Post-match Chelsea (A)

[Frogfish]

Well the PL has gone now. Even if both we and Chelsea win at City (next two games) we'll still be too far behind to catch them. On to the Cups it is.

As for this game ... we had enough good chances on the break to have put this game to bed even before Kovacic's worldie. Second half sort of petered out for both teams in terms of real chances but again we had the best. Kante and Kovacic ruled the midfield for most of the game against an inept Hendo, a too slow Milner and a Fabs weirdly well off his game, ditto VvD(both post-Covid perhaps), but did do some good work in there with his runs and passing.

Chelsea created little despite all their huffing and puffing and Kelleher looked very comfortable in goal.

Mane was his now usual self (spilling and losing the ball) bar a well taken goal and he did very well defensively. He really is one of the worst for not keeping himself onside though.

Cracking goal for Mo.

We should have started Keita over Milner, that error let Chelsea dominate midfield.

Kelleher : 8
Tsimikas : 7
VvD : 5
Konate : 6.5
TAA : 6.5
Milner : 5
Hendo : 5
Fabs : 6.5
Mo : 7
Diogo : 6.5
Mane : 6

Ox : 5
Keita : 6
Jones : 6.5 (not on for long but looked good)

 

[keniget]

Another hugely frustrating game for a multitude of reasons.

One of which is the fact that a point away to a pretty good (and fired up) Chelsea side should be a good, if not ideal, result but these days unless you have perfect season you can forget about the title.

<broken record>
We pin all our hopes on being able to go through a season without any major absences and significant loss of form. It's not realistic, not any more. We've failed on a few occasions now to invest in problem areas and once again we're suffering.
</broken record>

 

[My_Blood_Bleeds_Red]

What the heck is up with VVD ? He looks like he’s still strolling back into form. It’s been months now.

He’s playing like the white Mane.

 

[Red rose]

Kelleher was great. Looked comfortable. Nice to know we have good back up there

 

[Hansern]

What the heck is up with VVD ? He looks like he’s still strolling back into form. It’s been months now.

He’s playing like the white Mane.

He played like he had just been out with illness/Covid.

 

[LeTallecWiz]

Repeating what @keniget said:

<broken record>
We pin all our hopes on being able to go through a season without any major absences and significant loss of form. It's not realistic, not any more. We've failed on a few occasions now to invest in problem areas and once again we're suffering.
</broken record>

Another issue is Hendo ... Sorry, I know I'm modo'ing but I don't think he's physically capable of playing in these games like he used to. He doesn't protect TAA. He can be a brilliant impact midfield sub but he's lost some of his engine and that hurts our midfield big time.

VvD was off - he's not been great this year, but that's expected.

Mane - brilliant until final ball, then wasteful most of the time.

We could have won but this season was over after we were Juve'ed at Spurs ... The league is finished ... The 'best' league in the world was done before 2022 - what does that tell you folks? Money is the key factor in teams winning the league most of these years ... Maybe in 2-3 years time, we can see Pep take up an amazing, difficult challenge at Newcastle?

 

[King Binny]

 

[moron]

Its not about having to be perfect, its about winning and not drawing/losing those games you are expected to fucking win. Just look at the number of draws we have had, and all those games we have led in and then fucked up like today, like the city game etc... its too much of that shit in the league this season.

 

[King Binny]

 

[localny]

Ox in the last 5, losing the ball when we were 4 on 2... those are the moments that matter

We looked good, but not great.

Didn't look like losing in the second half. Didn't look like winning. And it's away at the Bridge.

Lots of positives, but you don't win the league without overachieving

The league is joke though with the financial doping

 

[Modo]

God save us now that Mane and Salah are gone.
Get ready to see a lot more of Ox.
It's so fucking unfortunate that Elliott has been injured.

 

[keniget]

Its not about having to be perfect, its about winning and not drawing/losing those games you are expected to fucking win. Just look at the number of draws we have had, and all those games we have led in and then fucked up like today, like the city game etc... its too much of that shit in the league this season.

That's the result of expecting the same level of performances and results from the same group of players 5 years running with practically no reinforcements. It's mental.

 

[Modo]

That's the result of expecting the same level of performances and results from the same group of players 5 years running with practically no reinforcements. It's mental.

It's infuriating

 

[Red rose]

God save us now that Mane and Salah are gone.
Get ready to see a lot more of Ox.
It's so fucking unfortunate that Elliott has been injured.

closer to Elliott retuning. It can’t come soon enough for me - (when he’s ready)I agree so unfortunate he had that bad injury !

 

[Farkmaster]

It's infuriating

The most infuriating part for me is not watching dips and declines in the good players. It's watching players who aren't good enough hang around. Every team makes errors, but ours are accumulating and they all play cm. Flush the fucking toilet every once in a while.

 

[binomial]

Struggled for most of the game but it's a decent result.

This all steps from 1 thing which is a lack of spending because we simply don't have the squad to get us through the season.

 

[SummerOnions]

How frustrating... We led through an error and a great goal, but then lacked the punch in midfield enough and were short of control on key moments to get a third in a counter attack.

Possibly we would have won if it wasn't for the Kovacic strike which is almost undefendable.

Positives:
Konate is beast
Salah and Mane scoring

 

[peekay]

That's the result of expecting the same level of performances and results from the same group of players 5 years running with practically no reinforcements. It's mental.

I am wondering if extending the contract of all of our core was a wise decision now - Robertson, Fabinho, Henderson - all have not hit their peaks. Have we worn them out? VVD has not been the same player since that Everton thug took out his legs.

 

[Athens]

Alan Shearer has some brass neck on him to talk about dangerous play.

 

[keniget]

I am wondering if extending the contract of all of our core was a wise decision now - Robertson, Fabinho, Henderson - all have not hit their peaks. Have we worn them out? VVD has not been the same player since that Everton thug took out his legs.

Yeah.

I said at the time that Henderson's contract didn't really make much sense beyond keeping him round as a leader / character in the dressing room. VVD I was concerned about and we're now in the rather unfortunate position of hoping a 30 year old recovers his best form after a really bad injury.

We're still a very good team. The problem, as it has been for the last few years, is that it's the same team. Creaking. And the creaks are just going to get louder and louder.

We don't have a big sale left in this team, those we would like to sell will probably have to go for cut price deals and we seem to have tied up all our money in "legacy" players. It's not an ideal situation from which to reinvest.

As far as I'm aware there are no superstars waiting to save us in the youth team starting next season so we have to hope the scouting team are able to find us a few bargains (likely made harder by the departure of Edwards) and / or FSG are able to put their hands in the pockets.

The starting point next summer has to be two midfielders and a forward.

 

[Donavan Ried]

Yeah.

I said at the time that Henderson's contract didn't really make much sense beyond keeping him round as a leader / character in the dressing room. VVD I was concerned about and we're now in the rather unfortunate position of hoping a 30 year old recovers his best form after a really bad injury.

We're still a very good team. The problem, as it has been for the last few years, is that it's the same team. Creaking. And the creaks are just going to get louder and louder.

We don't have a big sale left in this team, those we would like to sell will probably have to go for cut price deals and we seem to have tied up all our money in "legacy" players. It's not an ideal situation from which to reinvest.

As far as I'm aware there are no superstars waiting to save us in the youth team starting next season so we have to hope the scouting team are able to find us a few bargains (likely made harder by the departure of Edwards) and / or FSG are able to put their hands in the pockets.

The starting point next summer has to be two midfielders and a forward.

With the VVD sitution it now makes even greater sense to move Gomez on and keep Nat Philips. With two injury prone CB's Matip and Gomez what is the point of keeping both...?

Gomez would raise some much needed transfer funds. And besides being the better defender of the two, Mapit would not sell for as much as Gomez
Sell Origi,AOC,Gomez and Mane bring in a striker and midfielder and start the rebuild before we lose Klopp

 

[Markeh]

That midfield was so disappointing today, I’d give them all a 4/10.

Imo Milner has become a bit too comfortable with the idea of kicking people and breaking up play, the guy that always tops fitness stats doesn’t make that challenge out of laziness.

As a massive fan of Henderson i acknowledge his limitations and how he has always made up for a lot of it with graft. He seems to have two useful modes - the midfield water carrier with safe passing / solid defensively and the RCM mad man who uses all his energy to press and charge forward. Today he was neither, giving the ball away constantly and giving nothing going forward… It has been mentioned already in this thread that if he loses his legs he’s no good to us, he’s not going to mature into Pirlo. I could’ve throttled him for those shit lofted passes today.

Fabinho gets a bit of a pass for COVID reasons but i don’t think he has had a good season so far and I do worry he’s not going to age particularly well.

 

[Stevesquash]

Ordinarily we'd have been saying 2-2 away at the 3rd placed team was a decent result.

Unfortunately it was a must win game.

What I really don't understand is why when we get a 2 goal lead, can't we sit back a bit close the spaces and hit teams on the break? It's what every other team does.

We consistently leave the door wide open...

And teams predictably don't need an invitation.

 

[Modo]

Ordinarily we'd have been saying 2-2 away at the 3rd placed team was a decent result.

Unfortunately it was a must win game.

What I really don't understand is why when we get a 2 goal lead, can't we sit back a bit close the spaces and hit teams on the break? It's what every other team does.

We consistently leave the door wide open...

And teams predictably don't need an invitation.

The first goal was a total fluke, but the defence were a shambles for the second

 

[Red Astaire]

It's the most pathetic excuse ever but here it is to make you laugh - I missed the 2nd half of the game today because my brother-in-law thought he'd discovered 'treasure' - Silly twat was metal detecting and came across a Roman coin. Cool - but hardly worth telling me he'd thought he's just won the metal detecting lottery.... Anyway question is... How was Konate?

 

[rurikbird]

He played like he had just been out with illness/Covid.

Same with Fabinho and a few others.

 

[rurikbird]

I don’t understand the praise of Tsimikas - he did OK, but hardly a vintage performance. Top 3 were probably Kelleher, Mane and Mo.

 

[King Binny]

 

[Frogfish]

I don’t understand the praise of Tsimikas - he did OK, but hardly a vintage performance. Top 3 were probably Kelleher, Mane and Mo.

More than anyone he managed to get past their defence and put a few crosses in - which we didn't make the best of. Defensively he was sound for most of the match, Mount gave him some issues but his pace and aggression meant we rarely had issues from his side, they'd spin the ball back across the final third or throw in a cross but there was never much danger (in fact this was the case for most of the match - pressure yes but we mostly handled it well bar that ridiculous 2nd).

Definitely amongst our top 3 - which Mane wasn't (despite the effort he put in) and neither would Mo. be but for the superb goal (yes, I realise how contrary that statement is).

 

[kingjulian]

Was the mane elbow incident a red card offence? Considering what Kane got away with in our game against spurs, I'd feel super disappointed if that was given....