Sunderland 1-1 Liverpool: In game and Post Match Groans

Lets be realistic. Its been a tough start to the campaign.

Arsenal and Manchester City plus an away trip to Sunderland. The SOL is no easy place to go and pick up three points.

The only terrible result so far has been the West Bromwich Albion result. Against City there were positives and should have won. Against Arsenal not so many but its Arsenal and 3 points were never guaranteed. Against Sunderland, away from home and always a tough place to go. Against West Bromwich Albion there were no excuses whatsoever.

Rodgers has been unlucky so far with the injury of Lucas and I know it can't always be used as an excuse but he has limited resources after the transfer window so needs to study and work with his team in game time to assess their strengths and weaknesses.

I'm not making excuses for Rodgers but there is not one manager I can think of that achieved greatness straight away without mass funds. Actually, even City and Chelsea took time to achieve whilst splashing the cash.

Rodgers needs time and I can see a few shocks coming along, one of which may be Gerrard getting dropped, which might certainly happen if Lucas comes back in and fits in with ease.

Whisper it quietly

But Kenny should never have been sacked..

Brendan is possibly out of his league.

I'll always support the gaffer mind... Just saying

I've never stopped whispering Jon, irrespective we have a squad that needs to find it's level and to an extent the manager. Patience is required.

it seems to me that our mr BR is quite happy not to lose.

Why no more substitution?

He probably is considering we have no one who can come off the bench and change the dynamic of a game so he's forced to persist with his front line or make like-for-like substitutions and hope they produce the goods. I'd complain but there's absolutely nothing BR can do so there's little point. The situation is what it is right now and we just have to hope the team discovers the back of the net sooner rather than later. As it stands, I can't see us getting anything out of the Utd game.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19528004

Those possession stats look wrong to me. I'm sure we had more of the ball. 

 

Ok we should have more than 2 points but 5 of those points were lost against City and Arsenal.

....... AT HOME.

Whisper it quietly

But Kenny should never have been sacked..

I'll always support the gaffer mind... Just saying

You got this bit spot on, I will let you know about the other part after we play the mancs

Right,this is a game we could and should of won and it is our lack or could that be luck of someone who can put the ball in the net.Another thing that disturbs me is our close passing coming out of our goal area,close passing is ok as long as the players realise they cannot stroll through the match when they are doing it.Too many times it results in players being put under needless pressure.Now that that is out of the way it is time to regroup ready to knock sh*te out of United next week.

Plenty of top ten sides will go to Sunderland and come away without all three points so it's a pretty decent result.

Agree with this chats and always thought this would be a tricky game although I still think over the 90 mins, second half especially, we played well enough to win the game.

Wouldn't have called for Kenny's head after this start so not going to even think about calling for Brendan's.

I actually thought he got it wrong initially by playing Gerrard deep alongside Allen but as the game went on in thought Stevie had a good game which allowed Jonjo with the younger legs to still get forward to support the front men.

One player that stood out for me was Kelly, I know he isn't the best going forward but he does work him-self into the attack quite a bit going up and down the line plus he is very responsible on the defending part of the game.

As for the game it was one we should of well won, I mean it continues to show we have no a whole lot of threat when we get to the final 3rd in terms of creating (Sterling was great making things happen) and when we do not being clinical enough to finish them. Performance I thought was very positive going forward and hope to build on it.

I've never stopped whispering Jon, irrespective we have a squad that needs to find it's level and to an extent the manager. Patience is required.

I have a world of patience Stu..

Im just realistic..

He has my full support though.. Just saying

Remind me. Did we just put a goalscorer out on loan?.

No, we sent out on loan a striker with 4 league goals in a season

No, we sent out on loan a striker with 4 league goals in a season

Exactly Diego! And dare I say it a player who would encourage the many bad habits Liverpool have picked up over the past few years. Do I believe Andy Carroll would have made a difference today, two weeks ago, three weeks ago or last month? Unequivocally no.


As for the game today at the end of the day I felt it was a good point. Sunderland is never an easy place to go to and compared to our performance there last season it was miles better. The first half was ok. We pressed well from the get go but for the last 20 minutes or so of that we stopped our excellent pressing and closing down and gave them an easy foothold. The goal they scored was tame and Suarez and Johnson just had to do much better than they did. The second half was very good though. Plenty of attacks where we were facing the goal and made us look a whole lot more daunting to the opposition. Too often the past year or so we have seen possession with our backs to the opposition goal. The second half wasn't like that. Sadly today showed yet again that we must get rid of Stewart Downing quickly. He simply cannot play and is only useful with a big target man up front. The classic English style. Rodger's isn't that and he should be shipped on quickly. Again, there were too many forced balls trying to slice the play up with just one pass when it should be worked and caressed. But in the end it was a good performance and a good point that deserved more.

Haven't posted on or read this forum since Kenny's departure so hello again everybody!

Just watched the highlights there and we could have won that by 4 or 5. Looked like a good attacking performance and just luck kept it at 1-1.

All scripted to shut the cocky Mancs up at Anfield next weekend as always of late.

Come on Redmen

JFT96

Sadly today showed yet again that we must get rid of Stewart Downing quickly. He simply cannot play and is only useful with a big target man up front. The classic English style. Rodger's isn't that and he should be shipped on quickly.

More sad is the fact that we need funds to rebuild the team with but as another one of Kenny's flops and being relegated to 3rd choice in the pecking order, his value will be next to nothing. We have got to be patient because the task ahead of BR is monumental and could take years.

Why isn't Assaidi playing? I've seen YouTube clips of him smokin people.  What are we waiting for?

Despite the usual moaners I thought we did enough to win the match. It just wasn't to be.

Suarez booking was a joke, but despite that he had a decent game. I do wish he'd look up more though. Although saying that, when you're trying to avoid defenders feet, it's hard to look up as well. Maybe the coaching staff can help him keep it simpler at times.

Gerrard needs to step it up a gear, and stop dawdling in midfield.

Borini was unlucky.

Allen was a little subdued.

Johnson should be playing further up i.e. as a winger who can defend, with Kelly behind him.

Skrtel had a bit of a mare.

Sterling had a quiet-ish first half but was very good in the 2nd.

Kelly wasn't bad considering the couple of knocks on the head he got.

Shelvey was OK, but needs to control himself better.

Agger was pretty good, but got caught out of position once or twice.

Reina had little to do, and for their goal, he had to go for that ball. Shame he didn't get something on it.

Downing looked quite sharp when he came on, but I would have liked to see Suso get a run out. Still, the boss obviously sees things we don't, and I trust his judgement.
He's shown by playing Sterling that if you're good enough and you have the right attitude, you'll get your chance. Have to say that Sterling has grabbed that chance with both hands.

Yes, we should have won but we didn't so let's look forwards to smashing utd.

Gonna be tough until Rodgers can get the lads to do a better job of keeping the ball. The lads have passed it well in every game in the league this season BUT they give it away in dangerous areas or high up the pitch when we've got players committed forward and then suddenly the back 3-4 are in all sorts of trouble. And funnily enough it's our two best players (Stevie and Luis) who are the biggest culprits. They've got to be more patient on the ball. Stevie still playing too many 40 yard balls and both are guilty of risky attempts at 1-2s or quick interplay in tight areas which (when it doesn't come off) puts us into trouble. We need a clean sheet or two. I'd like to see us go back to basics a little.

If Enrique isn't the answer i'd like to see Downing given a game or two at left back. Get Jonno back on the right, It was a pretty limp block tackle he tried to make in the build up to their goal BUT it's unlikely that a left-footer would have made the same error.

For me I just don't think the lads are playing the way Rodgers has set out. forcing things too often, too impatient going forward with the ball rahter than the probing passing game we saw at Swansea last season.

Normally our way is to give any  new Manager at least 10 games grace to impose his style,with a summer transfer budget to enable this to be a reasonable assessment of his abilities.In my opinion,Brendan will need more patience from fans,because patently he has not got the squad he would have wished for at this stage of his Managership.Some of us old lags on here,can knee-jerk to the mis-treatment of Rafa in 1996-7 season's ownership,by corrupt owners.They were Yanks,but I believe that our current owners are not tarred with the same brush.They are plainly not asset-stripping the club,they seem to be running the club on sound financial footings,in line with the current FA guidlines.However,in reality,to be a top European Club,you need the following:- (1) a minimum 60,000 seater stadium,"(2) a potential £100 M annual transfer budget (3) a significantly invested "youth development" system, (4) A football Management team with European Management experience,to capitalise on our achieving this goal.How to unlock a thread.

Until the players and the manager fully understand each others way of doing things (and for that I think we need more players on the managers wave length brought in in January) this is going to be a very tough season for us.

Can't wait till the season ends even tho its only just started ffs, what a load off sh*t  i hate this f**king way we play its crap pure crap were 10 points off the top within only 4 games , Suarez is starting to do my nut in with all his f**king fancy foot work ,just cross the ball ffs sterling motm

Some F***ing Liverpool FC fanc can't appreciate sh*t! Get behind the team dammit!

We play Man U next? I just hope we don't have another handshake media circus. Love Suarez, but I don't think he is feeling any love still for Evra

Presently our team looks like Brad Pitt but is hung like a rabbit.

Until the players and the manager fully understand each others way of doing things (and for that I think we need more players on the managers wave length brought in in January) this is going to be a very tough season for us.

Made enough chances to win,  bad goal to lose  happy with a point ,hope hitting the woodwork isnt going to be a feature of our season again ,anyway
still early days for Brendan, the striker issue will cost us points till its resolved,which is a pain because we are making plenty chances .

Brendans moved on of what was of no use to him hes still only  working with the more adaptable players left from Kennys squad, come the end of the season I expect many more players to go .   
 

Sterling is getting better every week, was fantastic in the second half. Our only consistent player

Glen Johnson was piss poor for he goal.

Borini got into some better positions but still doesnt look like the answer to our goal scoring problems, he is improving though.

I'm a big fan of Jonjo but he must have given the ball away 10 times in the first half, he gets into some great positions but some basic errors yesterday unfortunately.

Stevie wasnt in the game at all, again

Another game we could/should have won, massive game next weekend against the mancs, cant f*cking wait for it!

Gutted again. Just glad we ended up getting something from a game we dominated again, for the most part.

Seems like our season is continuing on again from last season.