Football: Burnley 1-0 Liverpool: The Traore Syndrome
Sigh... dumped out to an own goal by Djimi Traore. What a drag.
He may have loads of potential, and improved under Benitez (somewhat), but the fellow has the concentration and focus of an Ah Beng watching Mystic River.
Ironically, I used to rate Traore quite highly, because I thought the boy had potential. But after all those mistakes he has been making, and watching him stumble around in every match he's played so far, I'm beginning to think that this is one player who may never live up to that potential.
Why Benitez (and Houllier before him) persists on playing him, I can't understand. Granted, Liverpool IS short on left-backs. We only have Riise and Carragher, besides Traore. Riise has to play left midfield right now because of Kewell's injury, while Carragher (being right-footed) is better played at right-back or centre-half, even though he CAN play left-back as well.
Anyway, back to Traore. The guy can defend. But he can't concentrate. Strikers nutmeg him, go past him and just bamboozle him without a raising a sweat. And when things get messy, like in last night's FA Cup loss to Burnley, he panics and starts making schoolboy errors (and in last night's match, concede own goals).
Sigh... Next player we buy needs to be a left-back. Strikers, we have plenty now. Midfield is fairly crowded. But we need better defenders.
Centre: Carragher is great, and so is Hyppia. Pellegrino is a top-class defender, so essentially, the central defence is covered with three good defenders.
Right-back: Finnan is injured, but I'd prefer him and Carragher more to Josemi. Josemi has been very poor in his first season.
Left-back: TRAORE? PLEASE stop playing him. Riise is great there, so when Kewell comes back, Riise should go back to left back. But we still need another left back... Maybe Benitez should think of playing Stephen Warnock in left-midfield more, and put Riise back to left back.
Goalkeeper: Kirkland, PLEASE stop getting injured. Dudek's confidence took a serious dip after the 2002 World Cup, and he has never been at his best since then. We NEED another goalkeeper.
