Thread: The Official 2009-2010 Soccer Thread

Pavlyuchenko didn't get moved did he? Says a deal to Birmingham is 70-75%. Not sure what happened with that after Keane leaving. Gudjohnsen sucks but they have him, too. Keane only has 5 league goals and 4 of them came in one game. It is an odd move for Spurs but Keane wanted to go and they did the right thing and let him.

I have issues with Crouch too and it got me thinking a bit about him as a player.

In his last 130 games he has 73 goals and 25 assists which is very respectable, the fact that for 57 of those games he was a substitute makes it a tad more impressive. 26 of those goals have come either in European competitions or for England too.

It is entirely bemusing to me.

It's because Crouch is a good player. He isn't "great" but I am still to this day pissed that he isn't playing for Liverpool.

Crouch wanted first team football, especially in a World Cup year.

Originally Posted by redxalonso

Crouch wanted first team football, especially in a World Cup year.

He could have had it too. I'd rather see him up front instead of our up-and-comer Ngog...

Originally Posted by chu gar

He could have had it too. I'd rather see him up front instead of our up-and-comer Ngog...

Yea, pretty selfish if that's the main reason he left. I understand that in a World Cup year every player with national team aspirations wants to play and impress as many times as possible. But a club like Liverpool is involved in four major competitions, there are plenty of games to go around. What makes the move even stranger is he went to Portsmouth, a club that is nowhere near qualifying for the Champions League. Lastly with Torres having issues with minor nagging injuries the move to Portsmouth is even more strange.

I don't know Crouch's motives perhaps he didn't see himself getting that much first team football with Benitez and Redknapp has always been fond of him (Redknapp played him regularly when he took over Saints) so perhaps he just really wanted to play for Redknapp. All that being said I think it is fair to say that it's odd that Crouch made that move.

Former U.S. soccer coach Steve Sampson: Alleged affair hurt '98 team - ESPN Soccernet

what's brown and kills babies?

John Terry's wallet.





ouch.

Originally Posted by ASUcruz

Yea, pretty selfish if that's the main reason he left. I understand that in a World Cup year every player with national team aspirations wants to play and impress as many times as possible. But a club like Liverpool is involved in four major competitions, there are plenty of games to go around. What makes the move even stranger is he went to Portsmouth, a club that is nowhere near qualifying for the Champions League. Lastly with Torres having issues with minor nagging injuries the move to Portsmouth is even more strange.

I don't know Crouch's motives perhaps he didn't see himself getting that much first team football with Benitez and Redknapp has always been fond of him (Redknapp played him regularly when he took over Saints) so perhaps he just really wanted to play for Redknapp. All that being said I think it is fair to say that it's odd that Crouch made that move.

Benitez went against the grain and bought Crouch. The last thing he wanted was for Crouch to leave.

Crouch played in 21 PL games mostly as a substitute during Torres first season, and all but one FA Cup and Carling Cup match. Basically, Torres lit up the PL in his first season and played in all the important matches when healthy. If you were Crouch and not knowing Torres was going to be this injury prone, plus Capello had just been appointed as new England manager, wouldn't you be thinking about a Plan B while sitting on the Liverpool bench? Especially when the chances of being dropped in a 4-4-2 system is much less.

Personally, I understand where he's coming from. It would be too big of a gamble to not be playing against the top teams when Capello was getting ready for WC qualifications. Benitez's inflexibility to interchange from the 4-3-2-1 is also to blame.

He went on to play 49 matches for Portsmouth the very next season mostly as a starter, which was, obviously, like night and day compared to sitting behind Torres. Had he(or his agent?) had a fair assessment of his own valuation to the national team, I think he would have stayed with Liverpool. The fact that he had some big games(not just in terms of scoring goals) for Liverpool before Torres arrived, probably inflated his ego.