skrtle Aurelio
Kuyt Miereles Gerrard Cole
Pacheco
Torres
Carra is proving a liability, Maxi has no urgency, Babel inconsistant so maybe its time to try a few of our hungrier starlets to get some game time. Kelly, Spearing, Eccleston, Suso and Sterling for example……
Roy get the team playing as a team or move over and let Kenny take over…..
A thoughtful piece indeed. I hold the opinion that too much emphasis is put on Torres. Now this might be thought of as inconceivable but he should be sold in the January window. He is showing irrefutable evidence of his lack of ambition and is simply treading water until he can leave. This is unacceptable behaviour considering Ngog and also Jovanovic put every effort into their performances.
With Ngog Jovanovic Babel Pacheco Gerard and Cole it is surely better to field a more offensive front line? If we have no offensive forward play then irrespective off what happens off-stage we are going nowhere but down! Time for some some excruciatingly progressive decisions before it is relly too late…
Seriously? The article is bad enough, but for each and every response to be in agreement saddens me.
I have only seen this site a few times, and mainly for news, but this as an opinion piece is stunningly bad.
Admittedly Torres is not firing, nor are Gerrard or Carragher, but to suggest that the answer is to drop any of them, let alone all of them is astounding.
Carra needs to be dropped for his confidence sake… Stevie needs the captaincy taking off him to give him a lift? For gods sake don’t take up life coaching or a job with the samaritans, you’ll force people into suicide.
Our defensive frailties so far stem far more from our inability to keep hold of possession and the constant exposing of our full backs that it has Jamie Carragher. Glen Johnson has been appaulinngly poor so far this season and Konchesky is yet to put in a decent display. Before he arrived, Agger was full back and clearly isnt comfortable there, or capable for that matter.
Finally, Torre needs more games, not less. He struggled with injuries for much of last season, barely kicked a ball during the world cup before picking up another which meant he didnt play a single minute of pre-season. Of course he is struggling for sharpness.
I have been as frustrated as anyone by his petulance at times, but this isnt new to this season, he has acted the same way throughout his liverpool career. If things arent going well for him, if he doesnt think he’s getting the decisions from the ref, he strops about. There have been many games where he has stropped about until scoring a blindingly good goal and it is all forgotten. 2 or 3 goals (in hopefully the next 2 or 3 games) and he will be back to being the cherished son, and rightfully so.
So to summarise, your article is nonsense.
BLINDSIDE:
Can i ask if you typed that with a straight face?
Sell Torres and we are knackered, the same way as we are if we sell Gerrard. And I will explain why if i need to…
I think a lot of people have missed some major points here. Carragher as spent most of his career playing at centre half as well as covering for our sub-standard full backs over the years. He gets unfairly slated in my opinion, yes the pace has gone (but he never really had it in the first place) but he always covers for Johnson whose positional sense is nill. As for Gerrard, against Sunderland at the weekend he was played as one of 2 holding midfielders alongside the inept Poulsen. SG has been our best player for many years now and he can’t go on bailing the team out forever, but on Saturday with 6 mins injury time he was practically playing alongside Carra at centre half. Our most influencial player standing on the halfway line deep into injury time pathetic, only one person to blame, Hodgson. Torres needs a partner he was loads better when Ngog came on. We have no wingers so we should adopt the 4-3-3 system that Chelsea use so effectively. My line up would be:
Reina
Kelly – Carra – Agger – Konchesky
Johnson – Gerrard – Meireles
Kuyt – Torres – Cole
KEKKER:
I agree with you on most of that, other than the 4-3-3
Our full backs are a problem for me, but more of a problem is our lack of width and 433 would exacerbate this further in my opinion.
I agree with highlighting the full backs and Poulson though, both need a real kick up the backside.
I think we have 3 or 4 options that would compliment Torres, but the problem is that each of them detracts from the team elsewhere.
The overriding problem is a lack of quality in wide positions, and lets be honest, we’ve been trying to solve that since McManaman left.
great article, agree with everything except taking the armband off stevie.
i don’t think we will lose nando, i think we have ALREADY lost nando! when did you ever see SG and torres combine to score a goal, never mind a vital equaliser, yet NOT celebrate together?? but i DO believe nando should be man enough to say ‘the club have shafted me so i want to leave but until i can go i will give 100% for the fans who have shown nothing but love and support’ i for one wouldn’t blame him for leaving because not only have the club let him down but so has hodgson by not bringing in support, we ALL knew masch would get his move so he didn’t need a deadline day panic, he had plenty of time, i’m afraid pique’s quotes are spot on! perhaps there are new owners waiting on the RBS and they can convince him to stay BY THEIR ACTIONS! otherwise we should say thankyou and good luck nando but i would hate to see him jeopardise his relationship with the fans by continuing with this attitude!
finally, on carra…i’ve been saying the same thing since midway through last season only to be shot down by the sentimentalists! i think he should be phased out while his legendary status is still intact!
My line up would be:
Reina
Kelly – Carra/Skrtel – Agger – Konchesky
Kuyt – Gerrard – Meireles – Cole
Torres – Ngog
Subs:
Jones
Johnson
Jovanovich
Pachecho
Lucas
Maxi
What a stupid article, all players no matter how good they are go through bad spells. The articles mentions Gerrard scoring twice against the mancs they disappearing for whole games……To my knowledge Gerrad has only played once since his brace against Utd, and as far as I can remember he scored a header to get us a point. Carra is still an outstanding defender, Gerrard still one of the best midfielders in the world as Torres still the best striker in Europe. Get off all the players backs and get behind the team!!
When things aren’t going well it’s easy to point fingers, until the club is sold which is the root problem then absolutely nothing will chage, it doesn’t matter who the manager is. It’s not the player’s fault they don’t go out to put in a bad shift but the malaise at the club is crippling everyone.
Until the clubs is sold I dont bel;ive that it’s possible to make an objective assessment of what’s wrong at Liverpool. Football is part psychology, teams can sense the unease and will come and have a go different to if they went to Stamford Bridge or down the M62.
oh my good god you are absolutely right, why wud dropping stevie from captaincy ‘ give him more confidence ‘ ? more like begin taking drugs lol, u who wrote this article, there is only one thing true about this, fernando is acting like a spoilt child but to be honest care less as long as he was scoring goals who gives a s**?! ynwa
It’s kinda serious when your defenders start knocking the hell out of each other…i smell a lack of coordination, again. Caragher is busting Skrtel for the second straight season.
There’s a serious gap in the attitude of our top players and I’m just not seeing the true Liverpool team spirit right there – coach included…it’s that simple.
Agree with this article. omg that’s the point Fernando NOT scoring goals. Cheyenne, I think this article is pointing out that when the team is doing badly the 3 players mentioned don’t get any flak (and maybe they should) oh my good god (pretentious name by the way) you’ve proved the point – it’s ok to get at other players – Agger, Johnson, Konchesky, Poulsen like you have. and Torres needs more games – poor Ngog gets slated for scoring goals!!!
Very good article.. It’s nice to get back talking about the football again,albeit negatively. Kenny was spot on when he said the ownership problems shouldn’t effect team performance but it seems to me that they are all waiting for Oct 6th(like me).Roy really needs to get the team playing like a team very quickly, the pressure on him is already immense.. However I believe Roy should be given a fair crack at it and calls for his head at this stage is just plain unfair.