Every close-season we get this. Gerrard is not a great central midfielder (certainly in the sense of the role now that English football is no longer just a thoughtless, gung ho pinball match), but he is a devastating attacking midfielder. Let's leave the world class parts of our team alone if we can help it. Alonso going means that our next biggest strength (central-midfield) is going to have a hole in it - let's fill that one hole with as best quality replacement as we can, not tinkering with and potentially weakening two parts of our team unnecessarily.