As somebody I quite admire once said ‘It’s not important what people think when you come in but what they think when you leave’.
That he nearly won the league is absolutely true. That he didn’t win any trophies at all is also true.
That he had some great players, producing amazing football is absolutely true. That he had some very average players that were his own personal choices is also true.
That he was unlucky that Suarez had one eye on the exit all along is true. That with the cash from his sale, he failed to effectively rebuild is also true.
That he absolutely smashed Arsenal 5-1 is true. That he lost to Stoke 6-1 is also true.
That a lot of what he said along the way was questionable or even problematic is also true.
Does he need to be revered as a demi-god for nearly winning the league? Of course not.
Does he need to be hated for any reason at all? Probably not.
But how you feel about him and remember him is personal opinion. It doesn’t negate any of the things that happened along the way. He tried his best and fell short. I’m not sure it requires an ongoing post-mortem at this point as we’re actually doing okay with his replacement.
Re: David Speedie, I had just turned 10 years old when he signed. I can’t really explain why he was one of my favourite players at the time. I guess a fresh faced Liverpool fan, without having the pressure of social media scrutiny, found favour with a snarly, competitive and talented player. The type of player who gave his all.
Judging by his twitter statement, he hasn’t changed much
Like not knowing how to organise a team on defensive set pieces? It was and still is one of his greatest weaknesses imo. As he seems blind to his own shortcomings, I don’t expect it to change anytime soon btw. But it drove me mad at the time.
Yes, he had shortcomings that winning a league might have disguised.
But any Liverpool supporter who says they were not excited and charged by that title tilt is not being 100% honest.
Of course he had his failings. Most people recognise that.
Oh I was excited, don’t get me wrong. But at the end of the day, his inaptitude to organise his team defensively is what prevented him from enjoying success with us. With the attack we had that year, we really should have walked the league. It was criminal to concede so many goals from bloody standard situations.
Then, when our best player left and some others injured themselves, he showed all his other glaring weaknesses: being shite in the transfer market, working against the ‘transfer committee’ and generally acting divisively instead of trying to unite everyone at the club around a common goal. The 6-1 at Stoke came as a logical conclusion to his tenure with us.
Bodgers wanted to teach Maureen a footballing lesson in that Chelski match…
What better way than to go toe to toe… and to the Victor the spoils…
Only problem was we had everything to lose and Chelski nothing to gain…
The Apprentice was desperate to finally become the Wizard so to speak…
Maureen was too wise for Bodgers and always will be…
It is that Bodgers arrogance mixed with naivety that cost us precious points when we needed them most…
HE PUT HIS OWN INTEREST AND AMBITIONS BEFORE THOSE OF THE CLUB AND THE FANS…!
That is what I could never forgive him for…
He is a Low to Mid-Table calibre manager at best…
Sorry this is over the top, negative, bollocks. He’s a good manager with flaws, he may never overcome those flaws. So may never become a great manager. But has to be at least good. Worked wonders at Swansea, nearly did the unthinkable here, was flawless at Celtic (in an admittedly weak league where the task was easy enough but still did it very well) and has been solid at Leicester where there are at least 6 teams stronger than them and they always seem within a whisker of top 4. He’s not spectacular, he’s not a Klopp, but I’ll never understand the hatred and vitriol. He really doesn’t deserve it. He was offered the job here, he didn’t seek it out. Was he supposed to turn us down? He did the best he could with the skills and abilities he had and came within a frustrating, tantalising last step to finally lifting the league again. He had us playing some spectacular, exciting football. Couldn’t sort our defensive issues but Klopp was finding that a challenge too till we spent a fortune bringing Alisson and VvD in, like to think he’d eventually have got it performing competently eventually but that’s guesswork. Rodgers wasn’t the right man for us but he was better than what had come before (sorry Kenny, not sorry Roy). He really didn’t earn the hate he’s gotten and he’s a better manager than his detractors like to admit.
p 4. He’s not spectacular, he’s not a Klopp, but I’ll never understand the hatred and vitriol. He really doesn’t deserve it. He wa
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I don’t understand the hatred and vitriol either… that’s why my earlier post does not contain any…!
I have put an opinion forward on the guy at a particular timeline in his tenure covering a particular event…
Unfortunately, you have tagged your reply to my post with a scattergun defence, and gone on a monologue ramble to encapsulate the mood (in your opinion) of an entire site against Bodgers… So why tag your frustrations onto me :0)
I’m glad you think he is a good manager… You have stated why that is in your chastising reply… But I am actually capable of doing my own homework and forming my own opinions on this matter… hence.!
I think everyone knows the score on Brendan. We all know the good football, the title near miss, the quirky sound bites, the transfer record, the power struggle, the personal ‘rebranding’ and new wife, and so on. You can easily look at one aspect of it and skew the overall assessment in any direction to suit.
With the passage of time let’s just look back and be generous in our assessment of the man. Or if we can’t quite go that far, at least let’s stop prosecuting the bad parts over and over. That seems the classy thing to do for a former Liverpool manager.
During the 13-14 season I was always working under the impression that Suarez was leaving at the end of the season. Pretty much everyone I knew felt the same and so I always viewed it as an accepted reality. This has always been one of the reasons for criticism of our summer 2014 transfers in that we spent a LOT of money seemingly without much thought on how we replace the most critical cog in our recent title challenge.
I watched a video over the weekend of a chat between Stevie and Carra that seemed to be from the early part of the 14-15 season in which Stevie mentioned his surprise that Luis left. I was stunned, but this suggests this was the perception inside the club. I dont know whether that should force me to give more leeway to Rodgers and co for handling the transition so badly or make me even more critical of them for being taken aback by something that was unfolding right in front of their face and pissing our chances away.
I’ve always thought that Suarez was edging towards a possibility of staying if we’d made it over the line and won the title but as we fell short he thought it wouldn’t happen here so he’d need to move on instead.
I think he would’ve left regardless what happened with the title that season. Really, he was too good for us, even if we were crowned champions for that season.
Yeah, it was his end-dream to play at Barcelona. He was going anyway, champions or not.
But as Limie said, it’s strange indeed how the club seemed to panic when he left. There was no preparation ahead of the summer to deal with his possible departure. The result was a disaster. That is not only on Rodgers, but also on the rest of the club’s structure.
But the divisive attitude Rodgers displayed during that summer is all on him.
We weren’t a greatly built or organized side, exceeded expectations on the pitch, etc. So yeah, we didn’t react well enough. Especially as Suarez wanted out a year before. To end up with two options; Balotelli or Eto’o was pretty disappointing from the club’s point of view. I mean, there is someone like Sanchez at the time (no issues if he opts to go to Arsenal) and then there are Balotelli/Eto’o. Why not someone like Griezmann, going from Sociedad? Surely there were better options between a Sanchez and a bloody Balotelli. We also tried to compensate with numerical options by keeping Borini from his loan at Sunderland and Lambert. Better preparation was needed, but I also wasn’t overly shocked that it didn’t turn out to be good. Winning the league or not, we had more work to do with that side.
At the Sanchez was a very obvious replacement, but by the time we got around to thinking about it Wenger had already sealed a deal for him. So, one of my criticisms has always been why we didnt start feeling out his people as early as July 2013. The answer appears to be that we genuinely didnt realize Luis was going to try to leave that summer, and I cannot get my head around that. Sure, they are privy to conversations we’re not, but it was out in the public domain that Stevie’s argument for getting him to stop fucking around with Arsenal was to give it one more year and then get a move to a proper club. None of it adds up, other than a club deluding itself.
Why would they? Of that list only Bernat was left out in September, and that’s because he has barely played after a bad injury 2 years ago. They brought no one else in during January so why would they have to leave any of those guys out now?
