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Liverpool Will Be Competitive

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carlv

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I don't get all the doom and gloom on here that we are not as good or can't compete, everyone is so much better.

We have got players who can change games and who are highly effective (some surprisingly).

Here are the minutes per combined goal/assist on premier league.

Arsenal: Giroud 123: Sanchez 126: Walcott 134: Ozil 140: Wellbeck 165: Cazorla 173.
Chelsea: Costa 105: Fabregas 135: Hazard 142: Oscar 193: Pedro 194.
Liverpool: Sturridge 85: Firmino 119: Origi 121; Mane 149; Coutinho 176: Ings 198: Wijnaldum 202: Lallana 206.
Man City: Aguero 82: De Bruyne 126: Silva 141: Sterling 181: Toure 185.
Man Utd: Rooney 107: Rashford 110: Mata 147: Martial 168: Young 182.
Spurs: Kane 118: Alli 141: Eriksen 170: Lamela 203.

Along with Arsenal we have a large number of players who can influence a game admittedly this does not take in to account some of the new signings made by the others as they have not been in the league long enough. Spurs could struggle as they are so reliant on 3 players.

I truly believe we will be in the thick of it due to no European commitments and that Klopp will do little in the way of rotation. I think the above shows the importance of Firmino.
 
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A lot of those stats are for players performing at other clubs and may not be replicated with us. This also has nothing to do with how well or badly we defend which is a pretty big part of it.
We were the 5th highest scorers (63) last season and we were joint 7th defensively (50 goals conceded) which is two goals worse than the previous season.
We were also two points worse off and one place lower in the league.
I think Klopp is a much better manager than Rodgers but he's yet to prove it with us and this season is the opportunity for that. I'm tired of every season being a transitional one.
It's probably too early this season for boundless optimism or defeatist pessimism but the no europe thing may not be as much of a factor as people think. With fewer games we'll have less opportunity to give fringe and youth players a chance to impress and so they might not be ready or motivated enough when required. Last season showed how a fringe or youth player when given a chance to play games can make a real impression.
 
Our Achilles heel was those darned hamstring injuries. Keeping the players fit should be high up in the priority if we're to mount a challenge.
 
I think we will be too. People are getting too hung up on our net spend and the lack of a LB and a dedicated DM. I'd rather trust that Klopp knows what he's doing as he's got a history of doing it at a high level before.

The net spend thing is moot for us, as we spent about 70mill on players, good ones. You dont have to spend every last penny you get straight back out again.

The LB thing, IF Milner is going to play there this season, stay fit for most of it, and play well - who cares if we didn't sign another LB? It's not like we're short of good player for the other positions that Milner plays in, so he 'may' have been on the bench if it wasn't for his new LB role, and he's a quality player, who knows.

The DM thing, that's a preference by some of us to how we'd set a team up and play the game, it seems Klopp thinks he doesn't need one and he knows more then any of us, so it is what it is. It seems like our style of play isn't going to involve much breaking up of the opponents play by the looks of it, but more us wisely using our own possession, which means a DM is probably a wasted role for our team.

And as for the rest of the squad, we've got the 25 players and it's pretty balanced. We've got 4 strikers, plenty of goals from midfield now, pace, at least a couple of decent CB's, a new decent keeper, a historically very good RB, some great youth players coming through, a great manager, the stadium has been expanded and the owners are willing to spend money.
 
Three of those four strikers haven't scored more than 10 Premiership goals in their lives, never mind a season

99% of fans were adamant we needed a LB, but you seem to believe that Klopp is infallible, so we don't because he doesn't

As for the DM, what I wanted, and have done for years, is a strong, mobile, physical midfielder who can give us control and presence in the middle of the pitch, tackle well and use the ball intelligently, while being position ally disciplined

Call that what you like, but we don't have one, and we need one
 
Sturridge obv has scored more than 10 league goals, Ings has, Firmino who's an occasional makeshift striker as he's a midfielder got 10 league goals last year. And Origi was 19/20 years old last year and went 1 in 3 in the league for us in his first season in England. Add onto that Coutinho who's good for 10 league goals, and Mane and Wijnaldum that both got more than 10 last year. That's not exactly an issue with goals.

As for the the DM, I'd like one, but I'm sure if I sat down with Klopp, he'd explain how I was wrong. Not many teams play the style of football Klopp does.
 
Ah, my mistake. Danny Ings has scored 13 Premiership goals in his life.

The rest was correct, and I would also question Firmino being a 'makeshift striker' and actually a midfielder

Because while he may be a bit makeshift, he scored almost all of his life-time 10 Premiership goals while playing as a striker, and sadly that's what Klopp seems to think he is

So that does leave us with Sturridge, but he seems to be rather out of favour, with Firmino being preferred and even the vastly inferior Origi. Although neither of those two have scored any so far, sadly
 
Last time I remembered football wasn't won on how many goals you scored.

Our midfield and defence is absolutely terrible, fans need to realise we won't be competing for a long long time.
 
binomial said:
Last time I remembered football wasn't won on how many goals you scored.

Our midfield and defence is absolutely terrible, fans need to realise we won't be competing for a long long time.
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How terrible can the midfield be if we dominated against Spurs and Arse away, and despite the result, had almost 90% possesion against Burnley? Surely there are signs for optimism?
 
There are always signs of optimism with us. It's the hope that kills us. We always show patches of class. However, the real indication of progress and source of optimism would be seeing some signs that we're going some way to deal with our longstanding issues. We still look like we will concede whenever the opponent attacks, we still concede a worrying proportion of shots faced on target, we still seem unable to deal with teams parking the bus, we still struggle to find consistency.

As good as the Arsenal and Spurs performances were at times, I don't know if a lot has changed. It's early days and we won't know for a few more weeks, but there doesn't seem to be any reason for me to believe that this season will go too differently than the last one.
 
Make up your mind, Hal. Either it's too early to know yet (which I would agree with) or it isn't. That post of yours is an odd mixture of the two.
 
Judge Jules said:
Make up your mind, Hal. Either it's too early to know yet (which I would agree with) or it isn't. That post of yours is an odd mixture of the two.
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Of course it's too early. I just don't see any signs of optimism yet, so I'm counteracting the positive views in here by asking what has actually changed from last year?
 
doctor_mac said:
How terrible can the midfield be if we dominated against Spurs and Arse away, and despite the result, had almost 90% possesion against Burnley? Surely there are signs for optimism?
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There are more than a few signs for optimism. There's a couple of dark clouds though, we are going to look mighty short if injuries take hold - and if it's an injury to Mané we might start to look a bit toothless.
 
Judge Jules said:
Do you think we'd have dicked both the Arse and Tottenham away within days of each other last year?
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"dicked"

"dominated"

"90% of the possession"

Anyone reading these posts would be most confused to discover that we'd only won one of our first three Premiership games, and lost 2-0 to a side that was in the Championship last year.

Possession is utterly irrelevant. It counts for precisely fuck all. So does chances created and shots on goal and worthless adjectives like "dominated". We'll be talking about how many times we've hit the fucking post soon.

We've won one, lost one, drawn one and have four points from a possible nine. All discussion outside of that is largely a waste of time.
 
That's way too indiscriminate. Are we the finished article? No. But is it remotely reasonable to expect us to be, at this stage of (a) Klopp's time in charge and (b) the new season? No again. Just as it would be daft to suggest that we're where we want to be yet, it's daft to go to the other extreme and start talking down our chances of getting there.
 
Judge Jules said:
Do you think we'd have dicked both the Arse and Tottenham away within days of each other last year?
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I wouldn't really say we dicked either, though we did play well. We were utterly average in the first half against Arsenal, then blew them away with some great stuff for 20 minutes, then tried our best to let them back in it.

Against Spurs we were the better side, and should have won, but I wouldn't call that a dicking either.


To answer your question: yeah possibly. We beat City 4-1 and Chelsea 3-1, both away, within 3 weeks of each other.

When we start putting the teams we should beat to the sword too, then I'll think it's finally starting to click.
 
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For the record, I really like what Klopp is doing with this team and I think that, in time, we will be a force. There's nobody else I'd rather have managing our team right now. My issue is with people saying we will challenge for the league this year. We are very much still a work in progress, and any improvement - if there has been any, it's too early to tell, though I'd argue that there hasn't been - is going to be a slow, gradual process.

We have improved a lot since we sacked Rodgers, though oddly enough, the results don't really seem to indicate it. But it's there. You only have to watch us and compare it with how insipid we were during the final days under B-Rod and it's apparent. I just don't want people getting their hopes up or expecting instant success while ignoring the reality of the situation.
 
Halmeister said:
For the record, I really like what Klopp is doing with this team and I think that, in time, we will be a force. There's nobody else I'd rather have managing our team right now. My issue is with people saying we will challenge for the league this year. We are very much still a work in progress, and any improvement - if there has been any, it's too early to tell, though I'd argue that there hasn't been - is going to be a small, gradual process.

We have improved a lot since we sacked Rodgers, though oddly enough, the results don't really seem to indicate it. But it's there. You only have to watch us and compare it with how insipid we were during the final days under B-Rod and it's apparent. I just don't want people getting their hopes up or expecting instant success while ignoring the reality of the situation.
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It's not always fair to compare points and positions from different seasons as a sign of progression (or regression) given all the myriad factors involved (ie other teams), but it's useful benchmark.

We need to show a positional and points improvement and continue progress in the cups. But then what? I just don't see any possibility of a genuine and consistent challeneg for the title. Anyone can have a run at it in one great season. We've done it under Rodgers. Leicester went one better. But if we want to be in that mix year after year, we need new owners.

Doesn't matter who is managing.
 
Hal, I stand to be corrected on this point but TBH my impression was that those saying we're going to win the league weren't fully serious. My guess is they put those posts up in response to the most pessimistic views being expressed on here by certain posters. :whistle: I certainly don't see us mounting a genuine title challenge yet, though I do think we're capable of - and should be expecting - Champions League football next season.
 
manwithnoname said:
It's not always fair to compare points and positions from different seasons as a sign of progression (or regression) given all the myriad factors involved (ie other teams), but it's useful benchmark.

We need to show a positional and points improvement and continue progress in the cups. But then what? I just don't see any possibility of a genuine and consistent challeneg for the title. Anyone can have a run at it in one great season. We've done it under Rodgers. Leicester went one better. But if we want to be in that mix year after year, we need new owners.

Doesn't matter who is managing.
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Well yeah, I agree, we definitely need to spend more money and this transfer window has been a bit of a stinker on the sly. My thoughts on Wijnaldum are well-publicised and we didn't get a left back or a defensive midfielder. I'm just hoping that the improvement we've seen in some of the players under Klopp (most notably Lallana, Origi and Lovren) can tide us over until we either get new owners, or the current owners decide to invest significantly in improving the first team.

He's a great manager, and it only takes a brief, shuddering, glance back to Lovren's stepovers under Rodgers, or the memory of Lallana Cruyff turning himself dizzy, to see what Klopp can do with his players. But that does only get you so far. Maybe he can do it by mixing emerging talent and nurturing it with the odd established head. Who knows. He's done it before.
 
Judge Jules said:
Hal, I stand to be corrected on this point but TBH my impression was that those saying we're going to win the league weren't fully serious. My guess is they put those posts up in response to the most pessimistic views being expressed on here by certain posters. :whistle: I certainly don't see us mounting a genuine title challenge yet, though I do think we're capable of - and should be expecting - Champions League football next season.
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I wouldn't be surprised to be honest if they were serious. Some of them, at least, anyway.

I'd be over the moon with Champions League football next season, but fear it may be a bridge too far.
 
Halmeister said:
Well yeah, I agree, we definitely need to spend more money and this transfer window has been a bit of a stinker on the sly. My thoughts on Wijnaldum are well-publicised and we didn't get a left back or a defensive midfielder. I'm just hoping that the improvement we've seen in some of the players under Klopp (most notably Lallana, Origi and Lovren) can tide us over until we either get new owners, or the current owners decide to invest significantly in improving the first team.

He's a great manager, and it only takes a brief, shuddering, glance back to Lovren's stepovers under Rodgers, or the memory of Lallana Cruyff turning himself dizzy, to see what Klopp can do with his players. But that does only get you so far. Maybe he can do it by mixing emerging talent and nurturing it with the odd established head. Who knows. He's done it before.
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My bet would be that that's exactly what FSG had in mind when targeting Klopp in the first place. That said, perhaps the straws in the wind about them seeking extra investment suggest that they've taken to heart some of the problems that Brendan and others have described above. For all the doubts about their approach so far, they do have a very direct stake in making us as successful as possible.
 
manwithnoname said:
"dicked"

"dominated"

"90% of the possession"

Anyone reading these posts would be most confused to discover that we'd only won one of our first three Premiership games, and lost 2-0 to a side that was in the Championship last year.

Possession is utterly irrelevant. It counts for precisely fuck all. So does chances created and shots on goal and worthless adjectives like "dominated". We'll be talking about how many times we've hit the fucking post soon.

We've won one, lost one, drawn one and have four points from a possible nine. All discussion outside of that is largely a waste of time.
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That's just not true. If we had gone to Spurs and been played off the park and sneaked a draw, and fluked a win against Arsenal and been played off the park by Burnley, then there would be much greater reason to be negative. At the beginning of last season we looked disjointed, bereft of ideas, and thoroughly demoralised as a team. Though our first three results were pretty much the same if I remember right. We have looked very dangerous and capable of dominating top teams. That's a long way from where we were at this time last year.
 
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