The May mutation. Formations, Famine and folklore and the Ghost of Liverpool past

[Papasmurf]

I think I might have a problem. There's a question that I keep repeating to myself at the same time every year, and I can't put my finger on why.

 

It's like this reoccurring dream, but it's real, and it always pops up at the same time each year.

 

Why the f*** has someone just given Steve Mclaren a job?

 

No. That's not it.

 

Although a recurring question, it is one with a simple answer: Stupid chairmen.

 

A more complex and pressing one to Liverpool fans must be: Why the huge difference between ourselves now, and towards the end of last season?

 

Why the huge metamorphosis that occurs between May and August?

 

What exactly happens, and is it really happening again?

 

Surely it can't be.......

 

The latter half of the season just gone saw us playing good balanced football.

Many of the draws we stacked up were not a result of us being unimaginative or unable to string passing moves together, but rather our inability to finish teams off after creating lots of chances and outplaying them for large parts of the game. It wasn't so bad. A key player here or there and surely.....

 

Sometimes the most basic factors are overlooked in debates such as these, and this one in particular is arguably what the whole debate circles on: The transformation that takes place between May and August.

 

I believe it's something that can be explained by the process of understanding.

But that doesn't explain everything.

 

It's not simply a problem with the formation. If it was, surely we would have hit the ground running the very moment Rafa switched to a 4-2-3-1 last season, which didn't happen. We began to play well over time and could switch formations effortlessly.

 

So, is the complexity of Rafa's instructions an issue?

Does it take more time to adapt to what he wants us to do?

Is it maybe a case that we are changing slowly every season into what Rafa ultimately wants us to be?

 

Is our process of evolution, and inability to carry out large scale changes all at once, one which is having this effect on us?

 

Maybe if Benitez had the funds to change things in just a year or two, we'd have been able to radicalise the Houllier ethos and we'd be playing the Benitez way from the start of every season. As it stands, maybe he's had to incorporate new philosophies based on the players at his disposal, and when new and better ones are added slowly, the new process has to knit together all over again.

 

I personally am somewhat baffled. But I am sure about one thing: It goes far deeper than a change of formation, or the fact we need a winger.

 

If this was an investigation, and the answer to the question of why we're so disjointed was "we need wingers", surely the first thing you'd do to validate the credibility of this argument would be to look at the end of last season when Kuyt was also on the right. Surely if this was the case our play would have looked narrow and stifled then too.

 

You'd come up with more questions than answers.

One of which would be: If we didn't have them towards the end of last season, why the good quality balanced football?

 

It just doesn't make any sense at all.

 

I am not for one minute saying we shouldn't be looking forr better wide players.

I have wished the arrival of quality wingers long before it became a cliche attached to us by everyone and his mate. You can go back to the days of .tv. The very first threads I started posting. When Morientes was being signed I said it then. My belief was, and is that a team with world class midfield and an average striker would provide more goals than one with a world class striker and an average midfield. I used man utd and andy cole as an example.

 

I do think better wingers are needed. To be clear.

 

But I do not think this explains our stuttering start.

I don't think it explains every stuttering start to every season which eventually sees us playing some of the most effective football in Europe. Maybe THE most effective.

 

We don't play like Arsenal. No team does. But we play with a high tempo, we spread the play very well, we have a shape, balance, organisation and a combination of defensive solidity and aggressive attacking which most teams find too much to deal with.

 

What we lacked is the individual class to make the tactical advantage pay off. We absolutely battered Villa in the mirror fixture last season. Run them ragged.

 

We did not look disjointed. We could pass, and pass well. Yes we needed better players. But our brand of football and our ability to play well and dominate teams was not compromised by this fact. Even though the results sometimes were.

 

I also remember the thread about gelling. I remember how much scorn was poured upon the argument. Everything from world cup fatigue to jet lag was blamed instead of it. Now it seems a much more common theme on the boards to see people giving more credence to the fact that, once players learn tactics to a T, and understand each others game, things begin to happen naturally. It's a process people have learned from watching us endure the same things every new season, only for it to suddenly begin to click, and without a change in formation or signature of a new player.

 

But even this argument doesn't solve it all.

 

If it was simply a matter of Understanding, how does that explain the team who spent all of last season understanding Benitez' ideas, suddenly being unable to cope with such simple things as a three pass move, all over again?

 

Would such small tactical changes, added to the incorporation of new faces into the team create so much unbalance?

 

Of course, we may suffer as a result of Rafa's emphasis on small detail. We may also profit from it on many occasions.It is well documented that he studies every action in great depth.

 

But maybe it's our continuing change which brings about the teething troubles we have every season.

 

Like I say, If Rafa has a philosophy on how he wants to play, and his idea of a perfect team, he's had to build it slowly. To constantly form and change it year after year.

 

I think we are suffering as much as a result of our inability to match the large scale changes teams like chelsea and man utd can make.

 

Man utd are a perfect example. A team who's stuttering start to the season ended emphatically in a European and Domestic triumph.

 

The team that drew, lost , and scrapped it's way through the beginning of the last campaign , flew through the latter stages of it. Now they're in a position to hit the ground running again. No large scale changes were needed this time round, he did most of it last season. He's had that advantage. A breath of fresh air was needed, he had an idea, and he was able to undertake the work all at once.

 

When you combine this factor with the fact that the players he signed were capable of brilliance, and were added to a team filled already with players capable of great things, it makes the teething process somewhat easier to endure. When you can play below par and still win courtesy of a Rooney volley or a Ronaldo dribble, it's not such a hard life anymore.

 

Maybe herein lies the problem. Some part of it anyway.

The building process is one we've all got opinions on.

Some want a small number of quality acquisitions. Others see the reason behind large scale and gradual upgrading of an entire team. One man insists we should sign Quaresma. The next man thinks it better to cover the gaping holes in the squad with multiple signings of an acceptable quality, then concentrate funds on key areas in the future.

 

Clubs like Chelsea, Man Utd and now it would appear, even Man city, do not have such questions to ponder. Upgrading can be done in a flash. `No compromise in quality needed here` reads the message on the envelope containing the blank chequebook given to Fergie and his mates.

 

We are a big club by name. Not such a Goliath by nature. Not just yet....

 

But people will overlook such factors. It would, after all, require greater mental strength and more character to acknowledge these things, and learn to understand how our path must be different from those above us in the financial stakes, than it would to blame the boss, the formation, the price of oil..

 

Can't we somehow, after five years of the same thing, begin to look just a little deeper into why these things happen?

 

Have we not evolved during the time of Rafael Benitez, to understand that, for some unexplainable reason, we do manage to grow into a highly efficient team during the course of the season, and ask ourselves why that might be?

 

Are we incapable of coming to any greater conclusion that "we've changed formation"?

 

We changed formation the year before, and before that, and since a few times. Yet every single time we manage to come up playing good football, winning games we really have no right to expect victory from.

 

Surely this, if nothing else, grants Benitez, his ideas, and his new signings a stay of execution, if only for as long as it takes us to recap on what has happened every single season so far. Maybe, just maybe, we can find positive ways to look at the situation and why it may be occurring, as oppose to assuming the worst, or discussing the course of action should the most disastrous scenario unfold.

 

It's unfortunate that the same people rear their head at the same time every season, only to retreat into hiding soon after, maybe popping out from the bunker to urge the board to back the fantastic manager we have.

 

Why does the faith they have in April and May when they're trawling the net for cheap flights to Istanbul and Athens (or more likely planning the night off work) not carry over the August - September period?

 

But why, if people are adamant that we need a change of manager, do they hardly ever have educated answers as to who they'd like in charge, and why?

 

Ask someone who thinks Benitez should be sacked, who they'd have in to do a better job with the resources.

 

The answer? :Er....

 

No, that's actually the answer. "er"

 

They don't know. It is highly unlikely anyone would do much better. It's unlikely we could find anyone to do even half as well.

 

What was the near unanimous declaration when we signed Keane?

 

The answer? "He'll be a good foil for Torres"

 

Whether or not they'd have chosen someone else, or think he's worth the money, that was the opinion of the vast majority.

 

Of course, now the breakup of the Steven Gerrard Fernando Torres "partnership" will be highlighted as another factor responsible for our woes. And guess who's fault it is?

 

Yep. The little Irish get. And the Spanish idiot for bringing him in.

 

That's what £20M gets you; a lower quality team......Didn't you know?..... Honest to god. It's the real truth. Swear down....

 

Sorry to whoever this offends, but all this s**** really proves is how spoon fed some people are by sky sports, and how pig ignorant and shameless some people can be. Singing the praises of someone one minute then blasting him the very second he shows signs that he might need time to adapt.

 

The same people coming onto forums yabbering on about how thick Charlie Nickville and his cronies are, are also unaware as to just how vulnerable they are to the damaging influence of the constantly repeated Cliche.

 

When The world class passer that is Steven Gerrard, Plays behind the world class striker that is Fernando Torres, you will inevitably find that the world class passes from the world class Gerrard find the world class runs of the world class Torres. Who usually applies a world class finish.

 

It's what they do, these world class sorts.

 

And so the Gerrard & Torres legend is born.....

 

Let's overlook the fact that they're just two very good players, and instead find mysterious ways in which we can describe their "telepathic" understanding.....

 

Maybe Torres is infact a distant relative of Gerrard, and their bloodline was always destined to intertwine in such a way.

 

Did you know Gerrard was from Ironside close on the bluebell?

Did you know that it's just down the road from Malta close?

It's hot in Malta isn't it?

Guess where Torres is from?

Hot there too.

Coincidence?

 

See. Destiny.

 

Maybe it's just the result of Andy Gray or Paul Merson exclaiming "ooooh it's that Stevie, Torresy Partnershippy in action again!" Every time Torres scores from a Gerrard pass....I doubt it though. Nobody would ever be blagged by them d****eads would they?! Ha. As if.

 

Yeah, it's deffo the Malta thing.

 

Mystic Meg must be laughing into her crystal b******.

Even she wasn't this bad.

 

Years of stagnation have taken their toll.

 

The famine we've had to endure on Merseyside has sucked dry the entire anatomy of some sections of the Liverpool fanbase. No longer do half of our fans understand football the way they used to. The most knowledgeable football brains were once educated by the cultured teams of old. Shankly taught us what it was all about. Paisley gave us our degree. Souness, Hansen, Barnes, Beardsley, Rush, Keegan and Dalglish held masterclasses every week. People were well fed back then. Understood what it was all about.

 

They understood what it took to make a good team. Some still do.

 

Unfortunately the starving, thirsty, undernourished see Gerrard and Torres working in tandem as an Oasis. They crave it. It is the only thing that can keep us alive, apparently.

 

When nasty old Rafa decides he's going to bring in a digger, someone who can harvest the supply , and instructs him to build a well, those who thirst for what they've never had, scream and shout. They only see the rubble and ruin it has created. No longer is it the fertile patch of land it once was. Now all it resembles is a mess.

 

They walk away at their peril. But they throw stones and demand the foreman to stop work immediately at the cost of everyone else.

 

Those who understand what the digger is for, understand too that, providing the excavation is successful, they will soon be enjoying a bounty to reward their patience.

 

When the work is done the water will flow, and the peasants will also be allowed to drink.

 

Even those who threw stones.

[Crazy Horse]

I gave up after a couple of lines, but FYI 'stupid chairmen' has in fact been the answer for almost 20 years now.

 

It surprises me that Moores makes it out of the ground safely each week.

[Maldini]

I still think the reason we're playing badly is only one of our "first XI" had a full pre-season. I said before the season that it'd take us a few weeks to click, the United game could be the catalyst.

[psl]

I still think the reason we're playing badly is only one of our "first XI" had a full pre-season. I said before the season that it'd take us a few weeks to click, the United game could be the catalyst.

 

Gerrard and Keane really could click together in the 4-2-3-1.

[Mad Scientist]

But I do not think this explains our stuttering start.

I don't think it explains every stuttering start to every season which eventually sees us playing some of the most effective football in Europe. Maybe THE most effective.

Every season we buy new players and every season it takes time for the new players to gel with the existing players and for the new team to build up an understanding.

 

That's it.

 

It's not rocket science that's for sure, and it certainly doesn't need a few hundred lines of airy-fairy exposition.

[Earl Hafler]

I still think the reason we're playing badly is only one of our "first XI" had a full pre-season. I said before the season that it'd take us a few weeks to click, the United game could be the catalyst.

 

And nothing to do with a return to a more conventional 4-4-2 with players in wide positions who shouldn't be there ?

[Mad Scientist]

And nothing to do with a return to a more conventional 4-4-2 with players in wide positions who shouldn't be there ?

We've been playing 442 because we only had two senior central midfielders available. Now that two more have returned from the Olympics we have immediately dropped the 442. We played 433 in the first half against Villa, and 4231 in the second half.

[Earl Hafler]

We've been playing 442 because we only had two senior central midfielders available. Now that two more have returned from the Olympics we have immediately dropped the 442. We played 433 in the first half against Villa, and 4231 in the second half.

 

I said the same elsewhere, although i don't think it's clear we played 4-3-3 in the first half - i think the players looked uncomfortable with it when we had the ball. It was a formation Howard Wilkinson would have been proud of.

 

The delivery from set pieces improved, although there was still nobody attacking the ball when it reached the centre of the area.

It's a similar story when someone has the ball near the opponents area - the lack of movement is unreal.

[Mad Scientist]

I said the same elsewhere, although i don't think it's clear we played 4-3-3 in the first half - i think the players looked uncomfortable with it when we had the ball. It was a formation Howard Wilkinson would have been proud of.

 

The delivery from set pieces improved, although there was still nobody attacking the ball when it reached the centre of the area.

It's a similar story when someone has the ball near the opponents area - the lack of movement is unreal.

I don't make this stuff up.

 

Rafa Benitez:

"We changed the system to play 4-3-3 and give Xabi Alonso freedom, then when he was being pressed we changed to 4-2-3-1. People said, 'Oh, Robbie Keane wasn't playing well on the left.' But we had to think about winning the game, not just one player."

 

Now it's clear, no?

[Earl Hafler]

I don't make this stuff up.

 

Rafa Benitez:

"We changed the system to play 4-3-3 and give Xabi Alonso freedom, then when he was being pressed we changed to 4-2-3-1. People said, 'Oh, Robbie Keane wasn't playing well on the left.' But we had to think about winning the game, not just one player."

 

Now it's clear, no?

 

I said it wasn't clear because the players didn't look comfortable with it. We changed second half, improved for a time but ultimately substituted £30m worth of centre forwards from wide positions and ended up with Benayoun and N'Gog trying to win us the game.

 

" We had to think about winning the game " .Not a shot on target. Three central midfielders who barely got into their area. The most creative central player in the team covering the left side.

Dysfunctional.

[Chili Palmer]

I don't make this stuff up.

 

Rafa Benitez:

"We changed the system to play 4-3-3 and give Xabi Alonso freedom, then when he was being pressed we changed to 4-2-3-1. People said, 'Oh, Robbie Keane wasn't playing well on the left.' But we had to think about winning the game, not just one player."

 

Now it's clear, no?

 

was he laughing while putting his hand to his nose and pulling it out to imitate Pinocchio when he said that?