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The League Table

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Brizzle

Brizzle

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TeamPlayedGoal DifferencePoints

Chelsea 20 25 46
Man City 20 25 46
Man Utd 20 14 37
Southampton 20 19 36
Tottenham 20 2 34
Arsenal 20 9 33
West Ham 20 7 32
Liverpool 20 1 29
Swansea 20 1 29
Newcastle 20 -6 27

20 out of 38 games gone. 7 points off 4th, 8 points off 3rd. Obviously not where we thought we'd be however looking better now than I thought it would do about a month ago.

As we all know, the teams around us are dropping points constantly and so we just need to find a few runs of 3 or 4 wins in a row and IMO will be right back in there with the 3rd - 6th places which are all very tightly packed. Southampton and West Ham are losing some key players to African Cup of Nations (Wanyama and Song in particular) which I think will cause them to drop back a bit.

I think 3rd/ 4th is still possible BUT only if we capitalise on those around us losing. It was only about 8 games ago that United were below us but they've shown that with a few wins on the bounce you can shoot right back up.
 
We definitely have a shot at 3rd-4th. We just need to get on a run. Stick on our top form players and let them do their thing ...
 
Doubt we will get 4th, yesterday was a big test for us and we failed.

20 games in and we have not won 3 league games in a row all season, that's pretty dreadful for a team aspiring for the top 4.
 
I found myself looking at the table during the game yesterday and thinking about the gap between us and 4th.

We never learn, do we?

How many times have we been here before? Stumbling all season, looking like we might be able to steady ourselves to capitalize on our rivals dropping points but never quite managing it.

We're past the half way mark now and I have zero expectations of this team making 4th.
 
keniget said:
I have zero expectations of this team making 4th.
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I'm with you there. I have no expectations of it, but I think it is possible. It will come down to mentality and grinding out results once our Europa League games start stacking up. If we don't make 4th I really hope that one of West Ham or Southampton do and leave Arsenal out of the CL. Not qualifying would see Arsene sacked (or very close to it) and cause a real stir around them. Could they charge such a price for their Season Tickets without the CL? Their income from hospitality at these games would be a big hit too.
 
The Borinis and Lamberts of the world simply dont fire you into top 4. So unless the owners are prepared to spend money we can forget it.
 
Realistically as in if I had to stick real money on it, I'd say we're looking at 6th or 7th.

However it's not pie in the sky to think we could begin to decimate teams with sturridge back.

Take yesterday for example, I think had we scored from the second half kick off as we almost did, or a couple of the gilt edged chances we had gone in, then they woukdnt have had the spirit to come back.

Same for a few games this season. Last season I don't believe our defence was truly any better, just that we stopped trams having the belief to bother doing any more than reducing the damage we could cause when attacking them by scoring so quickly & effectively.

If we can come close to replicating that we can go on a run & break into that top four.
 
From the start of the season you need to be averaging 2 points a game to be Guarenteed a top 4 finish..

This season 70 points would probably do it.. which is average of 1.85 points per game

We currently stand at 1.45 points a game with 18 games to go

We need to average 2.3 points per game in our final 18 games to reach that magic figure of 70 points..

Huge effort required.. After yesterdays result I cannot see it happening
 
I think it is very easy to criticize Rodgers for where we are on the table and some of it is deserved. But it is also important to not lose sight of the fact that he is building a team for the future, even if he has never used that as an excuse.

Rafa had a five year plan, Houlier had a five year plan, but they never had the balls to buy young upcoming players and blood them in. Even Kenny who could have got away with almost anything went for average older players like Downing and Adam.

Rodgers has built a team for the future. Our captain(after Gerrard) is young, at the end of this season we will have one player over 28...that will be Lambert, and he is hardly getting any minutes now.

It is very easy to lose sight of the bigger picture and start booing everything about Rodgers, but I think we have a real gem of a manager with proper balls for the first time since god know when...

All that said im hoping he can bring in a good experienced midfielder and goalkeeper in Jan.
 
You know, the problem with building teams for the future is that if you don't have some amount of success bigger teams are gonna come in and steal your "future" stars.
So, let's see how long Raheem etc will be content with our performances.
 
Modo said:
You know, the problem with building teams for the future is that if you don't have some amount of success bigger teams are gonna come in and steal your "future" stars.
So, let's see how long Raheem etc will be content with our performances.
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If you don't have the character to work to improve yourself and the team when you've had your career progressed by the Manager at a time when your application was wanting then you're an idiot.

As regards the League table, it's constantly changing as results are impossible to predict, even the League leaders can't maintain form.

Another 18 games will see a lot of changes.
 
Why does it seem like every time we have a strong team there has to be at least two other teams tearing it up in the league?
Culminating in us finishing 2nd or 3rd or whatever.
 
Two reasons. One: the teams in question have either been ManU, with their mahoosive turnover, or have had huge injections of cash. Two: they've been better run than we have, both on and off the field, and have developed a winning habit we have yet to retrieve for ourselves.
 
It completely depends on how Rodgers plans on using Gerrard. It starts and stops right there.

I think the team against Swansea could build a good momentum. Might be enough to reach 4th spot. Wouldn't put any money on it though.
 
Wiberg said:
It completely depends on how Rodgers plans on using Gerrard. It starts and stops right there.

I think the team against Swansea could build a good momentum. Might be enough to reach 4th spot. Wouldn't put any money on it though.
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Hard to say.. it was a good performance with the levels of pressing we require but that is unsustainable for 90 mins, and even less so for 2 x 90 mins a week.
 
So effectively we're talking about 13 wins out of the 18 games remaining.

We'll drop points away to Chelsea, arsenal & Everton.

Games against Southampton, Spurs, Man Utd & Man City are the must win games.

Looking at our fixtures - February is the month our season hinges on.
 
Lucky for us that everyone else is as haphazard at picking up points. It's doable, a big factor now might be that, as we know Gerrard is going, and with the cups due to start again, we have every excuse to use Gerrard more sparingly in the league, which might mean we'll pick up more points.

The midfield just looks disjointed with him in it, and the only real positive influence he seems to be having is from either pens or the occasional set piece. Drop him out the team for the league, bring him on as a sub when needed, play Lucas and Henderson in he middle and push on from there. Our midfield looked great against Swansea, you just knew yesterday in shifting Henderson back out-wide, to accommodate Gerrard, it would look unbalanced again.
 
mark1975 said:
Lucky for us that everyone else is as haphazard at picking up points. It's doable, a big factor now might be that, as we know Gerrard is going, and with the cups due to start again, we have every excuse to use Gerrard more sparingly in the league, which might mean we'll pick up more points.

The midfield just looks disjointed with him in it, and the only real positive influence he seems to be having is from either pens or the occasional set piece. Drop him out the team for the league, bring him on as a sub when needed, play Lucas and Henderson in he middle and push on from there. Our midfield looked great against Swansea, you just knew yesterday in shifting Henderson back out-wide, to accommodate Gerrard, it would look unbalanced again.
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I'm kinda for this.

I think we're starting to look light in the FB/WB positions again though.
 
kingjulian said:
I think it is very easy to criticize Rodgers for where we are on the table and some of it is deserved. But it is also important to not lose sight of the fact that he is building a team for the future, even if he has never used that as an excuse.

Rafa had a five year plan, Houlier had a five year plan, but they never had the balls to buy young upcoming players and blood them in. Even Kenny who could have got away with almost anything went for average older players like Downing and Adam.

Rodgers has built a team for the future. Our captain(after Gerrard) is young, at the end of this season we will have one player over 28...that will be Lambert, and he is hardly getting any minutes now.

It is very easy to lose sight of the bigger picture and start booing everything about Rodgers, but I think we have a real gem of a manager with proper balls for the first time since god know when...

All that said im hoping he can bring in a good experienced midfielder and goalkeeper in Jan.
Click to expand...


I think you're giving all the credit to Rodgers for something FSG and the committee have been responsible for.
 
peterhague said:
I think you're giving all the credit to Rodgers for something FSG and the committee have been responsible for.
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Not really, it's a bit muddied if anything, I can't see how it's that cut & dried either way. We don't know who bought who, we also know that we've bought players like Coutinho, Sturridge, Markovic, Moreno, etc with one eye on the future - yeah that might be FSG's blueprint, to buy young players, but you're not telling me FSG are responsible for the level of personnel bought. That does rest with Rodgers and the committee, good and bad. He's still adjusted to the structure and had us, last season at least, putting teams to the sword with a young, vibrant squad. Other managers have done well with squads that are already in place and reaped the rewards and praise for it, he's done that and (with the assistance of the committee) added quality within the styles that he wants and the age range the club wants.

The club has a young player/moneyball vision, if anything that dictates the standard we can go for and that means it probably restricts it too, Rodgers then has to utilise what he can get within that. I'm not saying he's infallible, we know he isn't on that note, but his style at Swansea earned him his place with us and we saw that at it's best last season, that's irrespective of the transfer policy, particularly when prior to last season, people were moaning about a lack of ambition in the transfer market.
 
mark1975 said:
Not really, it's a bit muddied if anything, I can't see how it's that cut & dried either way. We don't know who bought who, we also know that we've bought players like Coutinho, Sturridge, Markovic, Moreno, etc with one eye on the future - yeah that might be FSG's blueprint, to buy young players, but you're not telling me FSG are responsible for the level of personnel bought. That does rest with Rodgers and the committee, good and bad. He's still adjusted to the structure and had us, last season at least, putting teams to the sword with a young, vibrant squad. Other managers have done well with squads that are already in place and reaped the rewards and praise for it, he's done that and (with the assistance of the committee) added quality within the styles that he wants and the age range the club wants.

The club has a young player/moneyball vision, if anything that dictates the standard we can go for and that means it probably restricts it too, Rodgers then has to utilise what he can get within that. I'm not saying he's infallible, we know he isn't on that note, but his style at Swansea earned him his place with us and we saw that at it's best last season, that's irrespective of the transfer policy, particularly when prior to last season, people were moaning about a lack of ambition in the transfer market.
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All I'm saying is I don't think it's his doing that we have lots of good young players. It goes back to Rafa instituting changes to the academy and then to FSG pursuing a particular strategy for transfers, and a big part of that is actually reining in Rodgers' power over recruitment, not enabling it.
 
Reining in, restricting it. It's a bit debatable. There's quite a few good players we've missed out on for one reason or another, you could argue that it's probably had both effects. Rafa instituted changes to the academy, agreed, but he also spent bucket loads on young players and we saw how many successes from that? I agree it's a combination of things, but it's been the sum of it's parts rather than something you can pinpoint to a couple of factors. And there's no definitive aspect you could say has been a resounding success, but I guess the point is the factors working together have to some degree "worked" and it is pulling us in the right direction, despite this seasons hiccup.
 
Lads, we've been here before. It's not happening this year. We are too average, don't let the hope hurt you.
 
mark1975 said:
Reining in, restricting it. It's a bit debatable. There's quite a few good players we've missed out on for one reason or another, you could argue that it's probably had both effects. Rafa instituted changes to the academy, agreed, but he also spent bucket loads on young players and we saw how many successes from that? I agree it's a combination of things, but it's been the sum of it's parts rather than something you can pinpoint to a couple of factors. And there's no definitive aspect you could say has been a resounding success, but I guess the point is the factors working together have to some degree "worked" and it is pulling us in the right direction, despite this seasons hiccup.
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Not to me, not in his case. Obviously in most cases there'd be a trade off from limiting a manager's say over transfers, but Rodgers seems exceptional to me. His targets seem almost exclusively to consist of either a) players he's worked with before (at a considerably lower level than we need, mind you) or b) the latest journeyman PL player to have had an unusually hot spell of form.
 
RedNinja said:
From the start of the season you need to be averaging 2 points a game to be Guarenteed a top 4 finish..

This season 70 points would probably do it.. which is average of 1.85 points per game

We currently stand at 1.45 points a game with 18 games to go

We need to average 2.3 points per game in our final 18 games to reach that magic figure of 70 points..

Huge effort required.. After yesterdays result I cannot see it happening
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Your maths is off. This season anywhere between 60 and 65pts is expected to be enough to grab 4th.
 
Not so sure about your calculations Froggie. Unless the remainder of the league goes the same way result wise, and we take advantage I cant see it happen now. Southampton only need 30 points to reach 66 for example. I really had been hoping for a Southampton draw, Spurs defeat and a win for us yesterday.

It looks to me like our best CL option is through the Europa, Hope I'm wrong though.
 
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