Anfield Red

Are you wondering if we can keep up our run to stay at the top of the table? If you are having any doubts, watch this brilliant video of Torres & Gerrard in action proving they can fire us to victory with the lethal partnership they have formed!

Torres & Gerrard are Liverpool’s two top players, betwen them they have terrorised defences across Europe, watch this vid and make your mind up if we can still do it this year:

If you’ve read anything regarding transfers and Liverpool over the last week or so, all you will have seen is us linked with the likes of Downing from Middlesbrough and Valencia from Wigan, but after Rafa signed Albert Riera in the summer and also prefers to play Ryan Babel on the left; it is highly unlikely we will be going for another left winger.

Riera has only had 1 or 2 off games since signing for us, and although he has only managed one goal (against Wigan), it is fair to say he has been a decent signing based on his overall performances so far; so it’s not as if Rafa is going to turf him out in January is it?

Also, we have Ryan Babel – when he gets a game it is pretty much always on the left wing, and if he is lucky he gets a sub appearance upfront. When he has come on and scored, it has been from the left, then there’s Yossi Benayoun who will get a run out on the left if needed, so do you honestly think Rafa will spend £10million+ on a left winger? simple answer: NO!.

Check out this video of Babel in action and then try and tell me we need Downing instead:

George Gillett has taken out a ‘Personal loan’ of $75million, using Liverpool FC as an asset to secure the loan, putting more debt on the club.

Gillett is hardly Liverpool fan’s favourite person at the moment, and this will only make our opinion of him go even further downhill. Canadian website globeandmail.com reports this on it’s site: “According to a lien filed in Delaware, Gillett has taken out a high-interest, $75-million (all currency U.S.) personal loan from a U.S.-based private investment fund, putting up his heavily-leveraged share of British soccer giant Liverpool Football Club as collateral.

As security for the loan, Gillett’s company, Delaware-incorporated Gillett Football LLC, pledged all of its “right, title and interest in Football Investments LLC,” the documents show.

Gillett owns his 50-per-cent stake in Liverpool through Football Investments.

You can read the article in full by Clicking here

The latest transfer rumour doing the rounds is that Daniel Agger is on his way to AC Milan; but why would he be when he is getting a game in Liverpool’s starting 11 pretty much every week?

Agger was unlucky with injuries for a long time, but since Skrtel has been out he has been one of the first names on the teamsheet, playing in the Premiership and Champions League, so why would he go to Milan who are only in the UEFA Cup?

Rafa has already made in clear just over a month ago that he has no intention of selling Agger, saying “The situation is very simple, Daniel Agger is our player and he is not for sale,”

“His future is at Anfield and nowhere else. He knows my ideas because we have talked with him and he has a long future with us.”

Agger has been learning his trade playing alongside Hyypia and Carragher since signing for us, and is no doubt going to be part of a solid partnership with Skrtel for years to come when Carra and Hyypia are gone so there’s no reason for him to go.

Its all just more paper talk seeing as theres sod all else to talk about at the moment.

When Robbie Keane signed from Tottenham in the summer, everyone expected him and Fernando Torres to enjoy the same success Keane & Berbatov had at Spurs, but the £20million man has struggled to live up to his massive pricetag – is it simply a case of him not finding his form or was it a mistake signing him?

Keane has Premiership experience, so it is not as if anyone can use the age old line “give him time to adapt to the pace of English football”, so why isn’t he scoring?

4 goals in 22 appearances – doesn’t exactly make good reading does it? Don’t get me wrong, i want to see hitting the back of the net every week, but what is going on? He bagged 23 goals last season – an ideal signing , the “20 goals a season” striker we have been looking for, but with Fernando Torres out, Liverpool fans dont seem convinced that he is going to get near that tally again.

You only have to look at his face every time he gets subbed to see he is pissed off at not getting the full 90 minutes, but the way he is playing why should he get a full game? Everyone gets on the backs of Kuyt, Lucas etc after one bad game, so how many more is Keane going to get?

He has commanded massive transfer fees wherever he has been (nearly £60million in total), so he has obviously done something right – if we were seeing the Robbie Keane of last season i guarantee we would be more than 1 point ahead of Chelsea in the league. I; like everyone else was excited when he signed, thinking that maybe it could be “our year” and that we wont be relying on Torres for a match winner all the time, but something has to give sooner or later; he needs to start scoring.

Rafa has seen an array of strikers leave during his reign at Anfield : Bellamy, Fowler, Cisse, Baros, Pongolle, Crouch, Mellor, Morientes, Voronin – how much longer before Keane joins that list? Will Rafa admit he made a mistake in spending such a large amount on Robbie, cut his losses and sell him to someone like Newcastle for £10million at the end of the season, or will he change his tactics to accomodate Keane’s game and help him rediscover his goalscoring touch?

I am hoping for more goals like this one from our number 7, and hopefully we won’t be waiting too much longer :

Michael Owen could be available for a cut price fee (the same way he was when he went to Madrid), he is a proven Premiership scorer and would jump at the chance to come back – so why is Rafa so against signing him?

Rafa dismissed any talk of signing the former Liverpool striker by saying “”We will have Fernando Torres back soon, and I can assure everyone that clearly we are not going for Michael Owen”. Owen’s contract runs out at the end of the season, and he has yet to sign a new one, so with a bid of around £4/5million we could probably get him back with minimal fuss.

Gerrard would love to have him back, he has made no secret of his desire to team up with Owen at club level, and with the way Gerrard & Torres are playing, imagine having another great striker available. Is Rafa just saying no to Owen simply because he lost a decent striker so cheap when he first joined the club, or is he put off by Owen’s injury record?

Whatever the reason; there’s not a chance i’d say no to signing Owen back, if he can get some goals like this for us:

Rafa Benitez has spoken out to back Robbie Keane to get out of his current dip in form and start showing why Liverpool paid £20.3million for him.

Keane has hardly set Anfield alight with his performances so far, but Rafa insists it is only a temporary blip in form : “Robbie is a better player than the one we are seeing now. We know what kind of player Robbie Keane is. He needs people around him to pass the ball well.

“I believe he will be okay, he will score more if we create chances for him. But if that does not happen we have to use players with different qualities to open up the game.

“Robbie does get disappointed when things are not going his way. He is a worker, but he can improve.

“It is a question of confidence. If we score first in this type of game then we will grow and win. Some players may be lacking in confidence, but if we keep creating chances we will be okay.

“Robbie, when he came off, was disappointed. But players always want to be out on the pitch for 90 minutes, but we were thinking of different solutions and Ngog did well when he came on, holding the ball up

Liverpool were held to a 0-0 draw again at Anfield, but apart from stating the obvious (not scoring); what were we doing wrong?

We didn’t create enough chances last night, and it is starting to become worrying how much we miss Torres especially in games like this. We were done by the ref/linesman god knows how many times (Ilunga got away with about 6 handballs), and Robbie Keane again looked well off the pace and unable to do anything.

We really lacked pace upfront, Babel could have got more than 13 minutes at the end of the game, where we could have gone for a few through balls and utilise his pace/skill, but instead Rafa went for Ngog – unproven in any competition, whereas Babel has played in the Champions League, Premiership and for his National side – what more has he got to do?

Benayoun still tries walking the ball into the net, and although he had one good shot i don’t think he should be getting a game especially when he just isn’t a threat to the opposition’s goal.

What are your thoughts on the dull game that was Liverpool v West Ham?

Surely now that Fernando Torres is out injured Ryan Babel should be given a run of games as a striker?

Torres is expected to be out until the tie against Arsenal on December 21st, and while Keane has premiership experience, he is never going to get loads of goals playing as a lone striker – he needs someone with a bit of skill alongside him, and who better than Ryan Babel?

Keane is a clever player who can tee players up for goals with a through ball, and if Babel didn’t have to track back or work as a winger getting the ball in for a midget (Keane) then he might have a few more goals to his name.

Babel has made no secret of his desire to play as a striker, and with our star striker out what better opportunity?

We have Premiership games against West Ham, Hull and Blackburn coming up; hardly teams that we should worry about beating us, so why not give the Dutchman a go in his favoured position rather than on the bench? this leaves Riera on the left and Kuyt on the right, then Keane and Babel upfront.

Robbie Keane is never going to be able to play as part of a 4-5-1, he isn’t quick, big or strong enough, yet Rafa will probably end up playing this formation as part of a 4-2-3-1 with Keane running round on his own, with Kuyt and Riera trying to cross balls into him against defenders who outrank Keane in terms of height and strength, when we should be trying something different to break down teams who come and put 10 men behind the ball.

Liverpool face Marseille in the Champion’s League tonight, with Steven Gerrard likely to return from injury. Who do you think should be in the starting eleven?

Personally, i’d like to see a 4-2-3-1 with Babel getting a start, give him the chance to terrorise a few defenders:
Reina
Arbeloa Carra Agger Aurelio

Mascherano Alonso

Babel Gerrard Riera

Torres

Subs: Anyone but Lucas.