Unlike you RLB and most of you, I just thought we weren't good enough yesterday.
For the first half, our only chance was from the set piece that Yossi converted, we didn't threaten the keeper at all in open play and for 45 minutes, that is not good enough if we want to win the game. Yes, our possession rate is among one of the highest in the competition, at half time yesterday we were at a rate of 61% but in truth Fiorentina were more threatening going forward.
In the second it was an improvement, the game was more open and we had a few chances from Gerrard's crossing, our players failing to get their heads to the ball - and for me that's a chance lost. As long as we fail to get that ball and threaten Frey's goal we ain't going to do ourselves any good. And besides the sidenettings from Gerrard, and Pacheco's shot, I thought that was what summed up our chances - we didn't create enough to try and kill the game off.
What is more worrying for me is our inability to up the tempo. We look rather slow, taking our own time to try and probe them - which most of the time, came to nothing. We had no penetration in our attack, didn't held the upper hand over the game and that's why we lost. The only spark was when Pacheco and Torres came on, and for me Anfield was rather subdued as well, the Fiorentina fans making themselves heard more.
Onto the positives I was glad to see Aquilani getting 75 minutes on the pitch, Pacheco and Darby getting their chances as well. Darby's still got a long way to go though, I hope he has learnt a very valuable lesson not to dwell on the ball too long especially at top-level like the CL.
I'm sorry friends but based on yesterday's performance I don't buy your views, I'll stick to my thoughts and just feel we weren't good enough, honestly. We've got a high possession rate but we weren't sending them into the box as often as I've liked. That's not good for me and towards the end we were more interested to hoof the ball upfield to try and hold on for the draw, experienced players like Aurelio in particular hitting the ball to nowhere. Get the ball and control the game FFS.
Like I've said we weren't good enough yesterday, we didn't hold the upper hand and for me I thought we were slightly on the backfoot, Fiorentina looked more likely to score at times.
That's just my very honest opinion so I hope I don't get picked on too much.
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