Keith,
I wanted to wait until the end of the season before writing this. I agree
that there are plenty of positives, and that Kenny has really turned things
round since Roy left. I had my doubts at the time as to whether he would
still have the abilities of old and I'm glad to say I've been proved wrong.
I'm also confident that we have the right ownership in place at last to
build a team that is capable of being successful in the long run.
But I do think it is entirely unrealistic to think that we are going to be
Title contenders next season. I think we should definitely be challenging
for CL qualification and that that has to be our goal.
You asked for reasons why I don't think we will be Title contenders. Ok, in
no particular order.
Closing the gap on our rivals:
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This season has arguably been one of the weakest Premiership campaigns of
the past 10 years. Our realistic rivals next year for the top 4 (Utd,
Chelsea, City, Arsenal, Spurs) all dropped silly points at different times
and no one team dominated - Utd just dropped fewer points than the rest.
Despite that, we still finished 22, 13, 13, 10, and 4 points behind that
quintet, respectively.
Now I'm sure many will blame a lot of that on Roy - and there is merit in
doing so, in part. Yes, we had the third best points tally in the period
that Kenny was in charge - but it is wrong to translate that and assume that
we would automatically do that throughout the course of an entire season.
Kenny was fortunate that, in many senses, the pressure was off after the
first few games. It became clear that we would not get relegated and it
would take an almighty brave owner not to have given him the job for at
least another season.
How he, and the team he is managing, responds when there is pressure to
maintain that type of run over a full season is a different matter. Sooner
or later something will happen to test the team (a dodgy result or an
injury, for example) and we have to be able to respond to that. I think he
has done a marvellous job, don't get me wrong, but there is a vast
difference from having a good 18 game run and a good 38 game run needed to
win the Title.
Pressure Games & Coming From Behind:
----------------------------------------------------
That leads me on to an area where we have been traditionally poor for the
past 15 years. Many of us have long argued that if we attack from the start
we can dominate teams and knock them out of the game before they have found
their feet. That has been born out in some of the victories during that
run - such as Fulham and Utd at home. However, when we fall behind it is a
different matter. Since Kenny took over we have conceded the first goal 6
times.
In the League against a woeful West Ham, Arsenal, Spurs, Aston Villa. In
Europe against Braga. And against Utd in the FA Cup.
Of those 6 games we came back to win NONE of them - and that includes having
an extra game against Braga to try to accomplish it. The best we did was to
get the draw against Arsenal in that crazy match in the last minute. And we
only scored two goals in any of those 7 games. The one against Arsenal and
one against the Hammers when they were 2-0 up.
To win the League you have to be able to come back from going a goal down
and go on to win. Utd do it - we did it in our heyday. At the moment if we
go behind we nearly always stay behind, and lack the creativity to change
that. Until we do that then we are not going to win the Title.
Going back to my earlier pressure points, in the games where there has been
something real on the line (against Braga - and against Spurs & Villa to
secure European qualification) we have folded. I've not included the FA Cup
defeat at Old Trafford as that was the first game in charge.
Squad Depth:
-----------------
Yes, we've missed key players (Carroll & Gerrard) at times - but I'm sick of
that excuse whichever team uses it. Today's game is a squad game, and it is
virtually certain that at various points of the season you will lose some of
your best players to injury or suspension. That happens to virtually ALL
teams. The difference is having a squad that enables you to compete. Yes,
every team will have a strong core of 7-8 players who would always play if
available, but you can't become dependent on them always being available.
I think our squad at the moment is weak in key areas. Yes, we have fantastic
players in Reina, Gerrard, Suarez etc. But look at our bench the past few
games and there has been nothing there to inspire great confidence. Now I'm
not saying you do a Chelsea or Real Madrid and have £20M players filling the
bench - but you do need options, and players like N'Gog don't give you them.
Looking at our squad we need to address the LB, wide players, and a 3rd
choice striker - we also need a couple of additions to strengthen the squad
as a whole.
Our rivals aren't going to stand still - and I don't think we will get
sufficient additions in one window to suddenly correct the weaknesses that
we do have. I think we can improve next season, and we should definitely be
challenging for the CL. But I can't see us winning the Title next year.
-----Original Message-----
From: Keith Anderson
Sent: Tuesday, May 17, 2011 10:18 AM
To: lfc@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [lfc] Re: EW
ED, consider the facts if you want to be realistic, we have the second best
points tally since January after Chelsea - better than the team who just won
the title. We'd scored in every league game since Kenny took over, up until
Sunday. With the addition of 2-3 key signings I think there is every reason
to believe we have a realistic chance of a serious title challenge. One of
our major January signings has hardly played, and our captain has missed
most of our games since Kenny returned due to injury. So if you add in
Carroll and Gerrard, possibly Young, Cahill and Enrique, with depth in the
squad from Agger, Cole, Kelly, Maxi and youngsters like Shelvey, Flannagan &
Robinson, I think we have plenty of reason to be very optimistic that we can
be a contender for the premier league title next season.
Explain why you think we cannot be a serious title candidate next season
please.
Keith
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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