Oh just lay off crouch will you

[Lennon]

Would Crouch have got into the England team if he was still playing for Southampton?

The answer to this question is exactly the same as the answer to wether he should be in the England team or not.

[communistworkethic]

Would Crouch have got into the England team if he was still playing for Southampton?

The answer to this question is exactly the same as the answer to wether he should be in the England team or not.

er possibly.

[Lennon]

er possibly.

Bugger. I was thinking 'no'.

[americantrotter]

I think he did get into the squad that way. He had just finished the season with 16 goals and they took him to the states. Now though he hasnt scored i ages and there must be better players than that available. Beattie has even put a few in this year.

[Eborted]

Crouch - value £7m: Liverpool - 6th/7th/8th???
Davies - feck all and a pie: Bolton - 3rd

you have forgot the mammoth 1 goal that Davies has scored!

ffs - DAVIES does so much more for us than score goals. As a striker the 'goals for' column should be all that matters, but Davies is crucial to our system of play. Davies is one of the reasons why we score so many goals from our wide positions and from deep midfield. If Sven was looking for a goal-a-game striker he wouldn't be anywhere near the vicinity of Crouch. He wants a target man who can hold up the ball, head crosses and long passes, and lay-it off to other attackers and midfield players. Thats why he keeps picking Crouch. In my opinion Davies is far better at this than beanpole Crouch. Now stop trying to make a complicated discussion simple just so you can feel involved.......

it could be argued that Crouch does more than score goals, as i say apparently hes been playing well for liverpool this year, also in regards to your other posts its not as if im shouting "you fat bastard" as soon as Davies picks up the ball, you call crouch a beanpole yet if i were to make word on Davies's weight i'd be branded "immature" your all hypocrites i think ive issued one rant about Davies which collectivly summarises why i don't like him and think hes pretty crap, it doesn'tt border on pathetic neither is it pathetic, it included important points why he shouldn't play for us, it seems like im being targeted coz i don't like one player, get off his dick, belieave you me, i only mentioned him in this post coz of the similarity between the two players, you always hark on about crouch not getting enough goals (and frankly for the people who think he shouldn't have been picked last season, you'd have taken your own lives if davies or another player of ours had got 16 and not be picked, the other thing is he did at southhampton a club that were relegated) yet you always excuse Davies for it, i admit crouch doesn't deserve an english place this year (read my first post) but most of you hate crouch with some passion yet love davies its hypocrisy.

[Bench]

Its not hypocrisy. Its called football fandom.

Davies plays for Bolton. Hence why most Bolton supporters love him.

Couch does not. Crouch now plays for Liverpool. Crouch gets picked for England with little merit other than he plays for Liverpool. Hence why most football fans (with the exception of Liverpool fans) take the piss out of him and call him 'beanpole', 'lanky get' and 'freak' to name but sum.

If you recall most Bolton fans hated Diouf after his various incidents with Liverpool. Strangely most Bolton fans now love the guy because he is a Bolton player.

You'd do well to remember that Davies is also a Bolton player.

And if you called Davies a 'fat bastard' then I wouldn't call you immature. He can be a bit portly at times. But I do recall you called him a 'c*nt' for the simple reason you didn't like him. That, my friend, is immature.

[Steady]

Beattie has even put a few in this year.

2 I think. Please don't suggest Beattie should play for England, its rude.....

[plodder]

Peter Crouch + £7m= Joke

Eborted= Idiot.

See some things do add up.

what a great point *applauds*

Oh, you want a valid reasoned debate about the merits of Peter Crouch.

Well for that I'll let all the others do that.

My view is really simple, 'pool won something. Benitez tactically inept clueless muppet that he is, got someone to read to him the inform guide of English footballers, he hears that Peter Crouch was being considered for the England set-up. Found a few million lying around the anfield dressing room after Chelsea had visited, and bought him.

Only problem with that was the form guide was the centre pages of dogs weekly, he won coming out of trap 4 at Catsford. There is no chance in hell Peter Crouch will make it as a regular international. He has not the skill. Target men need something other that being 7' tall. Fair play to the guy, he is set up for life now. Milk whatever he gets from both 'pool and England. But lay-off him. No bother.

He'll provide his own ammunition for everyone to shoot him down.

[Eborted]

Its not hypocrisy. Its called football fandom.

Davies plays for Bolton. Hence why most Bolton supporters love him.

Couch does not. Crouch now plays for Liverpool. Crouch gets picked for England with little merit other than he plays for Liverpool. Hence why most football fans (with the exception of Liverpool fans) take the piss out of him and call him 'beanpole', 'lanky get' and 'freak' to name but sum.

If you recall most Bolton fans hated Diouf after his various incidents with Liverpool. Strangely most Bolton fans now love the guy because he is a Bolton player.

You'd do well to remember that Davies is also a Bolton player.

And if you called Davies a 'fat bastard' then I wouldn't call you immature. He can be a bit portly at times. But I do recall you called him a 'c*nt' for the simple reason you didn't like him. That, my friend, is immature.

Okay i know more people will like Davies more than crouch, but hwoever that still does not justify the calls for Davies for England, ahead of him, also in my humble opinion i think fat bastard is more offensive than c*nt as c*nt is just a random throwaway by calling him a fat bastard your actually picking up on one of his negative attributes wheather its more immature lets not debate that. I belieave Crouch will end this season with more goals than Davies (unless he gets injured) and if opta hold stats for this he will have more assists.

[H. Pedersen]

My view is really simple, 'pool won something. Benitez tactically inept clueless muppet that he is, got someone to read to him the inform guide of English footballers, he hears that Peter Crouch was being considered for the England set-up. Found a few million lying around the anfield dressing room after Chelsea had visited, and bought him.

Benitez really is bafflingly bad. Tactically yes, but more importantly, you'd think that with a Champions League trophy in his cabinet he'd be able to do better than Peter Crouch, particularly considering how much money he spent. Crouch is going to be the next Tore Andre Flo. Benitez really seems to know nothing about the football world outside of Spain, and all of Spain's best players want to play for Madrid anyway.

[Soldier_Of_The_White_Army]

Okay i know more people will like Davies more than crouch, but hwoever that still does not justify the calls for Davies for England, ahead of him, also in my humble opinion i think fat bastard is more offensive than c*nt as c*nt is just a random throwaway by calling him a fat bastard your actually picking up on one of his negative attributes wheather its more immature lets not debate that. I belieave Crouch will end this season with more goals than Davies (unless he gets injured) and if opta hold stats for this he will have more assists.

Should you run a poll (please dont) I am sure you will find 90%+ will vote that cxnt is one of the worse things you can ever call someone.

Calling someone a fat bxstard, inticates that the person in question is fat, calling someone a cxnt has no foundation as you have falled to explain WHY you believe Davies to be one.

Should you explain why Davies should come under the title cxnt then I will publically stand correct and appologise.

[50sQuiff]

My view is really simple, 'pool won something. Benitez tactically inept clueless muppet that he is, got someone to read to him the inform guide of English footballers, he hears that Peter Crouch was being considered for the England set-up. Found a few million lying around the anfield dressing room after Chelsea had visited, and bought him.

Benitez really is bafflingly bad. Tactically yes, but more importantly, you'd think that with a Champions League trophy in his cabinet he'd be able to do better than Peter Crouch, particularly considering how much money he spent. Crouch is going to be the next Tore Andre Flo. Benitez really seems to know nothing about the football world outside of Spain, and all of Spain's best players want to play for Madrid anyway.

I thought Flo was a very good player. Crouch however, is most certainly not.

[hisroyalgingerness]

apparently before the villa game he ran up to graeme taylor in the stands and said in his best posh southern voice

"thanks for all the kind things you said in the press. i appreciate them"

bless

[blurred]

Suppose I should reply on this being the token Liverpool fan on the forum.

Peter Crouch hasn't scored this season. This is something of an inescapable fact, especially for Liverpool fans and those in the media who like to shit stir. But it is all very easy to watch a 5 minute potted version of Liverpool versus Aston Villa, see him miss a header and say 'well, he's not worth that money, is he?'. The thing is, we all do that week in and week out. We get pissed off when people slate our team's players and yet we are guilty of the same errors ourselves. Personally, I always try to qualify my opinions (on pretty much anything, but especially football). Is it my nature? Probably. But there is a great deal of space in this world for people who have opinions and who can back them up. I take substance over style any day of the week. Thus when some Fleet Street hack decides he's got a clever pun about Peter Crouch being tall and rubbish and he'll sound really witty and clever to all his journo mates if he uses it, he'll use it, irrespective of its merit.

Now I've got a season ticket at Anfield (I've only managed Boro and Spurs away thus far, though) and I have to say that I'll stick up for Peter Crouch, much as if I started slagging off Nolan or Davies or any one of your players. To be fair to him, he's played about a dozen games (tops) and hasn't quite found his feet. Is that natural for a young English player who has moved from being a big fish in a small pond to the rather large pond of the European Champions? Have his performances (shots on goal aside) been poor? I would say that they haven't. In the Champions League game against Chelsea I thought he had a fantastic game (comparative to the excitement being offered elsewhere) and I thought he proved himself more than useful against United at home as well. Even against Villa this weekend where he was used as a late substitute, he came on, made a nuisance of himself, won a penalty, had a clear-cut chance (which he admittedly missed) and was there to in effect create our second by originally making the run and then having his shot blocked which fell to the feet of Xabi on the edge of the box. Would any other team be happy about a player coming on and having that much of an impact in a game away from home when you were drawing 0-0 with 20 minutes to go? I should say so.

As is often said of Crouch, he is there to provide variation. Rafa has come out and said that he will use Crouch/Cisse depending upon the type of defence of the opposition. Villa are a team that defend high up the pitch and, thus, are more susceptible to Cisse's pace behind them, as was shown by a couple of decent chances in the first half and numerous breaks in the second. When Rafa felt that a change was needed, he had Crouch there. I could postulate that had Baros been the sub on the bench at Villa Park that we would not have won that game, as he offers nothing of real difference to Cisse in terms of his pacey, running at defenders style of play.

To all those who knock Crouch - have a look at him. Watch him for 90 minutes (or as much as is reasonably possible). Try and form your own opinion of him and not be led by a media witch hunt. Now I appreciate that other Liverpool fans have different opinions to myself, and they are entitled to them and can justify them as they see fit, but for people to slag him off without seeing him, or for seeing but a snatch of him, is unfair - the problem is, though, that it happens all across the land to all players of all teams. Let's qualify our opinions, eh? Won't that make the world a better place?

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

How many assists has he had?

I don't mind him as a bit of a wildcard and a player that offers a few more 'possibilities'.

But £7million?

As an aside, do you think he has a detrimental effect on Liverpool's play when he is on the pitch, as finding him in the air starts to look like the easy option rather than playing it out of defence etc?

[50sQuiff]

I'm not sure it says a great deal about Crouch's all-round game that not only does he struggle to score, but he features in a team that struggles to score in general. We see Kevin Davies playing an absolutely integral role in practically every Bolton game and he's usually involved in most of the goals we score at some point. And we are a team that consistently scores goals (well, usually one) regardless of the opposition.

I don't rate Crouch as a target man and nobody rates him as a goalscorer, the question most non-Liverpool fans are asking is why on earth is he in the England team? What has he possible done to deserve this.. apart from play for Liverpool? I don't subscribe to the tabloid witch-hunt agenda and I'm not keen to stereotype Crouch as a useless beanpole but his wholly unjustified selection for England has generated a lot of rancour. If he's not a target man, what is this extra dimension he brings to England?

He comes across as a very personable guy and contrary to the hyperbole I've previously posted, he's not a particularly bad player. However John Hartson was a more effective player. That says it all surely?

[H. Pedersen]

I don't mind him as a bit of a wildcard and a player that offers a few more 'possibilities'.

But £7million?

I think that's the real point here. It may not always seem like it in this Chelsea-inflated football world of ours, but £7 million is a lot of money for any one player. Sure, when people are spending £25 million on mildly-above-average players like Drogba and Essien, £7 for Crouch is reasonable. But consider that for less than £7 million, we got Diouf, AND Speed, AND Ben Haim, AND Borgetti, and probably Nakata and Faye too. I think every one of those players will make more of an impact than Crouch this year. And all six of them put together will clearly be worth more than Crouch alone. Benitez has got to stop being so profligate. He doesn't have the bottomless resources of Chelsea. He's going to need results to keep the money flowing, but dumping huge chunks of money into bench players is hardly the way to get them.

[warthog]

I don't mind him as a bit of a wildcard and a player that offers a few more 'possibilities'.

But £7million?

I think that's the real point here. It may not always seem like it in this Chelsea-inflated football world of ours, but £7 million is a lot of money for any one player. Sure, when people are spending £25 million on mildly-above-average players like Drogba and Essien, £7 for Crouch is reasonable.

Call it a fiver and we'll take him.

[hisroyalgingerness]

I don't mind him as a bit of a wildcard and a player that offers a few more 'possibilities'.

But £7million?

I think that's the real point here. It may not always seem like it in this Chelsea-inflated football world of ours, but £7 million is a lot of money for any one player. Sure, when people are spending £25 million on mildly-above-average players like Drogba and Essien, £7 for Crouch is reasonable.

Call it a fiver and we'll take him.

granted chelsea are paying above the odds for players but nobody else is being forced into inflated prices (madrid must be pissing themselves) and £7m for crouch was a waste. i said when we were interested that i believed £2m for him would be reasonable

[bobo the clown]

Harry Rednapp said, when Liverpool paid £7m that he'd had only had half a season of truly good form & that, if anyone had gone for him a year earlier S'ton would have gladly taken £700k let alone £7m.

But, simple facts are that money to the likes of Liverpool isn't what it is to us. If they were willing to pay £7m, more fool them.