Since inevitably I'll be yelled at no matter which side of any given argument I find myself on, let's get one thing clear off the top: Dirk Kuyt is one of the best players in the world at what he does, and any trophy winning side needs a bit of graft sprinkled in amongst the glittering star power in order to be successful. He is also the sort of player whose qualities often go largely under-appreciated while some foolishly pine for a Ronaldinho type to come in and replace him, and he is the sort of player who will look better in a smoothly-functioning good team than a misfiring poor one where he is forced to work outside his skill-set in an attempt to make up for the lack of surrounding quality.
With all that said, even as Liverpool as a whole has looked considerably better over the last few league matches, Kuyt has looked terrible. I might have thought it hyperbolic to suggest he was having one of the worst runs of form in his Liverpool career, only then I saw a compilation of every touch he took in the first twenty minutes of last week's Tottenham match. Take the children out of the room and maybe down a few shots of Pepto before hitting play, because it's worse than you imagined:
And this wasn't an isolated bad stretch, even if it was perhaps the worst individual period in a recent, noticeable dip in form. Still, as was gotten into before, there is every chance the problem is a lack fitness owing to injuries with the Dutch national side and being overplayed with Liverpool on the back of said injuries.
Long term, then, there may be some tough choices when it comes to squad selection due to an overabundance of attacking midfielders, but for this weekend at least, Kuyt's apparent need for a little time off makes it easier to bring Gerrard back into the fold without having to worry about which on-form player needs to be shifted to the bench because of it. And when it comes to where to play him, well, if Meireles can play on the right because in Roy Hodgson's own words we don't play with wingers, then there's no real reason Gerrard can't play there, too. After all, the manager says it's central role, and with Kuyt offering a convenient switch already there's no real reason to fix what isn't broken--and the rest of the squad, clearly, isn't broken.
Except for Konchesky, of course.