Liverpool 07/08 Season Thread

El Nino opens his Liverpool account with a cool finish against Shanghai Shenhua. Gerrard comes on during the second half and makes it 2-0 with a beautiful curling shot.

Leto got a good run-out today and was backed by fellow Argentine LB Insua. Four S. Americans in the starting lineup (as opposed to one Spaniard) and Masch on the bench. Crazy.

Good to see Fernando in the books. Hopefully he'll make the score sheet again away at Villa.
 
Did you watch it, or just read about it? I'm waiting for e-season ticket to post highlights, as they didn't have live video.

How did Leto look? Can he contribute this year?
 
Stevie G to stay in the middle this year (according to Rafa).

Hell yeah!
The Link

Rafa Benitez has revealed skipper Steven Gerrard will feature more as a central midfielder this season.
Speaking after his side missed out on the Port of Rotterdam trophy on Sunday night, the Spaniard revealed Gerrard would play less games on the right following the arrival of Yossi Benayoun and the continued good form of Jermaine Pennant.

"Yes, normally he will play more games in the middle," said Benitez. "He enjoys playing there and I think he will play a lot more games there this season."

The Reds rounded off their pre-season preparations with a fiery 1-1 draw against Feyenoord in the De Kuip Stadium. The result meant Porto claimed the silverware following their 3-0 victory over Shanghai.

"The team was alright," Benitez added. "We had some chances and, okay, we could have scored more goals, but in terms of football it was okay. We are ready now for the season. We have competition for each position and now we need to decide after training who will start.

"We have confidence. We are prepared, we have a better squad, and hopefully we'll start by winning next week."

The Liverpool boss also revealed Harry Kewell was taken off during the second half as precaution.
 
Agreed DeadHead. 2005-2006 was Gerrard's best season and he was free to move infield and track back from his position on the right side of midfield. He did not play as a winger but as a right-sided midfielder and there is a subtle although substantive difference.

Moving him inside will put someone on the bench who is better than the Pennant or Benayoun or whoever else is playing the "wide" role instead of Gerrard.

Gerrard also gets in the way of the other CMs when deployed in the middle IMO. Liverpoool starts playing like England when Gerrard plays in the midfield.

Just another case of Benitez outthinking himself. Ultimately, Paul Doyle gets in right in his preview of Liverpool in the Guardian:

"Man for man, Liverpool possibly remain inferior to United and Chelsea. Manager for manager, they definitely do. Two facts that add up to third place."
 
Just wanted to confirm that Soccer City has Liverpool kits in DFW. I ended up just buying a retro t-shirt, but they had the home and away kits as well as a few different t shirts.
 
The CL and the PL are apples and oranges. One off results in cups are of little relevance when discussing the league. The table doesn't lie.

As discussed in the EPL prediction thread, Rafa is the king of advancing in the CL based on a road goal advantage over two draws. However, he has trouble winning on the road in the PL where you need to play aggressively to pick up three points. Road draws aren't good enough in the league.

Jose has averaged NINETY points a season in the PL over the last 3 seasons.

Rafa has averaged 69.
 
GB: I think you made my point for me. For me, if a team can't keep up for 38 games in the league, but REGULARLY defeats better funded opposition in Cup one-offs, this says to me 2 things:

1) the manager of that team is really good at tactics when given time to focus on a major match (in college football, this would be the dreaded "2 weeks to prepare" coach.)

2) this team doesn't have the depth to content week-in and week-out over 38 games. Again, let's see what Rafa does now that he can (to a degree) compete financially.
 
50 hours to kick off! I don't know if I'm more excited or nervous. We HAVE to get off to fast start this year. Not only do we not want to chase after only one week, but 3rd Round CL qualifiers are very scary. One off night could cost millions.

I trust everyone noticed that Villa is a 11:15 am (central) KO? I had to double check because often this means that the broadcast is delayed. Not so in this case: we're live on FSC.

Speaking of tv, I'm not seeing any indication that the Toulouse match is on. Anyone know different? How about a web site of questionable legal nature?

Also, we're about to let Carson go on loan to Villa (despite Rafa's earlier assertions that he would compete with Reina), and sign a French U-21 keeper from Lens. Never heard of him, but allegedly ManUre wanted him.
 
Match was good. Torres played well. He needs to be a scorer this season though. That free kick by Gerrard was allsome.
 
. . . AND exhale! What a match. Villa really give it their all, and if they play like this every week, they'll cause a lot of problems.

In the first half Torres was superb. Can't wait till he settles in!

Now I see why we payed all the coin for Babel. He looked a positive menace when he came on.

On the down side, the defense was appalling all game. Hopefully this gets sorted out sooner rather than later. Ashley Young had Finnan on the rack on day.

Oh and BTW:

STEVE GERRARD, GERRARD
HE'LL PASS THE BALL 40 YARDS
HE'S BIG AND HE'S FUCKIN' HARD
STEVE GERRARD, GERRARD

You can watch football for a long time and not see another free kick that good. The ball cleared the upright and the crossbar by no more than an inch each. Keeper had no chance.
 
Torres and Babel looked good. Babel is a big fellow and didn't lack for confidence. Actually, both are pretty decent sized and won't be pushed around by many defenders.

Defense was crap. Too many lousy clearances delivered straight to Villa and Young was certainly a menace on the left. We'll need to be much sharper against Chelsea. I was glad to see all of the offensive substitutions from Rafa. He was going for the 3 points all the way, and desperately wanted that 2nd goal even before we gave up the equalizer. Seemed like a more aggressive approach overall, although we really didn't have much to show for it. Hopefully, the finishing will improve as the season goes along.

Good start to the season. Stevie G comes up with a huge game winner and a brilliant free kick after playing a rather disappointing game. Nice to start with 3 points on the road.
 
I thought Torres was great in the first half. Definitely slowed down in the second half, but hopefully we'll see a stronger full 90 minutes from him as the season goes on.

Babel impressed. Was definitely pleased with him.

I didn't think the defense was that bad, but what the hell do I know.

Really questioned the starting XI, with Riise and Aurelio starting where they did. Really wanted to see Kewell out there today, but it worked out in the end. Anyone know why Rafa went with the lineup he did?

Stevie Gerrard - need I say more. He was close a few times, but in the end he is what he is for a reason. The whole place went totally mad when he scored. Indescribable.

Other thoughts:

We will obviously have to be better against Chelsea, but not a bad showing at all. We have to win those matches against teams like Villa away if we want to win England.

Trinity Hall in Dallas had a great atmosphere. Tons of Reds there just having a good time. Highly suggested to anyone in Dallas to go there to watch EPL. There were some West Ham supporters there to watch West Ham/Man City when I got there, but everyone was cordial.
 
Don't know if it's true or not, but I read on the LFC.tv boards that Kewell's out 2 to 3 weeks with a pulled hammy.

Huge suprise if true . . .
rolleyes.gif
 
Tolouse in midweek, then back home to face Chel$ki in a huge game. First, the Champions League action:

--------------Reina------------------
Finnan------Carra----Agger-------Riise--
Benayoun-----Momo---Stevie G-----Leto----
-----------Crouch----Voronin-----------

Masch in for Momo at the 60th minute. Babel on for either Leto or Benayoun. We definitely should not take this game lightly, but we have to stay fresh for the gigantic game against Chelsea next week:

---------------Reina------------------
Finnan-----Carra------Agger--------Arbeloa
----------Masch------Xabi--------------
---------------Gerrard----------------
----Benayoun----------------Babel-------
---------------Torres------------------

Xabi needs a CM partner with some grit and workrate. Masch is among the best in the world in those departments. This allows Stevie to see the ball a lot and drive the engine. Babel looked very dangerous in limited action this week and I think he earned a start. Obviously Torres plays.

Already a bit of a fixture congestion. I'm interested to see what Rafa does.
 
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