When the wheel of time has passed five years, klopp has worked hard to build Liverpool, which finally surprised Europe with its gorgeous attack and steady defense. In 20 19, they won the champions league again after a lapse of 14. In the 20 19/20 season, they rode the dust in the Premier League and established a huge integral advantage early. Liverpool's first Premier League title is just around the corner! So can Steven Gerrard at his peak occupy a place in such a near-perfect team? To discuss this topic, we should start with the story of Steven Gerrard and Liverpool.
The teenager wearing Everton's blue jersey in this photo is steven gerrard, who was only 7 years old. The reason why he wore the jersey of Liverpool's arch-enemy Everton was because of his uncle Leslie's prank. Leslie is a die-hard fan of Everton. He won a prize in a prize-winning competition initiated by Everton, so he got the opportunity to take a photo with the two championship trophies that Everton won that year. However, Leslie chose Gerald to take pictures, and I don't know whether it was intentional or unintentional. In short, when Leslie sent this photo to Gerrard's father badly, Gerrard's father, a die-hard Liverpool fan, was furious. He yelled hysterically at his son, "Liverpool! Liverpool! Only Liverpool! "
Gerrard, who was influenced by his father since childhood, finally entered Liverpool youth training. When he was only a teenager, he showed different characteristics from his peers. For example, when he practiced with the first team, he dared to shovel paul ince to the ground and couldn't get up. Then he looked down at Ince and said, "Get up and stop pretending!" According to Gerrard himself, "breaking the ball is my instinctive reaction to adrenaline, and it makes me sick to see the ball under someone else's feet." Gerrard was playing in the backcourt. He is full of energy, running all over the field and not afraid of any opponent.
1998, Gerrard 18 years old entered the Liverpool first team. 165438+ 10 In October, Gerrard made his debut against Blackburn in Liverpool. A year later, 1999, 12, Gerrard scored the first goal of his Liverpool career against Xie on Wednesday. In the midfield position, he will do his best to sweep the midfield in every game, persevering, and he will not easily let go of the occasional offensive opportunity.
If Manchester United's Class 92 reached its peak in history at 1999, then the peak of the golden generation of Liverpool was the five-time champion Ye Wei in 2000/0 1 season. It was this season that Steven Gerrard established his starting position at Liverpool. He made 50 appearances and scored 10, which helped Liverpool win the English Charity Shield, FA Cup and Carling Cup.
But during this time, one of Gerrard's shortcomings has also been exposed. He fouls and eats cards too easily. Maybe it's because he wants Gerrard to take on more responsibilities and think more calmly when playing football, or maybe it's because he takes a fancy to his innate leadership temperament. On June 6th, 2003, Liverpool manager Gerard Houllier handed the captain's armband to a 23-year-old young man. Gerrard has since become the flag of the Red Army. As the legendary Arsenal star Henry later said, "For me, Gerrard is Liverpool".
Gerrard seems to have a natural temperament of leadership. He always sets an example and makes selfless contributions. Of course, the most important thing is that when the team is in crisis, he can always stand up! June 5438+February 2004, the final round of the Champions League group match, Liverpool against Olympiacos. In the case of losing a goal first, Liverpool need to chase three goals in a row to qualify for the group. It was not until the 80th minute that Liverpool scored the second goal. Who can stand up? Who can make the final decision? Liverpool legends and fans are calling for Steven Gerrard, and Steven Gerrard has not let the fans down. He scored a Gerrard-style long-range shot in the 88th minute of the game, which finally helped Liverpool break through. This goal is absolutely priceless. In a word: "Without this goal, there will be no miracle in Istanbul!"
Istanbul night, I believe all fans are familiar with it and don't want to repeat it. I just want to mention three moments in this game. First of all, Steven Gerrard was the third culprit for Liverpool to concede a goal in the 44th minute of the first half. At that time, Steven Gerrard's midfield direct pass was cut off and was instantly countered by AC Milan. Kaka got the ball and passed it directly to Crespo to score. Gerrard's expression is simply annoyed. The second moment was eight minutes after the start of the second half, and Gerrard finally completed the redemption. He headed into the net in the penalty area and tied the score to 1-3, thus blowing the horn of counterattack. After the goal, Gerrard got up exaggeratedly and inspired his teammates with his arms.
The third moment was when Liverpool beat AC Milan on penalties to win the Champions League trophy. Steven Gerrard kissed Alonso after holding the trophy as captain, which really made me drunk.
In my opinion, the miracle of Istanbul is not only a miracle of Liverpool, not only a miracle of football, but also a miracle of all mankind! It's just that the great potential of mankind to create miracles has been released through Liverpool's playing football. No impossible task, no impossible reversal, anything is possible! In the song "You will never walk alone", Gerrard is the leader who led the team to create miracles in eight minutes!
As the longest captain in Liverpool's history, Gerrard won 1 Champions League, 1 UEFA Cup, 2 European Super Cups, 2 FA Cups, 3 League Cups, 1 Charity Shield Cup and 1 Community Shield Cup for Liverpool in 17, but the number of Premier League champions. This is the pain of Steven Gerrard's life, and it must be the time when he went to the bone marrow in the final stage of the 20 13/20 14 season.
In the 20 13/20 14 season, Gerrard was the closest to the Premier League champion. The combination of Suarez, Sturridge and Coutinho is in full swing in the front line. In midfield, Gerrard changed to play in the midfield this season and successfully completed the role of offensive dispatcher. Single-season 14 assists also put him at the top of the Premier League assists list.
However, in the key match against Chelsea in the penultimate round, Gerrard made a super-super-huge mistake, which made all his efforts go to waste. At the last minute of the first half, Gerrard accidentally slipped in the middle of the game and strode with his long legs to complete the fatal blow. Steven Gerrard's fall completely shattered Liverpool's first Premier League title dream. Steven Gerrard's fall made Suarez cry like a child after losing the Premier League title, which also strengthened his determination to leave Anfield. Steven Gerrard's downfall prevented his Liverpool career from ending satisfactorily. Gerrard's fall broke the hearts of all Liverpool fans. Gerrard, who was extremely depressed, said with emotion, "This note will accompany me for the rest of my life."
In the last game of Steven Gerrard's Liverpool career, Zhan Jun, a famous football commentator and Liverpool fan, said a classic sentence like this: "Steven Gerrard once fell, and he slipped. He set an own goal and made a mistake in returning the ball. You can laugh at him, but he is a symbol of loyalty. Those mistakes are the moments when he fell from the clouds to the world. Let's see, look at Gerald, and think about yourself. Maybe it was these people who landed on the earth.
Yes, Steven Gerrard has been mythologized by Liverpool fans. He is the perfect captain in the hearts of Liverpool fans. In fact, Gerrard is not as perfect and powerful as we thought. Gerrard said in his autobiography that when he defends in midfield, impulse is often higher than reason. He also admitted that he was often in a state of depression, tension and loss. Most of Gerrard's inner anxiety comes from worrying about disappointing teammates, coaches and fans, and the more worried a person is about mistakes, the more likely he is to make fatal mistakes. For this, the person who saw through it at first sight was old Ferguson, who once commented on Gerrard: "Gerrard is actually putting on airs and pretending to be brave." Perhaps too young to take on such a huge responsibility, Gerrard is really at a loss.
20 15 July, Gerrard finally chose to bid farewell to Liverpool, leaving behind the data of 602 1 day, 7 10 games and 186 goals. Three months later, klopp became the Liverpool manager. The greatest captain of Liverpool and the great coach who led the revival of Liverpool passed by like this!
After talking about Steven Gerrard's glorious years in Liverpool, let's revisit the original topic: Does Steven Gerrard still have a place in Liverpool now? First of all, Gerrard never hides his admiration for Liverpool under klopp: "I don't think this team has any weaknesses at all. Much better than Liverpool where I am. People are always talking about how strong the trident is in the frontcourt, but I think what really improves is the team's defense. " We can see that Gerrard praised Liverpool's defence and front line, but he didn't mention that his midfield was long gone.
The Liverpool midfield is not as fixed as the attacking lineup, but generally speaking, klopp prefers to exclude the combination of Henderson, Fabio and Vijay Nardoux. So, if the top Steven Gerrard competes with these three people, who can be squeezed out?
Let's first analyze the current Liverpool captain Henderson. Personally, I think Henderson is better than Gerrard on the defensive end, which may be due to his personality. Henderson, who is relatively conservative, will choose a more secure way to break the opponent's foot ball in defense, such as fighting with his opponent, while Gerrard may solve the problem directly with a shovel, but he is often punished for foul. On the offensive end, Henderson is very good at sending accurate long passes to the left and right wings. He is a qualified metronome, but it is not his characteristic to directly block the threatening ball. Gerrard is definitely far ahead of Henderson in scoring goals.
The second midfielder is Brazilian Fabinho. Fabinho's advantages and disadvantages are obvious. First of all, as a Brazilian, his footwork skills are very good and his ball control skills are first-class. When organizing the midfield, he can pass a striker, penetrating the straight plug, I am afraid only Steven Gerrard can match. However, Fabinho's weakness is also obvious, that is, the defensive coverage area is too small, so the double waist configuration is more suitable for him, and he needs a wingman. When Gerrard played in the back, it can be said that both offense and defense were excellent, which achieved full coverage of the area between the two restricted areas.
The last one is wijnaldum, who is a weakened version of Gerrard. Like Steven Gerrard, Vijay Nardoux is also a Mr. Big Scene. He is broad-minded and often stands up in times of crisis. In addition, wijnaldum is most similar to Steven Gerrard in that he is also an all-rounder in midfield, and can be competent in almost all positions of center and frontcourt. Mainly because of his solid basic skills, catching, catching, releasing and protecting the ball are all first-class. The reason why wijnaldum is a weakened version of Steven Gerrard is that his physical condition is not as good as Steven Gerrard's, which gives people a little less deterrence.
Steven Gerrard has played in every position in Liverpool midfield and can be said to be a brick of the Red Army. My evaluation of him is "all-round, covering the restricted area to the restricted area, able to attack and defend the midfield." At the beginning of playing defensive midfield, German strongman Harman came, so Gerrard went to play right midfield and was responsible for the cross. Later, the head coach asked him to play organizational midfield. After a while, Alonso came again, Gerrard was pushed to the front waist position, and Torres attacked the city and pulled out the village. Gerrard kicked this position, the accuracy of long pass and free kick was greatly improved, the curvature of the ball was flatter and the ball speed was faster. Of course, his violent long-range shot is always the most beautiful scenery at Anfield.
To sum up, I think Steven Gerrard at his peak can replace any of the three major midfielders in Liverpool at present, and his presence can upgrade the current Liverpool team to a higher level. Unfortunately, however, this fantasy will never come true. However, we don't have to be too sentimental. Although Steven Gerrard has little hope of winning the Premier League title for Liverpool as a player, he has great hope of leading the team to their dreams in the future!
Finally, I want to end this article with a sentence from Sir Alex Ferguson, Liverpool's old rival: "Liverpool are lucky because they have a Steven Gerrard;" Manchester United is lucky because Liverpool has only one Steven Gerrard. "