Same old, same old?

[Guest prophet]

We control games only to let it slip albeit to an atrociuos referring decicion!

 

i am excited by the prospects of the new signings in Torres and Babel. Very good promise!

 

BUT the problem seems to persist that although we control the games, our scoring chances are far and few.

We tend to shoot from outta box rather than get into the 6 yard. Even the lay downs by Torres comes to nought as on one seems to attck the ball in the box. Case in point: Villa game when Torres was the one to attck the ball from Kyut.

 

Seems that if we are to increase the goal averages, we need more than the shooting from oustside ala Riise, Babel,etc. We need the midfield to get into goal acoring positions IN THE BOX. Stevies seems the only one likely to do this but not yesterday.

[downunder]

But we didn't let it slip, we were pretty well in control and playing well until we were robbed.

 

2 League games in, 1 win and 1 draw against one of the best teams, Things are OK.

 

We DO need to sort our home form out though Far worse than last season.

 

 

[Diarmuid]

Yes.

[Guest prophet]

But we didn't let it slip, we were pretty well in control and playing well until we were robbed.

 

2 League games in, 1 win and 1 draw against one of the best teams, Things are OK.

 

We DO need to sort our home form out though Far worse than last season.

 

Slipped cos we didnt get the 2nd goal while we had almost total control of the game.

 

Goals matter.

[Nebraska Red]

We control games only to let it slip albeit to an atrociuos referring decicion!

 

i am excited by the prospects of the new signings in Torres and Babel. Very good promise!

 

BUT the problem seems to persist that although we control the games, our scoring chances are far and few.

We tend to shoot from outta box rather than get into the 6 yard. Even the lay downs by Torres comes to nought as on one seems to attck the ball in the box. Case in point: Villa game when Torres was the one to attck the ball from Kyut.

 

Seems that if we are to increase the goal averages, we need more than the shooting from oustside ala Riise, Babel,etc. We need the midfield to get into goal acoring positions IN THE BOX. Stevies seems the only one likely to do this but not yesterday.

 

 

you seem to have forgotten that there were TWO teams on the pitch today, and last week.

 

Chelsea set out to take a point and played a game that was designed to stop us playing, and stop the ball getting into their box. They kept the ball in midfield as often as possible and created very little.

 

Villa last week were the home team and they still played a game designed to stifle us and hopefully snatch a point.

 

What bugs me is the fact we have had 2 PK's awarded against us with today's being an absolute joke and last week's was a weak decision in my opinion. You see that kind of thing ha[ppen every week with nothing given.

 

As for letting games slip, it has only happened once this season, today, and that was due to a shocking decision by a jerk of a referee.

[Guest prophet]

neb

 

Yes the stupid penalty decision aside....we havent actually creeated that many goal opportunities altough we had the majority of possesion.

 

My take is our midflders tend to be to slow in breakaways.....getting into the box to help out the strikers.

 

Mor oft than not, we had to take pot shots from way out of the box

[Gary Gekkaloys]

Far too early in the season to be making generalizations about our style of play?

 

Although, controlling large portions of both of our two (fairly difficult) opening games is a positive sign from my point of view.

Torres looks fairly handy too

[Guest prophet]

Far too early in the season to be making generalizations about our style of play?

 

Although, controlling large portions of both of our two (fairly difficult) opening games is a positive sign from my point of view.

Torres looks fairly handy too

Gary

 

Its not after 2 games. Its a continium from last season where we controlled majority of games but fail to get the results. Remember Manure at Anfield?

 

El Toro looks very good!

[Gary Gekkaloys]

Gary

 

Its not after 2 games. Its a continium from last season where we controlled majority of games but fail to get the results. Remember Manure at Anfield?

 

El Toro looks very good!

 

Thats why, presumably, Rafa signed Torres, Babel et al. Give them a chance!

Torres looks capable of giving our attacking play a new dimension, but lets wait and see, eh?

[Guest prophet]

Gary

 

Read me thread again.

 

Its not the players, its the strategies and style of play.

 

How oft do you see pur midfielders getting into the box. Even Babels shootin from the outside the box. We have th players to go far BUT i am questioning the playing style. We can swing balls into the box for 90 mins BUT if its only Torres in the box, ALL these balls will come to nought....

[mercury]

Methinks the strategy was quite different and the line up very positive. Chelsea and Villa away are as hard to crack defensively as it can.

[redpool]

I agree a bit about what you are saying, but Chelsea scored one goal with the help of the Referee. What would you say they have to do to improve their scoring?

 

They had possession of the ball 56% of the time according to the stat report and the only shot they had on goal was the penalty goal. They ran time off the clock by passing the ball around in their half of midfield, yet we had the better scoring chances.

 

I believe, just as you do, that it would help if we got more midfielders up to support our runs, but seeing how we try to keep our two wings wide and play one defensive midfielder, it makes it kind of difficult. I have yet to figure out how we can improve offense without sacrificing our stellar defense (unless we just improve on shooting accuracy). Also, with all of our new players not yet settled, I have hope that they will upgrade our offense.

 

Because of the new players settling in, Benitez got his lineup right today. Maybe Babel (who shows signs of exceptional talent), Benni, Voronin, and the other new players, will be more offensive minded and be better than the players we are playing at this time.

 

For today, I am pleased with our effort in the two games, and am truly excited about this season. Most important, watching the game, I also saw it in our players actions. Next will be to see if we can continue this spirit, on a consistant basis, as the season progresses.

Edited August 20, 2007 by redpool

[Gary Gekkaloys]

Gary

 

Read me thread again.

 

Its not the players, its the strategies and style of play.

 

How oft do you see pur midfielders getting into the box. Even Babels shootin from the outside the box. We have th players to go far BUT i am questioning the playing style. We can swing balls into the box for 90 mins BUT if its only Torres in the box, ALL these balls will come to nought....

 

 

Better players improve the effectiveness of tactics and the style of play - for example, Torres gave us something in attack which we didn't really have last season. Give it time, its not going to radically change overnight.

[IgPig]

Its not same 'ol same 'ol because Torres scored that goal. We didn't have that before.

[JRC]

Its not same 'ol same 'ol because Torres scored that goal. We didn't have that before.

It's a bit harsh to criticize the team or tactics; even at home, a game against a very strong opponent like Chelsea is always goingb to be very tight; more often than not, it requires a little bit of something extra to get that advantage - which is wjhat we got yesterday with Torres (and didn't against ManU last year, for example)

 

Of course 1-0 is always precarious, that's why you have to rely on your defence doing a job in these games as well (which they did), but we shouldn't be getting uptight about our failure to get 2 or 3 - this was Chelsea we were playing; that it wasn't a perfectly respectable and admirable1-0 win was entirely due to a farcical refereeing decision, not any failings on the part of our defence or competence on Chelsea's.

 

In a top of the table clash like this, complaining about failing to score more than 1 - we had decent chances, but no real glaring misses - is just being greedy. Expecting basic competence from the Refereee isn't.

[Gerrardrules]

Kuyt works very hard and chases everything dropping deep several times asking for the ball. When we are counter attacking he usually will be too late in the box.

[Huyton_Red]

We were playing the best team in the country yesterday lads

 

Forget Utd, great team as they are, they overachieved last season, Chelsea are the ones to beat this season and we where the better team. in control and creating chances repeatedly

 

We made them look sh'te especially in the first half.

 

I was hugely impressed by Liverpool yesterday we are starting to look a formidable team, you are only ever one injury away from disaster of course with torres for example, if we lost him long term we would be in trouble but I like the look of us this season

 

It sounds strange and I know everyone is looking at how we do in the league, but I want us to get Ac Milan in Europe again. This will show how we have gone from the start of the re-building process, to work still in progresss to finally almost there

 

If torres had played in athens and gerrard had played central midfield instead of as a striker we would have won that game comfortably

[Eskimo]

neb

 

Yes the stupid penalty decision aside....we havent actually creeated that many goal opportunities altough we had the majority of possesion.

 

My take is our midflders tend to be to slow in breakaways.....getting into the box to help out the strikers.

 

Mor oft than not, we had to take pot shots from way out of the box

 

Did you honestly think we would steam roller one of the best teams in the league?

 

At best these games tend to only produce 2-3 decent scoring opportunities, resulting in the odd goal, normally the winner. Yes there is the odd blip, freak result whatever, but overall they are tight games with very few clear cut chances.

[Zoob]

It's still very early days, but I'm encouraged by what I've seen. in 3 games we're yet to conceed a goal from open play. We have new attacking players and it will take time for them to gel, but in Torres, it means that for the first time since Owen left, we have a striker with pace and intelligence.

[Guest prophet]

Did you honestly think we would steam roller one of the best teams in the league?

 

At best these games tend to only produce 2-3 decent scoring opportunities, resulting in the odd goal, normally the winner. Yes there is the odd blip, freak result whatever, but overall they are tight games with very few clear cut chances.

 

Did i asked for the steam roller?

 

All i am saying is that tacticaly we have a same problem getting goals from

 

a) lack of support from midflders(for goals) even though with posession and crosses coming in. We had lotsa crosses. no one to meet them. Remember the days when we had Houghton and company arrving late into the box to get the goals when the strikers drew the defenders away?

 

b) to have to depned on strikers alone for goals is not effective

 

c) evidence is more oft than not, we have to shoot from the outside the box

Edited August 21, 2007 by prophet

[growler]

thats part of the problem. we shoot from outside the box, but never make the keeper save. Our accuracy of shots is woeful

[lawrie]

All i am saying is that tacticaly we have a same problem getting goals from

 

a) lack of support from midflders(for goals) even though with posession and crosses coming in. We had lotsa crosses. no one to meet them. Remember the days when we had Houghton and company arrving late into the box to get the goals when the strikers drew the defenders away?

 

b) to have to depned on strikers alone for goals is not effective

 

c) evidence is more oft than not, we have to shoot from the outside the box

 

Midfielders in the box against a team like Chelsea = no midfielders in midfield when they counter attack at pace. Yesterday I thought we got the balance about right

[abc]

We were playing the best team in the country yesterday lads

 

Forget Utd, great team as they are, they overachieved last season, Chelsea are the ones to beat this season and we where the better team. in control and creating chances repeatedly

 

We made them look sh'te especially in the first half.

 

I was hugely impressed by Liverpool yesterday we are starting to look a formidable team, you are only ever one injury away from disaster of course with torres for example, if we lost him long term we would be in trouble but I like the look of us this season

 

It sounds strange and I know everyone is looking at how we do in the league, but I want us to get Ac Milan in Europe again. This will show how we have gone from the start of the re-building process, to work still in progresss to finally almost there

 

If torres had played in athens and gerrard had played central midfield instead of as a striker we would have won that game comfortably

 

Some good points there although I have two to add - when we go away to Chelsea/Man Utd/Arsenal and play well enough to get results (and actually get them), then I'll start believing we're ready to go all the way this season.

 

My other point is this: if Crouchy played instead of Kuyt as the lone striker in the final, we would have had more of a chance.

[Eskimo]

Did i asked for the steam roller?

 

All i am saying is that tacticaly we have a same problem getting goals from

 

a) lack of support from midflders(for goals) even though with posession and crosses coming in. We had lotsa crosses. no one to meet them. Remember the days when we had Houghton and company arrving late into the box to get the goals when the strikers drew the defenders away?

 

b) to have to depned on strikers alone for goals is not effective

 

c) evidence is more oft than not, we have to shoot from the outside the box

 

Again this was Chelsea not some second rate team and as I said before these games only tend to throw up 2-3 decent opportunities and are usually won by the odd goal, I really don't know what you were expecting.

 

Our central midfield was out numbered 3-2 in the first half, SWP was tucking in whilst Kalou (sp) moved out to the right when they lost possession, yet despite this we still controlled the center of the park. Second half was always going to be difficult they had no choice but to attack and Mourinho changed to an orthodox 4-4-2 which caused us more problems yet we still managed to restrict them, did they have a shot an target from open play?

 

Rafa could have taken off a striker and replaced him with a CM to stifle them in the second half, something he probably would have done in the past (hell in the past he would have started with that formation), but all credit to him he stuck to his guns. Had he done so I'm sure we would have a twelvty page thread on "Rafa and his negative tactics", can't have it both ways....

 

IMO the only weak spot was Riise, hardly his fault (well it is he's s***e), but what other options did we have, Kewell and Aurelio are injured and Babel lacks experience.

[Bigal]

prophet,

 

just a thought, if we tried that extra pass or 2 to get into the penalty area, and it didnt work, like arsenal do sometimes, would that get on your t***?