Puskas

The rotation thread has been rotated.

My reading of the situation pre-season was that the majority of the forum thought we would do better than last season, and most hoped for our challenge to last up until Christmas. A minority thought we'd win it. I didn't see any 'vast majority' "expecting" anything. I'm taking exception with Hodgson spouting his 95%+ statistic when it's patent b******s. When he combines that with a whinge about people getting 'personal' and then calls them w***ers 5 minutes later - well it's pure hypocrisy isn't it. Hodgson asked Mooks to 'show me the posts where one person said pre-season that they didn't expect a serious title challenge this season.' Cobs has already posted it. There more than one person in that expectations thread who didn't expect a serious title challenge this season. Add muppetry of the highest order to the hypocrisy charge. And don't start levelling 'petty' charges at me, Mr. Wallchart.

Ah, so you can't find any then. Didn't think so. Talking s*** once more - big surprise. Hey look - I can make up statistics too - 95%+ of this forum think you're a muppet Hodgson.

I must have imagined the two richest clubs in the country winning the league the last three seasons then. I don't think Derby are the best example - they could play against only 9 Arsenal players and still get walloped . And again I would prefer it if visitors to Arsenal were given more of incentive to try and beat them rather than just try not to lose to them, precisely because beating them would help us more than drawing with them.

The team with the star players (most money) winning all the time - that's what happens at the moment. Because of that the other teams might as well leave their strikers at home when they travel to play the rich teams. Personally I think this is bad. The neutral observer is you, watching a match where Liverpool are not involved. Do you want to watch another team digging trenches against Arsenal for 90 minutes? I find it boring, and I'd like to see them at least give it a go. The only team I can stand watching while they are playing very defensively (or just plain badly) is Liverpool.

According to you, we haven't challenged for the title under Rafa. Not even when we got over 80 points. So let us say that - when you want it to 80 points represents a title challenge, and when you don't, it doesn't. Sounds fair enough to me. And it would be a small majority, not a vast majority, and still nowhere near Hodgson's mythical 95%+, which was the whole point.

Why would my mindset have any bearing whatsoever on what happens with Liverpool's season? Or yours, for that matter? Besides, my mindset is one of quiet but cautious optimism. I'd much rather keep my expectations modest and be pleasantly surprised by the end of the season, than expecting the World in August and be in the depths of pessimistic despair by the beginning of November. And your analysis of our start last year is also out of whack. We had a shockingly bad start away from home, but our home form was pretty good. So far we seem to have sorted out our league form away from home, which was the area that most needed addressing. We haven't quite got the wins at home yet, but we haven't lost yet either and I'm confident that will come.

Apart from those saying 'improved away performances', '80 points plus', 'need to have a good start', 'flying start', 'to not have our interest in the League over before October/November/Christmas', 'I wanna get that feeling back of going into league games very very confident of a victory', '70 goals scored in league' (guess who), 'win heaps and play good football', 'a marked improvement in the league', 'World peace and an end to global starvation and suffering'. Got up to page 4, I think that will do for a representative sample. One person did they say they were expecting a quadruple. I think they were joking. Mooks said this: 'But of course our goal every season should be to win the league.'

I don't usually start forming 'expectations' about the eventual outcome of a season until around Christmas time. Before the season began I anticipated that we would struggle at the start the season because of the number of new recruits, and that it would take them some time to settle. I recall mentioning somewhere that we would need to be pretty close to the top by Christmas in order to challenge, because we play all the 'big three' away in the second half of season. That's about it for my predictions or expectations.

Don't forget that Kaizer is convinced that the less people that agree with him the more right he is. So I agree with Kaizer.

I don't think some people have ever quite grown out of the 'my daddy is bigger than your daddy so there' stage.

Thanks Cobs. Just over half the posters in that thread were expecting some kind of title challenge. No where f***ing near 95%+ then. So the question remains for Hodgson - let's see these threads with 95%+ please. Come on, money where your mouth is. Put up or shut up. It's interesting that among those with the very highest expectations were Big Wayne, David Hodgson and Ant...

Really? I never would have known if you hadn't said. So are we going to draw a line somewhere then - rotating 3 players is OK, but 4 is evil and clearly the work of the devil?

Pot. Kettle. Black. I am honoured to award you the Gonzo award for complete muppetry.

If you're so confident that why don't you show us the threads where 95%+ of the posters on here were saying "that given our investments in the summer, that we had to be challenging for the league this season"? There should be plenty in the archive (apparently). When you're ready.

I think it results in very negative, 10 men behind the ball football. I think encouraging teams to attack more would result in more attacking football (!), which would be more enjoyable to watch, particularly for the neutral observer.

It's not really possible to compare Mascherano and Gerrard. Yes, they are both midfielders but that's about as close as the comparison gets. Masch beats Gerrard hands down as a defensive midfielder, Gerrard is massively superior going forward. They are both very, very good at what they do best. On paper they look a good partnership, although we've been playing miserable football with those two in middle (Besiktas excepted). Maybe that's a form thing, maybe it's because neither can direct play as well as Alonso, who is the one player we seem to miss most when he's not playing (yes, even more than Gerrard). I agree with Leo. We're extremely fortunate to have three such talented midfielders. I also think we're very fortunate to have Lucas, who has huge potential.

I think it's more that 1 point is not so much less than 3 points - so they'll happily settle for a nil nil away and take the point, and only try to actually win their home games or the easier aways. I was thinking about this last night and came up with another idea - we keep the existing system but reward no points for either team for a 0:0, you only get your 1 point for a draw if it's a score draw. No goals, no points.

I disagree. I hate the whole 'park the bus' attitude that (most) visiting teams to Anfield take, with maybe a tiny chance of scoring one on a breakaway. The managers of the clubs in the lower half see 1 point for a 0:0 draw at Anfield as an excellent result. It would be a lot less good a result if there was 4 points for a win and only 1 for a 0:0 draw - then they would be encouraged to come out and attack a bit more, which would open up the game and make for a better spectacle for everyone. I also like the idea of rewarding teams who only get beaten by the odd goal, as it will give teams who are losing another incentive to try and score goals. The 'bonus' point for scoring three of more works the same - it will encourage teams who are dominating to continue attacking until the end of the match, to get that third goal and an extra point. Nope. I'm quite serious.

Where did I say anything about rewarding style of football? The system would reward wins more that draws, and would also reward the scoring of goals. It would encourage attacking football. It could still end up being be wimbledon style arial bombardments.

It's not like we haven't been trying is it? It's just that where we have been spending £10m on a player, Chelsea and Man U have been spending £20m plus. Even our record signing has been topped more than once by both of those teams. It's only Arsenal who have been competitive without a similar outlay, through spotting 'unrealised' talent and their youth system. We are certainly working on the youth system, but it will still be a year or three before we start reaping the benefits of that.

I would as well. However - the beauty of my system is that you could do just that - win every single game 1-0 - and still not win the league. That's got to make things more interesting, surely

I didn't think so. Made me chuckle anyway

I recall similar comments when we went from 2 points for a win to 3... It's basically the system they have in rugby union and it hasn't destroyed that.

I'd mentioned this way back on another thread. If we want to see more attacking football then I think there needs to be a change to the points system, and one that is tailored to punish 0:0 draws. My suggestion is this: 4 points for a win 2 points for a score draw 1 point for no score draw 0 points for a loss 1 bonus point if you score 3 goals or more 1 bonus point if you lose by just a single goal If it's 2:0 with 10 minutes left then both the losing and the winning team have a big incentive to try and score a goal. If it's 3:3 there's still a big incentive to get a winner. Should make things a bit more attack minded