[Archived] Is There Only Me And Mr Warnock Laughing Today

[waggy]

i must admit i agreed with warnock when he hoped united and liverpoo lost there cup finals,there disregard off the premiership was disgusting,in my eyes foolham should have been relegated but for liverpoo's weakened team,when they played them.the premier league must start making teams play there strongest teams, a points deduction system will soon make the big 4 or 5 take note.

[ElTwis]

i must admit i agreed with warnock when he hoped united and liverpoo lost there cup finals,there disregard off the premiership was disgusting,in my eyes foolham should have been relegated but for liverpoo's weakened team,when they played them.the premier league must start making teams play there strongest teams, a points deduction system will soon make the big 4 or 5 take note.

I disagree, with modern day football being the way it is the top clubs are fighting on at least 3 fronts. Squad rotation is a must when players are closing in on having played 60 games towards the end of a season with, say, a champions league final approaching! Even Rovers have rested players this year, would it be fair for us to be deducted points?

[waggy]

one or two a game is ok,but both utd and liverpoo have rested,6-7-8-9- players before and after big games,every team should put a team out to win games,is it sheff utd's fault they played liverpoo at home the 1st game off the season,when liverpoo think they have a chance off winning the league,or is it right that foolham play them,when they have qualified for the champions league final, and benitzes rest's 9 players.

[Hasta]

As I mentioned last time this was discussed Waggy, I can see where you're coming from but disagree. The only reason that the Liverpool players were left out is to either keep them fresh for, or to stop them getting injured before, the Champions League final. Rafa Benitez has a responsibility to his board and shareholders, himself, his players and his fans to do the best for Liverpool. On both a playing and financial level, the best was winning, the Champions League.

Had Warnock been manager of Liverpool I believe he would have done exactly the same thing. Also, had Rovers been in the Champions League final and Hughes had left players out at Fulham, I very much doubt whether you'd be disgusted in us and calling for a points deduction.

[thenodrog]

Rafa Benitez has a responsibility to his board and shareholders, himself, his players and his fans to do the best for Liverpool. On both a playing and financial level, the best was winning, the Champions League.

I disagree strongly with you Hasta. The board fans and players at Lpool and everywhere else for that matter have a responsibility to the Premier League first and foremost! In the 70's when teams like LUFC and Lpool held sway they would often play over 60 games a season regularly (42 1st div games fora start) yet they dared not field a weakened team for the very real fear of a points deduction.

I can just imagine the sh1t that would eminate from MU if BRFC for example had fielded a weakened team against Chelsea because it was some European match the following Thursday.... or vice-versa. We'd be on a charge before you could say Jack Robinson! I guess the big prob for the authorities is that most teams now have a squad that has international players right through.

Unfortunately in this brave new prem world so many of the old values are being sacrificed on the alter of the green eyed God.

[waggy]

THE PREMIERSHIP is the most important trophy off the season,to most clubs surviving/gaining promotion to the premiership is a big enough achievement.just because a team,has no chance of winning the trophy,they should not be allowed to play there 2nd eleven .

playing there weakened teams did not help either liverpoo or utd,it may well have handicapped them on there road to glory.i honestly believe the premiership must look at the so called resting off players,with so much money to be earned from premiership survival,the clubs owe it to one another to put there 1st team out.

[tcj_jones]

Squad rotation is simply part of football. You have to keep your best players at their fittest for the more important games. It might not have been in the past, but it certainly is now. Fitness is a far more important part of the game then it was in the 70's. If Liverpool, or any other team for that matter, want to field a weakened team and risk finishing with less points in the Premiership, then I consider that to be their perogative. Benitez's team selection was not part of some conspiracy to relegate a particular team, so I just don't see a problem.

[Rovers_4_life]

If Liverpool have nothing to play for in the league why should they be forced to worsen their prospects in other competitions? Every club has priorities and these are different. Why should clubs tell other clubs which competitions are more important? Its just down to luck of the fixtures computer, Sheff Utds season wasnt all about the Fulham - Liverpool game, there was 38 games for them to get enough points, they didnt so went down.

[daren]

And if the original poster had bothered watching any of those games, they'd know that it's a miracle that the lower team one. In the Fulham-Liverpool game particularly, Liverpool should have scored 5 or 6. If you've got a large squad you have to rotate, or players get unhappy and move on. There was no drop in quality for Liverpool (they just did an Arsenal and couldn't score which has been a problem all season). Same for ManUre West Ham, United were desperately unlucky not to score, and Tevez scored with the one opportunity.

It happens, get over it. It's like saying "It's unfair that west ham got to play Blackburn when Nelsen, Ooijer, Samba and Warnock weren't available." It's just the way things go. Sheffield United got what they deserved, by not playing particularly well for most of the season. Remember that they could have stayed up on the last day irrelevant of results elsewhere.

[Neil Weaver]

Agree with daren and jonesy, in these days of squads some of them that don't get regular run outs have to play a few games. Remember our side that went to Everton in the Cup in early Jan? Hardly a full strength 11.......

Brad Friedel

Andre Ooijer

Zurab Khizanishvili

Andy Todd

James McEveley

David Bentley

Aaron Mokoena

Tugay Kerimoglu

Morten Gamst Pedersen

Paul Gallagher

Matt Derbyshire

[Presty On Tour]

Agree with daren and jonesy, in these days of squads some of them that don't get regular run outs have to play a few games. Remember our side that went to Everton in the Cup in early Jan? Hardly a full strength 11.......

still a 4-1 victory was a tidy feat

[thenodrog]

If Liverpool, or any other team for that matter, want to field a weakened team and risk finishing with less points in the Premiership, then I consider that to be their perogative. Benitez's team selection was not part of some conspiracy to relegate a particular team, so I just don't see a problem.

If Liverpool have nothing to play for in the league why should they be forced to worsen their prospects in other competitions? Every club has priorities and these are different. Why should clubs tell other clubs which competitions are more important? Its just down to luck of the fixtures computer,

Ethically you two are way off the mark imo and well down the road to match fixing.

[USRoverME]

Match-fixing? are you insane? (well we all know the answer that that question, but..)

If they played a squad of 6 year olds (or those 12 year old cheerleaders from the other thread) that had no business being in the prem, then I might agree with points deductions... but Liverpool's "weaked" sides were still 'prem quality' sides. How many player on that Liverpool side don't belong in the prem? How many of them would have to go find work in a Championship side if they were let go by 'pool?

They should have beaten Foolham, in all honesty, they missed too chances. I guess if that's true we should get decucted points for all of Nonda's misses this season. Also, ManU fielded a weakened starting side against W.Ham. Why no outcry there? Why no outcry at the ugly match between ManU and Chelsea after the title was decided, that's still a competitive game? Why no cry about Liverpool playing basically the same squad (but with the 1st team keeper not the backup) the week before against Pompey? After all pompey still had European hopes in the balance at the time, and that directly affected us.

"Weakened" sides are a part of the game. You can whine and cry about modern football not being the game it was when TVs were Black and White, but its just sounds like sour grapes to me, and someone who hates any form of change.

[M-K]

Didn't Warnock rest some of his own players against Man Utd this season because he had a game against a relegation rival coming up? And didn't Sheff Utd benefit from Liverpool resting some of their players for the Champs League?

[Roar of the Rover]

Its upto Rafa which team he wants to put on, he put a team on that he thought were capable of getting a result againts Fulham but they never, thats football.

[Dazzi]

At the end of the day you still have to beat the team in front of you.

[thenodrog]

Match-fixing? are you insane? (well we all know the answer that that question, but..)

Never mind me insane are you stupid? (well we all know the answer that that question, but..) ..... Given the money swilling around the prem next season, given current bung allegations made against already extremely well paid managers, given the Italian scandals, and given the excuse that Liverpool had with CL involvement and MU with the FA Cup final would it be too impossible for 'representatives' of Fayed or Gollum to have slipped a relative of Rafa /Fergie a nice wedge into some foreign bank account to simply NOT select their first team?

The only safe way is for the FA to take a very dim view of 'weakened' teams in the form of points deductions for obvious or repeated offences.

[American]

If Adebayor wasn't so inept at finishing, it would have cost Liverpool 3rd place (Rafa's highest finish). It would be one thing if it was the week before the final, but it was 3 weeks - big difference.

Warnock was quoted at the time saying that what Rafa did was 10 times more disgraceful than what WHU did.

[Hasta]

Never mind me insane are you stupid? (well we all know the answer that that question, but..) ..... Given the money swilling around the prem next season, given current bung allegations made against already extremely well paid managers, given the Italian scandals, and given the excuse that Liverpool had with CL involvement and MU with the FA Cup final would it be too impossible for 'representatives' of Fayed or Gollum to have slipped a relative of Rafa /Fergie a nice wedge into some foreign bank account to simply NOT select their first team?

The only safe way is for the FA to take a very dim view of 'weakened' teams in the form of points deductions for obvious or repeated offences.

Very little is 'too impossible' in football Drog. However it is unlikely a coincidence that the two teams accused of fielding weakened teams are also the two teams that were in the FA cup and Champions League final.

If there is to be a case for punishment against the teams involved them that is down to the point that Waggy makes that it is unfair on the teams at the bottom. However nobody anywhere in football believes that either Utd or Liverpool took backhanders to field weakend teams to fix the matches. Your post is the first time I have heard of such a 'conspiracy theory' despite reading the boards of the relegated sides at the time they went down. (I appreciate you are being hypothetical)

I go back to my original closing few sentances earlier. Had Warnock (or Coleman) been manager of Liverpool or United I believe he would have done exactly the same thing. Also, had Rovers been in the Champions League final and Hughes had left players out at Fulham, I very much doubt whether you'd be disgusted in us and calling for a points deduction.

I do feel that most people objecting just see this as a chance to 'bash member of the big four'.

[ihateburnley]

bash your member with the big four and thumb

Err, there's no need for that.

Mods?

[thenodrog]

I do feel that most people objecting just see this as a chance to 'bash member of the big four'.

I still say that to allow the fielding of weakened teams willy nilly will open a Pandora's box of dodgy dealing, insinuation and accusation. How about 12 years ago if Lpool or God forbid West Ham had fielded a weakened team on the last day of the season and lost simply because they might have been in the FA cup final the week after? Would people on here be as understanding as they appear to be now when it doesn't concern BRFC?

[Eddie]

Manager's should be allowed to pick their team, they don't play in competitions for the sake of the other sides. I also saw agree with a comment I saw on TV the other day where they were saying how the top sides have squad rotation throughout the season, but will you only get upset about them "resting" players when it comes to crunch time? Also, to be fair to United they fielded a pretty strong team for the last game of the season when it meant nothing to them.

[philipl]

This is a moral and technical minefield:

- when is an injury an injury and a minor knock an excuse?

- when is a team picked from a squad the best one to do a job on the opponents? (you could argue Raffa fielded a weakened team against AC Milan). I'll never forget a much-changed team King Kenny picked at Loftus Road in 93/4 had me believing Kenny had lost his marbles when it was read out- we won 3-0 and it was clearly a case of doing the job.

- when do you blood youngsters?

When the Liverpool team was made public for the Fulham game I remember thinking thank goodness we were not down there being subject to those sort of lottery selections by managers who didn't care anything about the league's integrity.

After seeing the game, I just concluded that Fulham got very lucky on the pitch.

[thenodrog]

Exactly right Gunner. As I said earlier if WHU had played a weakened team and lost to MU in 95 we'd never have won the title and MU (or some betting organisation in the far east) would have been accused of bribery. The opinions on here would be very different thats for sure!

Also, to be fair to United they fielded a pretty strong team for the last game of the season when it meant nothing to them.

Yeah... right. With Giggs, Rooney, Vidic and Ronaldo starting on the bench?

Sorry but anything other than picking the strongest team with no more than one or two rested with the old excuse of 'taking a knock in training' is wide open to corruption and I'm suprised so many on here cannot grasp that simple fact. Utd would surely have played their strongest team if it had sent City / Lpool / Arsenal down, their fans would have demanded it.

To his credit the only time I've known Hughes ever play anything other than his strongest team is in cup competitions when it does not interfere with other teams.

[DaveyB]

There are two points here:

Firstly, all teams do it. Everyone rests players at certain times in the season, when it's in the best interests of their team. As has already been pointed out Sheff Utd chose to rest players at Old Trafford because they had a game against Charlton coming up a few days later - no one seems to be concerned that that may have cost Chelsea the title. Or does it only apply if it's one of the big clubs??

Secondly, a rule forbidding it would be unenforceable. Who's to say what your best team is? Is fielding an unknown reserve team striker (Derbyshire) ahead of a proven international (Nonda) fielding a weakened team? Maybe to everyone outside of BRFC.

Also it must be fairly easy to fake a few injuries if you really needed/wanted to rest players - look at how Giggs managed to get out of playing friendlies for Wales all these years!!

Finally, having lived in Sheffield for the last 8 years and having read and seen all the local media during that time, as well as having met Mr. Warnock on a couple of occasions, I have come to the conclusion that he is a grade A prick. He claims to be a Sheff Utd fan, but he is nothing other than a Neil Warnock fan. Everytime he gets the opportunity to say something contraversial he takes it - not because he's straight forward and tells it like it is, but because he knows that it will put him in the limelight, giving him the attention that he so clearly craves. This is just one of his many attempts at whoring himself in the media.