Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Ian Rush Urges Liverpool To Go On The Offensive To Achieve Premier League Top Four Finish

Liverpool's former striking legend Ian Rush wants to see Reds manager Rafael Benitez adopt a more attacking approach in a bid to finish in a Champions League spot this season.

Whilst Benitez's team have looked more solid in recent weeks, they played out a dismal goalless draw at Eastlands on Sunday with Manchester City.

In order to ensure a top four finish, Rush feels that they must now look to start scoring more goals.

"Clearly, there is something missing from Liverpool’s play at the moment, a spark that would make us an infinitely more difficult proposition," he told The Liverpool Echo.

"Quite simply, we are not creating enough chances and until that changes, it is going to be a struggle for Liverpool to overpower teams.

"It was great to see Yossi Benayoun and Fernando Torres return to action and once they are up to speed, Liverpool will start to go through the gears and I would imagine they will get a few more minutes on the pitch when we play Unirea Urziceni on Thursday, to get them ready for Blackburn.

"Once they are fit, though, Liverpool will not be able to make excuses if their displays continue to lack such sparkle."

Nevertheless, Rush is optimisitic that the Reds will be playing Champions League football next season, and believes Sunday's point was more useful to the Merseysiders than it was for their Mancunian counterparts.

"I have said all along that I’m confident Liverpool will win the race for fourth place and nothing that happened over the weekend has made me change my mind," he added.

"Looking at the positives, a point was slightly more beneficial for Liverpool; City have a testing run-in and need to chisel out as many wins as they can, as quickly as they can, to stand any chance of qualifying for the Champions League."

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