itt liverpool not winning things; sandbox i love football

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Theo is better as a winger than he is at any other position even if you want to specify that he's a crazy crane or whatever. He can't be a speed demon forever so he'd better figure out a more or less natural position or develop an optimum one and I'm pretty sure that isn't going to be as a striker

maybe he shd learn to cross a ball then

don't see nv around tbh, tho if we start a 'blue saturday' thread with obscure youtubes and nonsense cocktail ideas he'll be drawn out i reckon

Not that many footballers can cross a ball well, tbf 2 Theo

i don't consider it an essential skill but wd argue it is a necessary constituent of wingerdom

Who's the best crosser in the league then?

Sure I've seen plenty in my time who couldn't manage it (xp)

maybe he shd learn to cross a ball then

Frankly, every footballer should know how to cross and yes, Theo needs to work on that but I had despaired of him ever really amounting to anything but a one-time WC tourist until I saw him play the wing against Udinese and (admittedly not cross) make that run into the box to score. It was unWalcottesque to me or at least a novelty.

xxp

god knows, hardly anybody plays wingers any more. Baines is a better crosser of the ball than Theo but it ain't him

Oh I know you've always rated him Darragh. Just sayin' - last few weeks in particular he's been so so good. God I love him. (xposts)

being a winger who can't cross is like being a striker who can't shoot straight oh wait gervinho i see a pattern

tbf half the wingers in the league are of the cutting inside variety these days. You don't see many getting to the byline

i know, i just think that if you mainly do that, especially if you're playing on yr weaker side and consequently are more or less unable to cross, u shd be called something other than a winger. not that Theo plays on his weaker side. but it's like the difference between being a "centre forward" and a "striker"

K. Doyle for example is a centre forward but i don't think he's a striker

tbf half the wingers in the league are of the cutting inside variety these days. You don't see many getting to the byline

Heaven knows why, as the latter is about a million times more effective... provided you can cross the ball, oh, that's where it falls down

also unless you have a 30 million pound totem pole in the middle to head the crosses in this tactic mayn't be effective

It can't be Jermaine Pennant

Valencia used to do it but he seems to be completely frightened of taking on a defender since he came back from injury, and since he still plays on the right and doesn't even have the semblance of a left foot cutting inside is completely pointless

Who's the best crosser in the league then?

charlie adam's corners are worth 10 million quid don't ya know.

Corners are another kettle of fish entirely. Nani is an excellent crosser but his corners and set-pieces in general are awful

baines, bale, bellamy, gerrard, young, valencia all p good from top of my head, i'm sure there's loads more.

Cleverley landed a few beauties against us too, nani prob worth mention. Downing always used to be, but these days i dunno.

i've seen some rotten corners this season too, guys who regularly can't beat the first defender, several of them wearing Old Gold

rory delap, in a way.

Was going to mention C. Adam, but bombing down the wing and pinging over crosses seems beyond his physical capabilities (xxxxp)

Argh! Lucas! Six months! Now what? Henderson has got to step up big time.

Convinced that moaning about footballers being unable to cross the ball is a sign of getting older

don't mind footballers being unable to cross, think wingers shd be able to. obviously i'm getting old and senile but that's beside the point

I'm not sure if guys like Jimmy Johnstone, or whoever, were particularly great crossers either

NBS is teh_hoBB I'm sure

aye, just temporarily going back in time

Best crossers currently = Nani, Bale, Baines, Young. I'd probably rate Nani the best of those.

Assou-Ekotto is pretty sweet when it comes to putting in crosses as well.

corluka's a good crosser

Footballers being one-footed, not being able to cross, set pieces being poor- pet peeves

Trevor Francis is the earliest "dude who can run really fast down a wing and has no end product when he gets to the byline" player i can remember but he perhaps didn't invent it

bae- yep

Remembers Trevor Francis = noodle vague, no?

i thought it was obvious ages ago tbh

toyed with claiming to be pinefox for a moment

garrincha!

Oh yeah Mata as well.

dunno how Alan Ball was as a crosser of the ball but read an anecdote once where he complained to Ramsay that all he'd done was run up and down all match without receiving the ball

steve guppy- proper fuckin winger, son

have woken from my afternoon nap to be greeted with this 'lucas out for 6 months' news. Am sad for the player. Am sad for myself. May go for a nap for the rest of the season :(

will chime in with the 'players being one footed' pet peeve. Especially when they would rather not cross the ball at all than even attempt a cross with their 'wrong' foot!

xp. It's not official, but Shelvey has returned from Blackpool, which is pretty ominous. Just as Sky and the rest had woken up to the fact that he's rather decent, too. Gutted for him.

Shamrock putting up a proper fight against Rubin Kazan right now, 2-1 down at half-time

Don't get why we think Shelvey is suddenly going to transform into a top class DM when that's never been the role we've had in mind for him. Our overreliance on Lucas and our unwillingness to give him a rest has been hugely irresponsible and nothing short of a joke. Still, at least the fans can still dream of a trip to the new Wembley. And we do exist to win trophies. Yeah right. Fucking fuming right now.

Bruce gone

woah

woah. Hughes? McClaren?