Proportioning the Blame.

I agree with Redblood's opening post but not sure if he is talking about last nights game or the current state of the cub in general football wise.

If I presume it's about our current state of affairs and how we are now struggling to even get into any European competition next season then there are many people who have to accept some responsibility for where we find ourselves, some of whom are still at the club.

I'll leave all the ownership issue as it goes without saying that the original sale by David Moores was a mistake that had massive consequences on and off the field but hopefully that is now resolved, although it is a major reason why on the football side we find our squad to be short of the true quality players we need to compete.

Although Rafa Benitez was an excellent appointment and brought success to the club and I'm not sure if blame is the right word but Rafa bought players who fitted into his system. He planned things in great detail and possibly took a bit of the natural instinct away from players. The bulk of our current squad were Rafa signings and were bought to play in his system and to fit his tactics and it is possible that now under Kenny who allows players to express themselves a bit more and is maybe less restrictive we find that some of the players are not up to the task.

Also the fact that until Torres left and we signed Suarez and Carroll we only had one centre forward to speak of after Crouch was sold. Again I'm not sure if blame is the right word but it is a fact that although Rafa's team with Torres as the CF was very strong it is a fact that we were crying out for another option when he was injured.

I also feel that Rafa was under immense pressure in his final season and although he seen everything that was going on from the fans point of view and always seemed to have the best interests of the club at heart I do feel that he took his eye of the ball a bit last season and let things get the better of him which may have affected the players performance.

Roy Hodgson was never a good enough appointment but what he did manage to very quickly decrease the quality in our squad which I still feel was much better than Rafa got credit for. Mascherano was out of his hands but by loaning out Aquilani and Insua and buying Jones, Poulsen and Konchesky it was clear that he did not understand the type and quality of player we expected to represent this club. Also everything the man done seemed to suck the life out of the club by demoralising players, criticising fans and past managers, having a negative defeatist attitude and generally taking this club down to his level.

This leads me to the one constant through all this and that is the players. I feel that they need to take a large proportion of the blame as many of them have not performed to the level expected and many times it has not been a lack of ability but more a lack of effort and desire to win that has been the biggest problem.

I posted a few times while Benitez was in charge that the players let him down through a distinct lack of a will to win many times and I do believe that our squad's biggest problem is that too many players expect things to happen or are too willing to pass on responsibility to someone else rather than take that responsibility themselves. We don't have enough leaders in the squad and too many who go missing especially when the likes Gerrard is off form or injured.

It may also be that by moving from Benitez's meticulous, more rigid coaching style to Kenny's more fluid style we have players who fitted into one style but are not able to change to the others. Nothing wrong with either style but it may take another transfer window to get the squad more into the image of the current manager.

As far as Kenny goes I don't proportion any real blame on him as of yet. He got a call to take over for the rest of the season and to try and get us back to playing and acting like this club should and for the most part he has done this. He has and will in the future get tactics and team selections wrong. Tell me a manager who hasn't? He has also took a squad which at one point in the season was in the bottom three and got us into the top six and while results and performances haven't always been good it is clear we are going in a much better direction than under the previous manager.

He has the best interests of the club at heart and I'm sure if he and Comolli get the players they want in the summer we will see a much improved team and squad next season and I also believe that if Kenny has any doubts about his ability to take the club forward then he would not hang around in the job or take it on full time should it be offered.

Sorry for rambling on. Just my thoughts tonight!

Brilliant post mate.
Since last game vs Braga I watched on the stream I'm still under effects of it's aftershock !
-Firstly I'm shocked seeing how our team played. I don't care about the result or about we exit from the competition, just that performance of our team that hurt me.
-Second one is the day later I logged in this forum and found the like of "Who Should Be Next Liverpool's Permanent Manager"
I'm found it's difficult for me to explain what in my head now, but in this moment I just can say it's not a right time to blame king Kenny. We can wait and see at least until end of the season. Don't forget during season break we still have plenty of time to discuss about it.
King Kenny needs us the fans on his side now, please all of us the true fans of the club keep faith in him.

Meireles seemed more intent at fouling than getting the ball - Lucas was the one who spotted that we needed to break the line and made three or four runs which were not played in -  its what I thought Meireles would have been perfect for but I didn't see him make any?


Interesting you didn't highlight this part.

Because I'd already said I made comments in the match thread that Lucas had ghosted into the box and made one or two neat passes and started the game well, that was never in dispute on my part, hence no need to bold it, keep up Rodders.

Lucas and Meireles were outnumbered all night (bar the first 15 minutes, when Carroll was playing deeper) - two against three. As you're well aware Blud, it's very hard to to play a pass and move game when you can't find space and you have no wide outlet. Subsequently the ball that retains possession is a backward pass. It's a simple numbers game that we, as you well know, have used on many many an occasion.

Had Braga have been naive enough to go with only two in the centre and still out-gunned Lucas & Meireles, fair enough but they didn't mate.

Look at it another way (forget Kenny, for a minute):  i) You're the boss Blud - not Kenny; ii) The engine-room (as you know) is key to success; iii) You know that Lucas and Meireles ain't the best CM pairing in terms of passing and tackling - as you've said before. So. ....

Do you trust them to or even expect them to dominate a midfield where they are outnumbered? Or do you look to shore that area up with Spearing, for e.g.?

Let's pretend that you do trust Lucas & Meireles Blud; when you see that they're bottling it (out-numbered): do you stay 4-4-2 and hope a hoof pays off? Truthfully mate?

Listen, I don't like 4-4-2 at the best of times - I make no bones about that - but when we all agree that we don't have the personnel, either in CM or in 'wing' positions to make it work then. ... the question has to be asked; hasn't it?

Thursday night, in my opinion, the major contributing factor to our exit was that we got things wrong tactically. I honestly do not see it as a big deal. It happens. I have every faith that, under Kenny: it won't happen too often.

Whilst I agree with a lot of that post Bubby I still think they had to show a bit more bottle, now lets say for a moment when both Lucas and Meireles came deep to recieve to the ball from midfield, Braga were not pushing up on them closing and them down, that only happened when they tried to pass the halfway mark then the Braga midfield were there applying pressure and were dowq their throats.

There was no need for them to constantly to play the ball back to Carra or any of the other defenders, they may have been out numbered in midfield but for a Brazil and Portugese International to bottle it in that manner just compunded the knock it long to the big fella mentality.

Of course if it was me I would have changed it we were at home getting bullied by a side who are supposed to be inferior to us which again wasn't helped by by our midfield pairing bottling it.

We played against the likes of Fulhams, Pompeys, Evertons etc using the exact same tactic as Braga yet the afore mentioned teams beat us because they wanted it more than us and fought harder, had our players showed that same desire and mentality to win the game and not hide away the tactics may have worked, bearing in mind this happened under 3 different managers with 3 different set of tactics and 3 different ways of approaching games.

We can all point the finger of blame at Kenny for the tactics and substitutions and rightly so thats not in dispute for me, but who do you blame for the lack of effort and the hiding away that was clearly visible, or do we allow this continue and just keep hounding managers out for players not giving %110 in every game ?

Thompson set just on SSS, Kenny would step aside of Mourinho was available.

F**k me, I'm depressed listening to SSS, Cottee"player will no longer want to go to Liverpool" Nicholas "Liverpool will have to sell Reina, need 10 players" Cottee"Rafa Benitez has a lot of blame", Sterling " are you serious about Mourinho why would he want to go to Liverpool, 4 teams ahead of you that will attract players ahead of you"

Thompson faced an on slaugth there, he said Konchesky and Poulsen should never have been bought not good enough for the club

Was listening that as well Corbally, pissed me off.

Stelling twisted Thommos words to try and make him look like a tit.

Thommo basically said that he thinks Kenny would be prepared to step aside for someone of the calibre of Mourinho, because hes confident in his ability as opposed to any other manager. That Mourinho would be the only manager of being capable of bringing Liverpool forward apart from Kenny.

Then Stelling goes "So you think Mourinho will leave Madrid to come to Liverpool next season?" trying to take the piss.

Absolute shithead.

Don't watch SS if you want to hear positive things about LFC.As for Maureeen coming here not a chance.

Ya that is what Sterling said and he had a good laugh at it saying why would he go there. Thompson said if someone like Mourinho came he would step aside

We need a deeper & better squad, not so much a massive clear out, 20 players left in the summer ffs.

I reckon we just need to add 4 or 5 players who are better than what we have just now in the 1st 15.

I agree brei, I think we need at least 4 first team players of genuine quality and they won't come cheap

Sly does my nut in - why are Paul Merson or Charlie Nick qualified to talk about LFC.

F##k me - I was having a pint in my local on Thursday and Charlie and wife were sitting across from me - he was wearing 3in cuban heels! Paul Whitehouse gets away with that sh#t when he gets paid by Aviva - but there's no excuse in real life.

Rant over