Forget groin surgery, Steven Gerrard needs a lobotomy

So Liverpool have made it three eye-gougingly bad performances in a row with one notable constant, Steven Gerrard playing centrally in a 4-4-2.

Coincidence? Nada. Media furore? No chance. He may have taken the plaudits on Saturday for his last minute strike but he was truly woeful during the game just as he was against Sunderland the week before and just as he was last night yet still we get pathetic pundits pandering to his ego by lamenting his manager whenever he gets played anywhere other than 'Steven Gerrard's best position'. Surely it's painfully obvious for anyone to see that he just isn't good enough to play in centre midfield in a 4-4-2?

Superior athletic and technical capabilities alone do not make a player capable of playing in such a tactically disciplined role as one of the central two in midfield. It requires a player with solid fundamental tactical intelligence that Gerrard so obviously does not possess. Constantly squandering possession from deep through infantile impatience thus disabling his team's capacity to retain the ball further up the pitch and therefore stifling his own attacking ability, he's astonishingly frustrating to watch. He can not and never has been able to control a game and is more of a liability to a side when played there.

Of course he's a player capable of producing phenomenal feats from out of nothing but he's also a player capable of producing nothing out of his phenomenal potential when played in a role that requires great tactical responsibility. He requires players behind him to mop up, link defence and attack, and retain the shape of the midfield providing a base for attacking play. He needs to be freed of tactical responsibilities to be effective over 90 minutes.

He's not alone in this problem, almost every English midfielder suffers from a lack of football intelligence hence England's disjointed performances and failings. Look at the Croatia game where supposedly 'lesser' players passed the ball around the gaping English midfield like a bong at Woodstock, creating a glut of clear chances to punish players endulging in this embarrassing comic book heroism that the media champions. If only all English midfielders had the brain of Paul Scholes then they might be capable of playing the kind of football that the blinkered media thinks they're capable of.

Lobotomies for all.