Loyal acolytes of King Kenny will claim that the Reds were unlucky yesterday because of the second Carroll "goal" but that would miss the point entirely. It took Liverpool 60 minutes to turn up and it was only when Chelsea started to tire that Dalglish's assorted mercenaries came into their own. Up until then the gulf in class was almost embarrassing. And remember, this is a Chelsea team in decline!
As a neutral, I was fascinated watching Lampard and Gerrard. The conventional wisdom is that Gerrard is the better of the two, but head to head, Lampard looked much the better player to me. Stevie G is like Scotty Parker in a West Ham shirt, with added goal scoring potential. His energy levels and commitment are undeniable but the whole team is secondary to Gerrard and his desire to be everywhere at once means that others simply piggy back in terms of effort. Liverpool fans will scream in protest, just as West Ham fans screamed when I said Parker was part of the problem, but jettisoning Gerrard may be a vital first step in moving forward. Clinging to the past is no way to progress, as the appointment of Dalglish proves.
From an England perspective, Carroll's performance was encouraging. His potential is undeniable and as controversial figure as he is, the next Liverpool should be built around him rather than Gerrard. And as John Barnes says, Henderson must also be given his head now. There's talk of spending another chunk of John Henry's money but as Pardew has shown at Newcastle, spending huge sums is not necessarily the secret of success. Finding a team shape and a team spirit are more important and, in recent years, Liverpool have been too preoccupied with punching big in the transfer market thinking that if they can outspend Man Utd, they will outperform them. No chance.
It's time to break with the past. For Liverpool to move forward, both Dalglish and Gerrard need to be shown the door. It will be painful, there will be tears at the parting of the ways, but as they say in the Financial Services sector, past performance is is not necessarily a guide to future performance.
14 comments:
little unfiar in gerrard he was playing in a different position than lampard first half , the truth is he was playing in two as spearing was well out of his depth, second half spearing went off henderson took his place and went attacking and gerrard dropped deep to take up mata who until then had enough space by spearing to have a rock concert, i think gerrards future is a defencesive player as he gets older.
Seems like you have forgotten Gerrard's performane in the 2006 cup final HF? If it was not for him West Ham would have come back from Cardiff with the cup.
Gerrard is nt d problem,but spearing.Spearing killd d game
Your blog suxs, your article suxs, you have no idea what your talking about and picking on Gerrard is a joke in its self.
Good Day.
Liverpool's net spend last summer was around £38million, following the sales of Torres and Meireless.
Kevin in manchester writes...
Liverpool are so caught up in their own mythology- like west ham actually- that they are incapable of thinking outside the box. They'll hang onto Gerrard for dear life and you are right it'll do neither of them any good. Despite 20 odd years of decline they can't accept it and until they do they'll continue to exist in the shadows or worse.
I totaslly agree, Gerrard plays like a headless chicken. His way of playing makes the team unbalanced. His postional play is quite awful, but thats why they pick the ego that is Stevie G in the 'hole', so he does not have any duties but to play anywhere he likes, which again is a selfish egotistic way, but thats good old Gerrard. Personally he is a pile of fuking shite, and I would sell him to Sutton United. Or chuck him in the mersey.
Who cares what the net spend is, £135m has been spent to win the League Cup. Anyway, you Scousers are as creative with your net spends as you are with your alibis. How much did you spend on Torres and Meirelles? Net that off before you knock off the revenue from the sales and set it against the expenditure. And what other team finishing in mid table in the Prem spent a NET ££38m exactly?
Hammersfan, why get personal? and if we are going to talk NET going back to last season (meireles) and 4 seasons ago (torres) why not calculate in how much we sold Alonso for? or how much we bought Djibril Cisse? Or sold John Barnes? Or bought Ian St John? We are talking NET SPEND DURING DALGLISH's TIME. Moron. The season was woeful for the amount spent, even if you talk in net £38m or whatever it is. Stevie still plays well, he is just needing to take control of the entire midfield as Hendo and Spearing aren't doing their jobs. Both have the potential to be great 1st teamers, but they are only kids. We need to surround Stevie with decent players so that he has someone to play 1-2s with, to put through the defensive line or to just control the mids with. When Lucas gets back, I think we'll see Gerrard and Lucas anchoring the mid with Adam/Shelvey or a new signing behind the striker. Good luck in the new season Hammers, good to have you back. Although I do hate Fat Sam...
YNWA
Who ever critizises Gerard just want him in their team! Any IDIOT will know we don't have a quality defensive midfielder and like people have been commenting above, Gerard had to defend more than attack! If he did not do that the score would have been more than 2-1 so just shut the F*** up !!! Fact is we have 1 trophy United zero trophy that to me is BEAUTIFU!!!!!
Your manager is fat Sam. Nuff said.
I agree with the fact that Gerrard is everywhere at he moment. He was meant to be supporting Suarez but was dropping too deep, leaving the Uruguan isolated in attack and unable to influence the game. He had to drop in because the players around him weren't pulling their weight. IMO Kenny should have brought Carroll n at half time. He should have taken Spearing off and played Gerrard in midfield with Henderson. Gerrard could have dictated the play from deep and allowed Suarez to drop in the hole and cause damage. We all saw that Chelsea couldn't cope with Carroll when the delivery into the box was good from the flanks. Steve G isn't the problem: look at the season we finished second. He played behind the main striker (Torres) and didn't have to worry about what was happening behind home because we had Mascherano, Alonso and Lucas to step in. The team around the captain isn't good enough, and he doesn't trust them
Not actually read this...
Mate, you are obsessed with Liverpool!
G
Were we rubbish on Saturday? Yep until Spearing made way for Carroll. Until then we had no out ball Suarez dropped deep but no one ran beyond him. Yes this was Gerrard's job but he was covering for Spearing who never recovered from giving the ball away which lead to the 1st goal. The question I would ask is why did it take so long to put Carroll on. Chelsea always had that get out ball to Drogba so I blame Dalglish, and as for our love affair with Gerrard, yep it's true and yes he is at times a big part of the problem but look at what he's done, when Liverpool have needed someone to come up with the goods he's been there. And you should remember that 2006 FA Cup Final and not believe the guff your current manager spouts
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