beejay

Our decision-making is incredibly bad at times, I'll give you that (Kuyt's pass back to the goalie v Blackburn perhaps the best/worst example) but if you don't buy a ticket you won't win the lotto and Riise does have a rocket of a shot that has hit the back of the net often enough for me to give him the benefit of the doubt when he does have a pot on goal. Much as I love to see flowing footie with 33 passes leading to a tap-in from 2 yds, I also get a buzz from a screamer nearly taking the net off and we all want to know how he scored that goal (and broke that leg). Is it just that he's too gung-ho for your taste?

Ludicrous over-exaggeration. So when he scores f***en crucial goals from long range like v Chelsea (several), Manu, Barcelona etc etc you think in your unattached (detached?), unemotional way, f*** off Riise, why didn't you pass it square?? We are so short of goals from the back - and with the exception of Gerrard - from midfield that it's dumb to criticise a player who can score goals out of nothing. Have a go at the lad about other aspects of his game but being "f***in livid" when he scores beats Kaiser all ends up on the dumb scale.

Dumbest post of November candidate No 2

To be fair to Kaiser, he was responding to a post saying that PC should start ahead of Voronin because of his goal threat etc. What last night did emphasise was the fact we have a balanced strike force with Crouch or Torres leading the line and Voronin or Kuyt as link strikers.

Marseilles win. They can then finish top before they play us so might rest a few

Course he won't start. Have you forgotten about the Crouch Agenda?

Do you realise you've just said exactly the same thing in about 10 posts in this thread?

There are plenty of reasons for our loss of form but a major one is the loss of 3 key players which has showed up some real deficiencies in the squad. Some baffling selections from Rafa haven't helped, neither has the fact that some of the lads Rafa has brought in to plug gaps haven't had the chance to settle yet and the Heinze farce cost us the chance to bring in experienced defensive cover. I have been as depressed as any with recent form & results but have no doubt whatsoever that with Agger, Aurelio, Alonso, Kewell & Torres all fit & firing we will be a match for anyone

Couldn't resist it! Villa have some history of buying our cast-offs eg Baros, Collymore etc

By giving us c £30m to spend in January http://icliverpool.icnetwork.co.uk/0500liv...-name_page.html Villa fans are convinced that Riise & Crouch are also on their way to them - Carson £10.5m, Crouch £12.5m Riise £7m allegedly.

If Adolf Hitler was our manager with Pol Pot his assistant I'd be happy so long as they took us to the title

Don't think he hates us as a club, far from it. He & Rafa aren't bosom buddies that's for sure but I'm pretty sure we would be near the top of Mourinho's wish list

The sources in this story are supposedly from Portugal so the question is does Mourinho want the job as Liverpool manager if the opportunity arises? Answer, almost certainly yes. His problem is there is no vacancy and there is nothing coming out of the club to suggest otherwise

Crisis of confidence affecting too many of our players. Sissoko v Marseilles, Kuyt v Blackburn - but why did these two play the full 90 mins when they were so obviously suffering? Still if Kuyt hadn't missed that sitter on 89 mins Rafa could have said he got it right.

The subs made all the difference but Kuyt was so bad it was embarrassing.

Please hang on to 60 mins for the subs

No passion, no energy, negative garbage so far. We are very, very lucky to be level they need to get a rocket up their a*se. Kuyt, Riise, Babel & dare I say it Carra the hoof have been dreadful 1st half

Really hope we put on a performance tonight and take the points in style. I like the set-up assuming Kuyt is on his own up front with Babel, Gerrard & Benayoun coming up in support and if we win well, Rafa might be inclined to play this system more often. Big game, bit worried though because Blackburn are a hard, physical side and we will have to stand up to a bombardment.

Rafa's playing a dead bat to Kelly's question about our formation! We will have to wait til kick-off but I doubt if Stevie is playing on the right.

I thought Lucas was terrific, particularly in the 1st half. Great first touch, played it simple and always looking for the ball. A great foil for Gerrard who prospered as a result. He did tire in the last quarter and made a couple of sloppy mistakes but he looks real quality to me. Leto again looked lightweight and will need more time. El Zhar did well and what a blinding goal! Hobbs a bit iffy in the air for the size of him but decent on the ball. Promising performances and having seen the academy kids last night, I'm excited about our future - Nathan Ecclestone, Amoo, Pacheco & Irwin all looked great prospects, although the Hungarian lad missed a string of sitters.

The Benitez "style" is pretty much established - his Valencia teams, the references to Lippi's Milan in another thread - as strong, compact, organised, efficient, hard-working, intelligent & clinical. To put that sort of ruthless machine into place takes time and a whole lot of coaching. We have threatened to attain these levels at times but at the moment, for a host of reasons, the system is badly malfunctioning. I'm not convinced we don't have the personnel it may just take Rafa longer than any of us would like to instill his patterns of play into a team shorn of key individuals & confidence. But we never thought that zonal marking would work when we were leaking set piece goals in Rafa's 1st season and eventually, following long hours on the training pitch, it clicked and is now second nature with everyone knowing their role. We don't need to change anything right now, we have to allow Rafa the time to iron out the faults and organise the team to play in his style, then watch us go.

Arsenal have great passing & movement but they are also very good at destructive pressing and that's one reason we struggled to keep the ball on Sunday. Wenger has introduced the likes of Flamini instead of Gilberto so he can dash around making tackles and they have athletes like Toure, Gallas, Sagna, Eboue to keep a high line and compress the play. I'm not so sure we have enough athletes in our side who can maintain a high tempo pressing game AND are good enough on the ball to retain possession.

Work backwards - pick our best team for blackburn, rest the lot of them then select the side for Cardiff from the rest of the squad. Team v Blackburn reina finnan carra sami arbeloa gerrard lucas mascherano babel crouch benayoun Team v Cardiff Itandje Darby Hobbs Huth Insua Leto Spearing Sissoko Riise Voronin Kuyt

To be fair to Rafa (& Kuyt), we went into yesterday's game with too many injuries to key players and in such poor form to expect to dominate against a team with 12 straight wins playing at their peak. Rafa set us up to nullify Arsenal's great strength through the centre and to use Kuyt & Voronin as a 4-3-3 supporting Torres when on the attack dropping back to 4-5-1 when they had the ball. Scoring so early meant we were bound to drop back more and they both spent most of the game holding position rather than getting up alongside the lone striker. We shouldn't judge either Kuyt or Voronin on this game because they did the job they were instructed to do and rafa's tactics nearly won us the game. I hope that's the last time we see this starting XI though - we need to get back to controlling games and dominating possession as soon as injuries and form allow but for the moment, Rafa's having to find ways of grinding out results.

It was depressing to see Arsenal play such controlled, cultured football where we played hoofball but I remember seeing us lose 1-0 to the Mancs at Old Trafford in Roy Evans era and a United fan I know well was despondent because we played them off the park. Fowler, Collymore, Berger, McManaman, Redknapp etc looked world beaters. At that time, you would have been convinced that we would become the best team in the league with a dynasty of success but instead ManU kicked on while we fell away. Rafa is making mistakes in team selection at the moment but our biggest problem is injuries to the key passing components of the team in Agger, Alonso, Aurelio, Torres & Kewell. To my mind, he has bought extremely well and far from withdrawing funds for the transfer window, he has to be given the cash to finish the job. Rafa's team are capable of great football and we have totally outplayed Arsenal, ManU & Chelsea (twice) in the last 12 months, we just need time to click.