no comment bout Jonjo??..i'm disappointed!

This post has been edited by leftist: Aug 2 2011, 01:52 PM

Manchester City record-signing Sergio Aguero has revealed his affection for Liverpool, but stopped short of saying he was a genuine supporter of the Reds.

The Argentina international secured a £38 million switch from Atletico Madrid from City last week, and will fulfil a long-held ambition of playing in the Barclays Premier League.

Aguero does, however, have a soft-spot for Liverpool - which will surely be quickly forgotten by City fans - and was particularly impressed by the Merseysiders during the famous 2005 Champions League triumph.

Liverpool fought back from three-goals down against AC Milan during that night in Istanbul, and went on to triumph in a dramatic penalty shoot-out.

And Aguero was fully behind the Reds as they heroically fought their way back into the glorious encounter; cheering every Liverpool goal in the process.

“I used to like Liverpool and remember watching their Champions League final,” Aguero told ESPN.

“I cheered every goal as they made their comeback. So yes, I liked Liverpool, but to say I was a fan is a bit too strong.”

Meanwhile, Aguero has seen himself compared to Argentinian legend Diego Maradona - perhaps, in part, because he is married to the great man's daughter.

The young striker, however, rejects claims that he is similar to Maradona, although is flattered by the comparisons.

"I can only smile because these guys just don't know what they are saying," added the 23-year-old.

"Diego was a one-off, the all-time great who can never be matched. I know I can play, but do not say I'm the new Maradona.

"He was a magician with a ball at his feet, a leader, a total inspiration to him team-mates. No one, I repeat no-one, could have transformed Argentina and Napoli like he did all those years ago."


http://www.givemefootball.com/premier-leag...pot-for-liverpo

though your dreams be tossed and blown

This post has been edited by Rotuham: Aug 2 2011, 02:17 PM

Shelvey comes in together with Aquilani. Both also got a nice long range shot saved. 20 mins can't look much into his game. Aquilani definitely caught our eyes with his passing and corners, but I do think KD is looking to offload him to generate fund.

After watching the game last night I noted a few things as well - a lot of which have been mentioned already.
Glen Johnson seemed to overcommit which is very unlike him - he normally waits for the attacker to accelerate away before using his own pace to win the ball. Yesterday he seemed to lunge into tackles and miss the ball completely - might be a bit keen to prove that he's fit.

Carragher - Still the intelligent defender we can always rely on, but his lack of pace is becoming more and more evident. Without a quicker defender to partner with it'll be difficult to deal with strikers who aren't dead slow.

Agger - Played pretty well imo, probably our first choice centre back when he's fit. Only concern might be if he partners with carragher and he starts bombing forward and unleashing shots - if the shot isn't great and we get caught on the counter, carra is going to have to concede a yellow card at least when a through ball is played to a quick striker. Hopefully he'll choose his opportunities to go forward more wisely - but he does seem sharp and proved that by getting two goals from the corners.

Adam - Great to watch in midfield when passing, creating and shooting but seems quite poor when tackling so far. We're lucky to have so many centre midfielders to work with and he's definitely one we're going to use quite a bit.

Henderson - A player who I think is going to be a valuable member of our squad this season - probably can play in any position in midfield and do well. Smart player who works hard and makes intelligent runs. One of the best at playing the ball on his first touch (if you watched him at sunderland last season) and I think for such a young player his vision is pretty good.

Downing - Finally, we have an out and out winger. He's good with both feet and can cross and score with both feet too. Out wide we rarely see our players trying to beat opponents and get a cross in or take on the players to get a shot in - you need good acceleration to do that and players like kuyt don't really have that. This guy, however, does. His touch is good and I feel Carroll will definitely benefit from this new signing.

Aquilani - Brilliant. Pure class. I feel if he's given a full season to show his worth, he definitely will impress. Made an instant impact and I personally feel his vision is incredible. He can shoot extremely well and can slice through defences with just one killer pass. Please keep him.

Carroll - I'm still seriously undecided - I don't want to judge before he gets back into his full stride but at times his touch is so extremely poor and sometimes it's pretty good. Whatever it is, he's definitely a handful for defenders in the air. Hopefully our players will play to his feet as well because he really has a stinger of a left foot.

As a whole I was very impressed with last night's performance - though I feel the goals we gave away were quite soft bar the last one which was just an amazing strike

Can't wait for the game against sunderland - (i reckon many of the players who will start vs sunderland won't feature for more than 30 minutes against valencia)
Excited for the new season

The last striker we signed from Atletico declared similar affection as well. Sadly in these days of football, it doesn't mean much.

Aquilani will be a key man if he stays. I can already see how he and suarez will be able to link up.

Aquilani my man of the match for all the pre-season friendlies. You can see the impact he has on the team. I hope they don't offload him. The long shots remind me of Gerrard.

The positive that I will take from the match is the fact we have good depth in midfield.
1st half we relied too much on long ball and crosses to Carroll. Its a decent tactic but didn't seem to work, moreover Carroll was closely marked by 3 or 4 players. We became predictable. What is also frustrating is that Adams and Henderson didn't exploit the open space enough given that Carroll pulled their defenders out of position few times. And I think Merieles will take full advantage of such given space.

But because of our plenty options in midfield, we can bring in plan B with Aqua + Jonjo. And it proved that Aqua's corner produced a better result than Adam's corner.

I wouldn't say that Aqua+Jonjo played better than Adams+Henderson. We played different tactic with both combo. And I think each will be effective and will be used to cater different teams in EPL.

BTW, did we play 4-4-2 from the start? because I remember saw the formation with Kuyt n Carroll upfront. But in the game, it seems that Kuyt drifted more to the right.

Based on most of the pre season games, most of the ppl think aqua performed better compared with Adam but in my opinion Adam will be more suitable for physical team where Aqua might be non existence.. Valencia will be a good benchmark on our performance, can't wait for tat match.. Lucas might solve our defence problem, but 1 new CB n 1 new LB will b sweet.. Hope we will make 2 more decent signings for our back.. Will be better if we can get 1 more winger for our right n shift Kuyt to forward.. 1 more month to go, hope we could sign 1 or 2 n release few..

It's ironic that with all the money that we spent in the summer so far, we didn't realize all along we already had a player who can bring us back the glory years. Maybe that was why Rafa wanted Aquilani even when he knew about his injury back then.

Rafa did mention that this guy was different type of player from Alonso because he looks more like a 'Modric' or 'Nasri' kind of player. I hope he will stay with us for at least another season to prove his worth.

AC should lose weight a bit..

he did say that AA wasn't bought to replace xabi but more to be gerrard's replacement IIRC...

we should not hav bought Henderson in thr first place as I feel Aqualiani is much better than him.

btw, when is the Valencia match?

thx

the new Maradona is Uruguay number 9

I do think Henderson can be a handful player for us , at the age of 20 years old , I can see him play for his country in future.A good buy and I would rather buy him now rather then wait mu come and snap him away.

Aqua was proven to be a Good Quality player in the recent friendly, whereas Henderson is still so so only

U mean the ol' Gerrard rite?
Seems like ages ago since he last 'wow'ed us with his long shots..

This post has been edited by coolmast3r: Aug 2 2011, 07:24 PM

Excellent overview. I wish i had time to watch the game.

Here is for those who missed Aqua's touches in last night's game



But I feel he wil be leaving towards the end of the transfer window as he only played the last 10 - 15 minutes of the game.. KD can force him to stay but I think they will stick to the policy of releasing unhappy players... But it will be a huge lost for us if he leaves, on top of all the top class recent performances..

This post has been edited by all blacks: Aug 2 2011, 07:34 PM

whether he stays or leaves for some where, he needs a good season under his belt to be in the running for 2012.azzurri could use him beside aged legs of pirlo.

well imo, as most of u noticed, aa did changed the game, sadly he was on only for the last 15mins.. teammates around him looked like they raised their game when he was around. give both henderson and carroll sometime. they are still in their early 20s n as kenny said, they are signed for the long term prospect. dont expect carroll banging in 20goals plus(altho it would be just awesome to be wrong) next season and henderson performing all the time.

somehow i feel for aa because its evident he has the qualities esp in the technical areas of the game but kk prefer british players. or rather UK players.
i really hope carroll will prove u doubters wrong as i blv in him. he's not yr suarez like kind of striker but he'll prove to be effective. downing and adam should provide him with lots of crosses. also praying hard stevie will overcome his injury problem. being out since march,thats too long for me! he's already 31. i cant wait to see him linking up with suarez n downing. esp suarez. i meant like in a run of games. not just one or two games.

saturday is our last friendly. m really disappointed with the previous match. because its no longer preseason to me. we are just 12 days away. thats really soon. hopefully our defence find a way and so does our midfield. we need to defend as a team just like kuyt said.