The lack of creativity from our engine room.

Agreed, corbally.

Still stunned how unimportant people think the centre of midfield is. We had lucas and spearing in there the last two games and people dont think the centre midfield should be a priority in the summer baffling stuff

Agree mate and you know I like Lucas as a player but not blind to his faults and you are right in that we need to strengthen in midfield for next season.

I don't think Spearing would be included if Shelvey was available, and likewise Lucas if stevie was available. We have the players, just don't have any quality cover.  If you don't have a strong creative mid field, you need quality width. Today we had neither. Even without Johnson, I think Shelvey and Gerrard would have made the difference. Still desperately need to buy two or three quality players in the summer. Two wide men, and one creative center mid. The two wide men need to be able to operate as wide midfield/wingers, and as wing backs, to give us variation.

I definitely think we need improvement in the middle in the summer.

However, if we had two attacking wingers, every single time Lucas puts the ball out wide, that attacking winger takes on the man and creates an attack, Lucas all of a sudden gets the credit for switching the play and starting an attack. At the moment he plays it out wide and it usually comes straight back. Most of the players at Manure and Chelsea in centre mid don't take people on and more often than not play the easy ball, but the wingers and full backs overlap creating attacks.

It isn't just the engine room that needs improvement its the width more than the centre for me. Our 'wide men' are so easily marked in a game its frightening, so even if Lucas or Spearing or whoever had any actual creativity our wide man doesn't even look to get in the channel in between the full back and centre half.

Three midfielders needed in the summer. As poor as we have been centrally at times, our biggest failing has been against teams that expose our lack of width. Pack the midfield and we struggle. Yes we need a midfielder, but not as urgently as we need two quality wide men to stretch teams and open up some space. This is not the thread for discussing defenders, but we need a CB and LB too. Focus on one point after a loss all you want, but the fact is we need at least 5 first team quality players in the summer.

Charlie Adam

League Season Stats (2010/2011)

GAMES  27
GOALS   9
ASSISTS 6

Alberto Aquilani

League Season Stats (2010/2011)

GAMES  26
GOALS   2
ASSISTS 3

Impressive stats from Adam and I know theres a lot of shouts to get AA back in the summer so these two are our most realistic options IMO!

As Corbally said, the midfield is by far the most important area of the pitch where the majority of games are won or lost.

We definitely need a creative midfielder in the centre.

Charlie Adam

League Season Stats (2010/2011)

GAMES  27
GOALS   9
ASSISTS 6

Alberto Aquilani

League Season Stats (2010/2011)

GAMES  26
GOALS   2
ASSISTS 3

Impressive stats from Adam and I know theres a lot of shouts to get AA back in the summer so these two are our most realistic options IMO!

As Corbally said, the midfield is by far the most important area of the pitch where the majority of games are won or lost.

If it was done by minutes on the pitch, I'd be surprised if Aquilani mustered 13-14 games in total. 

He started 24 games though Roddenberry.

Thing is with comparing Aquilani and Adam this season is that they are in different leagues and I don't mean in terms of class, but in Aquilani's defense I'd imagine its much harder to create goals in serie A as its a more technical defensive league than the premiership.

Wonder would Adam be a starter for Italy, only recently he broke into the Scotland team. In the long run if we sign Adam I think people will be disappointed

Wonder would Adam be a starter for Italy, only recently he broke into the Scotland team. In the long run if we sign Adam I think people will be disappointed

I'd be happy with Adam. He's a player with much to prove to many people who wrote him off in his earlier day's.
Time for the big stage for him i reckon and why not?

It's a topic on which I always debate with my father. For me the problem is that when we play with 3 CMs in a 4-3-3 the 3 midfielders(Gerrard, Lucas, Meireles) do not create enough; they don't make many assists and when you play with 4-3-3 there are 3 players who try to score and need good service. Suarez is very creative and is a great scorer/striker. Carroll needs good service to score goals. As for Kuyt he's the only world class player without skills . Kuyt on his good days is wonderful and make assists, score goals but these days are becoming more and more rarer. The 3 in front are able to score but they cannot create their goals on their own bar Suarez .
Mereiles is a good CM but cannot make THE killer pass. Gerrard is often injured and Lucas plays as a DM.

Unless we bring back Aquilani and/or sign another creative CM we should not play 4-3-3. we should play a 4-4-2 or 4-4-1-1(4-2-3-1) with two world class wingers which Kenny(our new permanent manager) will sign.

                             Reina
Johnson/kelly     new cb/skrtel       agger        new lb

                Gerrard            Lucas/Mereiles
New RM                                                  new LM
                            Suarez
                           Carroll

He started 24 games though Roddenberry.

Whoops, I misread, I thought he was comparing Aquilani from last season.

The problems I see when we play lower table teams and mid table teams is that our passing is absolutely horrible. We can't hold possession and we find ourselves defending a lot. We need a good CM who is quality at passing and is creative. Charlie Adam fits that bill for me. He won't be very expensive, is proven in the EPL and is a player who would help us out.

I still think that Adam could be a one-season wonder. I know it's harsh to judge a player on the club he plays for as a direct link to his quality but if you compare Adam to Aquilani,

Adam: Rangers, Ross County, St. Mirren, Blackpool.
Aquilani: Roma, Triestina, Liverpool, Juventus.


Quality will always shine through, so surely if Adam has always had it, he would have earned a transfer to a bigger club earlier?

 It is not just the midfield but all areas that need to improve, the present players have to improve if we are going to win trophies but what really worries is when I compare the players we have sitting on the bench with the players Man U, Man city and Chelsea have sitting on the bench
   

Adam is grand at Blackpool where Holloway has the team set up so other people can do his running for him due to his immobility, he will struggle here where that will not happen

Exactly corbally, he is the main man, the other lads are obviously told to do his donkey work for him, then just give him the ball so he can do all the creativity.

He is too one-dimensional to be a big player here, even squad players should have more than one attribute that they can contribute to the team.

I just hope Kenny hasn't made up his mind on him, he is really barring set pieces starting to struggle the last few weeks, I'm not surprised to be honest looking at his conditioning.

Think teams have worked out everything goes through him a Blackpool and if he is closed down very quickly he really struggles

Exactly my thoughts. It would be interesting to see how he pays in a team with much bigger ability than him, and when every play does not go through him. He might raise his game, but personally I feel he would struggle to get on the ball and not be as creative as hoped.

Teams will always try harder against the bigger teams, which means more pressing. He will therefore be pressed more here and given less time. I don't think he will be able to handle it.

Watching Alonso tonight taking the piss out of Spurs was a reminder of the lack of creativity we currently have. Loads of forward passing. Hardly any square balls.

I miss him. Sigh.

No one does it better than him.

I felt so safe whenever he was on the pitch.