So a little bit of New Years’ Fun.
Inspired by a brief convo with Redwillis in match chat, I present the worst XI I’ve seen play for Liverpool:
GK: Brad Jones
So straight away I can hear the shouts of “Charles Itandje! “, and yes the eejit who couldn’t act in a respectful manner at the Hillsborough Memorial Service is definitely a far worse *person* than the affable Aussie who was unfortunately visited by personal tragedy, but I decided I’m going to try and do this based on on field performances. If we do it based on what they were like as people, then Suarez is the first name on the team sheet, isn’t he? That would be somewhat ridiculous.
Itandje’s few cup appearances were no different from every one of Reina’s understudies. Unremarkable. Likewise, I’m discounting Karius despite his brain falling out of his head around March or April 2018, cos he had actually played fairly well that season up until then. Jones on the other hand couldn’t displace the ridiculously error prone Simon Mignolet, and when Rodgers finally got sick of the Belgian’s clangers and brought in Jones, Brad unfortunately responded with the worst goalkeeping performance I’d seen since Turkish keeper Omer Catkic in a friendly against Ireland, who was so bad he came on in the 2nd half and was resubbed off 25 minutes later (How do I remember these things? ) . Jones’ performance against Man United consisted of diving out of the way of a shot and being sat on his arse by a very basic bit of skill from van Persie. He only had 1 or 2 more apps before he got injured and let Mignolet back in. Nice bloke. Poor goalie.
RB: Abel Xavier
Markus Babbel’s debilitating illness, coupled with Carra playing left back due to Vignal’s inability to stay fit and Riise being rotated between left back and left midfield, forced Phil Thompson (presumably directed by Houllier from his sick bed) into the market for a right back in the winter of 2001-2002. He came back up with a cheap deal for Abel Xavier, scarcely more than a squad player at Everton, who hadn’t finished higher than 13th in Xavier’s time there. Whilst the move might have boiled some p. in the blue half of the city, the more astute Evertonians probably realised they’d done us to get anything more than a Mars bar for him. Where Babbel was dynamic, powerful and quick, Xavier was slow and plodding. A goal on his debut quickly gave way to catching opposition players in headlocks on corners and being absolutely flummoxed by Ze Roberto’s ability to run fast in the CL quarter final against Leverkusen. Given that Stephen Wright was in good form that season and Xavier basically got in his way, signing no one and leaving Wright at it would’ve been a better option. Unsurprisingly he didn’t last very long and disappeared out of the team early on the following season.
CB: Mauricio Pellegrino
I believe Pellegrino’s last Liverpool appearance ended at half time with him being replaced and John Arne Riise, an attacking full back or wide midfielder, finishing the game at center back in his stead. Sums him up. A desperation signing by Rafa because we only had three center backs following the sale of Henchoz, and Pellegrino understood his defensive systems. Unfortunately, the Argentine’s legs were long gone, and he had no hope of adapting to the Premier League.
CB: Neil Ruddock
Probably not the worst CB at the club, even since I started supporting them, but definitely the biggest waste of talent. A traditional early 90s, how can I say, “rugged” center back who could defend aggressively and effectively, but with a good left foot to play out from the back, on paper Ruddock had all the tools needed to be a top center back. Unfortunately, he seemed more interested in being a fat, obnoxious dirty twat who boasted about breaking Andy Cole’s legs. He could’ve been Daniel Agger before Daniel Agger, but liked pies too much. One of the players who really sums up Liverpool’s problems in the early 90s. At least he has apparently got his life back on track and lost a bit of weight lately, because I’m pretty sure he was heading for a fatal heart attack otherwise.
LB: Paul Konchesky
Paul Konchesky is what happens if you sell the only fit left back at your club and leave your manager with literally no money to buy a replacement. I have to give props to Hodgson for bringing in two left backs (let’s not forget the return of Fabio Aurelio) for effectively nothing, but unfortunately, Konchesky proved to be worth every bit of that transfer fee. Whilst a glance at his career stats suggest he wasn’t without ability, remaining in the Premier League for a long time, he struggled badly at Liverpool, frequently being caught out defensively and wasn’t really all that good going forward either (then again who was in that team? ) . When Kenny took over, Konchesky was dropped quickly with Glen Johnson moving across from right back to take his place, with Jack Robinson making appearances late in the season. Pity Hodgson never thought of that.
CM: Salif Diao
I’m struggling to understand the signing of Diao, Liverpool weren’t exactly lacking for center mids at the time. I guess Houllier liked to collect them. Diao wasn’t particularly good at anything. He wasn’t athletic or good enough in the final third to be a box to box. Was too prone to defensive gaffes to be a defensive midfielder and his passing wasn’t good enough for him to be a playmaker. He must’ve had some ability, given that Rafa gave him a few chances and didn’t immediately bin him off like he did with Diouf and he had a decent career with Stoke, but he showed very little here. Maybe Tony Pulis’ Stoke was his level and he just wasn’t equipped to play in a team that had any ambition to play even the tiniest bit of football.
CM: Christian Poulsen
Hands up here, I thought Poulsen would be a decent signing. An experienced, tough tackling, defensive midfielder, who had some ability on the ball to go with it and had played in Germany, Spain and Italy. Seemed a good fit for a team that had just been deprived of the services of Javier Mascherano. But at 30, maybe it was just too late in his career to adapt to the English game as he was consistently poor under Hodgson. Like Diao, he just didn’t seem to do any one aspect of the game particularly well. A brief uptick occurred when Kenny took over, as he started 3 games in a row and was spoken of highly by his manager, but he soon dropped behind Jay Spearing the resurgent Lucas Leiva in the pecking order and was shipped out.
RW: El-Hadji Diouf
As a striker, Diouf scored 6 goals in nearly 50 appearances. I’m pretty sure at least two of them were penalties. So Houllier moved him to the right wing. For about a month at the start of 03/ 04, it seemed to work. Diouf terrorised left backs in the Premier League until it became apparent that he had as little end product as a winger as he had as a striker. Diouf would beat a man and then seemingly not know what to do next, usually chopping back to beat the same man again before eventually losing the ball or making a simple pass that he could’ve made 14 touches previously. After that month, all I can remember of Diouf as a winger was dribbling down a blind alley, cutting back inside and inevitably passing back to one of the CBs. About the only good thing you could say about him is he didn’t lack effort when on the pitch, even Gerrard admits as much, but the output was shocking.
LW: Bernard Diomede
Diomede scored on his PL debut and had it incorrectly chalked off. That’s as good as it got for the Frenchman who subsequently disappeared. A bit of Googling led me to a quote from Houllier saying that Diomede got injured and the team “had moved on” by the time he was fit again. Maybe that was the problem? A natural, old school winger was never going to fit in Houllier’s anti-football teams. Or maybe, given his career afterwards, he was just not very good.
ST: Mario Balotelli
Oh dear. This signing is the biggest case of the wrong player at the wrong club. In a team that had functioned the previous season based on runs in behind, he never made runs in behind. Maybe things would’ve been different if Sturridge had stayed fit and made the runs in behind with Balotelli coming short or engaging the CBs with his strength, but given his propensity to take 12 touches where 2 would to, it’s hard to see a set of circumstances where Balotelli succeeds at Liverpool. He struggled to effect games from the get go, and pretty soon was causing problems in training and being eviscerated in the dressing room by Henderson and Lallana. On the pitch, he didn’t run, took too long to do anything with the ball, and often resorted to shooting from out on the wing out of frustration.
ST: Sean Dundee
Famous for saying he was faster than Michael Owen before he arrived, Dundee’s time at Liverpool consisted of 5 appearances with absolutely no output before he was shipped back to Germany. Suffice to say he wasn’t very good.
Written by – Something Red – January 01 2025 08:30:02
