The Steven Gerrard Thread

I half suspect that an academy graduate would struggle with the pitch quality and physicality of the game in that era. maybe even the game prior to 1992?

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Exactly, comparing different eras is riddled with difficulty.

Bring Liddell to train today, with his hobnailed boots and Woodbines (I’m exaggerating) and watch as academy graduates whizz past him.

It’s no worse than spelling “institutionalised” with a zed.

I’m American now, the language is phonetic over here :joy:

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Not unpopular, just complete nonsense.

Season 2 Lol GIF by Dear White People Netflix

Why not switch it around? Bring Stevie G into the present from the past. How much better would he be? With better fitness, diet, training? At 27 he was called the best midfielder in the world by Zizou. Dom is nowhere near being called that yet.

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Could switch it around, put Gerrard or any other modern great back to the 60s and see how they fair in the same conditions, fitness regimes and waist high tackles

Hell, Soueness would be one of the best midfielders in the world right now if brought up in modern nutrition and training.

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For Gerrard and/or Szoboszlai debate/discussions

Gerrard was at his peak about 14-15 years ago, how much fitter do you think players are now from back then?

Things haven’t moved on that much.Go back to the 80s/mid 90s, yeah, you might have a point.

Prime Gerrard would be the best midfielder in the game right now.

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i would disagree.

I can only assume you didn’t actually watch him, given your posts here.

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I think that debates like this are a bit disrespectful to Stevie the player and quite unhelpful to Szoboszlai. Stevie was a world class player, a force of nature that ran himself into the ground for both his club and country, who played well in every role he was deployed. Would he play that well for Klopp? I have no doubts about it (even if his fitness record was imperfect - but he still played like 700 games for us, which I don’t think another Liverpool player will come close to). In fact, I think that he and Suarez are the only past Liverpool players who would walk into Klopp’s Liverpool and play regularly at their best level.

As for Szoboszlai, God forbid he gets injured - all the people who are comparing him to Stevie would start comparing him to Keita and how Leipzig did a number on us twice. Let the lad play and develop for us, no need to compare him to the greatest player we’ve had alongside Kenny after he’s played only a handful of games for us.

I did watch him from his debut to his retirement.

The point I’m making is that football is a sport of continuous improvement except on some specific talents like Ronaldo , messi etc

This is not a diss on stevie and his footballing exploits. It’s just a way of life.

Improve or perish.

And I meant the Brazilian Ronaldo…

I can add other guys to the list there like Ronaldinho etc. Flair/guile/trickery is something that 99% of footballers don’t have. But if you look at in terms of workrate , speed, physical characteristics, tactical understanding.

Also am at pains to say… Attack the argument , not the person.

I’m even more confused then if you have watched him.

The game hasn’t moved on that much in such a small space of time, and Gerrard was a phenomenal athlete as well as being technically incredible. He’d be running the show if he was playing today.

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And I did intend to create the issue fwiw.

Nope. The game has moved on. Both in terms of training etc and in terms of fitness regimes etc.

Check the incremental differences.

Maybe a Stevie now if he was playing could be on par with Dom or even better at the same age

My comment is that Dom at his age now is a better footballer than Stevie at his peak.

This is more a comment on the increase in general standards etc.

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I look at performances when I see a footballer. I can’t help if people have biases either towards recency or ageism.

My belief is that the next generation of footballers technically is always more well equipped than the previous generations.

With some notable exceptions. Sorry to say , Stevie in terms of natural talent doesn’t fall into that.

Ashley Young and James Milner are still Premier League starters at 38 and 37. They were around when Gerrard was in his prime and they were absolutely nowhere near him in terms of ability.

The game hasn’t moved on that much.

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