rgk_lfc

Having said that, I am wondering which PL club he even has a chance. Arsenal, Brentford, Brighton, Chelsea, Crystal Palace, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, City, United, Newcastle, Spurs, Southampton - all have moved past "personality" or "big name" player managers. They all have a plan or vision with DOFs running the scenes and look to hire managers who fit that vision. Everton too for all their transfer failings - you can see that they are trying to implement the modern DOF manager model - they just haven't nailed the appointments in the past. I don't know enough about West Ham, Wolves, and the remaining clubs. I just don't see space for someone like him managing in the PL unless he shows that he has something interesting in terms of tactics, vision elsewhere. Of course, at some point, there is going to be an intense media campaign to get him the LFC job, but he seems to be the exact opposite of the analytics data driven FSG type.

It is going to be tricky though. He got the LFC youth team job through his status as a player. It appears he got the Rangers job through contacts. Dalglish and a couple of others with connections to Rangers hierarchy played a role. Purslow played a big role in him getting the Villa job. I dont think he has gotten a job because he impressed the owners and CEO with his footballing vision or interview. I guess as long as his mates continue to back him in the media, he will end up getting another job.

Still early days to judge how good Michael Beale is going to be, especially at the particular level. But he has earned that job. Started at Chelsea at the U7 role worked his way up. Moved to Liverpool to coach the U16, then worked his way up to the U23. Took up an assistant manager position in Brazil. He has really put in the hours and earned all the jobs he got. By all accounts, he was a wonderful youth team coach. Will be very interesting to see how his career progresses.

He assembled that core on budget though. Credit to him for that.

I think Moyes is the greatest 6th to 8th place manager, PL has ever seen. Give him time and he can get any team to 6th-9th position on a budget. Look at some of his signings at Everton on a budget - Coleman, Howard, Pienaar, Arteta, Cahil, Lescott, Baines - brilliant. But when he is given money, it seems like he hits a ceiling and then bounces low.

It could also be that he finally has a manager who trusts him and knows how to use him. Marco Silva is an underrated manager.

Mitro appears to have finally figured out the PL. He did not give a single moment rest to our defenders on opening day.

I am not saying Parker's points are wrong. But there is a difference between a multiple leagues and European cups winning manager stating "I know what it takes and currently the owners are not backing me" and Scott Parker stating that.

Jones and Elliott are good enough to have a career in the PL. I am confident of that. Elliot looks like yet another technically solid, comfortable on the ball, clever young player which England seems to be producing a lot these days. Whether they are good enough to start for a team with ambitions of competing for a top 4, I am not sure about that. Definitely worth their place on the bench.

In the interest of balance and to defend TAA a little, depending on where the shot was taken from, that might be by design. Most top teams instruct their defenders to back off and allow opposition strikers to take the shot at goal if the shot is being taken from the outside and right or left of the box. This is because the chances of scoring a goal are very less. Also when the goalkeeper has a clear view of the shot and the goal, he should be able to catch it easily. If the defender tries to block it, then there is a chance of deflected shot going into the goal which is difficult for the goalkeeper to handle, or the ball deflecting to another player in a better position to take the shot. So it could be that. But the Sancho goal was different. Once Howe gets comfortable with Pope, you might notice it in your game also. Tell defenders to back off and bet on Pope to catch the ball. In a home game, if the shot goes out, the ball boys are also instructed to immediately throw the ball in so that you can start the attack immediately with the opposition still in attacking formation.

Check out the goal Mitro scored against us on the opening day. A big discussion among LFC fans now is whether TAA can't defend or does not want to defend? Based on the goals we are conceding and his role in that, it seems to be the latter than the former. He was never the greatest defender, but it has never been this bad before. I also don't think moving him to midfield is the answer. His vision and deep-lying crosses are incredible but he is doing that from deep inside his half with no pressure on him from the opposition and Salah distracting opposition left backs and left wingers ahead of him. The midfield is going to be more crowded. The opposition is going to be on his face; lot more opportunities to nullify him. His inability or lack of desire to track runners might hurt us more.

He grew up in a tribal fishing area. His first exposure to any sort of professional football was when he was 17 or 18 years old and that too for a youth team of a Colombian second division side. He is 25 years old but he has played far less football compared to players his age. His footballing age is 22 or 23 years old, if that makes sense. Also, when I said developing I meant still adapting to Klopp style of football. Klopp wants his attackers in the box whereas Diaz does his best outside the box - skills, tricks, and all. Mane was not the most elegant player but he was in your face attacker, constantly harassing the right back and right central defender. Diaz hasn't developed that aspect of his game, yet.

But his vision doesn't excuse this. Unless you are a prime Messi or Ronaldo, you don't get away with this. Fairly confident, De Bruyne would have done a better job of defending in that position. That should cost him his position in the world cup squad. Lot of issues that you all have covered for the most part. Diaz is an excellent player, but he is still developing and is not offering the physicality and threat of Mane upfront. Henderson and Milner shouldn't be starting games. Elliott and Carvalho are excellent youngsters, but they shouldn't be held responsible for holding our midfield together. Salah seems to be modeling his career based on becoming less talented Cristiano Ronaldo variant. As in not offering a lot other than scoring goals. We are definitely at the end of the cycle as @HTT II pointed out and kept it a bit too late to refresh. Once Thiago, Jota, Nunez is back we should be fine. By fine, I mean competing for the top 4. VVD has not been great, but I think once we replace Keita, and Ox and get more reliable midfielders both he and TAA should look OK. To me, the problem is the midfield. Two to three years ago, we had a younger Henderson, Milner, Gini, and Fabinho running around, pressing and hunting down every loose ball and offering a lot of protection to the defenders. We don't have that anymore which is exposing VVD and TAA. We definitely underestimated the scale of overhauling the squad in the short term, but I still trust our transfer committee to find solutions by next summer. I feel if we fix our midfield, a lot of the problems will be solved. As for Klopp looking clueless in post-match, his default mode when we lose or draw is to complain about the opposition being too defensive. Hated it when he or any other manager did that. He can't use that now as in three games; the opposition has gegenpressed us into submission.

But a lot of these managers spent time discovering and fine-tuning their systems and then took on high-profile jobs in the premier league. Howe took over Bournemouth in 2008, coached in the PL for the first time in 2015, got fired, did a sabbatical at top clubs in Europe, and finally earned the Newcastle job 10-12 years after he stepped into management. Rafa started coaching Madrid youth teams in the mid to late 80s, spent a lot of time in the second division failing, then got the break with Valencia in the early 2000s. Klopp, spent like seven years with Mainz, the majority in the second division, experienced several missed promotions and a relegation before he joined Dortmund. Conte was the same. As a manager, you want to experience multiple cycles of failures and challenging situations to discover what tactics work and what don't, how to tweak your system and manage your players when things aren't going well. Gerrard and Lampard short-circuited this process due to their reputation and experienced their first challenging situation at Villa and Chelsea, which are directly in the limelight high-profile jobs with cut-throat competition. I agree Scotland might not have been that competitive, but it would have been better for him in the long term if stayed on for a couple more seasons and challenged himself in CL and Europa League. At the very least spent a couple more years in the championship before taking on a job like Villa. I guess the problem is now everyone wants to be Pep. Going from B team coach to winning every trophy in 3 years' time.

Rafa and Purslow don't see eye to eye. Purslow was responsible for firing Rafa and replacing him with Hodgson. Also, Purslow conducted a purge of Rafa's staff and scouts.

Purslow loves SG. I think he will give him as much time as needed. Purslow is a good CEO, maybe even a great CEO, if he sticks to the financial and admin side of things. The problem is he loves the limelight and loves being associated with traditional British football royalty. He was one of the reasons for pushing Rafa out of LFC, replacing him with Hodgson, removing Rafa's scouts and players, and replacing them with his own style of signings - Konchesky, Joe Cole, a contract extension for Carra. So even if things get really bad for Villa, I am sure Purslow will give him time. Whether SG gets Villa out of the hole using that time is another question.

When Gerrard took over Villa, I wanted only wanted one of the two extremes to happen. Gerrard is a super coach who takes Villa to European glory. Leaves no doubt in anyone's mind that he is a top-level manager. Or Gerrard stumbles so bad that Villa sacks him within a year. Even if he stumbles onto say 12th position with a squad like Villa, his mates in the media will paint it as the next great managerial achievement and start the PR campaign for him to take the LFC job post Klopp. Just like you all experienced with Bruce.

Shearer, Henry, Aguero, Kane, Salah, Rooney, Vardy, Drogba, Van Nistelrooy, Cole. To me, he is right in the middle of the top 10 with Torres, Fowler, and Wright just missing out. He is just a bit below the genuine elite - Shearer, Henry, Aguero, Kane. He normally stays out of everyone's top 10 list because at his peak, he lacked the global profile of Shearer or Henry, the charismatic goals, larger-than-life celebration, etc. But in terms of effectiveness and contribution, he stands up to everyone. Particularly in their later years, Shearer and Henry needed a system or other people's legs to carry them. But Vardy was one of the strikers who did not expect others to put in the graft for him, he did it. Rooney, I think was the other striker like that. So those players will always have lower goal returns but that should not make their contribution any less valuable.

Early days, but he looks like a cracking manager. Neutralized and frustrated us brilliantly at Anfield. Now playing a different approach against Villa. In general, attempts to play attacking and forward-thinking football without compromising too much on defense.

Not sure if there is a father, son who have made their mark on the PL like the Schmeichel's. Also makes me feel old. Grew up getting annoyed at the dad for his performances at United. Now the son is also leaving.

In general, yes. They do have a quality youth team. But these signings are not cheap. 20 for Carney, 15 for that goalkeeper, 3-4 million for each of those other players. We are talking close to 50 million for players who are not even going to be near the first team next year.

Nah, mate. He has been incredibly respectful to us fans during his tenure at LFC and post LFC. The portrait of him in his living room which is often used as a stick to beat him with - it was given to him by a disabled fan and he promised he will have that close with him. Very respectful and polite whenever fans reach out to him for such purpose. I would reserve the word pricks to folks like Bruce, Pardew and their ilk. Rodgers is not a bad person in general. Does have a bit of a high opinion of himself and his methods:). He has his flaws but I wouldn't go as far as describing him as a prick.

Not quite sure what is happening but they are aggressively pursuing youth transfers. Eddie Beach and Tyler Dibling from Southampton, Omari Hutchinson from Arsenal, Zak Sturge from Brighton, Slonina from MLS. Some of these are decent money transfers. Carney for 20 million, Slonina for 12-15 million.

It got really childish also the final year he was with us. Started addressing Michael Edwards as Eddie or something like that, a name which Edwards hated being called. The bizarre part is Rodgers is an excellent coach. His weakness is identifying players and scouting. If he had focused on coaching the players and tactics, and let Edwards do his job, he probably would have been in the job longer. Anyways, this has nothing to do with Maddison. Sorry for the thread hijack.

Interesting to learn that. He hated Michael Edwards at LFC. Used his media mates to ramp up the pressure against LFC transfer committee. Tried to get them replaced but FSG stood firm on that aspect. It got really weird his penultimate season when he started playing Edwards signings out of their position to make them look bad - Firmino at right wing, Emre Can at right back. I really rate Rodgers football acumen. But it is interesting to see that the same issues are continuing.