Xabi Alonso is a great footballer but for some unknown reason Rafael Benitez has never seemed desperate to retain his services. For a couple of seasons there has been talk of Alonso joining Real Madrid and it’s always seemed absurd to me that the FSW has been so nonchalant it. Last summer he was seriously considering selling Alonso so Gareth Barry could be brought in to the team which utterly bemused me, given the Spaniard is clearly the superior footballer. Liverpool Kop have looked at this topic in much greater detail and I imagine most Liverpool fans will be gutted to see the talented midfielder leave.
However, what should cause them a greater concern is the fact they’re probably going to have to play against eleven men more often now!
Last season, Liverpool played against ten men on nine occasions in the Premiership. To put that in to perspective, that is five times as many matches than United, who played against ten men on just two occasions, against Stoke and West Brom.
Against United, Chelsea, Arsenal, Aston Villa, Everton, City, Wigan, Newcastle and Hull, Liverpool had a one man advantage. On five of those ten occasions, Alonso was the player challenged which resulted in the marching orders of one of his opponents.
September 13th 2008: Liverpool 2 – 1 United
Nemanja Vidic sent off for a challenge on Alonso.
September 27th: Everton 0 -2 Liverpool
Tim Cahill sent off for a challenge on Alonso
October 5th 2008: City 2 – 3 Liverpool
Pablo Zabaleta sent off for a challenge on Alonso.
February 1st 2009: Liverpool 2 – 0 Chelsea
Frank Lampard sent off after challenging Alonso.
May 3rd 2009: Liverpool 3 – 0 Newcastle
Joey Barton sent off after challenging Alonso.
Man Utd News 24/7
hahaha… nice, scott. i bet all those dippers who were giddy over us losing ronaldo don’t feel so good anymore. at the end of the season, no one will be talking about how much we missed ronaldo, but how much the dippers missed alonso.
Their are going to compensate Alonso with Aquilani. FSW is crazy and never stop showing this.
thems there sending off stats are amazing
They are buying Poulsen as replacement, Aquillani is extra, and he is a very fine player!
Don’t know why Real rate Alonso so highly, 30m?! That’s truly crazy
By the way how do you find such stats!
Great stats and article. I also remember him being responsible for getting scholesey sent off at Anfield 2007/2008.
Alonso was being shamelessly offloaded last year, to make way for barry. I don’t blame him one bit for wanting to leave after being treated so poorly by Benitez and the club.
He responded well though, arguably having one of his best seasons for them last year. I am very happy to see him go, he was quality and getting better.
On a slightly different note, Benitez has alienated a lot of his players historically by being very rigid in what he expects of them. You are part of a system. You have very specific roles to play. Do it or be dropped. There have been many reports also surrounding his inability to trust his players when they go out onto the pitch. He is a total micro-managagment type coach, and he seems to get off more on the strategic side of football, than the pure free flow love of the game.
Alonso was Liverpool’s most consistent player last year – they’ll definitely miss him.
alonzo is a better player than aquilliani without question. Italian midfielders tend to struggle with the pace of the English game. He will be a bust fo sho
The City game was a joke, Liverpool took full advantage of the incorrect sending off and turned the 2-0 deficit around to go on and win, wasn’t that the same with Hull? They were leading ’til a sending off?
Alonso and Aquillani are quite different players in my opinion – anyway why am I worried – we ain’t buying either of them!
over the moon to see the dippers lose one of their best players, alonso made them tick last year, now theyll have that crazy argie cunt running about midfeild for them doin fuck all
Rafa loses one more Spaniard, lol
Here’s the one where Alonso got Lampard sent off too – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1nIOn4Bido&fmt=18
this really is a big test for the FSW
ronaldo is a bigger loss to a team than alonso but in sir alex we trust and in history we learn
ronaldo can and hopefully has be replaced because as has been already discussed a million and 7 times on this how united have lost big places and kept on going
thats down to one man
now rafa is in this sitch that he has never been in before
GHTT..
Come on man! It’s not like they have lost Torres, Gerry or Mascherano!
This is the same player they wanted to replace with Barry last year. He’s hardly the best player in the world
tony mate he’s not the best player in the world
i never said he was
same way i never ever sad ronaldo is the best player in the world
they may not be the best player on the team but its how the heart beats in the middle of the game
fletcher is not the best player at united
but how baddly is he missed when he’s not there
Xabi Alonso is there heart beat
was there heart beat
id rather have alonso than mascherano, useless comes to mind
hes a good player alonso, torres and gerrard will struggle to provide goals without the good through balls on which they thrive
but still, thats their problem
The finding / remembering of them statistics is a worrying skill you have fella.
He spreads the ball about well and gives an out option to the defence but i really dont think the guy will be much of a lose to them ones.
Yep.
@ Tony Starks: You obviously didn’t watch Liverpool much last season if you don’t rate him that highly. He played a big part last season, basically the cog that made everything work, kind of like Carrick in our team but better, at least last season he was anyway. I think he’s going to be a big loss for them.
i don’t think they wi’ll mis him that much, for 30M they did well !, wha’s more worrying is that they are negiciating with valenia for villa so they can associate villa & torres and drop SG
tony starks
just to add on
when they where selling him to arsenal to bring in barry liverpool fans where pissed because barry didnt , in liverpool fans minds those who watch liverpool all the time, have a patch on alonso
Tremendous blog. Well done lad and well put across. Top marks.
Thanks for pointing this out Scott. I have been shouting about this all the time.
altonian, alonso ain’t better than carrick. End of.
On the flip side of things, I think this is a good addition for Real and will make them that much tougher to break down. Las Diarra will do the defensive Makalele/Mascherano role of tackling everything in sight and then make a five yard pass to Alonso so he can use his vision and passing ability to spread the ball to oh I dont know, some dorks I’ve never heard of named Ronaldo or Kaka or Benzema…
And aren’t they looking to get that Aqualiani or whatever the hell from Roma?? And isn’t he more of a second striker?? But isn’t that where Stevie Me plays?? Doesn’t make much sense to me.
I really hope the FSW trusts his youth and doesn’t purchase a CM replacement. That brazilian Lucas is worthless.
And does anyone know which team had the most reds given in their favor last year?? 8 surely has to be near the top. But yet they still go on and on about ref decisions going in our way…
How did you possibly notice that?
If I’m not mistaken, Alonso was also the victim when Newcastle’s very own Joey Barton get shown the red toward the end of last season. The result was pretty much done and dusted by then, to be fair.
SB
BBC website says that leaves just Jamie “I love Fergie” Carragher and Stevie GBH as the only players left from there 2005 Champ League winning team. Just shows the loyalty FSW shows to his players that a succesful(european wise) team has been decimated in such a way in only 4 years. In comparison we still have 3 players from ’99 team, ten years later.
i count 4 brown giggs scholes and neville
Technically 3 as Scholesy wasnt in champ league team, but 4 is a better number so will stick to that.
Also forgot about Brown
Altonian & GHTT & others..
Yeah you’re right I didn’t watch Liverpool much, couldn’t stand watching them.. obviously I respect the opinion of those who watched them play. We’ll see what happens.
To be honest I’m not too worried if they buy guys like Villa or Silva (not that they aren’t good players).
Should be a good season, bring it on!
can anyone explain to me where the fuck madrid are getting this cash from, i have heard its been funded by the government but surely that can’t be true in todays financial situation
@stretford972 It’s down to personal opinion in the end. I wouldn’t put a great deal between them, but as I said Alonso had a better season than Carrick. Carrick didn’t have a bad season but Alonso probably had his best in English football, hence why RM are buying him. Pretty sure if people were going to be honest a majority of people would choose Alonso over Carrick (at this moment in time). Carricks passing is excellent but I don’t think he imposes himself on games enough at times, probably due to playing so deep and defensively. If he had Hargreaves by his side I think this would help him considerably, freeing him up and allowing him to have much more impact. Alonso on the otherhand had Masch, allowing him to push further up field and basically control everything.
I come from a family supporting Man United and I rate Michael Carrick
But I am sorry Alonso is a lot better. Carrick rarely shows up against the big teams and stamps his authority in the match but he is by no means a bad player, he’s great I just feel Alonso is better but this is just an opinion.
I think it’s a huge loss for Liverpool which is our gain! Goals can be replaced but they will lack the calming prescense in the middle this season…Mascherano held the fort and protected Alonso who in turn spread passes all over the place.
With Mascherano wanting to leave, Alonso off and them likely getting replaced by Poulsen and Aquilani…I don’t know how that ones gonna work.
Tony – They won’t get Poulsen AND Aquilani I wouldn’t think. Infact I would be surprised if they get anyone. With the Fat Spanish Waiter in charge of transfers he is bound to fuck it up. As someone else said I am very pleased to see him go, he was their best player last season and arguably the heartbeat of the team. His stats for his assists to Saint Stevie and ladyboy would be interesting. He was treated disgracefully , almost pushed out to make way for Gareth “I want to play champions league football” Barry.
The stats Scott shows are amazing actually, EIGHT times and once each against all top 5 clubs.
Tony Starks – I would rather lose Mascherano than Alonso.
vidic will get ya15
its true
they pump money into real
people come from all over to watch the “worlds best players” and spend money in madrid real didnt have the money to buy zidane so the government bought there training growd off them, they used that money to get zidane and trained there for free from that day on
No doubt he will be missed by Liverpool. If Barca manage to pry away mascherano then I honestly dont see them being a threat this season. Torres and Gerrard are the best players they have but its Mascherano who holds everything together for them.
its disgusting theyre allowed to get away with that
london wouldnt spend a penny to save us if we were in financial difficulties
but it just so happens we can win everything without a governmetn backing us
shows the gulf in class between united and Real Madrid
Looks like they’ll be getting Poulsen according to SSN, as he’s a defensive midfielder though I expect he’ll be backup for Mascherano? I can’t see them relying on Lucas to take Alonso’s place, read about Defour earlier on SS so I’m guessing it’ll either be him or Aquilani.
he made 5 assists last season in the prem, less than sg (10), kuyt (9), Benayoun (6) and the same as reirra and torres. So he wasnt the most (directly) creative player at lfc.
———Casillas(6ft 1)———
—-Arbeloa(6ft)—–Ramos(6ft)——Albiol(6ft 2)—-Torres(6ft)——–
—————-M. Diarra(6ft)———-Alonso(6ft)————-
—–Robben(5ft 11)——- RVN(6ft 2)——–Kaka(6ft 1)———–
———————CR(6ft 1)———————-
R.Madrid’ team is looking real good especially with Pellegrini preferring 4 attacker plus one fullback while keeping others in behind should give them good balance
Ooof just to add, just read on the Utd website about VDS being out for the first eight weeks due to a broken finger, huge chance for Foster now to prove himself and really establish himself as his successor.
@ Brando, if you think Alonso will not be missed is deluded. He offers fantastic technique under pressure or in tight spaces for a deep-lying midfielder, he is creative with his left & right foot, exceptional vision, intelligence, fantastic passing-range, brilliant ball-striking, set peice speciallist, penalty taker and good @ intercepting balls.
Personally your transition from defence to attacking midfielder will be damaged thus causing your defence to play long balls.
@jamie surely CR / Robben on right / left, Kaka in the middle and RVN up top?
Either way that it is looking rather good on paper, still wouldn’t call the defence top notch but attacking wise it’s right up there.
van der sar out for 8 weeks!!!!!! its on manutd.com
alonso finished 59th in the actim index kuyt finished 3rd, berbatov finished 4th, carlos tevez finished ??? outside the top 100, suppose there are some good players in the league such as titus bramble and matty taylor who both made it
http://www.manutd.com/default.sps?pagegid=%7BF9E570E6%2D407E%2D44BC%2D800F%2D4A3110258114%7D&newsid=6637325
nt the greatest news
oooo mister time for ben foster to step up, good luck kidda
@ Altonian, firstly you can get more from CR by playing on the shoulder of last defence than on the wing where dribbling wise he doesnt possess the best control like wise to weave in&out of defence plus he doesnt track back [CR best attribute is pace & ball striking]. Also pellegrini like mobility in his front 4 to stretch the backline to create space for the 2 DM to setup attacks
playing players that can cut in more advantageous for scoring purposes.
Just like Brazil or attacking teams, the reason while the concede so much is balance between attack & defence not bad defenders, they exposed to much. Pellegrini prides himself on creating balanced teams. Mamadou has tackling and pace while Alonso has technique and ball intercepting qualities [perfect mix]
bet fosters having a party right now..lol
like [Messi] wise to weave in&out of defence plus he doesnt track back. missin word
Possibly, it worked well against Arsenal but against Barcelona he did very little. It probably will work well in La Liga against most teams, against the top teams though he may well struggle, after all in his time at Man Utd I always felt wherever he played he barely ever performed in the big games. RVN will not play there though, that’s pretty much guaranteed.
didnt he injure cesc last year as well?
also scott…no photoshop carlos tevez’s shower injury competition yet? what gives!
RVN is the one that i am not 100% sure about bcuz Pelle like mobility in his front 4.
O no! VDS – that’s bad.. Now we have the terrible Kuszak as backup!
his big, his dutch, he dosent let in much….VAN DER SAR VAN DER SAR
if someone could help little ol GHTT out tomorrow
as ill be traviling to manchester tomorrow and a van der sar post will be wrote by the great scot the red can someoneone fill in for me and copy and paste emilys van der sar chant on to your comment
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8zHQD0CR1Y&
heres hoping this will work
or scott if you have an opening for a video attachment on your post
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8zHQD0CR1Y& ???????
You kind of forgot another match where someone got sent off against Liverpool. The team was Wigan and the player is one of our new acquisition: Antonio Valencia. Liverpool then came from behind to win the match.
Good stat!
ghtt i will if scot dont bud, do is it just that link (not being thick lol, its just am at work and it wont let me open youtube links, websense bullshit)
oh and enjoy your trip m8 don’t get to pissed up lol
nice one mate
couldnt let emily down
she’d find out
tough match tomorrow
it’ll be good to see how our second string keeper who ever he may be fairs out
cause the 2 didnt do themselves much favours in asia
but i have faith
haha! great stats scott
no i agree m8, defo time for foster to step up,
i always remember the game he played for watford against chelsea he was tremendous, if he can re coup that form he’ll be a top keeper for us, still think we should av thrown 9-10 million at given 6 or 7 years ago
surely VDS out for 8 weeks is a bigger news than Alonso wanting to leave Liverpool. It’s just Liverpool after all..
nowthe best GK in the world is out of 8 weeks. I am really concerned with this. Last season one of the main reason we won was VDS’ long shut out streak. And now we have him shut out of the game for 8 weeks!
i agree vds is good but feel the defence shouldn’t be forgotten vida rio and evans especially, think foster will be fine
Scholes was sent off for attempting a punch at Alonso at well… (unless you’re trying to mention undeserved sending offs only)
After last season I got the feeling that Liverpoo
got a lot of there opponents sent of so I did some checking and this is what I found out.
Liverpool
1 man u Vidic 13 sept anfield
2 Eve Cahill 27 sept goodison
3 man c Zabaleta 5 okt Manchester
4 Wigan valencia 18 okt anfield
5 arsenal Adebayor 21 Des Emirates
6 chelsea Lampard 1 feb anfield
7 man u Vidic 14 mars Old trafford
8 aston villa Fridel 22 mars anfield
9 Hull Folan 25 april KC Stadium
10 newcasle Barton 3 maí anfield
Manchester United
1 Stoke Wilkinson 26 Des Britania
2 WBA Robinson 27 Jan The hawtorns
Arsenal
1 West Ham Cole 26 okt Upton park
2 Portmouth Pamarot 2 maí fratton park
Everton
1 Chelsea Terry 22 Des Goodison
2 Newcastle Nolan 22 Feb St.James
3 West Ham Tomkins 16 Maí Goodison
You might want to double check to see if I’m right.
My source was http://www.premierleague.com
I did also check the times the teams did get red carded them self.
I don’t remember the exact number but I think it was something like this
Man. Utd 5 red
arenal 3
everton 1
liverpoo 0
Best regards
Mummi
Glory glory Man United
And here is a link showing the genius Poulsen in action. The one whom liverpool are reported to be signing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hp8Tb2gWwRo&NR=1
in the record^
good night all ive to be up and out and on a coach in 3 hours
glory glory man united and please
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8zHQD0CR1Y&
i bet the liverpudlians are losing their sleep now, and even if they can sleep, they will be having a nightmare where a big red devil comes haunting them eerily with words “here we come…the 19th.. the 19th… hahahhaha”
You can hardly blame those guys for wanting to go studs up, knee high through a scouser…
Fergie has wrote the dippers off already!
Fantastic opportunity for Ben.
October 5th 2008: City 2 – 3 Liverpool – but didn’t liverpool have like 9 men then…i’m sure they had a man down while they were chasing right ?
Alonso could be gone, and scousers might be looking fragile for the time being, but am more concerned for United. We failed to score against Bayern Munich in the Audi Cup, fair enough it was a friendly final, but just think about what can happen when we meet teams like Bayern, Real and others (Barça, Inter etc) in Champions League games…I still feel Fergie should bid for Ribery and Silva, consolidate the midfield and wrap up the signing saga for this season. A sterner test also awaiting us this Sunday, Community shield vs. Chelski, and they wont give us an easy time on the pitch
rite$h
i dont think the community shield is all that i\mp.the schedule is rubbish wen u look at the fact that there are international matches on 12th aug,premiership starts on 16 aug and again there are midweek matches on 18 and 19.
we were lacking creativity and sharpness but that will improve as the season goes.remember we have lost the focal point of the team in ronny so it may take time to adjust to a new style of play
i dont want us to go for ribery bcoz of the price and he wants to go to madrid but silva will be a good signing.lets see how he performs tonight .
as for the scousers,they are going for poulsen acc to sky sports and he is a shit player plus is 30 years old,so they will miss alonso
crooney
u got it wrong mate.
shitty had 10 men wen pablo zabaleta was sent off with lfool down 2-1.though liverppol too were down to 10 men bcoz skrtel was injured and all substitutions had been made.
Just been past the tevez poster and it’s no longer there I was thinkin either they’ve took it down because of fergies comments or there replacing it with a new one because of the red paint all over it!!
I have never looked at liverpools squaad that closely neither will i . But i though rafa never used xabi in a proper way. for me alonso is a greatplayer . this season like fergi said chelsea are more threat than liverpool.
RE:Drew Vader
I know what you mean about people (especially the dippers0 claiming the refs won the title for us.
Liverpool did in fact have the most players sent off against them, here are the full stats.
Man Utd :
penalties for 4
penalties against 5
players red carded 7
players sent off against Utd 2
—————————————————————————-
Liverpool:
penalties for 8
penalties against 2
players red carded 0
players sent off against Liverpool 8
—————————————————————————–
I think it’s fair to say if Utd had a fairer share of decisions Liverpool wouldn’t have got so close.
i like this site, that is all
nice stats here, mate !
especially when you think about that for example the red card for Lampard was overturned by the FA, because it wasn´t a tackle against Alonso.
Good to see that the dippers are losing just another key player
knightsmith
there are 2 sides to what you are saying
we were fortunate to get penalty against bolton at OT wen it was trip by ronny but in the course of the season these things level themselves out.we were unlucky not to get the penalty against everton in the semis of the FA Cup.vidic deserved to be sent off in matches against scousers as did rooney and scholes against fulham but one player who didnt was ronaldo in the derby wen i thought his first tackle on wright phillips was brilliant.
on the other hand ronaldo could have been sent off for reacting so many times in many games but was targetted especiaaly by steven taylor against newcastle and pogatez against borough.
so it levels itself,but liverpool got a lot of decisions their way especially when they were making comebacks at the start of last season and wen lampard was sent off against them in feb.
RE: alex is god
I agree with what you say, but it’s always the dippers that claim the refs are on our side.
I think the most amazing stat, is the one where the dippers are the only side in the premiership not to have a player red carded.
@UnitedOne
The greatest respect to the Ginger King, but Alonso never really had a hand in his sending off two season ago, Scholes acted a twat and tried to chin him.
Just lost his head and went, although it would be been well worth it if he had connected.
I’m glad this has happened, it means that even the Dippers hate Real Madrid now! They loved em until last week!
knightsmith
point accepted.surprise none of their player was sent off
we should not think too much into what the dippers say ,we all kno FSW is a liitle insane and a maniac so all he says is bunch of trash and none of it is true
The reason Real Madrid gets so much money, is that they have their own TV deal, whereas in England, the deal is put in place as a whole. E.g, a TV deal with United is worth 1B, so to with Real, but in England, that amount is put together with all the other teams and redistributed by percentage back to United. But in Spain, Real keeps all that 1B to themselves, that is the big difference. That is why you see alot more teams in Spain struggling with finances compared to English teams.
scott, there was 5 occasions, another when liverpool were 2-1 down at anfield to wigan, when our boy Antonio Valencia was sent off incorrectly, and liverpool ended up winning that game, total farce!
alonso going will make a difference to the dippers.he was a good creative player like pirlo.
poulsen who is coming in is a defensive midand they aldready have masch and lucas there
advantage united
Man u fan,but sad to see Alonso leaves,just don’t understand Real Mad rid,they seems to be buying all star players from other team.I don’t respect them even though if they were to become champion either in their own league or champion league,because most of the players are all end product of other teams not theirs,to them money rules…..I guest if Pele or Maradona, or even Bobby charlton still playing they might even buy them…..hhaaha low class team …….To me Man U rules,and EPL still the best…..salute to Chelsea,Arsenal & Liverpool
Don’t forget March 12 2007: Scholes sent off after being provoked by Alonso.
The fact that players got send off for pulling back last man, 2 yellow cards for stupid tackles is not the only reason why teams win match but how referees applied the rules fairer this year.
As for so many tackle on Alonso resulting in players being sent off was hardly the player fault that the other guy was not up to his standard and resulted in rash tackle.
Alonso will be missed but if he as a big a loss to Liverpool as Ronnie is to Utd is still to be seen whereas Ronnie was Utd main player for the last couple of season you can not say Alonso was Liverpool’s main man!
Do you think Chelsea is really Utd main competition this year? Moreover, that Liverpool will not challenge at all?
That’s not what I remember it for,Kings,although Scholes did try to punch him(he missed horribly,as I recall).Unexcusable offense that was by the Ginger Ninja.
JOHN O’SHEA!!!!
Hey Scott , you forgot the red card issued to Joey Barton for his tackle on Alonso at the latter stage of the season .
Benitez has no charisma or discernible personal skills, therefore it’s no surprise that he’s managed to alienate a fellow Spaniard at Liverpool…He’s a complete muppet and I find it hilarious that so many Liverpool fans back him to the hilt as some sort of footballing saviour…wake up, you’ll never win the title if you can’t keep a team together for more than two years. Next out: Javier Mascherano
only team not to have someone sent off last season…………………liverpool.
how the fuck does that happen
liverpool had no-one sent off last season……..how?????