Re: Rival thread

by McAgger Thu Jan 30, 2014 1:10 am

I don't think anyone is going to catch City for the title so I've given up on that this season, hoping they beat all of our other rivals so we can finish second.

We can also catch up to Arsenal and even surpass them if we beat them at Anfield with their ridiculously hard schedule coming up.

by Red Alert Thu Jan 30, 2014 1:56 am

We have no chance of catching up to City.

I was talking about Chelsea.

If Chelsea lose against City, and we win our game against West Brom, we go 1 point behind them.

by Red Alert Thu Jan 30, 2014 5:25 am

Arsenal look set to sign both of Draxler and Vucinic. Good signings, but still not what they need. If they can get a top striker in, in the Suarez, Costa, Aguero mold, they'll be the next English "superpower" alongside City if you take into the account the average age of their squad.

by Art Morte Thu Jan 30, 2014 7:57 am

If Arsenal sign both of those, Podolski should leave.

by BeautifulGame Thu Jan 30, 2014 1:34 pm

Red Alert wrote:Arsenal look set to sign both of Draxler and Vucinic. Good signings, but still not what they need. If they can get a top striker in, in the Suarez, Costa, Aguero mold, they'll be the next English "superpower" alongside City if you take into the account the average age of their squad.

Raphael Honigstein ‏@honigstein 1m
Tomorrow's Süddeutsche Zeitung: "Arsenal's fabled delegation never arrived nor announced themselves in Gelsenkirchen on Wednesday

rofl

by mr-r34 Sat Feb 01, 2014 3:55 pm

Spurs, everton and united all down 1-0 at half time.

by Art Morte Sat Feb 01, 2014 4:04 pm

mr-r34 wrote:Spurs, everton and united all down 1-0 at half time.

Stop jinxing it, man!

by mr-r34 Sat Feb 01, 2014 5:01 pm

everton won, spurs drew and united lost, we NEED to take advantage of this week.

by Red Alert Sat Feb 01, 2014 5:03 pm

Spurs and United dropping points. Proud

Hull 1 - Spurs 1
Stoke 2 - United 1
Everton are about to win.

Decent weekend. We need to beat WBA.

Charlie Adam ffs. Proud

by stevieg8 Sat Feb 01, 2014 5:29 pm

"Unless teams drop points, we can't afford to drop a single game - this is a must win."

"Teams dropped points, we need to take advantage - this is a must win."

hmm

by Art Morte Sat Feb 01, 2014 6:03 pm

Excellent results for us today.

by DeletedUser#1 Sat Feb 01, 2014 6:30 pm

stevieg8 wrote:"Unless teams drop points, we can't afford to drop a single game - this is a must win."

"Teams dropped points, we need to take advantage - this is a must win."

Why are you so sensitive towards the term "Must win" ??

I personally think every single game is must win. Because I want to see my Liverpool top of the league, champions of England...and I think in order to achieve that, you need to approach every single game as a "must win" one with the right mentality and no complacency.

by McAgger Sat Feb 01, 2014 11:32 pm

Absolutely fantastic results. Need to take care of our own game and then we'll look to see where we stand.

Next week Spurs play Everton at WHL.

by Red Alert Sun Feb 02, 2014 5:49 am

Natalie Portman wrote:
stevieg8 wrote:"Unless teams drop points, we can't afford to drop a single game - this is a must win."

"Teams dropped points, we need to take advantage - this is a must win."

Why are you so sensitive towards the term "Must win" ??

I personally think every single game is must win. Because I want to see my Liverpool top of the league, champions of England...and I think in order to achieve that, you need to approach every single game as a "must win" one with the right mentality and no complacency.

This. A million times this.

Let's not forget stevie, every win we get over the teams that drop points is HUGE to us. We need that gap / space for some breathing space. We're not going to win our last 15 games. And Spurs are still 1 game behind us even if they dropped points assuming we drop points. So we need to win.

by stevieg8 Sun Feb 02, 2014 5:58 am

Because there is a MASSIVE difference between "must-win" and "it would be good to win". Going into games with a winning mentality is VERY different from labeling games as must-wins.

Must-wins imply elimination, whether mathematical or incidental (i.e. being close enough to elimination, or with a hard enough remaining schedule to make reaching your goals near-impossible). The term creates pressure and turns games into do-or-die situations.

I follow five sports with close attention, and a sixth to a lesser degree. I've NEVER seen the term thrown around the way this forum uses it. Must-win arises in very specific situations: single-elimination games (the most common use); the aforementioned crucial wins, whether against a division rival where tie-breakers may apply, or when it would leave a team needing to win-out or near win-out against a difficult schedule; and college football, which I don't follow but where going undefeated is essentially a prerequisite to being champions - every game is literally a must-win if you're looking to be the best.

If a game is not going to knock us out of contention were we to lose it (again, not solely meaning mathematically here), it is by definition NOT a must-win. It can be many things: a game we would like to win, a game we should win, a game that may serve as a litmus test of the team's abilities, etc. etc.

For the record, I agree with you - LFC as an institution should go into every game expecting and playing for a win. I go into every single weekend expecting us to win, whether it's rational (this week) or just my heart (leading up to Man City away, for instance). And it's heartbreaking when we lose a game against any team. But the term you're using does not accurately reflect that sentiment.

Instead, you use "must-win", and it directly influences the conversation we have here in GL LFC. When every game is a must-win, every loss and draw is a crisis; every loss and draw is the end to our top 4 hopes. If we lose to a bottom side, it's points we couldn't afford to lose; if we lose to a top side, it was a 6 pointer that we couldn't afford to drop.

And yet, here in 4th we still remain, despite losing to Hull - or Arsenal - or Man City; whichever "must-win" you want to choose. And because even if we lose to West Brom tomorrow (yet another supposed must-win), in 4th we will stay.

As much as I'd love to, we DON'T need to go undefeated to get 4th place. In fact, we don't even need to go undefeated to win the title.

And while I know you disdain logic and reason and prefer to let your emotions rule your every thought (or at least the ones you deem worthwhile to post here), I personally hate how I have to avoid checking this site after every dropped point because I don't want to hear all the overblown complaints and criticisms. And maybe if we tempered the pressure (keep in mind, the pressure does NOT mean the expectations) just a bit, we'd hit less of a crisis mode after every single loss.

And just to preempt Red Alert's inevitable response, I do think we're a flawed team. But just as we're not nearly as good as our reactions suggest after wins, we're not nearly as poor as our reactions suggest after losses; and if we're being irrational anyway, I'd rather enjoy myself in the process.

by Red Alert Sun Feb 02, 2014 6:29 am

I've already explained the "must win" intent in the Spurs thread I think it was. Might even been the game at Goodison against Everton though.

"Must win" games isn't the best way to describe it. But the intent has to be there for us to win it. If we have the intent to go out and get the 3 points, we'll win a lot more games than we'll lose.

EDIT: And I don't think we're a "flawed" team, really. I think we're missing 1 first-team player (preferably a "marquee") from fighting for the league if we can hold onto Suarez and stop this counter-attacking thing we've adopted all season long. The experiements haven't helped, either. I just want death by football ffs. Sad

EDIT II: We'll probably have to play a 4231 counter-attacking style until the end of season / Lucas gets back now. Gerrard can't play the controller role, so I'll be surprised if we'll play an attacking 433 with him in that role. Can't see us getting the results if we do play him there alone, though.

by iftikhar Sun Feb 02, 2014 6:34 am

iftikhar wrote:February Fixtures (all competitions)

Arsenal: Palace (H), Liverpool (A), United (H), Liverpool (FAC/H), Munich (CL/H), Sunderland (H)

Manchester: Chelsea (H), Norwich (A), Sunderland (H), Chelsea (FAC/H), Barcelona (CL/H), Stoke (H)

Chelsea: City (A), Newcastle (H), WBA (A), City (FAC/A), Everton (H), Galatasaray (CL/A)

Liverpool: WBA (A), Arsenal (H), Fulham (A), Arsenal (FAC/A), Swansea (H)

Tottenham: Hull (A/1-1), Everton (H), Newcastle (A), Dnipro (EL/A), Norwich (A), Dnipro (EL/H)

Everton: Villa (H/2-1), Spurs (A), Palace (H), Swansea (FAC/H), Chelsea (A)

United: Stoke (A/1-2), Fulham (H), Arsenal (A), Palace (A), Olympiacos (CL/A)

Newcastle: Sunderland (H/0-3), Chelsea (A), Spurs (H), Villa (H)

Already a good start for the month. Anyone impressed by the steel shown by Everton!!!

by McAgger Sun Feb 02, 2014 6:37 am

Everton have a tough schedule coming up and with injuries to important players piling up. I expect our distance to keep increasing. At the moment though, just hoping we can take care of business tomorrow.

by Red Alert Sun Feb 02, 2014 6:37 am

Newcastle aren't rivals to us lol.

They're irrelevant without Cabaye.

by Red Alert Sun Feb 02, 2014 6:50 am

I hope Pulis can get a result against Arsenal. That'd be brilliant. Especially when we beat them next week at Anfield. :coffee:

by Nishankly Sun Feb 02, 2014 7:16 am

Just noticed if United win the CL we get EL even if we finish 4th pale

But that wont happen with Moyes around, Right?
RIGHT?

by McAgger Sun Feb 02, 2014 7:28 am

United aint winning CL, not in a million years with the current squad. Laughing

by BeautifulGame Sun Feb 02, 2014 10:01 am

Nishank wrote:Just noticed if United win the CL we get EL even if we finish 4th

But that wont happen with Moyes around, Right?
RIGHT?

Moyes winning a trophy rofl

by McAgger Mon Feb 03, 2014 11:31 pm

Could've been only 4 points off the top right now with the top team coming to Anfield next matchday had we not been stupid against Villa and WBA. Can't believe we drew those games. BS Mad

Both of those games we gifted the equalizing goals to them. Mignolet and Kolo Mad

by mr-r34 Tue Feb 04, 2014 12:12 am

Add hull to that Mcagger and we could of been 1 point off.

by McAgger Tue Feb 04, 2014 1:43 am

Newcastle away two points dropped, playing 60 minutes against 10 men and still draw Laughing

Everton away two points dropped, Joe Allen misses the easiest sitter in history of man kind to take it to 1-3. Laughing

Also Mirallas should have been red carded for that challenge on Suarez in the first half.

City at the Eithad with the referring shambles. Mignolet mistake, Sterlng sitter miss Proud

Too many points dropped where we seriously should've and could've done more. I hate looking back at those stupid mistakes being the cause of us possibly missing out on something good.

Sad

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