Moneyball won't win the Premiership 2012-13

He is being forced to play in some approximation of Lucas' role due to the latter's injury, which isn't ideal but I think he's done quite well. Who do you think they should've bought this summer? Iirc you didn't think Dempsey was at their level. The transfer period feels months ago already and I can't remember what outright strikers they were trying to attract, maybe Llorente?

Crisis was last week. In truth Liverpool have been okay but toothless in all games, except when the wheels came off v West Brom, and Borini looks like he's getting better so that should be improving too. The alarm was more about how slick Spurs looked when they've have a new team out there, their rate of progress is much higher.

"I think the Liverpool supporters will enjoy watching this kid play football," Rodgers added. "He is 5ft 6ins but in terms of being a footballer he is 7ft 6ins.

"He's absolutely immense. His courage in getting on the ball, how he reads the game and his football intelligence is outstanding.

"We paid £15m for him and I said that very quickly that price would double and people probably laughed at me.

i don't like managers who move to a new club and try to buy mostly their old players (allen, borini, sigurdsson)

they might all be good players but it shows a lack of perspective -- they are often sold at a premium when others of similar qualities could be found

mourinho is a bit like this, certainly used to be, but he operates at a more rarified level and i don't fancy rodgers' chances of building a similar personality cult no matter how many converts he drags along

Villas-Boas came into this match with rumours circulating that the Spurs chairman, Daniel Levy, had given the 34-year-old three games to save his job after a less than satisfying start to his time at the club, with the former Chelsea manager's position put under even more scrutiny after his predecessor at White Hart Lane, Harry Redknapp, appeared to deride his modern style of management in a weekend interview, claiming that "these days you are getting [from managers] 70-page dossiers on this and that. Bullshit can baffle brains at times."

lol avb out etc but i mean this can't have a shred of truth in it, can it? not the arry cuntiness but the 'three games to save job' shit?

I'm slightly alarmed at how much better Spurs look than Liverpool, considering they're both new regimes looking to occupy similar ground.

But they aren't at the same stage of development. I know Spurs lost players in the summer but Liverpool are starting from significantly further back.

Yeah I know, but part of it is showing a new way for Liverpool to be wanting. Seeing Spurs stroking it about and probing at pace like in the first ten minutes yesterday, really stretching Reading - even though Liverpool have started all their games well it hasn't looked liked that.

matt otm- lfc aren't starting from 4th place, and it prob should have been higher than that tbh. we've gone backwards over the summer, lfc just haven't gone forward.

yeah exactly, spurs finished 4th last season.

and have had what, 3 good seasons in a row?

When did you start thinking Tottingham were one of the Big Clubs etc.

yeah. i think avb is, if not to the ludicrous extent being suggested by the press cronies, at least somewhat shadowed by the success redknapp enjoyed. Rodgers took over a team in need of an almost complete overhaul, even allowing for modric's inevitable departure there wasn't much to be done personnel wise to keep spurs ticking over at cl-places level. Levy will take some of the flak for the fact that we've seemingly regressed rather than solidificated in the tranfer window, but avb is answerable for the deployment of the players we do have and the start was very poor indeed.

And he's picking gallas, who has been a complete disaster for over a year now.

ultimately spurs have a far better squad, that's what worries me. liverpool aren't performing way below their level, a little below maybe.

Gallas has played well so far this season, but it should be Vertonghen and Kaboul over the longer term.

Also, y'know, it's Reading, the could conceivably finish bottom of the table. See how we do against an actual good team (or one who give us a kicking and lump it up to a big man).

The one thing that Sigurdsson and Dembele provide is more attacking threat - they're much better at running at defenders than VDV and Modric, although they don't have quite the same eye for a pass. Last season, if Bale and Lennon were marked out of a game then it became much harder for us to score, there should be more options now, especially with Dempsey in the mix as well.

Both Liverpool and Spurs have completely restructured their midfields, we at least have a front line that's more or less consistent with last season. Rogers hasn't cracked that part yet.

yeah i think liverpool have been playing to par, though obv not getting goals- but that said i do think they've been unlucky with results from those performances too. Fully expect them to finish top 7 this year as is, which you'd expect to be recognised as progress.

xp disagree about gallas, obv. he's been shockin and lucky not to have been at fault for several more goals than he has been.

disagree that sigurdsson is in any way better at running at defenders than modric, not sure he's even any better than vdv in this regard. He was ok yesterday, against a turgid reading, but in every other game he's looked one-paced and ineffective to me.

Sandro's such a fuckin beast tho, dembele and he can definitely carry one passenger if it means he can pick out the odd pass as good as the defence-splitter that released lennon for the opener yesterday. Good for thudd, that.

You said yourself you'd only seen the Norwich game though.

saw newcastle, norwich, reading. You said we were unlucky v wba, i'll take yr word for it. Gallas woeful for most of the other three

liverpool are broke enough that if they were solid this year and the new signings didn't all need to be ditched again come next summer that that would be big progress, another window to build sensibly.

yeah it's basically the same job hodson was doin imo

that weird few months under dalglish where they thrashed everyone really warped things

yeah that was fuckin strange. What were the drivers there, istr bellamy being on song, was torres doing a job then? Can't remember him doing it under dalglish.

istr it being largely about Maxi, Lucas, Kuyt and Bellamy; Suarez was great too obviously. Throw in the defence being typically strong, which has never really changed, a mostly settled XI, good vibes and a bit of the inexplicable, and there you go.

Mereiles as well.

Ah yes. Even I'm underrating him now.

Bellamy wasn't there at that point though, right? Unsure if Kuyt figured a lot during that run either.

Maxi was briefly a star. Selling Meireles when you already are lacking any force through the middle, in terms of attack, was always madness.

Neither he was. The detailed wikipedia record uncharacteristically peters out in March though, so no more enlightenment there. I saw them at West Ham during that run and they were a bit terrible. I remember Danny Wilson particularly struggling, I don't know what's happened to him since.

bedtime for me but I am confident in the way only a non-spurs fan could be that they will go on to win this 3-1.

― pandemic, Sunday, September 16, 2012 3:48 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

thought so ;)

been pleased with lfc for the games vs man city and sunderland, thought they looked good in both. The wba game we were okay first half and a shambles in the 2nd. Against Arsenal I thought Arsenal controlled the game p comfortably.

victory against Utd is inevitable too

pretty awesome riposte from avb, when asked about the harry comments:

Villa-Boas said "he didn't feel any pressure" from Levy and, asked to respond to Redknapp's criticism, intentionally shifted the focus to another Portuguese manager who has worked in London, saying: "It is not about the manager, it is about the players. It is the players that take us to success and different managers have different leadership styles and the ways they go about their business. I am not sure if Harry was mentioning that about José Mourinho but, if he is, I find it strange."

second half of 10/11 was meireles/spearing/lucas/maxi, suarez/kuyt. we needed to build on the solidity that spearing/lucas provided in the middle. we needed a better spearing, not a shit gerrard, which is what we got with adam. amazing that dalglish hit on a very good formula almost by accident, and then completely ripped it up.

and that fucking goal at wolves. THAT was the blueprint. that was the cat and mouse right there. we should have gone, 'ok, that's really pretty amazing, how do we do it again?'

danny wilson seems to be behind coates and carragher and isn't figuring for the U21s either. needs to get some games in the europa or go on loan to get some games.

'some games' obsession there.

Didn't Fowler & McManaman own a racehorse called 'Some Horse'?

What's the contractual/transfer/in-favour/out-of-favour position wrt to Coates, Cole, Henderson, Jones and any other currently-invisible random bods I might've forgotten?

F&M's second horse was called "Another Horse".

Coates is broadly 'in favour' I think, he's the next man up if either Skrtel or Agger are rested/injured/suspended. Cole still has 2 years left I think but will always be injured so don't know if Rodgers rates him or not and will probably never find out. Henderson out of favour and has 3 yrs left iirc. Would like to see Jones get a run out in EL or CC, not cos he's any good, but more as a msge to Pepe that he can't just sleepwalk through playing every game this season.

Actually Henderson might have 4 years left actually. You do less than that for serious crimes these days poor fella.

Don't actually have that many random squad players who never play types anymore tbf

coates started against city didn't he, guessing he'll be playing the europa games with carragher.

henderson's a weird one (the situation, not jordan, sure he's a lovely fella). rodgers really talked him up when he first came in, but not in a 'i don't agree that carroll can't play tiki-taka, he cost £35m ffs' kind of way, he seemed pretty sincere. don't think he'd be in his first 11 if everyone was fit, but i'd have thought he's still part of his plans? although they did try to swap him for dempsey so what do i know.

apparently doni has had to return home to brazil for personal reasons, but he's been named in the 25-man squad, so i'm guessing he'll fight it out with jones to be reina's back-up when he returns.

Didn't realize you had another Rafa-era Spanish youth signing yet to debut - Suso.

I was hoping for more from Coates tbh

Coates hasn't been there long enough to say, in my view.

foreign young centre half? Needs a fill year tbh

suso was in the squad for sunderland. rodgers was talking about young players getting a chance last week, and named suso as one of those, so he'll probably get a europa/league cup game at some point.

not comfortable with calling it the capital one cup. too many syllables.

yowch, that looked sore

Aye, I went ouch myself.

I love watching Baines do those give-and-go moves, he could've had a goal and an assist from them already.