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Why it’s been One of the Strangest Pre-seasons for Years

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I managed to get through about 50-60 minutes of Liverpool’s friendly with Galatasaray on Thursday night before starting to lose interest. The boys that took part put in the effort they certainly tried and did a lot of running, they were not at fault in that sense. Also, it’s hard to complain from the point of view that we fielded what was effectively our reserve team against Gala’s strongest side, so a 3 nil defeat was hardly unexpected.

Moving forward, if we were to face the Turks 6 months down the line (if we’d been in Europe), you can probably say that Reina, Johnson, Carragher, Agger, Skrtel, Kuyt, Gerrard, Lucas, Adam, Downing and Suarez would’ve all been starters and that’s without considering that both Aquilani and Meireles may still be at the club as well. Any Liverpool side missing those players is going to be much-weakened anyway.

But the reason I say that this is the strangest pre-season the club has had in years is that we’ve barely seen any of these players yet, even after half time. Perhaps the only one that has really taken part so far has been Andy Carroll and that’s because he was working on his fitness after his injury kept him out for all but the last couple of months of last season after he’d signed. There’s also the fact that Reina and Gerrard have been not long had serious operations and are in rehab; then there is Lucas and Suarez only just having returned from the Copa America.

However, that doesn’t explain why – thus far – we’ve not seen more than 10-15 minutes here and there (and usually not together) of any of our established first-teamers. Then you can include the likes of Maxi and Aurelio and throw in all of our new players as well: Adam, Downing and Henderson and there’s only Doni who has seen any significant action as of yet. Now, before there I get a barrage of abuse telling me I know nothing, I’m not saying that I demand 5 nil wins from all of our friendlies and I certainly don’t think playing our first-team in every game would be a good idea. All I’m saying is that I’m slightly concerned about two things: a) that these friendlies are being used primarily as a shop window, to move on the likes of Aquilani, Ngog, Cole and Poulsen because all four of them have seen plenty of action and not one of them is likely to feature next season (even if they are still at the club) and b) that there have been too few occasions when our new players and 1st choice players have been played together and been given an opportunity to work out each others game; to gel together and find that bit of cohesion that we would all hope for before the season gets going.

With just over two weeks to go until our very first game of the season, it is a bit of a concern as far as I’m concerned but we still have two games left to throw a few of them into the mix and see what comes out. I’m hoping to see a much stronger side against Valerenga next week, now that the pre-season training has been under-way for close to a month. With the final friendly at home to Valencia, it’ll be a good work out in preparation for the game at Anfield with Sunderland a week on. I have no doubt that Kenny and the coaching staff have got everything in hand and I have faith that they know what they’re doing but from what we’ve seen in pre-seasons gone by, the line-ups and casual way in which our friendly games have been treated so far have been a little alien to me to say the least. What do you think?

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I'm a 32 year old Liverpool fan, living in the heart of the City Centre. I've supported the club since the day I was born and have been writing articles for L4L for over 3 years, writing close over 350 articles in that time. My favorite player of the past generation is Sami Hyypia.

I am the current editor for L4L, with my day job being in R&D for the NHS.

15 comments

  • Lee says:

    It has been a very disappointing pre-season even if you consider the fact that we still need at least 3 more quality players before the season kicks-off.

    There was a lot of promise going into it but as expected, the pre-season was just one big anti-climax.

  • bleed redq says:

    gerrard out untill september might hurt liverpool they need to keep aqalani, he has been playing good….and as for carol he needs to find his feet and that too soon!!!

  • me says:

    I’ll take a 3-0 loss in all the friendlies if we can avoid injuries and beat Sunderland in the first real game of the season.

    • soebi says:

      I’ll take a 3-0 loss in all the friendlies if we can manage to the top four at the end of this season

  • jonesey says:

    Gerard should have been ready for Sunderland – this sounds like a mess

  • stan howard says:

    i saw a photo of the man united squad in the daily mirror, they looked relaxed but focused, the looked a close knit bunch and almost all of their first team were there, we on the other hand look like have a missmash of cant get rid of duds, but we both start the season at the same time, i hope this dogs dinner of a pre season has no bearing on the real thing. no matter what it is awful planning, dont worry about how you are going to play two games in four days – dont arrange then so.

  • stan howard says:

    gerrard out, so much for our sports scientists – do these people have too much of the say, everything is over cautious, i bet if stevie were traning as he should have been he would no be out now. all our players seem to take an age to come back after injury.

  • Galen says:

    According to lfctv he’s got an infection, its not being cautious

  • stan howard says:

    galen – it must be a bad infection if he needs to go into hospital,the most likely place he caught it is the sports scientists grubby hands. only joking. we will miss out greatest player very much, get well soon stevie.

  • B says:

    In King Kenny we trust. Like the King said the first few friendlies were for match fitness and the first teamers who didnt feature were either away at the copa america or not ready for fully training. The scum had a full strength to choose from so no wonder they won all their pre-season matches. YNWA

  • Dee says:

    Pardon me for this…. But if it’s not KK in charge and it has been another coach so far, what do u think the reaction would have been?
    Simply hope he gets it right, although am not xpecting much.

  • David T says:

    I also just think that a lot of people under-estimate the importance of a good, successful pre-season. You only have to look at what usually happens the sides that enter the Europa League at the first stage: by Xmas the squad is knackered and they start slipping down the table due to not having had a proper rest and pre-season beforehand.

    As somebody else mentioned further up the comments, United’s pre-season couldn’t have been better: they have all their squad fit, they signed the players they wanted early on and everybody’s been involved; even Owen scored last night in a 2:1 win over Barcelona. We just seem to have made a pig’s ear of our build up to the new season so far; I just hope I’m wrong and we start the season off really well.

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