Sunday, January 6, 2008

FA Cup 6/1/2008 - Luton Town vs Liverpool

Awful. Simply awful. Liverpool just keeps getting worse with each game. They started the match brightly enough, putting Luton under pressure with some bright play from Babel and Youssi. But it quickly degenerated into a war of attrition as they struggled to cope with Luton's aggressive pressure. Granted it was another 'new' team put out up Rafa. While he might insist that soccer is now at such a level that tactics require differentiation every game, but unless you have robots for players, they are going to struggle coping with different players in their surrounding positions every game.

You have to admit it - most footballers aren't very smart. Sure they might be street smart, but on the field, it takes another level of tactical awareness and players in England are more inclined to have their chick radar up instead of spending their evenings going through set plays. I would hope that Rafa has a group that will do the latter. But when your captain relies more on gung-hoisms every game then you know where you are headed.

And that's out of the club gates for Rafa, according to some media quarters over the weekend. There have been suggestions that Jose Mourinho could be on his way to Anfield. If so, I am not sure how that would help, except to put Liverpool on a long unbeaten home run and winning some trophies. Now you mentioned it, yes that would help a lot. But Anfield fans looking for entertainment, be ready to stay away.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Greetings -- I enjoyed reading your review of the game and, unfortunately, have to agree with all of your remarks.

I was hoping to speak with you about publishing some of your future articles.

If you are interested, please be in touch.

Michelle@sportingo.com