01 Sep 2015 18:38:20
Seeing Illori has gone on loan with possibly an option to buy and the first thought is why would we possibly do that? But before going nuts about how wrong it is let's consider this -
The majority of the fans might think he should be playing for us right now but the club don't. There is a reason for this. It might be a rubbish reason and he turns out to be excellent for West Brom or there might be something we're not privy to. Is he disruptive, lazy or something else entirely.
Instead of going nuts, isn't it worth waiting to see how this pans out?
01 Sep 2015 19:01:29
Maybe because he is one of the players some are asking BR to take a chance on instead of playing Lovren every damn game.
If there are no alternatives his favourite project can't be dumped from the team.
Seriously, how much worse does Lovren and Skrtel have to play to no longer be deemed first choice CB's?
They would both be at the end of my list of players that I would play at CB before them- the list would look something like:
Sakho
Gomez
Ilori
Can
Henderson
Benteke
Sturridge
Skrtel
Lovren
01 Sep 2015 19:23:46
Ilori wouldn't do worse than our current centre backs. The kid deserves a chance on merit. This deal shows BR has the intimate and complete control on transfers.
01 Sep 2015 21:58:10
It's just silly. Rodgers basically signed Illori to replace Skrtel and then ended up changing his mind on Skrtel and keeping him. He's done stuff like this so many bloody times at this stage that I'm starting to lose track of it.
That being said, I don't think it actually matters who we play at center back anymore because they haven't been coached & instructed properly since Steve Clarke left the club and will all mistakes. Skrtel & Lovren will make mistakes. Sakho & Toure will make mistakes. Gomez will if we use him. So would Illori if we'd kept him and given a chance. I thought we might be improving it with O'Driscoll and Rodgers' claim that he's paying more attention to defensive coaching, but both Skrtel and Lovren were horribly poor against West Ham, following from last season where they averaged a mistake a game. As did Sakho & Can.
If we were able to go back in time to 2003 or 2004 and get Sami Hyypia at his peak, I bet he'd look rubbish after a couple of months playing in this team.
I hope I have to eat my words on the foregoing, but I suspect I won't.
01 Sep 2015 23:18:59
Something, I agree with your post in part. But mistakes happen which is why you have preseason to foster a complimentary partnership to minimize the mistakes. BR has no clue about defensive football. If he did, he wouldn't tolerate Dumb and Dumber and their recurrent mistakes. But they don't care because they know he will pick them again. Terry and Cahill haven't made that many mistakes yet Mou wants them to improve or rot on the bench. Sahko and Toure must be asking what needs to happen before they can get a game? BR will play both vs Utd again barring a miracle and we will see the outcome.