The Anfield Wrap

Comment made today at half-time on TAW:

Mike

9 December 2012 at 5:02 pm

For The Attention of Brendan Rodgers:
How much longer do we have to suffer you and your mediocrity. You are a man of many words and few worthwhile actions. Your system is rubbish, your methods are over convoluted nonsense… You are simply not up to the job of managing our great club….you allege you have seen everything in football… You have seen and done precisely nothing… We cannot afford to give you money to spend on more average recruits.. Assaidi, Borini… Pathetic, both of them not fit to wear a D team shirt… Please leave quietly and stop further damage… How you have flown under the radar so far this year is an embarrassment to LFC and shows how low we have let our standards drop to…
I am not negative by nature, but I know someone not up to the job when I see them..

http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2012/12/citytalk-the-good-doctor/#comment-11663

 

Comment made today at half-time on TAW:

Mike

9 December 2012 at 5:02 pm

For The Attention of Brendan Rodgers:
How much longer do we have to suffer you and your mediocrity. You are a man of many words and few worthwhile actions. Your system is rubbish, your methods are over convoluted nonsense… You are simply not up to the job of managing our great club….you allege you have seen everything in football… You have seen and done precisely nothing… We cannot afford to give you money to spend on more average recruits.. Assaidi, Borini… Pathetic, both of them not fit to wear a D team shirt… Please leave quietly and stop further damage… How you have flown under the radar so far this year is an embarrassment to LFC and shows how low we have let our standards drop to…
I am not negative by nature, but I know someone not up to the job when I see them..

http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2012/12/citytalk-the-good-doctor/#comment-11663

 

When I first seen that I thought it was Mike Girling that said it! Just someone in the comments section, I'd pay no attention to it personally. Our own match thread here shows some of the knee jerk reactions that were going on.

Comment made today at half-time on TAW:

Mike

9 December 2012 at 5:02 pm

For The Attention of Brendan Rodgers:
How much longer do we have to suffer you and your mediocrity. You are a man of many words and few worthwhile actions. Your system is rubbish, your methods are over convoluted nonsense… You are simply not up to the job of managing our great club….you allege you have seen everything in football… You have seen and done precisely nothing… We cannot afford to give you money to spend on more average recruits.. Assaidi, Borini… Pathetic, both of them not fit to wear a D team shirt… Please leave quietly and stop further damage… How you have flown under the radar so far this year is an embarrassment to LFC and shows how low we have let our standards drop to…
I am not negative by nature, but I know someone not up to the job when I see them..

http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2012/12/citytalk-the-good-doctor/#comment-11663

 

This type of person is exactly what's wrong with a minority of our fanbase. It's frustrating.

This type of person is exactly what's wrong with a minority of our fanbase. It's frustrating.

Yes it is and every club has its share. The instant gratification generation - don't you just love them? 

When I first seen that I thought it was Mike Girling that said it! Just someone in the comments section, I'd pay no attention to it personally. Our own match thread here shows some of the knee jerk reactions that were going on.

No, Mike Girling is much more sensible to post this. In fairness, the author is quite articulate. He's clearly in the wrong but he worded it quite well.

Comment made today at half-time on TAW:

Mike

9 December 2012 at 5:02 pm

For The Attention of Brendan Rodgers:
How much longer do we have to suffer you and your mediocrity. You are a man of many words and few worthwhile actions. Your system is rubbish, your methods are over convoluted nonsense… You are simply not up to the job of managing our great club….you allege you have seen everything in football… You have seen and done precisely nothing… We cannot afford to give you money to spend on more average recruits.. Assaidi, Borini… Pathetic, both of them not fit to wear a D team shirt… Please leave quietly and stop further damage… How you have flown under the radar so far this year is an embarrassment to LFC and shows how low we have let our standards drop to…
I am not negative by nature, but I know someone not up to the job when I see them..

http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2012/12/citytalk-the-good-doctor/#comment-11663

 

Some dickhead who's decided to post his views on the comments section of the website gets his Evertonianised view put on here too. I want it all and I want it now? Piss off.

Link to the latest podcast:

PODCAST: AFTER THE BIG ONE

Neil was joined in the big room at Parr Street by Paul Machin, Dan Hunt, Dan Fitzsimmons, Mike Nevin, Matt Lim, Nick O’Prey, Rob Gutmann and Jim Boardman to discuss “the biggest game in twenty years”.

http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2012/12/podcast-after-the-big-one/

Another good one discussing the West Ham game and transfers, well worth a listen.

Falling Out Of Love? [MODERN FOOTBALL IS sh*te

]

BY BEN McCAUSLAND
 
ME and Liverpool Football Club are going through a bad patch. Every long-term relationship has its ups and downs – I understand that – but I have felt this way for a while now and I don’t see clearer skies on the horizon. The dynamics of our relationship has changed, external parties are affecting us and the cracks are starting to show.

Just a few weeks ago, I had a conversation with a friend in which we discussed the current malaise in our affections towards Liverpool Football Club. We talked about the reasons – Hicks and Gillett attempting to play us all for fools and very nearly getting away with it, Torres breaking our hearts and making it impossible to trust another footballer ever again, the Hodgson Hangover, the somewhat-higher-than-inflation rise in costs of match tickets and oil-rich Arab’s and Russian’s playing chicken with Platini and his FFP scheme making it harder and harder to compete all figured pretty high.
 
We even jokingly (drunkenly) made plans to abandon Liverpool whenever Rafa got his next management job and instead follow his new team and began to daydream of Rafa taking over at AC Milan or St Pauli. Based on recent developments at Stamford Bridge it is a good job we didn’t pinkie swear on that promise to follow Rafa, as I am not sure how welcome The Shed would make me and Kevin feel.
 I have been a season ticket holder for over 15 years, and whilst I would be loath to ever give that up, am I really going to keep going when the inevitable happens and it costs me £1000 for 19 games of football?
 
For the last 12 years, if Liverpool were playing, chances are I would be there. Missed games were few and far between and I have had unbelievable times and made great friends thanks to Liverpool.
 
But if we are honest, modern football is sh*t.
 
Football fans all over the country have different reasons for getting fed up with their club – mercenary foreign owners, bankruptcy, Bill Kenwright, Milton Keynes, wallet-bleeding ticket prices to name but a few. My love affair with Liverpool is potentially on the wane due to two direct reasons – firstly Hicks and Gillett (although I am not going to go there in this piece, too raw!) almost pushing us to the brink of extinction and making me realise football is just another big-business now, and secondly, getting my heart broken by Fernando Torres.
 
In 2008, an Evertonian friend of mine said that “not since the heyday of Bowie have so many grown men been so ridiculously in love with an androgynous tw*t”, and he was right (although I disagreed with the “tw*t” part, at the time), we were head over heels, daydream about, want to be mates with, IN LOVE with him. And didn’t he know it. Looking back now, akin to a scorned lover looking through old texts from an ex, the flowery prose with which he waxed lyrical about the “bond” he has with the supporters, his love for the city and his book – with a Liverbird on the cover – which was basically a love letter to Liverpool, now all just seems so hollow and made our split all the more painful.
 
I saw Torres as “one of us”, in a way that Fowler was and Owen wasn’t, he was Spanish but he “got it”, he understood what it mean to play for us, and when he left us he took all trust I would ever have for footballers with him.
 
I’ll be honest, it has given me an almost perverse pleasure in seeing Fernando struggle since he left, and to use the ex-girlfriend analogy again, it’s been like watching the ex get fat and start seeing some lad you know she thinks is a dickhead. And whilst Torres can point to 3 major trophies won since he left us, I can point to minutes on the pitch and decisive contributions made in those competitions *coughPegguyArphexadcough*.
 
I can’t lie, it has been especially difficult to see Rafa make his return to management with the thoroughly undeserving Chelsea, and even worse that he just might be the man to get Torres close to his 08/09 pomp.
 
I guess what I am trying to say is that the LFC / Torres break-up has left me with some emotional detachment issues in that I can’t (or won’t) form another bond with a player like that again. I see Suarez doing what he does but I can’t give him the adulation I once would have, because at the back of mind I am thinking “well, he’ll be off soon”.
 
A third reason is the atmosphere, and the general “match day experience” at English football. The Guardian, and in particular Raphael Honigstein, don’t help either – with their seemingly endless supply of articles detailing the many ways in which the Bundesliga is superior to our own Premier League.
 
Safe standing areas? You got it.
 
Have a beer watching the match? Why of course!
 
€190 for a season ticket? Why would you pay any more?
 
Clubs owned by its fans? Wouldn’t have it any other way.
 
Barring a few occasions each season, watching Premier League football is a very sterile experience. By all accounts going to the match in the 70’s and 80’s was at times a terrifying and disturbing experience, and no-one wants a return to those days. But does it have to be so far the other way that these days the person standing up, singing and enjoying themselves is in the minority?
 
I have only been to one German League game, a 2.Bundesliga game between St Pauli and Bochum. To be honest, the standard of football was solid gold sh*te, but watching the performance of both sets of fans was seriously impressive. Also standing, with a beer, was a rare treat.
 
Obviously the issue of standing at football is a hugely emotive one for Liverpool, but I for one would love to see a Safe Standing Area implemented in the Kop. Where my season ticket is there is probably 20 rows of people who stand for every game – at the big games the entire Kop remains on its feet – and when a goal goes in there are people going arse over tit over the seat in front, shins cut to ribbons and general mayhem. The presence of seats in these situations does in fact add to the problem.
 
For as long as ticket prices keep rising and rising, and the “fun-levels” of going to the match keep decreasing, (a friend of mine recently referred to going to Anfield as “a chore”), more and more what I would term “proper fans” will be turning away from football, resulting in further diluted atmospheres.
 
I would like to say that this will eventually result in dwindling attendances, thereby forcing the clubs to actually have to work to sell tickets, but the most recent survey of ticket pricing suggests that this is some way from happening unfortunately.
 
A direct knock-on from this is the disappearing characters from our support. I went to both the Moscow and Udinese away games recently and it struck me that there was a lot of faces missing that in years gone by would have been nailed on to be out there. So many of the old guard who helped make our support so famous and unique are choosing not to bother anymore, and the exorbitant ticket prices are making it massively difficult for the new breed to go regularly enough to establish themselves.
 
The working class are being squeezed out and the homogenisation of supporters is well under way.

http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2012/12/falling-out-of-love-modern-football-is-sh*te/

That's a really good article which sums up how many fans feel about the modern game, myself included.

15 minutes in and at the break if you want to get on it:

live on @CityTalk1059 now: http://radioplayer.citytalk.fm/  #LFC 

Was going to put this in the Alonso thread but its locked up. Will put in here as its from the TAW website.

Decent article on Alonso:

A Meditation on Xabi Alonso

By James Dutton
 
You’ve probably seen that video on the BBC website where Xabi Alonso, in his dreamy Basque-English accent, wistfully reflects on Liverpool, a club he still feels ‘attached to’ and one which he still claims to support:
 
“I still feel really attached to Liverpool and I still consider myself a Liverpool fan. After five years, I think I needed a change. It was the right time. Some things happened, not that summer but the summer before when they tried to tell me I wasn’t as important as I thought that I could be. It came to my mind that my position was different and the following summer I decided it was the right time it leave.”
 
Last Saturday lunchtime during Alonso’s appearance on Football Focus, Match of the Day aficionado Gary Lineker tweeted to 1,412,770 followers:
 

Huge error from Liverpool letting @XabiAlonso slip away.
 
This, in turn, was retweeted by 1,415 people and generated a number of comments. Vinny Shepherd opined:
 

‘@GaryLineker If i remember rightly Benitez pushed him out as he wanted Gareth Barry? Was the start of a mini exodus i think?’
 
According to SempreInter:
 

‘@GaryLineker To think that this due to FSW wanting to get rid of Alonso to sign Gareth Barry instead. Instead ended up with none of them
 
John Dawkins:
 

‘@GaryLineker unbelievable that rafa wanted to pie him off for gareth barry ha ha embarrassing really. Leagues apart’
 
And let’s not forget Carolyn Hughes’ two cents worth:
 

‘@GaryLineker Absolutely, the team photograph was never quite the same again either #eyecandy’
 
It’s a convenient summary of the ills that have befallen Liverpool since the departure of the ginger-bearded Spaniard. This February marked the four-year anniversary of the club’s historic 1-0 victory at the Bernabeu, which was conveniently bookmarked with two demoralising 2-0 defeats to West Bromwich Albion and Zenit St. Petersburg.
 
But Lineker’s 10-second tweet cannot begin to explain the nearly four-year diagnosis which has seen Liverpool’s domestic and continental fortunes plummet into mediocrity.
 
Lineker’s statement is one that merely confirms the narrative, which with the benefit of hindsight neatly sidesteps the issue of context. In the summer of 2008 there were very evident noises emanating from Anfield considering allowing Alonso to leave.
 
It was a situation which, just three years before, was barely unthinkable. With Steven Gerrard on the cusp of leaving following the breakdown in his contract extension, there was a genuine school of thought that believed Liverpool would not suffer from the loss of their captain due to the presence of Alonso.
 
That is a testament to the remarkable impact that Alonso made on the club in that 2004-5 season. He arrived as one-half of the beginning of the Rafalutionalongside Luis Garcia; the first seeds of spring in Rafa Benitez’s Anfield vision. In the early season defeats of West Brom and Norwich at home, and then the unforgettable comeback at Fulham, Alonso was instrumental; his metronomic passing was something the Kop had not witnessed since the days of Jan Molby. His goal during the first-half of that victory over Arsenal, the first signs of what would become the Benitez mantra, was picture-perfect.
 
His absence from the New Year, due to a broken ankle at the hands, or feet, of Frank Lampard was keenly felt as inconsistency in the league grew. Yet he made his return in that defiant display in Turin in the Champions League quarter-final, one which shaped the end of Liverpool’s season.
 
The season ended in glory for the Spaniard, his goal which drew the club level in Istanbul etched his name into Anfield immortality. He had impressed enough to grant himself status alongside Gerrard, both in stature and positionally on the pitch.
 
His second season cemented the promise of the first; a goal from his own half against Luton Town in the FA Cup confirmed the ability he possessed.
 
But despite the phenomenal success of those first two seasons, the Basque entered a period of sustained decline between 2006 and 2008. It is a decline that many have since neglected, preferring to focus on the form in his final season which earned him his move to the most successful club in world football.
 
Aside from another, even more impressive, half-way line goal against Newcastle in September 2006 Alonso didn’t do a lot in those two seasons. His 2007-8 season was wracked by injury; he sustained a metatarsal injury early in the campaign, only to aggravate it during his comeback game against Arsenal at the end of October.
 
The Basque took time to settle back into the side, facing stiff competition from Javier Mascherano and the new arrival Lucas Leiva. Rumours abounded that his relationship with the manager had broken down, no doubt fueled by Alonso’s refusal to travel to a Champions League game against Inter Milan due to the birth of his baby.
 
Two moments from those two seasons stick in the memory. A reckless foul on Kaka in the 2007 Champions League final which led to Milan’s first goal and inexplicable hesitation on the edge of his own penalty area against Barnsley in the 2008 FA Cup. This was not the Alonso of 2004-2006. Many conveniently neglect the decline and focus instead on the circus that defined the summer of 2008.
 
The public pursuit of Gareth Barry is now regarded as an embarrassing episode in Liverpool’s recent history, used as a stick with which to beat Benitez for his supposed lack of grip on reality. But it ignores the contrasting trajectories of their respective careers at that time. Barry had made a considerable impact on a stale England set-up and become one of the most consistent performers in the Premier League; Alonso for all his genius had become a frustrating talent, and little more than a bit-player for a glittering Spanish side.
 
Many forget that Alonso’s stock had fallen so rapidly that he was placed on the bench for the first game of the 08-09 season. A certain Damien Plessis, now of Arles-Avignon, was preferred. It’s easy to blame Benitez (#blamerafa) for Alonso’s estrangement, but who’s to say his career would have taken the stratospheric turn that it has without the experience of that summer?
 
In that summer of 2008 he was heavily linked with a move to Juventus, a period in which La Vecchia Signora were feared more for their reputation than their ability. There was no hint of the future that awaited him in his homeland, both domestically and internationally, for he played little part in the country’s Euro 2008 success.
 
Lineker is correct, looking at it from a 2013 angle it was indeed a ‘huge error’, but it made sense in 2008, despite the hurt it caused in 2009. Yet the idea that the club ‘let him go’ is a fallacy in itself; Alonso did, after all, hand in a transfer request. And who would begrudge his desire for a move to the most decorated club in world football, after they had just spent over £130m on the two most recent recipients of the Ballon d’Or?
 
Many point to Ferguson’s ability to coax another season out of Cristiano Ronaldo, but that ignores the second-coming of the Galáctico era in 2009 which effectively swung Alonso’s head. Without his orchestration of the 5-0 aggregate victory over Real Madrid just months earlier, would they have come calling so relentlessly that summer?
 
In a perverse way Alonso owes his career to Rafael Benitez, not for bringing him to England in 2004 but for giving him a reality check in 2008.

http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2013/02/a-meditation-on-xabi-alonso/

More good stuff from the lads. be interesting to hear what they discuss on Monday though, with the international break and all that.

http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2013/03/citytalk-transference/



iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-anfield-wrap-podcast/id456906266

Direct: http://traffic.libsyn.com/theanfieldwrap/CITYTALK_-_TRANSFERENCE.m4a

Really like their podcasts! Keep up the good work lads.

Latest show is apparently one of the best TAW's there has been.

I'm catching up on Monday's first (which is a cracker so far) then I'll get on this:

THE ANFIELD WRAP ‏@TheAnfieldWrap  2m 
Everybody talkin' 'bout: CITYTALK: ROLE MODELS - http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2013/04/citytalk-role-models/ …

Direct: http://traffic.libsyn.com/theanfieldwrap/CITYTALK_-_ROLE_MODELS.mp3 …

 iTunes: http://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-anfield-wrap-podcast/id456906266 … #LFC

 
 

Had stopped listening there for a while, just didn't have the time. Must try get back listening to the lads again.

Latest show is apparently one of the best TAW's there has been.

I'm catching up on Monday's first (which is a cracker so far) then I'll get on this:

THE ANFIELD WRAP ‏@TheAnfieldWrap  2m 
Everybody talkin' 'bout: CITYTALK: ROLE MODELS - http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2013/04/citytalk-role-models/ …

Direct: http://traffic.libsyn.com/theanfieldwrap/CITYTALK_-_ROLE_MODELS.mp3 …

 iTunes: http://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-anfield-wrap-podcast/id456906266 … #LFC

 
 

Love listening to these lads..

Been listening to The Rider as well they have put out.. Same banter and some boss tunes to boot

Sean Rogers on this week's Podcast. Excellent contributor to TAW he is, well worth a listen.

PODCAST - A BELGIAN KEEPER?

Direct: http://traffic.libsyn.com/theanfieldwrap/PODCAST_-_A_BELGIAN_KEEPER.m4a

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-anfield-wrap-podcast/id456906266

http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2013/07/podcast-brendan-rodgers-talks-to-taw/

Listening the latest episode with BR as the main guest.

Really worth subscribing to the podcast and listening to this one in particular.

Listening the latest episode with BR as the main guest.

Really worth subscribing to the podcast and listening to this one in particular.

Yeah it was a good listen.. Brendan comes across well, he talks about and says a lot of things in the episode I agree with and like to hear regarding tactics and the way to play..

He didn't really answer the Reina questions great..or more answered without giving an answer and I think the lads could have pushed him on it a bit more with the way he answered.

All in all I like Brendan the man.. I'm really hopeful he has enough to take us back to the top, I have to admit I'm not 100% convinced still but he has my full backing.

Just listened to that as well and about to say exactly what PD said about Pepe.

Brendan was very vague about it and one minute talking about competition, then offers coming in, then benefiting Pepe in a World Cup year.

Found it interesting how the boys were alot quieter than usual and were respectful and a tad intimidated by having the gaffer on the show!

Found it interesting how the boys were alot quieter than usual and were respectful and a tad intimidated by having the gaffer on the show!

Yep.

Didn't like that as I thought they could have been a bit more pressing on a few questions.

Yep.

Didn't like that as I thought they could have been a bit more pressing on a few questions.

Agree but still funny how even those whose job is in the media and are in and around the club still get a little shy when presented with players and managers.