Central midfield this season...

[RedThaiDevils#7]

Big problem today was the gap between the MF's and the Fwd's, liverpool were winning the second ball and attacking us and Suarez linked the ball up well.

Rooney's enthusiasm was gone and if we play Berbs, we need more of the ball.

Anyhow, it was well done by Liverpool to close down our MF any how, they knew Scholes/Carrick didn't have the legs in them so they out played us...

Was good on paper at first glance, but SAF should have got a fwd to drop down and link up the play more... Rooney hasn't been doing his job that well and his touches have been letting him down.

 

[RedThaiDevils#7]

Carrick is the shit black and white print to Keane's HD.

No complaints, we definitely need a new Keane again...

Its got to be like in 2006 where we're looking for a holding player who will allow us to dominate 4-4-2 again...

Candidates would be
Modric for Scholes
Hamsik for Hargreaves.
Sahin/Goetze/Kagawa ( Dortmund has been playing dominant football with them three )

Pastore would be a luxury buy and would be too pricey, but I definitely see him the big deal in the coming years.

 

[Carl]

Our midfield is like a leaking pipe. It's still technically doing it's job of moving the water around and it's somthing you can cope with and at times, when the leak appears to have stopped, you think it's OK. But then it starts to leak again.

The reality is though, to fix it, you need to rip it out and start again.

 

[Red Indian Chief Torn Rubber]

Our midfield is back to its poverty of 2005/2006.

 

[Bloxy]

Our midfield is back to its poverty of 2005/2006.

watch out for SAF starting to play defenders and forwards in midfield soon.

 

[Mainoldo]

watch out for SAF starting to play defenders and forwards in midfield soon.

He really is a stubborn bastard when it comes to his Centre midfield... Jeezz

 

[wr8_utd]

Central midfield? What central midfield? We don't have one this season for most of our away games.

 

[Sunny Jim]

Central midfield? What central midfield? We don't have one this season for most of our away games.

We.didn't have one last season either. i hope saf buys a fecking midfielder in the summer

 

[apotheosis]

We.didn't have one last season either. i hope saf buys a fecking midfielder in the summer

He should have bought one last summer! Having just tied up lucrative new deals for our central midfielders, can anyone really see Fergie going out and buying more than one mid?

Imo we need at least 2. We need someone like Sahin who can orchestrate the play from deep, and someone like Goetze who can add a bit of pace and dynamism in the final third.

If we only sign 1 player he will have to be fecking unbelievable to have any really positive effect on the current level of general stagnation.

 

[MadDogg]

Playing a 442 with Scholes and Giggs making up two of the midfield four? Away? Against Liverpool?

It was never going to work. Poor team selection from Fergie there, we either needed to go with a three man central midfield or have Fletcher playing instead of one of Scholes or Giggs.

 

[FreakyJim]

With Carrick and Fletcher signing new deals it looks more and more like we won't have a midfield next season either.

 

[Sylar]

We need an injection of pace and hunger. And creativity (somebody to control the midfield)

Not too much to ask for ...

 

[Mick1991]

The centre midfield is certainly the odd one out in this team.

 

[Tibs]

Kaka

 

[Stookie]

I hope we strengthen in the summer, its frustrating watching your rivals splash out whilst we sit there with no apparent clout. Could we be in danger of doing an Arsenal?

 

[MUFCgal]

We definitely need to strengthen in that area. It's just become very stale IMO.

A top class midfielder brought in would make the world of difference.

 

[Bear Attack]

Our midfield is back to its poverty of 2005/2006.

Pretty much. And the sad reality is that in spite of this catastrophic performance, Sir Alex will probably remain adamant in his stance with regard to the central midfield department. Our midfield has been quite pedestrian ever since the end of 2007. The truth is that he has left this as a gaping problem for a long and I can't see him fixing it. I have a really bad feeling that we aren't going to splash money on a capable midfielder this summer either. Tough times, these.

 

[Red Indian Chief Torn Rubber]

Pretty much. And the sad reality is that in spite of this catastrophic performance, Sir Alex will probably remain adamant in his stance with regard to the central midfield department. Our midfield has been quite pedestrian ever since the end of 2007. The truth is that he has left this as a gaping problem for a long and I can't see him fixing it. I have a really bad feeling that we aren't going to splash money on a capable midfielder this summer either. Tough times, these.

He fixed it after the poverty of 2005. He will do so again.

 

[Name Changed]

The decision not to play Fletcher was absolutely stupid. He was one of our better midfielders against Chelsea. Carrick was poor in both games. Poor decision that cost us badly.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Dunno if anyone's point it out yet but we had 57% possession today, away from home.

How is that possible with a midfield as ineffective as the one portrayed in this thread?

 

[RedLars]

Dunno if anyone's point it out yet but we had 57% possession today, away from home.

How is that possible with a midfield as ineffective as the one portrayed in this thread?

In the second half Liverpool pretty much just sat back and let us pass the ball around. And it was clever, because we hardly ever looked like creating anything of danger. Only hint of creative spark came from Giggs, but it was far from enough on the day.

 

[Devil may care]

^^^ Right, we had most of that possession in front of them and they were happy to let us have it, sitting at 2-0 waiting for us to commit so they could hit us on the break.

 

[Ole's_toe_poke]

Dunno if anyone's point it out yet but we had 57% possession today, away from home.

How is that possible with a midfield as ineffective as the one portrayed in this thread?

I don't think possession means much. Its what you do with it. Defensively the midfielders were poor.

All the passing was done infront of their 2 banks of four and at a very slow pace. We weren't incisive. We didn't really hurt them except in the last 10 mins and this is a Liverpool team with a terrible defense. Glen Johnson wouldn't have had an easier game and he is fecking shite.

They looked like scoring every time they broke.

 

[Badunk]

I hate it when we go out with a whimper against Liverpool. I have to live amongst these scouse twats. Every feckin one of them thinks they're a comedian.

Fergie, please, for the love of god, buy some fecking quality midfielders in the summer. I'd even take Charlie Adam at this rate.

 

[giggsyflying]

ours is similar to liverPOOR's late 80s. aged squad and lack of money to buy good players and just use a limited budget to buy mediocre players.......

 

[Alex]

Dunno if anyone's point it out yet but we had 57% possession today, away from home.

How is that possible with a midfield as ineffective as the one portrayed in this thread?

We really seemed to get caught out a lot for only giving them 43% possession that was the problem.

 

[Commadus]

Dunno if anyone's point it out yet but we had 57% possession today, away from home.

How is that possible with a midfield as ineffective as the one portrayed in this thread?

If you look at the goals - Suarez should never have been able to dribble past 3 players. Nani mistimed header and VDS mistake.

Thing is Liverpool sat back and packed their defence we just put aimless crosses into the box which Skrtel and Kyriagos ate for lunch.

We never stretched Liverpool enough - it was only when Hernandez came on and attacked the near post did it pull their defenders out of position and create some half chances for us.

 

[Alex]

Hernandez played for 50 minutes

 

[sglowrider]

We were 2 or 3 goals down and who do we bring in? Fletcher? Not exactly a match winner. We have too many workman like players. We someone who can open up defences. Scholes can do it only in certain types of matches. He was overrun or bypassed in yesterday's match.

 

[Commadus]

We were 2 or 3 goals down and who do we bring in? Fletcher? Not exactly a match winner. We have too many workman like players. We someone who can open up defences. Scholes can do it only in certain types of matches. He was overrun or bypassed in yesterday's match.

Opening up defences requires good runs from the forwards and good passing from the midfield we had neither.

Barca and Arsenal at times play some majestic football because they move the ball quickly and have runners and players who can stitch moves together.

 

[manusteve]

The decision not to play Fletcher was absolutely stupid. He was one of our better midfielders against Chelsea. Carrick was poor in both games. Poor decision that cost us badly.

On the radio they said that Fletcher had felt poorly all week so don't know if that had anything to do with it.

THAT SAID, I think it was it was wrong not to play 3 central midfielders. I don't care what statistics may show as regards the success of the various combinations of centre-midfielders but Scholes and Carrick was always going to be ineffective. They just occupied the same kind of space in front of our back four and going no further than midway in Liverpool's half.

We should have had Gibson/Fletcher to plug the gaps in there, and played only one up front (take your pick).

We had lots of possession yes, but much of it was wasted.

I wouldn't like to see Carrick and Scholes in tandem for ANY games for the rest of the season. Personally, I would prefer Carrick-Fletcher-Anderson/Gibson. I don't think that this season Scholes has contributed any more incisive passes than Carrick could manage.

 

[Alex]

We were 2 or 3 goals down and who do we bring in? Fletcher? Not exactly a match winner. We have too many workman like players. We someone who can open up defences. Scholes can do it only in certain types of matches. He was overrun or bypassed in yesterday's match.

I agree it would have been nice to be able someone with more quality going forward

 

[AlwaysRedwood]

We were 2 or 3 goals down and who do we bring in? Fletcher? Not exactly a match winner. We have too many workman like players.

Park, Valencia injured.

Those are the guys who are very much are missed in games like this.

 

[Alex]

Park has been out for fecking ages

 

[Shimo]

Park has been out for fecking ages

Valencia even longer. Point is both those guys can give us something more when chasing a game. Also, it has meant in their absence Giggs, Nani have shouldered a lot of the burden.

We definitely lacked energy in CM yesterday. Scholes IMO was everywhere and wanted the ball, unfortunately in a game like yesterday Carrick's weak point where he doesn't step up his energy levels in a game like this didn't help. He needed to provide at least to a degree what Fletch/Ando provide but, wasn't able to.

Carrick / Scholes these days against a very motivated CM, it's a tough ask for them.

 

[Kelvin]

Our central mdifield is a fecking joke, its unreal we still have to rely on Scholes, this is crazy.

 

[RedThaiDevils#7]

Scholes is still the best MF we've got, we always have to rely on him...

 

[Kelvin]

Scholes is still the best MF we've got, we always have to rely on him...

for how long he will retire one day.....

 

[RedThaiDevils#7]

Yeah, which is a shame.

If he does retire, we definitely will have to reconsider at least a new MF. 1 for Hargreaves which is a certain that he won't play.

Giggs has already signed a new contract and we know how good he is at CM.

Here's worried more about the wing situation with Obertan/Bebe' not offering enough to actually ask for a spot on the bench...

I'd rather seek Hargreaves replacement, we have young Cleverly who will be converted into a Wing/CM player somehow as he can play every position in MF for Scholes.

So Who do we replace Hargreaves with ? Hargreaves was the successor to Keane, had the pace, the passing, the crossing and the energy, if he never had the injury... who knows, we might won the CL two years straight and would never have lost last years PL.

 

[Carl]

ours is similar to liverPOOR's late 80s. aged squad and lack of money to buy good players and just use a limited budget to buy mediocre players.......

Cringe