Portsmouth v Liverpool Match Thread

Sorry guys, but I was looking at the voting of Man of the Match, and I saw that 86 people had actually voted for Benayoun, I think that his performance was terrible. So many times when we were attacking and he had the ball he would always choose the worse option, for example; when they had 5 players defending and we had 4 players attacking (including Benayoun), he could have passed the ball out in front of Torres on the corner of the box but instead he passed it into 2 LFC players and 4 Portsmouth players, and even before that chance I thought he was playing badly, does anyone agree or is it just me?

the reason we have been numerous points off the top in the last couple of seasons was because we lost at places like portsmouth, and apart from last season it was with a full strength side.
why question the gaffa?
three points today may have been great, but we have to take week 6 of the premiership in perspective. another three points may have been fine, but in the long run, one point was gaines and we have now got advantage game-wise over our rivals. The gaffa does not and will not concede any ground to our rivals, hence the point that we win zip in september, and having a squad like ours, means when someone like crouch, who has bitched for his place constantly,now has no argument after a contribution like todays.
this is what a squad is all about. Why be so negative about something that is positive at the moment?..?
we are a great side at full strength, and agreed when we change things, we can look ordinary.
However, still not conceding a goal from open play, and stil being unbeaten is very, very good
and is a reason to be very positive rather than the latter.
We have breathing space from our rivals, exept arsenal, which means we are in a much better state than we were in the last few starts to our season, and having looked at the table towards our next few games we could be very successful football wise

Got to agree that was a pretty poor performance today ..

Is it just me or is it when Crouch plays we seem to just lob balls up to him ..
The first few games we played without him we stroked the ball around and took on the defenders with pace ,today with Crouch and veronin there was little penetration and zero shots..

I think Rafa needs to stop underestermating teams and field the best side and only change when injuries or tiredness arises

i think we now know who our best 12-13 squad players are...
crouch and yossi should get the boot....what a joke they are

I actually rate Yossi.

Ok - League wise, we should be happy...but there has to be a huge negative towards our performance yesterday and what seems to me...SAME OLD LIVERPOOL, NOTHING HAS CHANGED!

And that's aimed at RAFA.  I thought he'd realised that totally changing your team week in week out, just doesn't work.

I actually thought Pompy were awful yesterday and for the taking...but on the chances made, we ended up being for the taking....which is shocking.

Disappointed - more so with the performance.

Leaving aside whether Rafa was right or wrong to bench Torres etc - the fact is the team we put out should have beaten Portsmouth.

Lucky to escape with a draw.  But maybe in the past we would have lost that game.  Trying to remain positive and looking forward to 6 points in the next two games.

Very upset with the selection today, i think this goes to show rafa had one eye on the champions league game, i believe he'd still rather win that then the premiership, i think you have to start with your strongest line up in every league game or you have no chance of winning the title, i would have thought he'd realised this by now.

Fratton park is a hard place to go but we come away with a point and not playing all that well either,Rafa done himself no favour picking Crouch and Vorronin together if he was gonna pick one of them then it would be better to partner them with either Kuyt or Torres,2 points dropped im afraid hope this isnt costly come may.

Now we've all had our moan - me included - we should not forget that we do not know   what kind of state these players came back from international duty in. Don't forget that travelling takes it out of you as well.
We are all disappointed we didn't win this after the results going in, but we could have lost yesterday and didn't. I plumped for a draw going in because Pompey are an awkward side and have strengthened during the summer. I have my moans about the team selection, but Rafa gets it right far more often than he gets it wrong, so I'm not about to slam anyone on the basis of what has been, essentially, an off team performance. What matters now is what happens next.

You're pretty much right Jammy.  It's just disappointing when you see other sides grinding out the results.  We could be a lot worse and considering this stage in the season we're usually way off the pace we're still in pretty decent shape.

Let's just look ahead to the next game and hope it was a blip.

On the one hand I'm well disappointed with the result, coz three points would have been so much better, and as others have said earlier in this thread, the team selection was a little odd to say the least.

On the other hand, I can partly understand Rafa's logic, given that most of the players were only just back from internationals, and with the Porto game in a couple of days, his team selection for the Pompey game was likely to be restricted, and from that point of view, I'm glad we came away with a point and a clean sheet.

With Birmingham and Wigan up next, which should be a fairly straight forward six points, I am still very positive about the season so far.

YNWA

 well I dont totally agree  when we say some players were tired because of international duties,,other teams have international players too ,yet they played and played well, IMO
  I accept saying rafa head the porto game in mind and I am in favour of team rotation, but dont like the idea of changing 4/5 players from game to another.....
  hope it will not be the same type of rotation in the next 2  games ,vs birmingham and wigan thinking we can beat them both with half of the ideal  starting 11 at the moment
   but on the other hand as it turned out  happy with the point against a tough side   like pompey when playing home
 

I say no matter who plays where, if we have a winning type of game play we use it unless for some reason we defend

I would of taken a point before the kick off but having seen the game they were there for the taking and Rafa got the selection wrong for me. Torres and Babel should of started. I thought we hit too many long balls and these were too easy for Campbell and Distan to mop up all day long. I would of liked to have seen a bit more football being played and I believe this would of beaten Pompey. Great save by Pepe from the penalty, even the Pompey Lads in the Boozer after the game didn't know why it was given! They weren't supprised Kanu missed it though, They don't seem to like him much and have affectionately named him the Slug!

All in all though it was a good day, 6.05 train from Limey to Euston, underground to waterloo and then onto Fratton. Alcohol was being comsumed at 8.30 and like a true Lush I blame this on Sky for the Kick off time! The Journey home took in those Picturess towns of Gliford, Manchester and Southport. By this time it was too late to get home and I crashed on my mates couch. I awoke feeling not to clever on Sunday and got a train to town. Diner was a Wetherspoons Burger before more ale was consumed in the Empire and then Liverpool Public houses. I finally returned home at 9.05 pm Sunday. I am now looking for a good devoice Lawyer!

  What's the problem Crazy Horse? You can't be blamed for these early kick offs. Sounds like you had a cracker of a weekend. Only problem being - and I agree totally - it's a shame we couldn't play football on the floor.

This may be a bit late but I haven't been able to get on line since Saturday. What a lot of tosh. Resting players after 6 games. This shouldn't happen before 20-25 games. When players are off form or injured yes. When a team is winning they have to keep going to maintain the consitency. This rotation is rubbish. It seems Rafa has not  learned from his previous seasons in the prem. Or perhaps he sees the C.L. as priority. When the substitutions were made on Sat, there was a different tempo, more pace and urgency to our game, more movement off the ball, more players wanting the ball, more direct play. Doesn'tthat say something. Use the squad players for what they are. Cover for injuries etc. 2 more points thrown away, Same old nonsense then and after what was a great start.