25 Apr 2024 22:48:39
Obviously an interesting and anxiety filled time for fans.

Klopp was a real difference maker so I’m not making a direct comparison between Slot and Klopp. But my thinking is that before Klopp came in, the vast majority of fan opinion on the squad at that time would have been that they couldn’t win this or that or even be competitive.

Enter Klopp and a European final that first half season.

Again not a direct comparison but my encouragement to everyone is to see the potential in the players we have and how a new environment can help them to improve.

It may be u popular to say this, but we’re not a useless team. Anyone coming in has a fantastic squad to build upon.

1.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 06:13:22
The ability is definitely there. It’s just been the lack of application this last month.

2.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 07:47:19
I think it’s a bit more complicated than that. How many of them do you truly trust in the most important games? If you can’t up for a title run in against your biggest rivals then you clearly have problems. The first rule of football is win you duels, we look actually scared like young kids. Some of the clips of Sob, Jones and Trent trying to defend set pieces are cowardly. Lots of work to do.

3.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 08:36:22
I've never had Szob, Jones and TAA down as defensively minded; especially on set pieces.
In fact, we over rely on VVD to deal with set pieces and Everton did their homework. They targetted him and we were in trouble.
More generally I believe that we have been more focused on attacking than defending this season. Our midfield leaves and we bring in Mac, Szob, Grav and Endo and only the latter is a defensively minded player and we all know he was a cheap option.
Not only that, but we also tell one of the defenders to drift into midfield and leave the right sided and inferior centre back covering a larger area.
It's not my thing and it's intended to get us on the front foot but how often have we conceded the first goal this season? It has the opposite effect, we end up chasing games and it was always going to catch up with us.

4.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 09:18:05
You don’t need to be defensively minded to give one. Effort, desire, application. At least give 100%. You actually jump and put a challenge in, don’t cower down, it looked like they were praying the ball didn’t come near their area. I don’t see how you’re going to give certain players a set of balls.

5.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 09:40:54
You do have to be defensively minded to defend. If your mind is not telling you to defend or sensing danger you're not going to do it as well as someone that is defensively minded. It's easy or lazy for a corner to come in and let VVD deal with it.
I agree though that every player should defend and put the effort in. Some are more natural than others though and Trent, Szob and Jones have never struck me as defensively minded types.
Trent has some brilliant attributes but they are usually going the other way.

6.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 11:03:15
Trent is an amazing player I agree. But I fear if we don’t add a couple of leaders then these kind of defeats when it really matters will continue to happen. Mac, Jones, Sob will never ever be a good enough midfield to win the PL.

7.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 11:21:33
The problem stems from a one formation for every game for me, it’s worked for klopp for sure but there’s always been teams who we couldn’t get past and who defended deep, usually he’d throw another 2 forward attackers on and we’d manage to get through it. However against Everton 2 nil down we put kostas and Gomez on…. that is giving up. (and both should be out the door now) Agree they need a rocket up their arses all of them. But why can’t we change formation 3-5-2 for instance, pack the midfield would have destroyed all Everton attacks and 2 front players closer together with crosses into box. Kloppo given up and rubbed off on players, should remember they are playing for the club and more importantly the fans not the manager.

8.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 11:24:27
Mark - I don’t think this was a title worthy team to start with. And I think most reasonable fans would agree. But we’re building towards that. What has changed the narrative is Klopp announced his departure which turned this season into All or nothing. And contextually, we performed so well for much of the season so we’ve fallen from a winning position.

In reality we are about where I think we should be.

So, now it depends on what you believe we have to build on. Sounds like you’re in the camp that believes this squad is full of useless and unreliable players o we need to clean house. Or thereabouts, yea? I’m of the kind that we have more than enough to build on and we should do just that. A major clean out would set us back years imo.

9.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 11:49:30
So City on 76 points are a title worthy team and arsenal on 77 points are a title worthy team but us on 74 points aren't quite a title worthy team.

2 weeks ago when we were top with the title in our hands not 1 sinlge LFC fan said we aren't ready for the title or top 4 is the aim.

There's nothing wrong with aiming for the moon and coming up short. But let's not just make excuses and pretend like we knew all along that we weren't going to win the title.

There's actually still a chance we might still win it but just not a very good one.

10.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 12:08:26
JK - to re-phrase, my pre-season prediction after the midfield overhaul was a top 4 finish and anything else a bonus. I agree, it's not over and if you follow my responses you'll know I am one of the more pragmatic and optimistic on here.

I think you will find plenty of posters on here who made predictions that we would fall in the title challenge because our performances were starting to fade. That wasn't my position, but it's not correct to say that not 1 single LFC fan said we aren't ready because there were plenty and they were on here.

My point is that this team is being unfairly criticized against the standard of a title contender team. yes, we have been chasing the title but my view of it is that we have been over-achieving
relative to the development phase of the current group of players.

I'd like to think that people would appreciate where this team is actually at and see that there is a fantastic foundation for the new manager to build upon.

11.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 13:02:55
Faith sorry mate. My reply wasn’t all aimed at you and I do enjoy reading your posts.

I seem a part of your post and thought it would be a good discussion point and jumped in and then went off on my own tangent.

I’m certainly one of the fans who believed we could win it all but that was because of results over performances.

So much so I’ve paid over the odds for my Wolves tickets and was researching flights and hotels in Dublin the morning of our Atalanta hammering.

12.) 26 Apr 2024
26 Apr 2024 13:51:08
I am not in the camp of a full clear out and I am not in the same camp as you Faith. Somewhere in between the 2 and feel we need min 5 additions. We lack in all areas. We concede too many, we don’t score enough and the midfield can’t control a game and we lack leaders. So some work to do in each department.