Thread: Its a squad game!

A walk over? Their backline, as I said before, was Degen, Hyypia, Agger & Dossena. They had Torres up front, Babel on the wing & brought Alonso on after 1 hour. Lucas, Plessis, El Zhar & N'Gog, while yet to do it for Liverpool, are some of the most talented youngsters in world football. I'm sorry but, on paper, tat is a strong lineup.

Originally Posted by anderton46

The team they put out is somewhere like the strength of stoke or one of the promoted clubs. Very poor. We had all first team players who will go on to be playing more matches this season.

That's just not true. Dawson hasn't played under Redknapp, O'Hara is not first team & neither is Zokora (he's only been playing to cover for JJ). Bale hasn't played a first team game since Arsenal & neither Pav nor Frazier have been starting. Lennon also has been coming off the bench. Degen, Agger, Dossena, Lucas, Plessis, Babel, Torres, N'Gog have all had first team starts in the Premiership this season while Hyypia has come off the bench. In fact, the only Liverpool player to have not played a first 11 game this season was El Zhar (I think). Even Cavalieri got a start in the last round against Crewe. There is no way you could call that our first 11 & there is no way you can compare the Liverpool team with Stoke, although they played worse than a League 1 team on the night.

I think a big portion of their problem was the fact that they only had 1 Brit in their entire 18 man squad & that was Jamie Carragher on the bench. We had 9 out of 18, 7 of whom started. As good as foreigners are in our league, they don't come to England to play in the league cup & don't really get that, altho it is the least important competition here, it is still a massive occasion. The British players will have watched League Cup games since they were kids & see it as a huge opportunity to play in a Wembley cup final. Therefore they want it that much more & that looked very much evident last night.