Aren't all the best rants? That plus finger wagging. You could get a seat in the commons
Roiling football blather
- Thread starter crackerjack
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baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
Did someone seriously say Totti was better than Gerrard?
Is it my memory, or was he meant to be the key player in a side that was massacred 7-1 in the Champions League Q-Fs last season?
Gerrard has been a disappointment at international level, but he would NEVER let his team get humiliated like that. If you want proof, I think you need to look at a certain match in Istanbul....
Is it my memory, or was he meant to be the key player in a side that was massacred 7-1 in the Champions League Q-Fs last season?
Gerrard has been a disappointment at international level, but he would NEVER let his team get humiliated like that. If you want proof, I think you need to look at a certain match in Istanbul....
32 goals in 50 games last season, and 8 in 11 this year would indicate that Totti being better than Gerrard isn't so laughable. But anyway, I'm off down the pub. See you lot later!
baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
Sure, he's a good player, but his rep is more inflated than Gerrard's, I think.
Yes, drink is a good idea. Nice thread to while away an afternoon at work!
boombox
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If you hit the post, you have missed. In what way is hitting the post unlucky? It doesn't change which team is best, it reveals which team is best.
Gerrard was playing the same balls into the box, making the same runs for one-twos, attempting the same shots, running down the same balls. However, the opposition dictate the outcome of these endeavors as much as he does. The defence was tighter, the blocking was better, the movement of Beckham, Lampard, Cole was non-existent. It is all about context.
crackerjack
Well-known member
Totti played in last summer's World Cup Final, though you're right, he wasn't much cop.
IdleRich
IdleRich
Had to rush off and actually play the game last night - 6-3 and through to the final Get In!
That was a joke.
I think that Gerrard does everything Gattuso does and more.
I always thought that was a bit unfair, at the end of that game they were saying "Totti went missing" but he's the striker for fuck's sake, what was he supposed to do, get back and prevent them scoring all the goals or just score eight himself? But I do think that highlights the difference, he basically could have no bearing on that match, he simply wasn't in it by dint of position, that can't happen for a central midfielder
Have Liverpool got better since Mascherano joined though? I would say no. They're already out of the running for the league and struggling in the championship.
I think that there is an element of good or bad luck in the hitting of the post but if you're too obtuse to grasp that let's take a different example. Suppose that the referee makes a scandalous decision and gives a penalty incorrectly, the team who are gifted the penalty score it and the other team has a goal wrongly disallowed for offside, is the team that won the best because they had the skill to get the penalty? In your world it is, not in mine.
Is that supposed to be an argument for Gerrard (et al) playing the same for country as for club? To me it just says that they played shit on Wednesday (no arguments from me), the point is that they don't do for their clubs. The defence was tighter than what? All the teams that Gerrard and the rest have done well against? You're seriously saying that Croatia's defence is better than Milan, Chelsea etc? Weird.
vimothy
yurp
In defense of Gerrard - and I say this as a Man Utd fan - you have to say... Champions of Europe, 2005.
boombox
...
Liverpool were able to turn that match around due to the abject complacency of Milan and the introduction of Hamann to counteract Kaka. It is symptomatic of our near-sighted Anglo-centric view that the final has since mutated into another 'Gerrard as one-man-team' legend. What about Vladimir Smicer's 30-yard goal or Xabi Alonso's equaliser or Dudek's vital save from Shevchenko in Extra Time and subsequent heroics in the shoot-out?
I am saying that Gerrard, in my opinion, played as he always does but didn't get the results he sometimes gets in other matches. I cannot make it any clearer.
vimothy
yurp
But I'm not just talking about the final mate.
mixed_biscuits
_________________________
Liverpool only won the final because Milan packed up and went home at half-time.
crackerjack
Well-known member
This kind of nonsense is just as much a part of England campaigns as all the absurd optimism beforehand.
Over at The Guardian we've got someone telling us everything would've been OK if only Mac had dumped the current squad (Rio and Crouch excl) and drawn his team from
IdleRich
IdleRich
All true but surely you would admit that Gerrard had a good game?
No, but you could make it more correct. The point is, Gerrard very regularly gets great results against teams far superior to Croatia, that suggests to me that he didn't play as well against Croatia as he did against the superior sides. I don't know why it doesn't suggest that to you as it seems to be the only sensible conclusion.
Nothing to say about how a refereeing decision can influence the result and change the worst side into the best side?
crackerjack
Well-known member
What, it's realism to claim Gattuso is a better player than Gerrard, or that England haven't underacheived in this group, that on player named the Champions League's best in 2005, and another named 2nd best player in the world the same year have nothing more to offer than we saw in these games?
That's the problem with tinterweb - you get to talk flagrant bollocks without being exposed by the smirk that must be playing on your face right now.
Only once he moved to the right. Me and my flatmate were talking about that final this morning, and we both agreed that Hamann, Smicer and Carragher were much more vital to that win. Good dive though.
As for Totti, how did I forget the Lucas Neill thing in the last world cup? I had it in my head that he'd retired from internationals after the Euros prior to that, but if there's one thing this topic's proved it's that I'm not prepared to let facts get in the way of a good argument...
Ignoring the Gattuso/Gerrard thing because I've said already I think he's better...
Gerrard is a great player in the right circumstances and so is Lampard, but for whatever reason they're not doing it at international level, and haven't since Euro 2004 (where Paul Scholes played on the left, and as I remember was instrumental in creating space for both of them, even from a position not natural to him). The comment about them playing exactly how they do for club level was nonsense; they clearly do have more to offer, but they're not getting any younger and I don't think we're going to get it from them in a white shirt with this current set-up. So I think it's time to ditch both.
boombox
...
I don't reach my conclusions by a circuitous route. I simply watch his individual performance and judge it. Anyway, I don't believe any team is far superior to Croatia.
What I originally said was that the assumption that the best team wins was a logical starting point. Obviously there are freak occurrences.
When Milan decided to give Liverpool the freedom of Istanbul, yes.