Sunday, December 13, 2009

John Aldridge: Liverpool FC Must Cut Out Errors In Order To Rescue Season

I hope Wednesday’s defeat to Fiorentina acts as a wake-up call because it’s time everyone realised just how desperate the situation is that we find ourselves in.

To be out of the Champions League and out of the Premier League title race before Christmas is a real kick in the teeth.

It’s unbelievable and now it’s’ game on’ with the battle for fourth place. We’re playing catch-up and it makes Sunday’s clash with Arsenal at Anfield very juicy.

People are saying it’s a must-win for Liverpool. I wouldn’t go as far as that but it’s certainly a game we cannot afford to lose.

I know we had Reina, Carragher and Johnson missing but Fiorentina were without seven first teamers. It just shows the depth they have is better than ours.

On the balance of play we probably deserved a draw, but we were undone by another late goal.

It was the third time that’s happened in our group and those lapses have cost us dearly.

You’ve got to learn from your mistakes, but we just haven’t done that this season.

At one point the Italians had a corner which was chipped to the edge of the box for one of their lads to volley.

Nobody in red bothered to close him down so they did it again.

You’ve got to deal with things like that but nobody seems to take responsibility.

When things are going wrong defensively you need to sort it out on the training ground, but I’d question whether that’s happening. It seems to me things are just being swept under the carpet.

The players should be angry at what’s going on and they should be determined to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

We can’t keep on making those kind of errors and expect to achieve anything.

Arsenal have got the best young players in the league, but they lack a bit of experience and we have to capitalise on that.

The big positive the other night was the return of Fernando Torres. He looked very sharp and it was great to see him back.

If he can stay fit then there’s every chance we’ll finish in the top four.

Alberto Aquilani did okay against Fiorentina and getting 75 minutes under his belt will do him the world of good.

He showed some good touches and vision, and did well going forward.

However, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him back on the bench on Sunday.

I think Lucas will come back into the centre of midfield.

Rafa clearly has a lot of faith in him and the Brazilian, who has played every league game, seems to have become his first name on the team sheet this season.

The fact is the manager seems to like central midfielders with defensive qualities.

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