Report: Rafa concern over Gerrard

From Sky

Rafa Benitez feels Steven Gerrard's England exertions have impacted on the midfielder's displays for Liverpool.

Gerrard started England's Euro 2008 qualifying double-header against Israel and Russia earlier this month, having missed Liverpool's three games leading up to those ties with a broken toe.

Since returning to club action, the Reds captain has been unable to influence matches in his usual buccaneering style.

Benitez is in no doubt as to where the problem lies, with the Liverpool boss believing it is too much to expect Gerrard to maintain such a high tempo of performance.

"It could be that playing twice for England has had an impact," Benitez told the Liverpool Daily Post.

Problems

"They (the England staff) knew (what I felt about Gerrard playing in both games), but in this situation everyone was talking about how important this situation was for England.

"His national team is England, but it is clear that these players cannot play every game for 90 minutes.

"Gerrard was not 100 per cent physically fresh, I don't mean fit but fresh.

"In these kind of games you need to keep the tempo really high and if you play too many games in a row for 90 minutes, especially if you are not fit, then normally you have problems."

http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,11669_2753373,00.html


Simple solution then Rafa me old mucker. Don't play him.  We scored 10 goals in 2 games without him.  And shouldn't you have realised this BEFORE you played him in the last 3 games - 3 drawn games! 

It's an obvious assumption to make isn't it. He hasn't been his usual self at all since coming back from the England camp.

I see this week as a perfect rest for him with some time to work on training.

It's an obvious assumption to make isn't it. He hasn't been his usual self at all since coming back from the England camp.

I see this week as a perfect rest for him with some time to work on training.

I agree that Gerrard needs time to recover.  I just hope that he will come back hungry for a game rather than feeling he is depended upon, which has been proved he is not.

I said before the Birmingham game he needed a rest, a few people disagreed with me, but I think his performance proved my point.

I really don't see how anyone could possibly think it will be a good idea to play him tonight, as has been suggested in the match thread. It's the Carling Cup FFS, there isn't gonna be any better opportunity to rest him. Again I'll say what I said before the last game, if we don't rest Gerrard he will continue playing sh*te.

I have to agree. Gerrard always used to be the one who motivates the team when the chips are down but that really doesn't seem to have been the case since his return from international duty. I really hope that they rest him tonight and he will come back into the next game he plays with the hunger and determination to succeed he always seemed to have before.

I think Rafa is just looking for excuses would he have said owt if we had won the last 2 league games?i Doubt it.

I think Rafa is just looking for excuses would he have said owt if we had won the last 2 league games?i Doubt it.

Since he came back from International duty he HAS looked jaded, that's not Rafa making an excuse it's a fact. Where Rafa has gone wrong though is he should've recognised this & given him a break.

I have to agree with Eddie what is the point of playing him tonight if he's not ready.Initally I  sugested to play him on saturday thinking a goal might cheer him up but now rest him until he's ready otherwise he'll become part of the problem rather than part of the solution.