Liverpool Banter Archive February 23 2018

23 Feb 2018 14:04:00
Hey Ed, ever think of adding a FAQ page, apologies if this is a FAQ 😜.

{Ed001's Note - we did have one for a while but no one ever bothered reading it and continued to ask the same questions anyway, so we gave up.}

23 Feb 2018 14:47:49
Have you thought about a player database with the Eds comments on it?

So each player that the Eds comment on gets a page and on each page is the last thing an Ed said about that player across all the football pages.

So for example someone comes to the Liverpool page and wants to ask about Dybala. They see the link to the player database and seach for Dybala. This goes to the Dybala page where the Eds last few comments concerning Dybala from all of your sites are recorded.

Just a though, no idea how complicated it would be to administer, probably take at least an hour or so each day once set up.

{Ed002's Note - It would not be viable I am afraid. There is the search engine that works fine.}

24 Feb 2018 03:00:10
how about a check list that comes up when you post:

- no questions will be answered that state ' what are the chances of'
- have you at least attempted to read a couple of the posts?
- no random names cos he scored in your fifa team

:)

23 Feb 2018 11:31:26
Big debate that i always see online is "how many world class players are there in the Premier League? "

The term world class is too broad though. So my question would be, how many players in the Premier League have a genuine claim to be the best in world in their respective position?

For me that is Kane (CF), Salah (RF), De Bruyne (CM), Silva (CM), Kante (CM), Azpilicueta (RB), Alderweireld (CB) and De Gea (GK) .

Would that be fair? I think so. Therefore i find it totally baffling when people try and say there are no world class players in the Premier League. I'll go out on a limb and say all 8 of those players (as an individual signing) would start in any team in world football, even if the formation has to be shuffled a bit. If you supplement that 8 man team with Alaba (LB), Godin (CB), and Neymar (LF) you are not far off the best 11 a side team in the world. Who else gets in that team on current form? Is Ronaldo better than Kane? Is Messi better than Salah? Is Buffon better than De Gea? I wouldn't disagree with anyone who says they all get in ahead of the Premier League trio, but i also wouldn't disagree with anyone who says they don't. Aside from those 3 who all finished top 4 in the Balon D'or alongside Neymar though, I'm not sure anyone else in world football can even make a legitimate claim.

I think we are now entering an era where the Premier League doesn't just have the best managers; I think it actually has a lot of the best players too. The only real worry is that Kane and De Gea are both targets for Real Madrid, and Alderweireld wants out of Spurs as well. We may all jokingly say we want United and Spurs to lose their best players (myself included), but don't we all want the very best players to be in our league, deep down? Salah will probably be around for a while yet, but he is already looking at Real Madrid too!

Either way, on this seasons form i think a lot of the the best players in the world are currently playing in the Premier League. Long may it continue!

23 Feb 2018 11:46:22
I also think this league has the best players, by far. I would agree with the players you've listed sis but I'd also add Hazard and Firmino to them. There's plenty of fantastic players and a good amount of world class players in this league which is what (for me) makes it the most exciting league in the world.

23 Feb 2018 13:00:37
I think regardless of what players are world class or not in our league we have the most entertaining league in the world at least.

23 Feb 2018 13:01:44
I would add Hazard and Aguero to that list MK.

23 Feb 2018 13:02:35
No Aguero and Ozil (criminally underrated) MK?

23 Feb 2018 13:11:14
Ozil is a great player but I wouldn't class him as world class.

23 Feb 2018 13:26:01
Really Salah? I drool when i watch him play🤤🤤🤤, maybe its just a personal preference then.

23 Feb 2018 13:36:10
I wouldn't say kane is world class as i think the term is used very easily (not by you MK but in general) to describe players who yes are of a good standard but not world class imo
World class to me depicts a player who stands out from his peers
who is among the very very best in whatever he or she does
Neuer for example has been world class for years
Messi and Ronaldo are the obvious ones
Suarez (cant stand the fella)
Marcelo
Modric
De Gea

if your talking directly about strikers yes Kanes numbers are verv very impressive

but so was Alan shearer's and I would love anyone to tell me he was world class
For me world class is something that truly divides you from the best ala Pele Maradona Zidane Buffon Baresi Maldini Best etc THE LIST IS ENDLESS but imo Kane does not currently fit world class for me just my opinion lads.

23 Feb 2018 13:46:49
Each to their own scholes mate, I think he's brilliant and all, but world class I just can't see it personally.

23 Feb 2018 13:51:05
It would be a contradiction to include Hazard when i later stated Neymar is the best LF in the world. Same for Aguero/ Firmino and Ozil after I cited Kane and Silva as the best in their respective roles.

I do agree that those 4 are world class by the way, but i was only talking about players with a legit claim to being the best in the world in their positions. The term world class gets deliberately misinterpreted by a lot of people so i thought I'd avoid it all together 😂.

23 Feb 2018 14:04:07
World class IMO = the top 23 players that would make up a squad. i. e 3 keepers and two players for every position. So for me playing a 433:

GK-De Gea, Neuer, Olblak
LB-Marcelo, Alaba
CB-Kompany, Varane, Godin, Chiellini.
RB-Kimmich, Walker
CDM-Kante, Vidal
CM-De Bruyne, Silva, Modric, Naingollan,
LF-Ronaldo, Hazard
RF-Messi, Salah
CF-Kane, Aguero

It’s all opinions of course, but to me that’s damn near the best 23 man squad your going to get currently and I count 10 players from the PL there, 4 from the bundesliga, 7 La Liga and 2 Serie A. I genuinely do think the best quality players we have in this league is higher than other leagues.

23 Feb 2018 14:12:23
Is Salah world class or is he having a very good season? I love him to bits but I think he needs a few seasons under his belt perform at this level. It seems disingenuous for some to be on here saying Kane isn’t but Salah is.

23 Feb 2018 14:22:58
Hazard and Aguero are within that bracket also.

23 Feb 2018 15:41:12
Marcelo is woeful, how can people even claim he's a world-class fullback when he can't even defend?

23 Feb 2018 15:42:55
MK you say you didn't wanna mention them as you mentioned Neymar and you mentioned Kane. But you named 3 CM players in the list? Silva and de bruyne can't both be the best midfielder in the world! If you're naming a 'world 11' then fair enough. But that 11 could have two strikers therefore Aguero and Firmino deserve a mention.

{Ed025's Note - as strikers go TIA bobbys not getting anywhere near even the bench mate..

23 Feb 2018 15:46:33
good post MK but you asked is Messi better than Salah. does that question have to be answered because i presume its a joke right? . Messi is the greatest player of all time while Salah isn't even our best player (Bobby firmino) .

23 Feb 2018 16:29:17
Salah is easily our best player, behave!

23 Feb 2018 16:37:38
Also Messi is not the best of all time either. that's for the new generation, call me crazy but i would take the Brazilian Ronaldo, Maradona before him, even though Pele was way before my time but some of the goals he allegedly scored messi can only dream about!

23 Feb 2018 16:37:48
Kane shouldn’t be in the same sentence as the rest of them. All the others have got to be knocking on the door of world class.

23 Feb 2018 16:43:26
DeGea, D. Alves, Godin, Chiellini, Alaba, Busquets, Modric, Silva, Messi, C. Ronaldo, Suarez. They are the best today for me.

23 Feb 2018 17:29:17
No Roberto or Kirchoff in there MK.? ;)

I think world class is used too easily these days and without proper context.

Is it based on this season, a few seasons, the last few games? That would make a massive difference.

I think a lot of players would get picked on YouTube clips and FIFA or Football Manager ratings, rather than due to them being watched week in week out.

I think my only nailed on from what I watch, whether it be over a few games, a season or 3, would be DDG.

There would be more, but again it depends on the time frame we are talking about.

23 Feb 2018 17:32:36
I don't think there's any world class players in the Premier League personally.

I think there are only 3 in the world. Ronaldo, Suarez and Messi.

There are very 20 x excellent players. But world class is just another level that none of then have reached.

23 Feb 2018 17:37:18
Alves, Chiellini, Ronaldo are past it due to age but all 3 are
great players but currently not world class anymore.

Suarez is not the same Suarez anymore due to a knee operation
Busquets? Really mate? He is a terrible defensive midfielder in my opinion.

Mine would be something like:

David de Gea, Cesar Azpilicueta, Diego Godin, Toby Alderweireld, Alex Sandro, N'Golo Kante, Moussa Dembele, Kevin de Bruyne, Lionel Messi, Neymar Jr., Robert Lewandowski

2nd team:

Manuel Neuer, Joshua Kimmich, Vincent Kompany, Mats Hummels, Marcelo, Marco Veratti, Luca Modric, David Silva, Mohamed Salah
Eden Hazard, Harry Kane

3rd team:

Jan Oblak, Kyle Walker, Rafael Varane, Andreas Christensen, David Alaba, Ilkay Gundogan, Koke, Paul Pogba, Antoine Griezmann, Kylian Mbappe, Sergio Aguero

Alot of top class players like Niguez, Sane, Eriksen, Coutinho, Alli who will probably end up ''world class''

was really tough thinking of top class defenders.

23 Feb 2018 17:43:26
LOL, you say that putmaneontheright and then go and say Ronaldo who has been terrible this season and Suarez who is not even half the player he was 6 months ago and i would say 10 other forwards have already passed him! Hilarious in my opinion. You guys play too much football manager or fifa, watch the games!

about another point raised over, Marcelo sure he isn't the best defender but he is the best LB going forward. And there are not many teams who attack these top teams for some reason, look how many teams have actually had a go at Man City this season, its shocking because that is the only way to get something out of them but there are not enough brave managers out there, most think about damage control instead of causing the damage.

23 Feb 2018 17:56:24
Lovren is world class.

23 Feb 2018 18:06:07
De Gea, De Bryune, Aguero, Kante, Hazard and Sanchez

These are the world class players currently playing on the premier league.
Ozil is too inconsistent.,

23 Feb 2018 19:34:47
I think the term "world class" has become far too exclusive these days to say there are only 8 world class players on the planet is ridiculous. I think you look at the stars of international teams.
Kane is world class, he has smashed all the goal scoring records, of course the lad is world class.
I would go so far as to say we have a few world class players.
Virgil van djike, mo salah, sadio mane and Firmino. And I think players like Ben Woodburn, Joe gomez, trent Alexander Arnold and dom solanke are future world class players.

To be more definite I'll say the top 5% of the professional players. Not the 0.0001%, that's just daft. You might as well say there are no world class players, it's is only slightly more ridiculous than 0.0001%.

23 Feb 2018 19:47:02
ED2, where did that list go of the world class squad we made together?

{Ed033's Note - i can dig out the threads and post them on a single page somewhere over the weekend hopefully

23 Feb 2018 21:53:56
Messi is only the BOAT to those who were born between 1995 and 2000.

23 Feb 2018 23:02:09
Darn tootin' Supersalah. World class is the best of what's available at the time and if you asked your typical league1 or 2 manager I'm pretty sure they would all say each team in the premier league has several world class players with several of those teams being made up entirely of world class players. It's all relative to your level. Are the top 100 tennis players in the world not all world class? I would argue with anyone that said they weren't. To suggest that out of the thousands of footballers and hundreds of teams in the world only a handful would get into 99% of the teams is ridiculous.

We just get spoilt by watching a selection of the very best week in, week out. If everyone is special, no one is.

23 Feb 2018 23:09:26
Supersalah, i 100% agree with you. saying that there are only a handfull of world class players in the world is ridicoulous imo. I would say players like Koulibaly, Alex Sandro, Dybala, Hamsik, Mertens, Modric, Vidal, Thiago, Boateng amongst others are all World class players?

23 Feb 2018 23:33:01
Thanks ed033 happy digging!

24 Feb 2018 01:39:12
Agreed wellred and stoupid. The term world class has to be relevant to something other than old Roy of the rovers. Players like Messi and Ronaldo, in the past Pele, cruyff Eusebio even gazza and Maradona are beyond world class, these people are special. The Premier league is littered with World class, it is one of the elite league in the world. If not in this league and others like it then where?

Harry kane scores worldies all the time, he is world class. Maybe a good way to define world class players would be to say anyone shortlisted for the balon d'or. Then many people would argue that Firmino is wc.

24 Feb 2018 08:32:34
Good point supersalah, in the last Balon d'or Coutinho and Saido Mane were among the top 30, 2 months later Salah beat Mane and Aubameyang for the best African player of 2017 with quite the margin as well, so will we see Salah in the top 30 Balon d'or next season? 99.99% certain he will be there. I get the point about doing it for more seasons but that just annoys me, its like he didn't have 3.5 brilliant seasons previous to this one, he was ruining Tottenham and Chelsea for Basel, he was sensational at Fiorentina, and was arguably Roma's best and most important player, didn't score as much because he played a lot further down the pitch for Roma, more of a creator role unlike here at Liverpool. just listen to all the Roma players say how the are struggling now because they sold Salah, maybe an excuse, but he was marked by up to 3 players in Italy too and freed up huge spaces for Dzeko, Shaarawy, Florenzi etc. In my opinion people who call Cristiano Ronaldo world class still have no right to talk about what players are top or not because they simply know what they speak of. Ronaldo runs 5 meters each game and 50% of his goals in the last 2 seasons are penalties. Greatest of all time my backside.

24 Feb 2018 17:24:29
I agree nostradamus, I haven't seen Ronaldo play since the euros. There is no doubt he was world class of course but I can't really comment. In his day he was more than world class, he was a genius.

27 Feb 2018 08:48:23
That's a joke. Ronaldo. at this current moment has scored 11 in 7 games.

You telling me he isn't a world class player because of a bad 6 months spell AFTER WINNING 5 BALLON DORS? scoring basically 40 a season for the past 6 years like Messi.

Ronaldo and Messi have dominated the world's best trophy award unlike any other. There is also no other player who can even get remotely close to hearing either to it. Ronaldo slows then Messi takes it. Simple.

Suarez is still the best striker in the world. It is as simple as that. Kanes good but not world class and has never been in suarezs league.

23 Feb 2018 09:47:18
hello eds.

just a bit of question. How close were we to sign david villa, david silva or even mata when it was benitez era. I remember constantly seeing these names linked esp david villa. imagine villa, torres, gerrard, Alonso in their prime. woww

thanks.

{Ed001's Note - Silva and Villa were all agreed but the club refused to pay the money.

Mata was never close, he was interested (as I revealed at the time only for certain other journalists to c'n'p my exclusive and claim it as their own) and the club considered him but then Chelsea came in for him and we were out of it.}

23 Feb 2018 09:58:32
Blimey, how close. That team would have been truly special.

23 Feb 2018 10:36:03
Silva would've been my pick out of all three, he is truly something special, I'd still have him in the team even now. Such a shame we lost out on him.

23 Feb 2018 10:43:16
No one really knows how things would have worked out had they come, IMO even tho both players would have definitely improved us at the time. Same for Salah. had he come in 13/ 14, we would definitely not have had the Salah we know and love today as he was just 21 at the time and still learning the game (Sigh) .

23 Feb 2018 12:28:32
Oh man what a team we could have! Torres Villa Silva Gerrard Xabi Mascherano Arbeloa Aurelio Carragher Hyppia Reina!

23 Feb 2018 15:01:52
2005 was right platform for us to build, we could have done something special under Benitez if not for hicks and Gillette.

23 Feb 2018 17:31:25
To be fair, Shreyan, Hicks and Gillett, sheisters thou they undeniably are, didn't take over the club until 2007.

David Moores is the one you want to look at for not building on 2005. He was only interested in extracting the maximum value for himself from any potential sale.

24 Feb 2018 00:16:55
Dani Alves as well if I remember right.

23 Feb 2018 05:31:41
Not a stats guy at all, and wouldn't even know how to find out. But, I'd love if someone could work out how many points De Gea has saved for ManU this season. What I mean by that is, if they had any other keeper in the league, can you generally look at a game and say "with Migs or anyone else, they'd have lost/ drawn that game? "
I'm sure you could look at a save, or string of them, that have got them a point or 3, and put that down to the man between the sticks.
My guess is that if you swapped DDG for Migs/ Karius, we'd be maybe 6 points ahead of them.
Clearly I'm bored. Someone do the numbers (subjective i know) and brighten my day :)

23 Feb 2018 08:12:55
It is a relatively pointless debate though. We'd be much lower without Salah, but it's irrelevant because we have Salah. Every team has a best player who digs them out. For Man U, that just happens to be their goal keeper.

He is probably worth 20 point a season to them at least, but what is Salah worth to us? What is De Bruyne worth to City? Kane to Spurs? Kante to Chelsea? Maybe De Gea is worth even more than most other star players because he is the best shot stopper in the world and United concede a lot of shots due to a weak midfield (Pogba, Carrick, Herrera, Fellaini etc) shocking full backs (Young, Darmian, Shaw and Valencia) and a few very average centre backs in Smalling, Rojo and Lindelof.

Matic doesn't have the legs to do it by himself, and Jones and Bailly are forever injured nowadays. Therefore De Gea is propping up the base of the entire team. So yeah, he probably is the most vital player to his particular team in the whole division. But the fact is, he plays for Man U right now and it's his job to save them points. Hopefully he goes to Real Madrid in the summer though because I'm bored of hearing how good United are, and i think it'll all come crashing down without him. Their argument would be, that they could reinvest his transfer fee and salary to improve the team overall though. So it's impossible to say they will definitely struggle without him.

23 Feb 2018 08:30:00
According to the premier leagues official numbers Salah's goals has given Liverpool an extra 14 points so far this season, compared to 12 because of Harry Kane's goals and only 7 points for Aguero's goals.

In my opinion any team would struggle a bit in the start if they lose the best goalkeeper in the world! My opinion about de Gea has nothing to do with the Sevilla game because de Gea has been pulling off unbelievable saves for 5 years now consistently and makes very very few mistakes.

Real Madrid are looking at Courtois too, but if i was a Real Madrid scout there is no chance i would say Courtois is of a similar level to de Gea because he clearly isn't even close and has a few howlers in him. If de Gea leaves Manchester United they will probably be like 8-10 points off if the don't replace him with Alisson or Oblak. Every goalkeeper is supposed to save a lot of the shots he faces, it's their job but the difference is de Gea saves shots fans and players already started celebrating a goal in their minds. He is unbelievable! What makes me think he is so good is also probably aided by the fact Mignolet have been costing us 8-10 points a season for 4-5 years now so its tough thinking a Manchester United player is this good. heh.

23 Feb 2018 10:13:55
Nostradamus, i agree with most of what you say, but the Premier Leagues official numbers literally only factor in goals though. They don't factor in that World class bit of skill that lifts the whole stadium, or the goal created or started by their magic, or the space their team mates had because 3 players were marking the star man.

There are too many subjectivities and variables to accurately put into numbers how many points a player is worth to a team. You can only speculate or guess. From what I've seen of De Gea for example, he has kept Man U in the game multiple times at a single goal ahead. That will only be measured as him saving them 2 points. But if that one goal had gone in, it might've given the other team the confidence to score again costing United all 3 points. Then there is the confidence that he gives his defenders, which reduces the mistakes they make by panicking. How do you measure that? Or what about the saves he makes at 0-0 that stop a team from being able to defend a lead? If United go on to win that game 3-0 they might say he hasn't saved them any points because Man U would've won 3-1 anyway. That isn't how football works though. That miracle save at 0-0 might have been worth all 3 points.

You can't measure how much an individual is worth with statistics. You can only take a stab in the dark hence why I'm saying this debate is irrelevant and we should just accept that every team has a star man who is important to them. De Gea is United's most important player and i THINK he's worth 20+ points a season with all the subjectivities and variables factored in. That is a total guess though. Statistically he's probably only worth 10 points a season. Salah statistically is probably worth 15, but I'd say he is also worth more like 20+. The thing is though, this is all based on the assumption that the player who replaced them would have no positive impact of their own. If you then deduct the amount of points a slightly lesser quality replacement would be worth, the very best players are probably only worth an EXTRA 5 points (individually) over a whole season. But football is all about fine margins. 5 points can be the difference that turns you from top half to top 6, from top 6 to top 4, from top 4 to title challenger, or challenger to victor.

So regardless of what the Premier League website says, you simply cannot put a definitive points total on what these individuals are worth. You can only guess and everyone's guess will be different. There is too much going on in the background that cannot be quantified.

23 Feb 2018 10:34:29
This is just a wish fulfillment exercise to have a dig at Utd and Mourinho. The only thing that counts is that they are, currently, doing better than us. We can make all the excuses we want (transfer spending, DDG etc) but we're behind them.

The good news is that it's within our power to change that in the next month or so.

23 Feb 2018 10:50:08
Agree with your points as well, MK and Nostradamus. It is fundamentally, a pointless debate. The PL stats say what they say BUT it lacks any form of nuance and perspective, things that are being shown in both of you's posts and that pints to the fact that no one knows how we would fair w/ o Salah or how Utd would fair w/ o DDG precisely, none of which can be weighted. It is all based on assumptions, things that lack nuance and that can be debunked by making other assumptions.

23 Feb 2018 12:52:02
Statistically he has saved 18.36 points, rounded down to 18. Not a bad return.