Yesterday our misery was compounded further as Liverpool failed to compete with Palace, let alone take points off them. A soulless, dreary Liverpool made hard work of a 3-1 loss and as a consequence, Brendan Rodgers must surely find himself under the most pressure he’s experienced since joining the club.
More worrying than the result, however, is the loss of principles, principles that should serve a manager with this type of squad well. Where has the meritocracy gone? We saw Toure deal with arguably the best attack in the world to then be replaced by Lovren in the very next game, who’s done very little to warrant his continued place in the side. We saw Emre Can play well in the Bernabeu, then keep his place in the team vs. Chelsea – and score our goal – for him to then be dropped to the bench against Palace after the international break. It’s baffling.
Mamadou Sakho is a player who I feel has performed well when asked to, and dealt with the inconsistency well. He can look ungainly, and we all remember him storming off, but surely he now deserves a run in the team when fit?
It’s become a case of Rodgers’ favourite players continually being picked. Why? If there are better players in the squad, why not play them? Pride. It’s pride and his ego. And perhaps he wants to prove that the players he likes are the best ones at the club, even if they aren’t.
Glen Johnson had a poor game. He was surrounded by space for the majority of the 90 on the left and didn’t have the tools to exploit it. Manquillo also struggled on the other side. Part of that was down to Palace’s wingers, no doubt, but where was Moreno? For me, he’d have made best use of that space and has the pace to track back with the fast wingers Warnock deployed. At the minute it’s extremely difficult to see what the team selection is actually based on.
The crux of all this is, Rodgers must improve himself and us or he’s likely to be receiving a parting visit from FSG. How long does it get left though? Until we’re out of the Champions League, which could be this week? Until we’re out of the running for top four next year, or the summer? Tough decision.
Currently, as it stands, there aren’t many candidates who could come in long or short term and succeed Rodgers. The best options would come from the international teams, as they’d probably be more open to certainly a short-term position, but also long term. Who there would take this challenge on? Löw? Klinsmann?
If left too long and improvement doesn’t come about, then this whole season could well be a write off. Rodgers has to start getting back to what we’ve been good at over the last couple of seasons. He has to start looking arsed on the bench and touchline during games. He must start playing the players who’ve played well in previous games and dropping the ones who haven’t.
It’s a long road, and despite the embarrassment and very poor start to the season, there is still time to sort this out. It all depends on whether Rodgers is the man to do that.
