Time to lay-off this much criticised Liverpool ace?

It’s apparently open season on Liverpool’s 35 million pound man Andy Carroll, as critics seem to be lining up to have a dig at the big number nine. Is this criticism over the top, and is it simply due to his fee?

Clearly having the label of the most expensive British footballer in history is always going to leave you open for high scrutiny and inevitable criticism. However, the scathing manner of the criticism of Carroll has been a bit far fetched, particularly at such an early stage of the season. The fee and the media hype surrounding him, isn’t Carroll’s fault, and for a young player with everything to prove, it hasn’t helped his cause.

Carroll joined Liverpool with a serious injury problem, and he has struggled to regain full fitness since the injury. It was unfortunate for him, that he couldn’t hit the ground running, and he wasn’t fully fit when he played for the reds at the end of last season. He still doesn’t quite have his full fitness and match sharpness back, but he is certainly getting there with each passing week. He has obviously lost a lot of confidence after his injury problems, and it will be important for him to start building that up again.

It seems that Andy Carroll’s past mistakes are also counting against him, as critics continue to bash his lifestyle choices and even Fabio Capello has somewhat harshly chipped in with his thoughts on Carroll’s extracurricular activities. Critics are quick to suggest that he is wasting his talent, however this seems to have little bearing on his time at Liverpool, where nothing has come out to suggest anything other than the fact that he has got his head down at the club.

Criticism of Carroll rather than other players also seems unfair, as Liverpool have not really played to his strengths as of yet. When Carroll is on the pitch they seem to revert to a manner of play whereby they hoof the ball downfield to him, which inevitably ends in nothing.

They have yet to get the service or movement around him correct, they should be playing it down the wings and providing great service to Carroll in the centre, the return of Steven Gerrard should help Carroll out in this department.

To be fair to Carroll, he was unlucky not to score against Arsenal and had a perfectly good goal disallowed at Sunderland, if those two incidents had been slightly different, everyone would be raving about him, as the biggest hope for the future of English football, so we need to put things in a little perspective.

Carroll is in good hands with Dalglish, who will endeavour to get the best out of him, and his experience and know how will definitely be a help to Carroll. Liverpool have wrapped him up in cotton wool up to now to protect him from further injurys, but now is the time for him to be given a regular first team place so that he can fully regain his sharpness and match fitness, as well as his confidence.

Carroll won’t get forever to prove himself, but we have to at least give him a fair chance, and the constant criticism of him is over the top and unjustified. The expectation due to the fee that he should have hit the ground running is harsh, and he should be judged by what he does on the pitch after a full season not four games.  Everything is now in place for him, he’s at a great club with a good manager, so now it is up to him, but he needs to be given a fair chance and that is not something he has been given so far.

Written by Lauren Rutter for FootballFancast.com. Do you think criticism of Andy Carroll has been over the top? Let me know your thoughts by commenting below or following me on Twitter @LaurenRutter

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