Reina had little to do and was unlucky to be beaten in the 90th minute
Following last night’s draw in Lyon, Liverpool players have today been licking their wounds as the players returned to Melwood to assess the casualty list.
The reds must re-group for our next League game against Birmingham City on Monday evening.
Jamie Carragher’s disappointment was there for all to see in his post match interview following the game.
The rest of the squad are equally disappointed.
Dirk Kuyt, who saw the keeper deny him twice in Lyon said:
“It feels like a defeat. I think we deserved to win, but we conceded in the last minute and everyone is really disappointed.
“It’s out of our hands now, but we stuck together as a team here and everyone put a lot of effort into the game.
“We showed character and that’s what we have to do at this stage. We deserved more, but all we can do is work hard and be ready for the next game.
“If we keep working hard like this, things will change quickly. The most important thing is we as players, staff and a team are sticking together and we want to fight – I am sure we will come back stronger.”
Pepe Reina felt the reds deserved far more out of the game.
“I am really disappointed because I think we played one of our best games of the season so far, but we did not get the result we wanted.
“I thought we’d done enough to win. We didn’t deserve to lose at home when we played Lyon, and we didn’t deserve to draw here, but that’s the way it is and we have to face it.
“We were really unlucky but it’s the way things are going at the moment. We have to keep fighting while we have a chance.
“At the moment we are not in the best situation, but I think we have a strong character and enough quality to sort things out.
“All we can do is play with desire and passion and try to be more consistent.
“The worst thing is we are not depending on ourselves. We need Lyon to get a result in Fiorentina, but all we can do, and have to do, is win in Hungary.
“We will keep fighting and the least we can do is win our two remaining games.”
Liverpool will be hoping that Lyon get something out of the game against Fiorentina in the next fixture.
Yep, Kyriakos looked shaky and Voranin was awful
I think our Greek defender whose name i hate spelling but will give it a try…Kyriakos or something like that was guilty in us conceding the killer equaliser.He should have cleared it instead easily ended on his backside looking on as the ball ended in the back of the net….
That’s our very problem that we don’t have a large enough squad capable of dealing with three or four major injuries unlike a Man Utd or Chelsea who are far stronger.The owners are to blame for being liers and too tight fisted and Rafa is also responsible for some terrible signings that begger belief!.
As for Rafa we simply can’t afford sacking him.
Kyriakos doesn’t look great, but then the manager had is eye on Michael Turner at £6m for possible cover. We were outbid by sunderland of all people and ended up with Kyriakos for a paltry £2m. Why would the manager spend so little on such an average player if he had the choice not to? Obviously his hands were tied when it came to funding this transfer, hence we’ve had to gamble on mediocrity yet again. OK Rafa signed the guy fiar enough, but the sloppy defending that cost us the game is entirely down to the player. Did people blame Alex Ferguson when Ferdinand was outstripped and outstrengthed by Torres before lashing the ball past Van der Sar? It’s starting to sicken me that every little thing that goes wrong or goes against us must be Rafa’s fault. Deggen gets sent off agaisnt Fulham. Oh that must be Rafa’s fault for a) signing him and b) puting him in the team. Nothing to do with a shocking refeering decision then? Add this to the fact that the guy was actually having a decent game before the red card, but conveniently people forget that bit.
This time i’m not blaming Rafa but K’kos for even a £2 million defender should have successfully cleared that ball infact i could have done it!
Having said that Rafa has made some terrible signing’s but i won’t repeat the list but i’m telling everyone right now that it’s Rafa’s fault if it rains tomorrow,wink!!!!!!
You are quite right, some of the signings haven’t worked out, but I generally think this is becuase he’s had to gamble on budget gap pluggers when his top targets have been too expensive. Kyriakos doesn’t look great, but then Rafa supposedly wanted Michael Turner or Matthew Upson, however, both players proved too expensive. I was vey sceptical when we signed Pennant. Everyone knows the lad has got a quetionable attitude. We wanted Simao but couldn’t afford hom so gambled on a wide player with proven premiership experience and one of the highest assist and crossing rates of any player in the prem. It’s not Rafa’s nor anyone else’s fault the guy was a bag of shite in a red shirt.
Cara said in his book, some players feel they’ve made it once they sign for Liverpool, that the hard work stops and they can put their feet up and basque in their own success. The truth is that when you join Liverpool, the hard work really begins and you have to prove you have both the attitude and character as well as ability to play for such a huge club. If you can buy the best then this problem is partly overcome, however, loads of players, big names too, have failed miserbaly to do this. Dean Saunders, Stan Collymore, Mark Kennedy, El Hadj Diouf, Sali Diao, Djiril Cisse, Robie Keane, Paul Stewart, Paul Ince and others. If you haven’t noticed, most o these players were signed by either Souness, Evans or Houllier and most cost big sums, most of which we lost when they were sold on. At least Rafa’s made plenty of money on players he’s sold on becuase they weren’t good enough for us such as Crouch, Sissoko, Bellamy, Arbeloa etc. The guy is being asked to pull a rabbit out of the hat every season. Something’s gotta give.
@Graham
I’ve been reading a lot (and I mean a lot) of things on the Liverpool forums over the last few weeks and yours is the first post that has made any sense to me! Fellow Reds, can we all just calm down and take note?
Also feel more time is needed, for the full squad to return to fitness, our key players will make a vast difference to the side. It would be wrong to do anything drastic at this stage. Firmly believe that things can only improve in the long run.
I watched the game against Lyon and although it was not a vintage Liverpool performance, they had more than done enough to merit the win.
There will, of course, be more talk about Rafa and his position, but for me he has to be given more time.
You only have to look at Newcastle as the classic example of getting rid of managers when they begin to struggle and look at the mess they are in now.
Benitez has been so unfortunate with injuries this season. I do not think Torres or Gerrard have ever been fully fit, Aquilani has yet to feature much, which has made Alonso’s absence all the more keenly felt and also the likes of Skrtel, Johnston Agger, Riera and Aurelio have been in and out the team.
He has never been able to filed a full strength side and, more importantly, a settled side. That was crucial towards the run-in last season when we went on a superb run of winning games.
Benitez is not blameless, but the players have to take responsibility. Credit to guys like Reina, Carragher, the much-malingned Lucas because they’ve never hid, even though the latter two have come in for stick.
Players like Voronin and Babel should view this as a chance to stake their claim for a place in the team, but Voronin just does not look interested, while Babel goes from the sublime to the ridiculous, although I still think he merits getting a run.
Insua has seized his opportunity, but there are others who have not stepped up to the plate often enough.
Yes the stats make for grim reading just now, but could any manager have coped with such injury problems better than Benitez has.
He has more than earned the right to be judged when he is able to get a full strength side on to the park. As a manager, you can affect a lot of thing, but there is little you can do when you lose so much quality out of the side because on injury.
There’s no doubt that as Liverpool fans we all share in the disappointment that we have not been able to build on how we finished in the Premiership last season, while our chances of Champions League progression look grim, but there is still much to play for this season.
The critics in the media will through statistics at it to try and make us doubt otherwise, but for now let’s get behind the team as they need our support now more than ever.
sorry its just gotta happen rafa has got to go :/
Poll on our forum indicates 84% of Liverpool fans back Rafa Benitez.
2 years ago we run the same poll and it was 84.2%.
Vast majority of people I have spoken to as well also still think Rafa is the right man. The media are completely out of touch with the ‘majority’ of reds.
yep ! name one manager who dosn’t make mistakes ! hes ahd no choice but to go for third/ fourth rate players because of the owners ! both past and present.