Right. Bit long this post so happy for it to be ignored, but I felt that it was worth trying to get some perspective on matters following the all out assault from everyone following the Stoke game. Funny thing is we dominated Stoke. We didn't have many chances but we certainly did enough to win. Statistics-wise it looked like we battered them. Match of the Day showed us attacking for 95% of the highlights and Reina had one save to make from miles out that was straight into his gloves! 0-0 is not good enough but is it really the end of the world? Does Kenny deserve the backlash? Personally I don't think that Kenny's doing a particularly bad job. Ok so we're not winning as many games as we would like to at the moment (particularly at home). Sure, most of this is to do with our finishing, however for a run of 3-4 games we kept coming up against 'the performances of their careers' from the opposition's goalkeepers - remember Norwich and Wigan? I would be far more concerned if all the stalemates we've suffered at home were deserved. Apart from maybe Sunderland on Matchday 1 (where we simply disappeared in the second half) you can justifiably look at each match (including the games against the two Manchester clubs) and say, hand on heart, that we deserved to win them. The difference between Kenny and Hodgson is that every result against Hodgson was justified, and in fact some of the results (where we won under Hodgson) were probably not justified. As it stands he's now managing WBA and if any of you have watched the Baggies of late they're playing just the way we did and the way Fulham played when he was there before them. I personally believe that Benitez self-destructed in his final season by returning back to tactics that were too negative and bringing in an injured Alberto Aquilani as some sort of replacement for Alonso, who has since proven (as we all knew very well) to be world class. Nevertheless I've been following Liverpool FC for over three decades and I can safely say that (since the title winning teams) the season we finished 2nd under Benitez was the best I've seen - no holds barred, attacking, joyful football where we would try and score more than the opposition (anyone remember the ridiculous 4-4 draw with Arsenal for an example of entertaining 'cut 'n' thrust' football. What I'm now coming to is Kenny's present team and the current situation. Bentiez's 2nd place season aside, LFC are playing better football than they have done for YEARS. Roy Evans (largely) aside, Houllier, Souness, Hodgson and large stretches of the Benitez reign played far less entertaining football. For what it's worth this is what I think: -
1) The way the team plays under Kenny is pretty good to be honest. LFC nip the ball about all over the pitch with speed and purpose and there have been very few matches where we haven't been entertaining to watch. This obliterates the Hodgson rubbish and the overly-cautious approach of Houllier and, particularly in the EPL, is more satisfying than Benitez's reign apart from that wonderful season when we finished 2nd. Having said all this if those bl**dy Americans had actually bought David Silva when Benitez was after him the rest, as we say, could be history.
2) We have a pretty good squad. With Agger, Skrtel, Coates (he will turn out to be be our Phil Jones) and Carragher I am happy with central defenders (bearing in mind we have other youth players gaining experience elsewhere such as Wilson etc). At left and right back we have Luis and Glen (Glen is better than a lot of people give him credit for on here) and we have Kelly and Flanagan and Aurelio as back up. In Pepe Reina we have 1 of the 5 best goalkeepers in the world and a solid deputy in Doni. So far so good. As we hit midfield our defensive cover of Lucas (one of the most underrated players in the premiership and easily as effective as a certain Argentinian DM that left us for Barcelona) and Spearing is pretty solid with attacking central midfielders of Gerrard, Shelvey and Henderson (Henderson has been slowly improving in my eyes and will prove a great player whilst Shelvey is currently the closest match to Stevie when Stevie first broke into the team). Unfortunately Charlie Adam has regressed to his Rangers days and needs to be sold. On the wing, Downing and Bellamy are great players and Kuyt is hardworking but this is, for me at least, an area of improvement. Kuyt needs moving on and we need one world class winger that can play either side to interchange with Downing. I suspect we bought Downing because statistics told us he would feed Carroll, however if we were in the Champions League does anyone really think this would have been our signing for the money? For an extra £5M we could have players like Eden Hazard and for the same we could have targeted Juan Mata etc. Anyway there is some work to be done here. Now we come to Strikers. Suarez is class but not a natural goalscorer. Caroll is class if you play to his strengths. We do not. This is where work is required. But hey, at least we don't have Ngog up front anymore. I suppose the thing to ask is who do you fear from the other big clubs in the Premiership. Lets look at Man Utd. Our midfield isn't perfect but look at theirs! Who would you have from their team. I would probably only pick Rooney and Jones. Nani on a good day maybe? Wellbeck? Not sure. From Chelsea I would probably only pick Mata, Sturridge and a fit again Essien. Man City Aguero, Johnson, Yaya and Silva. Arsenal Van Persie and Jack Wilshere. Spurs, Gareth Bale and Modric. What I'm trying to say, cliched though it sounds, is that we are only a couple of players short of a team ready to challenge for everything. Plainly put (and it will never happen). If LFC want to start winning everything again they need players like Eden Hazard and Neymar, players that won't come until we are in Europe. It is a Catch-22. The whole point of messieurs Downing, Carroll, Henderson and Adam were to get us into Europe to ultimately get themselves replaced by the next calibre of player.
3) Tactically I think we have the defence sorted but we struggle to support our attacking play. This is obviously one of the main problems with getting Caroll involved. Kenny favours our wing-backs to charge forward, which is good, but this isn't always backed up by the rest of the team, particularly the central midfielders. Team selection is also odd, since Kenny seems to love Caroll but never plays him. Substitutions are often too late or underused if the team is struggling to break down the opposition and then there are the odd moments (like against City in the CC where we had about 8 defensive players on the pitch in the second half or playing Stoke City at home with 5 across the back!!) I think Kenny has our general link up play pretty good (see point 1), but some of the overall tactics could be sharpened up, i.e. lets go to 4-4-2. This is where I think most of the fans have taken issue with Kenny, that and the fact that he cannot seem to make up his mind about Caroll and Bellamy. Plainly put if Kenny dropped Adam from the squad, put Maxi on the bench and played Caroll and Bellamy more then we would probably be a lot happier. Nevertheless Kenny knows far more about these things than me so I'll put my faith in him and see where we end up at the end of the season.
4) Kenny should not be judged on improvements from Hodgson's terrible reign. He should be judged against something more realistic. That was a manager that thought we were a mid table team because of one poor season under Bentiez. Kenny should be judged, in my honest opinion, against an average Rafa Benitez season (and one that has spent big bucks on new signings!). However, we should never talk about Caroll being £35M but rather £15M less than Torres. If the Barcodes had wanted £10M for Caroll, Torres would have gone to Chelsea for £25M - we all know this so we cannot use it as a stick to smash Kenny with.
5) The current owners of the club have really rammed up the advertising on the official LFC website and are looking to expand the franchise wherever possible, as to be expected. With the racism issues recently they have begun advertising the local community work of the club and have put tributes to its greatest fans such as Bobby Wilcox. They are working hard to connect to the fan base, but a lot of this is for monetary gain (as to be expected). Kenny was brought back to appease the fans. It brought an end to the empty terracing under Hodgson. And it initially brought a good run of results. If the fans turn against Kenny (which I really hope we do not as he is one of our greatest legends) then they will make changes. If we end up in Europe through the Carling Cup and get far in the FA Cup but fall short of 4th in the league then that will probably be enough for Kenny to soldier on. Whilst not as lucrative as the Champions League it will still show progress. But will this keep the fans happy?
My final point is that it is more than possible that we could win our remaining 17 games of the season. Similarly it is likely that we will win 10 of them, draw 5 and lose twice. However not once have I gone into a game and thought to myself 'this is too hard' or 'gonna lose this one'. We raise our game against the top teams and struggle to break down the weakest teams. At least this makes for an exciting season where anything can happen but one where there is a lot of hope. Under Kenny, where we are not getting the points where we certainly DESERVE to have the points, this is the crucial point. One or two minor tweaks here and there and these missed opportunities will be converted into 3 points. We need to stand together and weather this transitional period. And for goodness sake lets agree to drop kick ADAM the f**k off the ship!!! :-)
