Dejan Lovren (Liverpool > Zenit St Petersburg)

Should have signed Fonte.

Probably didn't have the right "Character" 

Probably didn't have the right "Character" 

Yeah was probably happy to stay at Southampton, the b***ard.

Not good enough for us he found his level at Southampton where the pressure wouldnt have been as high but to be a top worlclass CB you need to thrive under pressure and deal with it. Lovren will not improve and will only get worse as he will be in and out of the team so for me this player would only work if Skrtel was moved on and the fact that he's not going means this pile of dog turd will continue to be an over paid 3rd choice CB behind Sakho.

Lovren’s Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Dejan Lovren is mentally weak.

I don’t like making assumptions or accusations like this, especially when they’re towards people I don’t personally know, but this is just something you can’t ignore. All players want to be loved but Dejan Lovren seems like the sort that needs positive reinforcement to function. Less than one week after saying he doesn’t want to be the made the scapegoat again this season he’s making Patrick Ronaldinho look like Sergio Aguero. Poor defensive positioning against a Malaysian side a mere 3 weeks before the Premier League kicks off is hardly a positive.

The Croatian international arrived in the summer of 2014 following a ‘successful’ season at Southampton. He pushed the move to Liverpool saying his head was already at Liverpool when he heard of our interest, and could he be blamed? A chance at playing in the Champions League again only a season after a number of clubs passed up on him for a fee south of £10million. His time at Lyon a forgettable one. The pressure of a big club seemed to unsettle him and his countless mistakes were put under the microscope much to his horror.

“[The French] journalists were killing me, asking why the club payed millions for a player who didn’t have enough experience.” Experience counts for very little. If you’re good enough then you’re old enough and the journalists knew this.

In a game against Lille he was sent off after picking up a silly second booking after hacking down Nolan Roux, from behind, as he was running away from goal. It left Lyon with the task of having to see out 25 minutes of the game with 10 men and missing a centre-back having already used their 3 substitutes. His response was as follows -

“I agree with the second yellow card, but not the first,” Lovren said. “I’m not in the best form of my life and I’m very disappointed at being suspended.”

Hardly an apology, is it? Questioning the first yellow is futile, he’d already been booked and should have enough in game awareness not to get himself sent off. He fails to accept responsibility for the red card, and in France this was a regular occurrence.

He toils under the pressures of a big club whilst shouting about why it’s not his fault and revels in the applause when at a smaller club.

After moving to Southampton and seeing an upturn in form he was sure to get a dig in at those in France -

“I was the same player in France and I think now I’m showing the quality to everybody and proving, even to myself, that I was not so bad in France,” Lovren said, per Paul Doyle at The Observer (h/t The Guardian). “It is just that in England the referees are different [and more lenient].”

What’s alarming here is he doesn’t say he’s changed his ways, he just says the referees are ‘softer’ in England. He carries on with the whole ‘French referees have a vendetta against me’ even when he had moved on. It’s almost as though he has an inferiority complex. Surely if you’re a clever player and you think a referee may have your card marked you don’t give them chance to book you?

Maybe it’s true, maybe Dejan did perform better at Southampton but why is that? Could it because of the expectations of the club? I mean no disrespect to Southampton but they weren’t challenging for top 4, they weren’t in Europe and they have no history of success. Could he be the sort of player to suit that type of club?  The opposite to the likes of Lyon and Liverpool. As soon as he’s under the pressure of playing for a big club we start to the weakness in his mentality. Could it alternatively be because at Southampton he had two monster midfielders shielding him? Morgan Schniederlin and Victor Wanyama are two of the best in the Premier League at what they do. They made the likes of Jose Fonte look like a rock. Dejan made mistakes at Southampton but they were masked by the midfield duo. This leads me onto yet another time Dejan tried to pass the blame.

This was never confirmed but in December the Mirror reported that Dejan Lovren was ‘privately insistent that he is not receiving enough protection from the Liverpool midfield.’

Now don’t get me wrong here Dejan, the Liverpool midfield offered very little protection, that’s true. However it was the same the season prior, and the year before that. So what exactly did you expect when you signed? Had you not watched Liverpool play? He was signed and labelled as this defensive leader who would sort our defensive issues out and there was even a mention of him being future Liverpool captain in his first interview. Like I said, I agree we offered no protection to the defence but even so, many of his mistakes stemmed from poor decision making and horrific positioning. Nothing to do with the midfield, just basic defensive traits. He didn’t take on the responsibility, he decided to blame the midfield. He just reminds me of someone that has an answer for everything and it’s usually “yeah, but I pissed on the toilet seat because you never put it up”.

Then came his recent revelation. In an interview with the Liverpool Echo during the pre-season tour he came out with this “But it is not Dejan Lovren-Liverpool, you know? I cannot defend all alone. It is 11 players. When we are good, everyone is good."

“I cannot defend all alone”, it’d be nice if you could even defend at times, you know? We’ve persisted with Martin Skrtel for all this time literally all you had to do was be better than him. The same way it’s a dead cert Nathaniel Clyne will be a success purely for not being Glen Johnson. It’s very much a team game but you can’t blame Danny Sturridge for you trying to play Cristiano Ronaldo offside when he was in his own half, can you? Yes he literally did that, there’s a video of that here.

Also translates as ‘Look at me, tell me how good I am, look at meeee’. You imagine him sat looking at his phone all smug when he’s reading all the replies to this.

You’re at Liverpool FC, you’re expected to perform and not be fussed over when you don’t make a mistake. It’s kind of your job. Dejan Lovren is very much a needy player. He needs approval and to feel loved. I’ve just got a puppy, when she was being house trained you’re encouraged to go over the top with your positive reinforcement. Dejan Lovren seems to want to carry this on through his footballing career. He uses social media and encourages interaction when it’s going well but is using Twitter to engage with fans the best idea?

Upon leaving Lyon he also sent a tweet after the club had lost a game saying something along the lines of “I’d like to see the supporters blame that one on me.” He’s a very insecure player from his days at Lyon, which probably left him mentally scarred but he’s using this as a reason and excuse for why people have this perception of him. It’s a ready made excuse for him that he scrambles towards at any given opportunity.

He wants all the praise and none of the criticism and it’s this attitude which could prevent him from becoming a decent centre-back at a club challenging near the top. He’s got all the physical attributes needed but the mentality is all wrong. He has a big season at the club and these excuses can’t be his go-to option anymore. Actions speak louder than words.

http://anfieldindex.com/15640/lovrens-actions-speak-louder-words.html

Bolding and italics are from the original.

Lovren’s Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Dejan Lovren is mentally weak.

I don’t like making assumptions or accusations like this, especially when they’re towards people I don’t personally know, but this is just something you can’t ignore. All players want to be loved but Dejan Lovren seems like the sort that needs positive reinforcement to function. Less than one week after saying he doesn’t want to be the made the scapegoat again this season he’s making Patrick Ronaldinho look like Sergio Aguero. Poor defensive positioning against a Malaysian side a mere 3 weeks before the Premier League kicks off is hardly a positive.

The Croatian international arrived in the summer of 2014 following a ‘successful’ season at Southampton. He pushed the move to Liverpool saying his head was already at Liverpool when he heard of our interest, and could he be blamed? A chance at playing in the Champions League again only a season after a number of clubs passed up on him for a fee south of £10million. His time at Lyon a forgettable one. The pressure of a big club seemed to unsettle him and his countless mistakes were put under the microscope much to his horror.

“[The French] journalists were killing me, asking why the club payed millions for a player who didn’t have enough experience.” Experience counts for very little. If you’re good enough then you’re old enough and the journalists knew this.

In a game against Lille he was sent off after picking up a silly second booking after hacking down Nolan Roux, from behind, as he was running away from goal. It left Lyon with the task of having to see out 25 minutes of the game with 10 men and missing a centre-back having already used their 3 substitutes. His response was as follows -

“I agree with the second yellow card, but not the first,” Lovren said. “I’m not in the best form of my life and I’m very disappointed at being suspended.”

Hardly an apology, is it? Questioning the first yellow is futile, he’d already been booked and should have enough in game awareness not to get himself sent off. He fails to accept responsibility for the red card, and in France this was a regular occurrence.

He toils under the pressures of a big club whilst shouting about why it’s not his fault and revels in the applause when at a smaller club.

After moving to Southampton and seeing an upturn in form he was sure to get a dig in at those in France -

“I was the same player in France and I think now I’m showing the quality to everybody and proving, even to myself, that I was not so bad in France,” Lovren said, per Paul Doyle at The Observer (h/t The Guardian). “It is just that in England the referees are different [and more lenient].”

What’s alarming here is he doesn’t say he’s changed his ways, he just says the referees are ‘softer’ in England. He carries on with the whole ‘French referees have a vendetta against me’ even when he had moved on. It’s almost as though he has an inferiority complex. Surely if you’re a clever player and you think a referee may have your card marked you don’t give them chance to book you?

Maybe it’s true, maybe Dejan did perform better at Southampton but why is that? Could it because of the expectations of the club? I mean no disrespect to Southampton but they weren’t challenging for top 4, they weren’t in Europe and they have no history of success. Could he be the sort of player to suit that type of club?  The opposite to the likes of Lyon and Liverpool. As soon as he’s under the pressure of playing for a big club we start to the weakness in his mentality. Could it alternatively be because at Southampton he had two monster midfielders shielding him? Morgan Schniederlin and Victor Wanyama are two of the best in the Premier League at what they do. They made the likes of Jose Fonte look like a rock. Dejan made mistakes at Southampton but they were masked by the midfield duo. This leads me onto yet another time Dejan tried to pass the blame.

This was never confirmed but in December the Mirror reported that Dejan Lovren was ‘privately insistent that he is not receiving enough protection from the Liverpool midfield.’

Now don’t get me wrong here Dejan, the Liverpool midfield offered very little protection, that’s true. However it was the same the season prior, and the year before that. So what exactly did you expect when you signed? Had you not watched Liverpool play? He was signed and labelled as this defensive leader who would sort our defensive issues out and there was even a mention of him being future Liverpool captain in his first interview. Like I said, I agree we offered no protection to the defence but even so, many of his mistakes stemmed from poor decision making and horrific positioning. Nothing to do with the midfield, just basic defensive traits. He didn’t take on the responsibility, he decided to blame the midfield. He just reminds me of someone that has an answer for everything and it’s usually “yeah, but I pissed on the toilet seat because you never put it up”.

Then came his recent revelation. In an interview with the Liverpool Echo during the pre-season tour he came out with this “But it is not Dejan Lovren-Liverpool, you know? I cannot defend all alone. It is 11 players. When we are good, everyone is good."

“I cannot defend all alone”, it’d be nice if you could even defend at times, you know? We’ve persisted with Martin Skrtel for all this time literally all you had to do was be better than him. The same way it’s a dead cert Nathaniel Clyne will be a success purely for not being Glen Johnson. It’s very much a team game but you can’t blame Danny Sturridge for you trying to play Cristiano Ronaldo offside when he was in his own half, can you? Yes he literally did that, there’s a video of that here.

Also translates as ‘Look at me, tell me how good I am, look at meeee’. You imagine him sat looking at his phone all smug when he’s reading all the replies to this.

You’re at Liverpool FC, you’re expected to perform and not be fussed over when you don’t make a mistake. It’s kind of your job. Dejan Lovren is very much a needy player. He needs approval and to feel loved. I’ve just got a puppy, when she was being house trained you’re encouraged to go over the top with your positive reinforcement. Dejan Lovren seems to want to carry this on through his footballing career. He uses social media and encourages interaction when it’s going well but is using Twitter to engage with fans the best idea?

Upon leaving Lyon he also sent a tweet after the club had lost a game saying something along the lines of “I’d like to see the supporters blame that one on me.” He’s a very insecure player from his days at Lyon, which probably left him mentally scarred but he’s using this as a reason and excuse for why people have this perception of him. It’s a ready made excuse for him that he scrambles towards at any given opportunity.

He wants all the praise and none of the criticism and it’s this attitude which could prevent him from becoming a decent centre-back at a club challenging near the top. He’s got all the physical attributes needed but the mentality is all wrong. He has a big season at the club and these excuses can’t be his go-to option anymore. Actions speak louder than words.

http://anfieldindex.com/15640/lovrens-actions-speak-louder-words.html

Bolding and italics are from the original.

The author didn't happen to be Dave Hendrick mate?

He hates Lovren.

Lovren’s Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Dejan Lovren is mentally weak.

I don’t like making assumptions or accusations like this, especially when they’re towards people I don’t personally know, but this is just something you can’t ignore. All players want to be loved but Dejan Lovren seems like the sort that needs positive reinforcement to function. Less than one week after saying he doesn’t want to be the made the scapegoat again this season he’s making Patrick Ronaldinho look like Sergio Aguero. Poor defensive positioning against a Malaysian side a mere 3 weeks before the Premier League kicks off is hardly a positive.

The Croatian international arrived in the summer of 2014 following a ‘successful’ season at Southampton. He pushed the move to Liverpool saying his head was already at Liverpool when he heard of our interest, and could he be blamed? A chance at playing in the Champions League again only a season after a number of clubs passed up on him for a fee south of £10million. His time at Lyon a forgettable one. The pressure of a big club seemed to unsettle him and his countless mistakes were put under the microscope much to his horror.

“[The French] journalists were killing me, asking why the club payed millions for a player who didn’t have enough experience.” Experience counts for very little. If you’re good enough then you’re old enough and the journalists knew this.

In a game against Lille he was sent off after picking up a silly second booking after hacking down Nolan Roux, from behind, as he was running away from goal. It left Lyon with the task of having to see out 25 minutes of the game with 10 men and missing a centre-back having already used their 3 substitutes. His response was as follows -

“I agree with the second yellow card, but not the first,” Lovren said. “I’m not in the best form of my life and I’m very disappointed at being suspended.”

Hardly an apology, is it? Questioning the first yellow is futile, he’d already been booked and should have enough in game awareness not to get himself sent off. He fails to accept responsibility for the red card, and in France this was a regular occurrence.

He toils under the pressures of a big club whilst shouting about why it’s not his fault and revels in the applause when at a smaller club.

After moving to Southampton and seeing an upturn in form he was sure to get a dig in at those in France -

“I was the same player in France and I think now I’m showing the quality to everybody and proving, even to myself, that I was not so bad in France,” Lovren said, per Paul Doyle at The Observer (h/t The Guardian). “It is just that in England the referees are different [and more lenient].”

What’s alarming here is he doesn’t say he’s changed his ways, he just says the referees are ‘softer’ in England. He carries on with the whole ‘French referees have a vendetta against me’ even when he had moved on. It’s almost as though he has an inferiority complex. Surely if you’re a clever player and you think a referee may have your card marked you don’t give them chance to book you?

Maybe it’s true, maybe Dejan did perform better at Southampton but why is that? Could it because of the expectations of the club? I mean no disrespect to Southampton but they weren’t challenging for top 4, they weren’t in Europe and they have no history of success. Could he be the sort of player to suit that type of club?  The opposite to the likes of Lyon and Liverpool. As soon as he’s under the pressure of playing for a big club we start to the weakness in his mentality. Could it alternatively be because at Southampton he had two monster midfielders shielding him? Morgan Schniederlin and Victor Wanyama are two of the best in the Premier League at what they do. They made the likes of Jose Fonte look like a rock. Dejan made mistakes at Southampton but they were masked by the midfield duo. This leads me onto yet another time Dejan tried to pass the blame.

This was never confirmed but in December the Mirror reported that Dejan Lovren was ‘privately insistent that he is not receiving enough protection from the Liverpool midfield.’

Now don’t get me wrong here Dejan, the Liverpool midfield offered very little protection, that’s true. However it was the same the season prior, and the year before that. So what exactly did you expect when you signed? Had you not watched Liverpool play? He was signed and labelled as this defensive leader who would sort our defensive issues out and there was even a mention of him being future Liverpool captain in his first interview. Like I said, I agree we offered no protection to the defence but even so, many of his mistakes stemmed from poor decision making and horrific positioning. Nothing to do with the midfield, just basic defensive traits. He didn’t take on the responsibility, he decided to blame the midfield. He just reminds me of someone that has an answer for everything and it’s usually “yeah, but I pissed on the toilet seat because you never put it up”.

Then came his recent revelation. In an interview with the Liverpool Echo during the pre-season tour he came out with this “But it is not Dejan Lovren-Liverpool, you know? I cannot defend all alone. It is 11 players. When we are good, everyone is good."

“I cannot defend all alone”, it’d be nice if you could even defend at times, you know? We’ve persisted with Martin Skrtel for all this time literally all you had to do was be better than him. The same way it’s a dead cert Nathaniel Clyne will be a success purely for not being Glen Johnson. It’s very much a team game but you can’t blame Danny Sturridge for you trying to play Cristiano Ronaldo offside when he was in his own half, can you? Yes he literally did that, there’s a video of that here.

Also translates as ‘Look at me, tell me how good I am, look at meeee’. You imagine him sat looking at his phone all smug when he’s reading all the replies to this.

You’re at Liverpool FC, you’re expected to perform and not be fussed over when you don’t make a mistake. It’s kind of your job. Dejan Lovren is very much a needy player. He needs approval and to feel loved. I’ve just got a puppy, when she was being house trained you’re encouraged to go over the top with your positive reinforcement. Dejan Lovren seems to want to carry this on through his footballing career. He uses social media and encourages interaction when it’s going well but is using Twitter to engage with fans the best idea?

Upon leaving Lyon he also sent a tweet after the club had lost a game saying something along the lines of “I’d like to see the supporters blame that one on me.” He’s a very insecure player from his days at Lyon, which probably left him mentally scarred but he’s using this as a reason and excuse for why people have this perception of him. It’s a ready made excuse for him that he scrambles towards at any given opportunity.

He wants all the praise and none of the criticism and it’s this attitude which could prevent him from becoming a decent centre-back at a club challenging near the top. He’s got all the physical attributes needed but the mentality is all wrong. He has a big season at the club and these excuses can’t be his go-to option anymore. Actions speak louder than words.

http://anfieldindex.com/15640/lovrens-actions-speak-louder-words.html

Bolding and italics are from the original.

spot on everyword this

The author didn't happen to be Dave Hendrick mate?

He hates Lovren.

nope, someone named Sam McGuire.

Lovren’s Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Dejan Lovren is mentally weak.

I don’t like making assumptions or accusations like this, especially when they’re towards people I don’t personally know, but this is just something you can’t ignore. All players want to be loved but Dejan Lovren seems like the sort that needs positive reinforcement to function. Less than one week after saying he doesn’t want to be the made the scapegoat again this season he’s making Patrick Ronaldinho look like Sergio Aguero. Poor defensive positioning against a Malaysian side a mere 3 weeks before the Premier League kicks off is hardly a positive.

The Croatian international arrived in the summer of 2014 following a ‘successful’ season at Southampton. He pushed the move to Liverpool saying his head was already at Liverpool when he heard of our interest, and could he be blamed? A chance at playing in the Champions League again only a season after a number of clubs passed up on him for a fee south of £10million. His time at Lyon a forgettable one. The pressure of a big club seemed to unsettle him and his countless mistakes were put under the microscope much to his horror.

“[The French] journalists were killing me, asking why the club payed millions for a player who didn’t have enough experience.” Experience counts for very little. If you’re good enough then you’re old enough and the journalists knew this.

In a game against Lille he was sent off after picking up a silly second booking after hacking down Nolan Roux, from behind, as he was running away from goal. It left Lyon with the task of having to see out 25 minutes of the game with 10 men and missing a centre-back having already used their 3 substitutes. His response was as follows -

“I agree with the second yellow card, but not the first,” Lovren said. “I’m not in the best form of my life and I’m very disappointed at being suspended.”

Hardly an apology, is it? Questioning the first yellow is futile, he’d already been booked and should have enough in game awareness not to get himself sent off. He fails to accept responsibility for the red card, and in France this was a regular occurrence.

He toils under the pressures of a big club whilst shouting about why it’s not his fault and revels in the applause when at a smaller club.

After moving to Southampton and seeing an upturn in form he was sure to get a dig in at those in France -

“I was the same player in France and I think now I’m showing the quality to everybody and proving, even to myself, that I was not so bad in France,” Lovren said, per Paul Doyle at The Observer (h/t The Guardian). “It is just that in England the referees are different [and more lenient].”

What’s alarming here is he doesn’t say he’s changed his ways, he just says the referees are ‘softer’ in England. He carries on with the whole ‘French referees have a vendetta against me’ even when he had moved on. It’s almost as though he has an inferiority complex. Surely if you’re a clever player and you think a referee may have your card marked you don’t give them chance to book you?

Maybe it’s true, maybe Dejan did perform better at Southampton but why is that? Could it because of the expectations of the club? I mean no disrespect to Southampton but they weren’t challenging for top 4, they weren’t in Europe and they have no history of success. Could he be the sort of player to suit that type of club?  The opposite to the likes of Lyon and Liverpool. As soon as he’s under the pressure of playing for a big club we start to the weakness in his mentality. Could it alternatively be because at Southampton he had two monster midfielders shielding him? Morgan Schniederlin and Victor Wanyama are two of the best in the Premier League at what they do. They made the likes of Jose Fonte look like a rock. Dejan made mistakes at Southampton but they were masked by the midfield duo. This leads me onto yet another time Dejan tried to pass the blame.

This was never confirmed but in December the Mirror reported that Dejan Lovren was ‘privately insistent that he is not receiving enough protection from the Liverpool midfield.’

Now don’t get me wrong here Dejan, the Liverpool midfield offered very little protection, that’s true. However it was the same the season prior, and the year before that. So what exactly did you expect when you signed? Had you not watched Liverpool play? He was signed and labelled as this defensive leader who would sort our defensive issues out and there was even a mention of him being future Liverpool captain in his first interview. Like I said, I agree we offered no protection to the defence but even so, many of his mistakes stemmed from poor decision making and horrific positioning. Nothing to do with the midfield, just basic defensive traits. He didn’t take on the responsibility, he decided to blame the midfield. He just reminds me of someone that has an answer for everything and it’s usually “yeah, but I pissed on the toilet seat because you never put it up”.

Then came his recent revelation. In an interview with the Liverpool Echo during the pre-season tour he came out with this “But it is not Dejan Lovren-Liverpool, you know? I cannot defend all alone. It is 11 players. When we are good, everyone is good."

“I cannot defend all alone”, it’d be nice if you could even defend at times, you know? We’ve persisted with Martin Skrtel for all this time literally all you had to do was be better than him. The same way it’s a dead cert Nathaniel Clyne will be a success purely for not being Glen Johnson. It’s very much a team game but you can’t blame Danny Sturridge for you trying to play Cristiano Ronaldo offside when he was in his own half, can you? Yes he literally did that, there’s a video of that here.

Also translates as ‘Look at me, tell me how good I am, look at meeee’. You imagine him sat looking at his phone all smug when he’s reading all the replies to this.

You’re at Liverpool FC, you’re expected to perform and not be fussed over when you don’t make a mistake. It’s kind of your job. Dejan Lovren is very much a needy player. He needs approval and to feel loved. I’ve just got a puppy, when she was being house trained you’re encouraged to go over the top with your positive reinforcement. Dejan Lovren seems to want to carry this on through his footballing career. He uses social media and encourages interaction when it’s going well but is using Twitter to engage with fans the best idea?

Upon leaving Lyon he also sent a tweet after the club had lost a game saying something along the lines of “I’d like to see the supporters blame that one on me.” He’s a very insecure player from his days at Lyon, which probably left him mentally scarred but he’s using this as a reason and excuse for why people have this perception of him. It’s a ready made excuse for him that he scrambles towards at any given opportunity.

He wants all the praise and none of the criticism and it’s this attitude which could prevent him from becoming a decent centre-back at a club challenging near the top. He’s got all the physical attributes needed but the mentality is all wrong. He has a big season at the club and these excuses can’t be his go-to option anymore. Actions speak louder than words.

http://anfieldindex.com/15640/lovrens-actions-speak-louder-words.html

Bolding and italics are from the original.

Agree with every word of it.

Remember there were rumours of a fall out with Stevie and wonder if that was in relation to Lovren's suggestion that there wasn't enough protection from midfield. Personally think he had a point about protection but “I cannot defend all alone” takes the piss, it really does.

For a player that was talked of as being bought with a leadership role in mind (where Mick clearly got the captain crap from) he's demonstrated nothing but a very weak mentality and these quotes simply reinforce my view of him. Should be behind Ilori now in the pecking order and give the young lad a chance who has shown tremendous promise so far. If Lovren can't stand the competition then time to find yourself a new club, if he can then best of luck to him on battling his way back up the ladder.

That journalist is incredible! What's he doing writing for an online blog !? With his psychological expertise he should be writing for scientific journals or helping to study the human connectome!

Lovren’s Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Dejan Lovren is mentally weak.

I don’t like making assumptions or accusations like this, especially when they’re towards people I don’t personally know, but this is just something you can’t ignore. All players want to be loved but Dejan Lovren seems like the sort that needs positive reinforcement to function. Less than one week after saying he doesn’t want to be the made the scapegoat again this season he’s making Patrick Ronaldinho look like Sergio Aguero. Poor defensive positioning against a Malaysian side a mere 3 weeks before the Premier League kicks off is hardly a positive.

The Croatian international arrived in the summer of 2014 following a ‘successful’ season at Southampton. He pushed the move to Liverpool saying his head was already at Liverpool when he heard of our interest, and could he be blamed? A chance at playing in the Champions League again only a season after a number of clubs passed up on him for a fee south of £10million. His time at Lyon a forgettable one. The pressure of a big club seemed to unsettle him and his countless mistakes were put under the microscope much to his horror.

“[The French] journalists were killing me, asking why the club payed millions for a player who didn’t have enough experience.” Experience counts for very little. If you’re good enough then you’re old enough and the journalists knew this.

In a game against Lille he was sent off after picking up a silly second booking after hacking down Nolan Roux, from behind, as he was running away from goal. It left Lyon with the task of having to see out 25 minutes of the game with 10 men and missing a centre-back having already used their 3 substitutes. His response was as follows -

“I agree with the second yellow card, but not the first,” Lovren said. “I’m not in the best form of my life and I’m very disappointed at being suspended.”

Hardly an apology, is it? Questioning the first yellow is futile, he’d already been booked and should have enough in game awareness not to get himself sent off. He fails to accept responsibility for the red card, and in France this was a regular occurrence.

He toils under the pressures of a big club whilst shouting about why it’s not his fault and revels in the applause when at a smaller club.

After moving to Southampton and seeing an upturn in form he was sure to get a dig in at those in France -

“I was the same player in France and I think now I’m showing the quality to everybody and proving, even to myself, that I was not so bad in France,” Lovren said, per Paul Doyle at The Observer (h/t The Guardian). “It is just that in England the referees are different [and more lenient].”

What’s alarming here is he doesn’t say he’s changed his ways, he just says the referees are ‘softer’ in England. He carries on with the whole ‘French referees have a vendetta against me’ even when he had moved on. It’s almost as though he has an inferiority complex. Surely if you’re a clever player and you think a referee may have your card marked you don’t give them chance to book you?

Maybe it’s true, maybe Dejan did perform better at Southampton but why is that? Could it because of the expectations of the club? I mean no disrespect to Southampton but they weren’t challenging for top 4, they weren’t in Europe and they have no history of success. Could he be the sort of player to suit that type of club?  The opposite to the likes of Lyon and Liverpool. As soon as he’s under the pressure of playing for a big club we start to the weakness in his mentality. Could it alternatively be because at Southampton he had two monster midfielders shielding him? Morgan Schniederlin and Victor Wanyama are two of the best in the Premier League at what they do. They made the likes of Jose Fonte look like a rock. Dejan made mistakes at Southampton but they were masked by the midfield duo. This leads me onto yet another time Dejan tried to pass the blame.

This was never confirmed but in December the Mirror reported that Dejan Lovren was ‘privately insistent that he is not receiving enough protection from the Liverpool midfield.’

Now don’t get me wrong here Dejan, the Liverpool midfield offered very little protection, that’s true. However it was the same the season prior, and the year before that. So what exactly did you expect when you signed? Had you not watched Liverpool play? He was signed and labelled as this defensive leader who would sort our defensive issues out and there was even a mention of him being future Liverpool captain in his first interview. Like I said, I agree we offered no protection to the defence but even so, many of his mistakes stemmed from poor decision making and horrific positioning. Nothing to do with the midfield, just basic defensive traits. He didn’t take on the responsibility, he decided to blame the midfield. He just reminds me of someone that has an answer for everything and it’s usually “yeah, but I pissed on the toilet seat because you never put it up”.

Then came his recent revelation. In an interview with the Liverpool Echo during the pre-season tour he came out with this “But it is not Dejan Lovren-Liverpool, you know? I cannot defend all alone. It is 11 players. When we are good, everyone is good."

“I cannot defend all alone”, it’d be nice if you could even defend at times, you know? We’ve persisted with Martin Skrtel for all this time literally all you had to do was be better than him. The same way it’s a dead cert Nathaniel Clyne will be a success purely for not being Glen Johnson. It’s very much a team game but you can’t blame Danny Sturridge for you trying to play Cristiano Ronaldo offside when he was in his own half, can you? Yes he literally did that, there’s a video of that here.

Also translates as ‘Look at me, tell me how good I am, look at meeee’. You imagine him sat looking at his phone all smug when he’s reading all the replies to this.

You’re at Liverpool FC, you’re expected to perform and not be fussed over when you don’t make a mistake. It’s kind of your job. Dejan Lovren is very much a needy player. He needs approval and to feel loved. I’ve just got a puppy, when she was being house trained you’re encouraged to go over the top with your positive reinforcement. Dejan Lovren seems to want to carry this on through his footballing career. He uses social media and encourages interaction when it’s going well but is using Twitter to engage with fans the best idea?

Upon leaving Lyon he also sent a tweet after the club had lost a game saying something along the lines of “I’d like to see the supporters blame that one on me.” He’s a very insecure player from his days at Lyon, which probably left him mentally scarred but he’s using this as a reason and excuse for why people have this perception of him. It’s a ready made excuse for him that he scrambles towards at any given opportunity.

He wants all the praise and none of the criticism and it’s this attitude which could prevent him from becoming a decent centre-back at a club challenging near the top. He’s got all the physical attributes needed but the mentality is all wrong. He has a big season at the club and these excuses can’t be his go-to option anymore. Actions speak louder than words.

http://anfieldindex.com/15640/lovrens-actions-speak-louder-words.html

Bolding and italics are from the original.

Can't argue with any of that can you? Some really interesting points.

This is me every time he has the ball or it's going in his direction:   

Surely I shouldn't be feeling that way about an international defender playing for Liverpool?!

What's the human connectome?

Fascinating ongoing scientific research, literally trying to "map" the human brain.
http://www.humanconnectomeproject.org/

I realise my post is more than a little facetious but I do find it slightly amusing so much about someone's character can be gleaned from a combination of 140-character twitter posts, quotes and implications. The fact that the bolded parts are bits of speech that the author has literally made up tells you quite a lot. Maybe Lovren isn't mentally strong enough to deal with the pressure, but I don't think there's any real evidence in that hit-piece above. It's clearly written from a heavily biased point of view.

Fascinating ongoing scientific research, literally trying to "map" the human brain.
http://www.humanconnectomeproject.org/

Cool! Thanks!

Fascinating ongoing scientific research, literally trying to "map" the human brain.
http://www.humanconnectomeproject.org/

I realise my post is more than a little facetious but I do find it slightly amusing so much about someone's character can be gleaned from a combination of 140-character twitter posts, quotes and implications. The fact that the bolded parts are bits of speech that the author has literally made up tells you quite a lot. Maybe Lovren isn't mentally strong enough to deal with the pressure, but I don't think there's any real evidence in that hit-piece above. It's clearly written from a heavily biased point of view.

Spot on art not surprised with the usual suspects jumping on the new scapegoat clutching at anything they can grasp to push their biased views across.

He was only asking about that bit, to be fair I tacked the other paragraph onto the reply to him 

Anyways back to Lovren.. I hope he'll turn it around but do agree there's a lot of work to be done, and most of its up in the guy's head.

terrible player the sooner we can shift him the better

no surprise he has a sh*t mentality, so do we as a club (see above post). but now we have the chance to create a new culture. we can either back our players to grow and be educated, or keep blaming them individually, pretending we're still the greatest club for development in the world but failing to develop anyone...

Rodgers found a suitable replacement for Lovren 

Rodgers found a suitable replacement for Lovren 

No no no can you not see by the way Rodgers is holding it and his facial expression that the dummy is clearly weak mentally and can't handle the pressure of being at a top club!

No no no can you not see by the way Rodgers is holding it and his facial expression that the dummy is clearly weak mentally and can't handle the pressure of being at a top club!

It's got no character.

It's also more reliable, sturdy, steady and tougher than Lallana and Sakho.

Rodgers found a suitable replacement for Lovren 

At least that wouldn't be getting the:



treatment.

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2015/02/10/258C2EA700000578-2948377-image-a-13_1423610116144.jpg

Could have been a world class centre back and tried that too Luke.

At least that wouldn't be getting the:



treatment.

Hahaha never noticed Rodgers covering his face there!