Reina’s frustrations create a problem of Kenny’s doing

By Matt Ladson on April 2, 2012

About Matt Ladson

Matt is the co-editor of This Is Anfield. Follow Matt on Twitter: @mattladson.

• guest

  Sorry that many of your feel that legend is a flop – Kenny stepped into the breach and most Liverpool fans were jubilant.  Kenny will turn it around; I just hope that those turning on him will take a look at what he has done for this club we love.

• Liverpool Rising

  What we need is to continue this rebuild, and adding the 4 players we need in key positions we all know, so that we have at least two great players in every position and so that formidable game-breaking partnerships grow.

  Our back 6 are unchangeable. Reina, Skrtl-Agger with Lucas, Enrique and Johnson, are irreplaceable. We need a backup for each of them so that in case of injury we can continue without consequences, and we have a backup except in the Lucas position, so that’s one of 4 places (while spearing is full heartedly there, he is good as a 3rd option, unable to successfully fill the shoes of Lucas). Coates and (in case a second replacement is needed) Kelly are fine replacements for the great cb duo Skrtl-Agger, and Kelly, Flanagan and Robinson are fine developing full backs to replace Johnson or Enrique. Doni, we can’t yet have an opinion but we soon will. Since we can’t say yet, I reserve the need for another option. 

  Our front 5 need more fine tune and cover. While the gerrard-suarez partnership is in theory unchangeable, gerrard missed at least half of the last two seasons and will be older every year, so a creative mid is needed, that’s a 2nd of the 4 spots. While Henderson is being groomed and his natural place is central mid, I see that an experienced central mid to replace gerrard when he’s injured until henderson comes of age is vital. Adam can’t fulfill that role (at least not yet, so can’t be relied on for that). So one experienced creative midfielder to cover for gerrard with henderson as an in-grooming backup, and Shelvey growing fast already!
  I for one believe in Downing improving by the year, and if the rest of positions and link ups in offense work and get covered, his virtues will be shown. Bellamy will still be a very exciting tool player in that position for the next few years. As much as I would love him to be able to play week in week out, we all know he can’t, but having him as an asset for 20-30 mins in most games can be game changing, and can make up for the cases where Downing will not be on his day (again, next year I believe he will be overall much better after he keeps adapting, and fixing the attack overall will also make him look much better).
  The right side is where this 3rd spot comes. In the absence of a player suited for that spot, Henderson being played out of place of course had consequences (both on the performance of this lad, and the team). Kuyt is still an occasional hero, but will be so less and less, and was never a right wing person anyway. We can start discussing right wingers and I for one would be very excited if we signed someone like gaston ramirez, but I will start getting off subject: the point is, right wing is a spot we need a great player in. Sterling being groomed there the while, gives us 2 players in that spot as well. 
  Then the front two. Suarez is irreplaceable, simple as that. While I think Carroll should stay and be groomed for what we bought him for, and he has all the potential to become that in 2-3 years when he hits his prime, the biggest issue is that while he does that we missed having a scoring machine, and the 4th spot we need is this place, for at least that period. So a player in his prime, at 26-27, that is scoring with eyes closed, is a player we need until Carroll develops to what he was bought for. So that’s Suarez + new experienced striker, with Carroll and occasional hero Kuyt as covers. Youngsters soon to emerge as potential subs coming as well, we all know who they are. 

  Fenway knows better than managing their finances with the logic “oh this player cost us 35 mil or 20 mil”. For Fenway, it’s the big picture: They sold and bought, overhauling the team (a process  n o t   d o n e   yet), with the result being around 35 mil spent, but wages reduced around 30 mil a year. Which, over a year, is about 0 cost. In a debt free club, building for the future in this way gives an edge over declining rivals (Their decline is not yet clearly shown, same as our rise is not yet clear to many, but it’s there nonetheless, and the Fenway men see it, and navigate it). 

  Fenway will never walk alone, Dalglish will never walk alone, our players will never walk alone, this club.. will never walk alone. 

  • Liverpool Rising

    @Costasy: Thank you for the suggestion, but I for one reserve my wondering.Henry and Werner are far more serious owners than your post suggests. They know that their rivals are succeeding by means not available to them yet because of the status they found the club in upon their arrival, but they also know they took the right club for what (and how) they want to repeat their success with boston red sox. Unlike you (who, without meaning to underrate you, haven’t done this before), they know that they have to take time in building this team, and they know that they need to come through pain and wounds to achieve that. They know that it can’t be done easily, instantly, and magically. They know and understand there’s a way about the club, and their intention is to restore it. The fact that it can’t be done by waving a magic wand, but by being smart, planning in long term and working on things far beyond scorelines or performances that seem to make you already deciding and concluding, doesn’t mean they intent otherwise. Liverpool fans wanted Dalglish back for a reason: Dalglish is everything that impersonates liverpool, a l r e a d y. Both as a player and manager, a l r e a d y. And as a person. There is a way things were done in Liverpool, and people inside the club that knew it would take over and carry it on. After years of missing this, we are on our way back to restoring the liverpool way. Again, the fact that it doesn’t happen overnight clouds you from seeing the signs that it’s being restored.@Bomber25: not in his first year he didn’t. it took him what, 7 years? If you intent to learn from Fergie, be my guest, but even in that case, you can see that he took over with one goal in mind (surpassing us) and that he knew it wouldn’t happen overnight, and that he worked with long term plans to achieve that and build an empire. I think that in his first full year, Dalglish has Liverpool at least on par if not ahead of where Fergie had Utd. Fergie worked on the academy, Dalglish already has the academy breeding, courtesy of Rafa, and has worked there himself so knows exactly what he’s got for the very near future (So no I don’t think it will take him 7 years, but also, I am not more fond of a quick spell of a potential one off success than I am of rebuilding a force that will be dominating for years).Who has won a cup on his first full season with half the team adapting and playing for the first year together? And with key players injuries and absences costing us. Imagine being in Dalglish’s shoes – having partnerships or trios in mind that you never even get the chance of playing most of the time, let alone having them developed over a season! And if it’s damaging within a partnership, imagine having two of them at the same time denied. The trio force of Agger-Skrtl-Lucas making us the best defense in premier till christmas, then being denied Lucas from the trinity drops it to 2nd best and then being denied Agger dropping it to 3rd best and below. The attacking trio of Gerrard-Suarez-Carroll never being able to start together until late in the league, and then with the back trio already denied, well, you see how different it looks than how you designed it. The two decisive trios starting together at  t h e    s a m e   time is imperative for this new team, yet was never the case this first important season. And yet there were so many great displays and a cup won and a semifinal to another reached, knocking out the old and the “upcoming” empires in the process by dominating them, not by being lucky. 

• Dunn

  I would not compare Dalglish to Ferguson. Ferguson has had twenty five years at his club to set up a title winning system – Kenny in his current reign has had only one.

  What frustrating for me is that Dalglish seems to be not with the modern game. He has had a lot of time out of the game so this is understandable. However, we have been getting weaker as teams such as Spurs, City and even now Newcastle have been getting stronger. Of course, we had problems off field for ages and some mis-management on the field in the ending days of Benitez’s reign and Hodgson’s but to be honest complaining we’re no where near winning the title is ignoring the elephant in the room of not even qualifying for Europe.

  As a person who has been living in the city it is easy to see Liverpool are built and ran as a ‘big’ team. Our recent performances have not been of that reputation and if we continue to do so we could just be a history of British football.

  Dalglish is a brilliant servant to this club – it is so admirable the way he was willing to risk his reputation at the club and be brave enough to take up the managerial position when he had nothing to prove. His place in history is untouchable – but I think he needs to move aside and allow someone else take charge of the team. Move him back to his place sorting out the Academy – his experience and time would be better spent there. 

  • Me

    This is absolute rubbish. What modern day managers are you talking about?
    Red nose? You’re havin a laugh mate.

• Mojo_88

  dalgish needs to get sacked he is stubborn

• Mojo_88

  how can you have manager who has not managed for nearly 10-15yrs  and put him on front line, he does not have the qualitys now he may have once in the past but that is it its the past, he does not have the b**ls to change reina even though he has made mistakes in games , fergie has no mercy took off de gea and put his second goalkeeper when he was struggling , he seems lost for tactics, kenny must go!!!!! by the way i am liverpool supportet but come on guys the results speak for themselves

• charles faizal

  yes! i prefer jones, then doni, the worst is Reina!