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Football - To Russia with Löw


Philokles

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Great timing by Zidane.  Walk off into the sunset as a legend and let someone else deal with the aging stars who are too expensive to transfer.  Plus he'll always have the option to return when the timing looks good.  With Low and Pochettino both just having signed extensions, I wonder if RM have available many options that would excite their fans and fit their expectations.  Conte would probably win a title for them but clash with Perez over transfers.  Perhaps Chelsea shouldn't be playing chicken with Napoli over Sarri just now.

Silva is a good pick for Everton.  I'd like to see Everton do well, if they would just stop clogging us in every Merseyside derby.  That squad needs to be overhauled and it's disappointing that all their spending last year didn't get them much progress.  Pickford, Gueye, Walcott and Siggurdsson were good buys in recent years but in the meantime they lost Lukaku, saw their defense and Gareth Barry age out, and whiffed on Rooney and possibly on Keane and Klaassen.  It's like trying to fill a bath using a leaky hose while water is pouring out the plughole.   

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Klopp is in a tough position with regards to Karius because if he backs him to bounce back and it goes badly then he will have gone 4 years without fixing a position that liverpool fans have been wanting fixed and is an obvious place where we lose points every season.

He had a good finish to the season once given regular starts but the CL final really put him in the firing line.

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For me Karius has shown enough to be worth sticking with. Even in the Madrid game he made some damn good saves. Chances are, it will be really really hard for him to have a worse game, error-wise and occasion-wise, than the CL final. If he can get over this, it will be the biggest hurdle he will ever face as a keeper, and will hopefully result in him being a much more resilient keeper going forward. Buying a new goalkeeper won't guarantee anything and being a Liverpool keeper is going to heap a shit ton of pressure that most keepers aren't used to dealing with. It will only feel like you've dealt with the problem until the new keeper slips up, which they will, and the whole cycle starts again.

Considering the money being touted for Allison and others, I'd much rather spend that money elsewhere. Ideally someone who can rotate with the front three without being a significant drop in tempo and quality (which Ings, Solanke, Ox, Lallana and other loanees are at this point). Even if Ward plays instead of Karius, it won't drop our game tempo and overall quality of the team too much, but Mane and Salah being out seems to completely stuff up our game. So I think fixing that is significantly more important than the goalkeeping situation. 

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I actually agree with that although I think Ox did enough to be a fairly regular starter in midfield for us, really liked what he brought to the team in most of his appearances after joining but he isnt really a viable option in the front 3. I actually think its worth backing Karius next season but if it doesnt work out it could lead to a bad atmosphere around Klopp.

With Keita and Fabinho on the way in we get a bit more quality in midfield. If we bring in someone who can play up front at not much fall off from our starting front 3 the team really starts to look good.

Lovren, Matip and Karius then become the guys that everyone will start to look at to lift their level or be replaced.

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Other than DDG, I’m not sure there’s any keeper in the PL who is significantly better than Karius in the last six months.  Courtois has declined a bit, Ederson’s goal-keeping isn’t as good as his distribution (he just doesn’t face many shots or crosses), Cech and Loris have faded.  Most of the other GKs look good when they are beaten by only two shots out of twenty (as Mignolet did at Sunderland), but that might not translate to a top team who needs a GK to concede none out of three or four shots allowed, while also being very handy as a sweeper keeper.

So it’s an expensive gamble whether Oblak or Alisson will make enough difference.  I’ve no doubt that DDG has been worth 15-20 points a season to Utd in recent years, especially since their low scoring gives them less margin for error.  But even then he’s helped by a relatively deep defensive line and a strong DM.

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I don't see Karius staying at Liverpool. Maybe he can come back after a good season or two loaned, but now every flaw he makes, every game he plays, will have the shadow of Kiev. The fact he produced not one, but two drastic mistakes during the most important game of his career, specially considering they showed lack of focus and attention (the first one, specially) also shows he doesn't have it in him yet to play at this level.

Plus, I don't think he was ever that reliable in the first place.

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3 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

Other than DDG, I’m not sure there’s any keeper in the PL who is significantly better than Karius in the last six months.



Nick Pope, pretty definitely.

It probably is fair to say that sorting out the defense and midfield cover (though that latter should be done with Fabinho and Keita coming in) than immediately getting a new goalie, though.

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6 hours ago, Winterfell is Burning said:

I don't see Karius staying at Liverpool. Maybe he can come back after a good season or two loaned, but now every flaw he makes, every game he plays, will have the shadow of Kiev. The fact he produced not one, but two drastic mistakes during the most important game of his career, specially considering they showed lack of focus and attention (the first one, specially) also shows he doesn't have it in him yet to play at this level.

Plus, I don't think he was ever that reliable in the first place.

I think he will stay as number 2 but I can’t see Klopp trusting him enough to go into next season with Karius as the number 1. 

Big Karius supporter and I wanted him to take over from Mignolet a lot sooner than he did but I don’t think I’ll ever get over that first mistake :lol: .

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4 hours ago, Rorshach said:

Jordan Pickford has been better than Karius. 

Can’t see an argument against it, really. 

I don’t agree with that. Decent goalkeeper stats are a bit hard to find but Karius has the same number of clean sheets in half the season, no errors leading to goals compared to 2 for Pickford, admittedly also only for half a season, and a better save percentage.

With the eye test Karius hasn’t had any really poor games in the league since he was made number 1. I haven’t watched Everton games religiously but Pickford under the radar had a really poor game in the last game of the season. I don’t think many people noticed because it was the last game on Match of the Day but he probably should have saved all 3 of the goals he conceded against West Ham.

Fabianski and Pope have been good but they’re probably not the type of keeper Liverpool need. With the way we play we need more of a sweeper keeper like City have gone for in Ederson.

Can’t say I’ve really noticed how good of a season Foster had.

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9 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

Ederson’s goal-keeping isn’t as good as his distribution (he just doesn’t face many shots or crosses)

This may be true but his distribution is so good that you may be undervaluing his goalkeeping. Whilst he may not face as many shots as others do, he also doesn't get as much protection when the shots do come in. I would argue that although Pep's strategy leads to fewer shots at his goal, those shots often come in the form of better chances due to the larger exploitable spaces City leave by defending higher up the pitch. It's a calculated risk that requires a keeper who can handle being given less protection and Ederson has been incredible at that.

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Wonder if Abramovich would actually sell though. He could still run the club from outside England. If he does sell, Chelsea (or rather their parent company Fordstam) would have to repay that £1.17bn loan that is owed to Abramovich. Either that or any new potential owner(s) would have to foot the bill.

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19 minutes ago, Consigliere said:

Wonder if Abramovich would actually sell though. He could still run the club from outside England. 

He could, but why would he? If he leaves England, there's no real benefit for him in owning the club. 

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35 minutes ago, mormont said:

He could, but why would he? If he leaves England, there's no real benefit for him in owning the club. 

Well, he could turn into one of those owners like the Glazers who just leech money from the club. He could also recall that loan. There's still money to be made from Chelsea.

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20 minutes ago, Consigliere said:

Wonder if Abramovich would actually sell though.

I think Abramovich is at a point where, even if he doesn't want to sell the club, he needs reconsider how the club is being run.

Ivan Gazidis said that finishing outside the top 4 in 16/17 was going to be a 'catalyst for change' for Arsenal. With that, Wenger's powers were gradually taken from him last season, as Arsenal created a managerial structure and appointed people to fill roles for tasks that Wenger previously completed along with coaching the team. They pushed Wenger out after another poor season and went through an extensive process to appoint a new manager, interviewing eight candidates.

Abramovich, if he is to remain as Chelsea owner, needs to lay out a clear managerial structure and needs to fill the void that has been left by Michael Emenalo's departure. Once that structure is in place, they need to ask themselves: do we want a clear footballing philosophy, and do we want to risk not winning the title every season at the expensive of playing a certain brand of football, while committing to the promotion of youth players to the first team? Chopping and changing managers has worked well at Chelsea in regards to delivering trophies alone, but that is all. Economically, it has cost the clubs millions of pounds paying out compensations to sacked managers, compensations to other clubs to take their managers, and completely overhauling the squad every time they appoint a new manager.

Abramovich should regard a four season period in which Chelsea finished 1st, 10th, 1st and 5th as their own catalyst for change. Clearly the yo-yoing of the club up and down the league table is an indicator that something is wrong behind the scenes, whether it be down to the people he has working for him who run the club, the styles / personalities of the managers they have been appointing, or the players being recruited by the club.

 

 

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2 hours ago, ljkeane said:

I don’t agree with that. Decent goalkeeper stats are a bit hard to find but Karius has the same number of clean sheets in half the season, no errors leading to goals compared to 2 for Pickford, admittedly also only for half a season, and a better save percentage.

Some weird formatting on this end. Will look through the post later, to see what I left out. 

However, I think you should look wider. Before looking at stats, I would like you to consider the fact that Pickford constantly had at least one of Martina, Williams, Keane or Funes Mori ahead of him. Sometimes several of them. While Karius had VVD. Basically, being Pickford required goalkeeping in a rather more averse enviroment. 

Also, before looking at stats, Karius - for me - never gives off a feeling of «safe hands». He can produce great saves, but is still able to produce the kind of games he did before he was number one for half a season (short time span, that). And on top of that, the Kolarov shot and the Bale goal both point to either poor technique or lack of consentration. The former is bad, the latter - in the CL semi and final - is worse, I’d say.

Pickford makes mistakes, sure. So has Karius. But to my eyes, Pickford is a more assured keeper. Considering the calamitous defense we’ve had this year, that is a great achievement.  

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1 hour ago, Consigliere said:

Well, he could turn into one of those owners like the Glazers who just leech money from the club. He could also recall that loan. There's still money to be made from Chelsea. 


I've always been convinced of the theory that a big part of the reason Abramovic bought Chelsea was to make himself so visible that if he ever fell out with Putin or other varieties of the wrong people Spripal'ing him would be a different proposition. If he's not able to be there week-to-week I'm not sure how much use it is to him for that anymore.

He certainly hasn't been just about leeching the money.

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29 minutes ago, Rorshach said:

 Before looking at stats, I would like you to consider the fact that Pickford constantly had at least one of Martina, Williams, Keane or Funes Mori ahead of him. Sometimes several of them. While Karius had VVD.

That's a fair point. On the other hand with the way Liverpool defend, pressing with a high line, you'd expect them to concede fewer chances to shoot than teams that defend deep, like Everton under Allardyce, but the chances they do give up are often far more likely to result in a goal. That should give Pickford an advantage in save percentage.

Ideally you'd need something like the average xg per shot faced or something like that to compare but it's not something that's freely available so far as I can see. Regardless, it's certainly not clear cut Pickford's been better than Karius, it's actually leaning the other way on the objective numbers you can see.

29 minutes ago, Rorshach said:

And on top of that, the Kolarov shot and the Bale goal both point to either poor technique or lack of consentration. The former is bad, the latter - in the CL semi and final - is worse, I’d say.

Obviously the Bale attempted save was bad but the Kolarov one gets brought up a lot as criticism but I'm not convinced. He does get in a bad position but Kolarov has absolutely leathered it and it's moved a lot. It's not unreasonable to get into a bad position, that's going to happen sometimes, especially with shots as difficult to handle as that, the important thing is he found a way to make a save. It's a perfectly decent piece of goalkeeping for me.

I think that's part of the issue for me. Goalkeeping's quite a hard position to judge how well players are doing, it takes watching quite a lot of playing time to really assess, so when narratives catch on people don't really tend to keep a close watch on how a keeper's currently doing unless it's their own club or one they watch a lot. The narrative with Karius was he wasn't much good after his first spell so when he came back in there were loads of articles from journalists who probably don't watch him that much about how Liverpool need an upgrade when the reality was he actually had a good season.

29 minutes ago, Rorshach said:

Pickford makes mistakes, sure. So has Karius. But to my eyes, Pickford is a more assured keeper. Considering the calamitous defense we’ve had this year, that is a great achievement.  

I'm not saying Pickford's had a bad season, I think he's been decent. I just do think Karius has had a really good season up until the Champions League final which has been glossed over a bit by a lot of people.

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