16 posts tagged “football”

liverpool 4 - blackburn 0

Apr 12, 2009
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After a disappointing defeat to Chelsea in the Champions League, Liverpool picked themselves up with a 4-0 demolition of Blackburn Rovers. Sam Allardyce had made all the right noises in the run-up to this match but Rafa Benitez obviously didn't feel he was important enough to warrant a reply, preferring to let his team provide the answers on the pitch instead.

Even without the driving force of Steven Gerrard, rested for the European return fixture, the Reds were several classes ahead of a Rovers side that only registered their first genuine attempt on goal in the 70th minute. I wonder what Benni McCarthy was thinking, the South African striker benched while Christopher Samba, a defender by trade, foraged upfront in a lone striker role.

A quickfire goal by the irrepressible Fernando Torres set the Reds on the way at Anfield. A long ball from Carragher, chest, swivel of the hips and -boom- GOAL. The Spaniard added one more with a bullet header before the break but in truth, he could have had his hat-trick. An uncharacteristic miss after a swift counter sent the ball agonisingly high.

The second half was a more laidback affair. Xabi Alonso pulled the strings in midfield, patiently probing, but it took Danny Agger to carry the ball out of defence and smash it from 30yards or so, reminiscent of his first goal versus West Ham. The sad state of affair for Rovers was compunded when Lucas headed across goal to David N'Gog to nod in his second of the campaign, and the game's fourth goal.

It was a stroll in the park for Liverpool and it was a very handsome win considering they were playing without Gerrard. Torres looks to be peaking at the right time but with United picking up lucky victories and a game to spare, Rafa and his men know that all they can do is keep on plugging and keep on winning.

not keen on keane

Feb 9, 2009
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i caught the tottenham hotspur vs arsenal match where robbie keane made his return debut for the home side. he definitely fits into their style of play better than he did at liverpool. honestly, the moment he admitted he was a boyhood pool fan, we knew he wasn't going to be long at the club.

Firstly, his transfer was a huge shock to most fans who were expecting Gareth Barry to be our major summer purchase. Reasons being a) Keane plays the same position that Gerrard was excelling in last season and we have surplus of similar players b) He cost us $20mil considering we weren't willing to fork out $18mil for Barry who'd definitely give us options in midfield and defence.

Secondly, none of the boyhood Pool fans seemed to do well. Jari Litmanen and Jason McAteer were two who could have done better but fizzled out in the end. Maybe it's some jinx. Carra is a boyhood Evertonian mind you.

As it played out, Keane never did excel in his position in the 'hole'. Gerrard provides more drive and attacking impetus as a second striker, and links up with Nando almost telepathically at times. Keane has huffed and puffed, making clever runs and being a nuisance in general without actually proving to be too much of a goal threat. I mean, we already have Kuyt as the hardworking, non-scoring striker. We didn't need another one.

I suppose it's disappointing that Keane left because I still think he's a terrific forward who'd give us options if Benitez wasn't so much of a stubborn arse. Even more disappointing is that we didn't get a replacement and ultimately, I think it was a waste of money to have even bought him in the first place when we could have bought Barry.

Imagine with Barry, there's someone in the middle to anchor things better instead of Lucas as a fallback, and even a replacement left-winger when Riera gets tired. As a creative force as well, Barry's driving runs would provide better support than Masch. Doubt that transfer's gonna happen now. We've still got 3 months till the title race ends. Hope things work out eventually. YNWA.

can't stop the crimson tide.

Dec 29, 2008
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players celebrating

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Liverpool are perched top of the league, three points ahead of Chelsea, as 2008 winds to a close. After 18 years of waiting, could this finally be the year the Kop faithful are waiting for - league title number 19?

We can only hope, and take it one match at a time. Long-suffering fans will know better than to predict victory with five months of competition left to play and distractions like the Champions’ League and FA Cup on the horizon.

Nonetheless, despite the occasional mutterings about Rafa’s tactics, belief in the side is growing stronger. You can’t deny today’s eleven is far more balanced than recent teams, with a grittier edge to their personality too. There’s not much fuss about the team, mainly mechanical precision to despatch passes and chances when they come along.

As a unit, Liverpool defends rabidly like a pack of hounds and attack like a kung-fu master. They still lack that little bit of self-confidence and arrogance sometimes – the kind you notice in United and Chelsea. That ruthlessness could make the difference.

Albert Riera and Fernando Torres have quickly established their importance in the side. Alonso's recovered from last season's malaise to be our one of our top performer while Yossi Benayoun and Dirk Kuyt have also proven to be useful attacking outlets when necessary. Emiliano Insua's been a revelation at left-back and you figure once Robbie Keane and Ryan Babel really hit top form, the red tide will be even more fiercesome.

The team isn’t perfect and may take one or two more players to make it so but it’s a really nice feeling to have your team on top for once, and not worry that the lead’s going to be relinquished in the next game.

Still, there’re still five months to go and we can’t be complacent. Let’s hope the boys maintain their belief and develop a more ruthless edge to take their chances when they arise. We just have to keep on winning the next game, and the next and every other one after that.

what were they thinking!

Dec 22, 2008
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Gerrardjpg

Liverpool is still in search of a win at the Emirates after a pulsating 1-1 draw against Arsenal. The league leaders failed to capitalise on playing against the Gunners' 10-men and further consolidate their position at the top of the table. Despite fighting back after falling behind to a Robin van Persie cracker, Steven Gerrard and co must have been disappointed with their lack of attacking thrust. I know the fans are.

Robbie Keane justified his inclusion with a rocket of an equaliser, similar to van Persie's effort but not many other players with the liverbird on their chest seemed to rise to the occasion. Lucas, in the side due to Mascherano's sickness, was lucky not to have been sent off for numerous offences but it was Adebayor who received his marching orders instead. Without Fabregas, who limped off at halftime, Arsenal still proved a threat. It almost seemed as if the Reds were the ones playing with one man less.

By the time attackers such as Babel, el Zhar and Ngog came on, it was too late. Babel, who'd been harping about the lack of playing time, should look in the mirror and ask if he deserves a starting spot. He was piss poor in all aspects from control to effort. Carragher wasn't having one of his better games either. I'd have thought the attacking impetus would have been cranked up once Adebayor left the field. Instead Liverpool seemed content on a draw, contrary to what Sammy Lee mentions in the interview.

A draw means a Chelsea victory against Everton (as if they want us to be top of the league) would allow them to leapfrog us back to first place. An extremely disappointing result considering 3points were ripe for the plucking. This sloppiness has to be eradicated, otherwise it's going to be the same old broken record we've been used to for the past 18 years!

lion pride?

Dec 18, 2008
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There's a regional football tournament goin on currently - the AFF Suzuki Cup. Previously known as the Tiger Cup, Singapore's the defending champions. We actually won it twice in a row and three times in total, remaining unbeaten in the tournament for 19 games I think. Obviously we are favourites for this. Partly I think because we're defending champs but also maybe because we've always been embroiled in controversy in the tournament for some reason or other. Whether it was the Thailand walk-out in the last final, or the fights with Myanmar, the competition is super drama.

A bit of background here about our national football team, the Singapore Lions. Singapore's sports includes a Foreign-Talent scheme where they fast-track foreigners who take up permanent residency based on talent. Over the years we've had a number of new citizens folks who've done our country proud. Some camps are for the FTS, some are against based on arguments of patriotism, mercenaries and pride.

Our Lions include a number of these FTS citizens, from Africa, Europe and China. They've always given their best when turning out for the red and white and most of them have upped the performance of the Lions, although credit has to be given to the coach as well.

Bai scores

While I support the FTS however, I think we shouldn't lose track of the objective of developing home-grown talents too. With the S-League now quite a well-developed competition in itself, I had figured we'd have more talent coming into the national squad. Especially since they get to play alongside more skilful foreign players and against supposedly guest teams from Japan and Korea who are supposed to pose stronger opposition.

Thus I was disappointed to see that we're still reliant on so many foreign-born players (i think the 1st match had only 4 local-born players in the lineup). Case in point, Two of our young up-and-coming strikers were ruled out cos of injuries and they drafted in a 37yr old instead. Sure he's a top scorer in the league but come on, do we really have no one else who should have been groomed by now?

I know our population is small but still, I think the development of our local footballers need to be ramped up otherwise a crutch mentality will develop where the administrators will just expect to plug gaps by drafting in foreigners. These short-term approaches should be balanced with the bigger scale I feel. And I hope we can do that soon with the Youth Olympics coming up etc. Meantime, I hope we recover from the insipid showing in Hanoi and slam some goals in this coming Sunday against Vietnam! Hat-trick please!

apologies to riera

Nov 18, 2008
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i doubted albert riera's signing when it was first announced but i'm glad i've been proven wrong. For the life of me, i can't recall a time when we've had a decent left-winger at Liverpool. Steve McManaman comes to mind but he was more of a drifting right winger than a left-winger. Riera's added a lot of balance down the left and he's been a productive and valuable channel for the team.

All in all, it's great that we're sharing top spot with Chelsea. If we'd held out in that Spurs game, we'd be sole leaders but I think it's okay that we're at least competing. How often has it been that we'd be in the chasing pack at this stage of the season.

Having said that, 18 years of supporting the Reds have taught me enough to not take anything for granted. A title's only won in May so till then I'll believe it when I see it. Still, it's nice to cling on to that hope that we'll finally break the duck. The team's looking a bit more balanced these days although our fullbacks are a bit vulnerable. Kuyt's starting to score again and except for the fact that Keane's still finding his goal-scoring form, I think we're doing okay. Hopefully, things will continue to look up and we'll need slip-ups from the Blues as we go along. It's just one game at a time for now.

YNWA.

Red Relief

Sep 16, 2008
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Okay this is late I know but what a result last Saturday no?

Finally, Rafa's managed to put out a side that beat the scum in the league. And without Stevie G and Torres too. Keane and Kuyt toiled tirelessly upfront for the team and Mascherano and Alonso bossed the middle of the park. It was a gritty team display and finally, after the heartaches of the past few last-minute losses, it was definitely sweet to grab 3 points from this encounter.

Realistically though, one victory doesn't make a season and there's still a long way to go. Scum's defence was uncharacteristically shaky and Sir Rednose made some errors in team selection I felt. But keep this up and hopefully we'll still be there and thereabouts come Xmas. And I'm glad Riera played so well. Let's hope he keeps it up cos it's about time we have a decent left-winger!

Here's to a win over Marseille tonight too!

YNWA

quiet anfield musings

Sep 2, 2008
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Well, another new season of the Barclays Premier League's kicked off and we've finally seen the transfer window close.

Each year, it seems to be the same story - it's going to be our year - and each year, we're out of the race before Christmas. I've learnt last year, that it's a lot better for my health, to not be so emotionally involved. I still love the club but seriously, you all have to admit it's super frustrating at times.

Badgelogo

5 comments

I was quite excited about news of Gareth Barry joining us. Although he's not the out-and-out winger we need, his stability on the left would free Gerrard to play in the hole behind Torres. I had assumed Rafa would have stuck to this winning formula since we were on fire during the final leg of last season when Gerrard and Torres clicked so well together. Once again, Rafa stumps with his stubborn 4-4-2.

Keane was brought in for $20mil which I think is quite a rip-off. He's not bad but not worth that amount surely. Especially seeing how they had a tough time stumping up $18mil for Barry who's way more versatile and a bit more functional. It's quite a surprise as well seeing how Benayoun was revelling in that position behind Torres during pre-season. It's evident that we have way too many players who are capable of playing that role. And we need width on the left so naturally we bought Robbie Keane. I really don't understand.

Now we've bought Riera who didn't leave the best of impressions at Man City. I suspect he'll be shipped off next summer too like Gonzalez, Nunez and etc. Voronin deserves to be shipped off but I'm quite gutted Finnan got sold off. He's one of our most consistent players (except for last season's dip) and our best crosser probably.

I am still hopeful we can either bring in better wingers (January) or hope our strikers step up now that Torres is hamstrung. It's gonna be a struggle. Oh and I do hope more of our youngsters get a chance to establish themselves in the first team. Most of them get sold off after loan spells out. Quite a shame really.

Do I think we have a chance? It won't be easy. I just wish Rafa would be less stubborn.

painful

Feb 17, 2008
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before i tear into liverpool i have to give credit where it's due to Barnsley who despite the difference in league standings and squad value, performed well, played exciting flowing football and well deserved their 2-1 victory in the FA Cup with 2 decent goals and a solid goalkeeping display by Luke Steele. ok the gracious part is done and sit back for my first rant on liverpool for this season.

The quick overview of the match is, Liverpool created plenty of chances with Yossi and Babel starring with their runs and dribbling but one of the most incompetent strike pair in europe (kuyt & crouch) fucked up the chances coupled with a shaky defence (mainly finnan & risse & goalie watshisface). Kuyt broke his duck but Barnsley equalised when riise was too lazy to try and block a cross. then kuyt and crouch missed every chance infront of goal and benitez took off the highly effective babel for the one-sided kewell (seriously, their righback had no change against babel but kewell couldn't even get the ball past him). Then Gerrard came on for Lucas and played alongside Benitez's lovechild Alonso who was extremely poor. he lost the ball in the 92nd minute which led to the barnsley striker getting the ball and shooting through the legs of carra for the winning goal. i almost expected it really. anyway...

frustrating, disappointing, baffling. these are all adjectives i've used to describe liverpool this season (and many many other seasons HAH! older liverpool fans will understand). the same can apply to rafa benitez the manager whose days i think are numbered at anfield. we started well enough in the league but early signs were there that some of the players weren't playing as well as they could. I'm singling out our defence in particular and xabi alonso who's a poor shadow of himself this season, probably due to injury or something. i'll get to the players later on. firstly i'm targetting rafa.

the public spat with the americans was uncalled for. despite whatever differences in opinions you have with your bosses, you do not come out in front of the international media and act like a spoilt brat. that's a sackable offence in my opinion and i'd have fired him right away for that show of petulance and insubordination. You try doing that at work and you see what happens to you! frankly i'm not surprised that they are sounding out other managers, benitez doesn't hide the fact that he himself has been approached by other clubs, tit for tat i'd say and the yanks are trying to call his bluff. his rotation policy has been scrutinised over the last few seasons and this year is no different. i can understand the need for resting players if they have been overworked or coming back from injury but truly, every game? surely these professionals on millions of pounds of wages are fit enough to last more than 2 games in a week? What else do they bloody do?? he's really lost the plot this time and i don't think he knows his first team either. ok he's lost some players to injury but he should have realised that defence lacked cover at the start of the season but he failed to address that with his transfers. I think Rafa's got to stop blamin the owners and hold his hands up when he's done wrong because frankly he's bottled it during some of our crucial matches. Seriously, a replay against Luton? conceding against Waterloo? Nonsense by Liverpool standards. Red fans are a patient lot as we've suffered long enough but we seem to be regressing.

Players wise, some of them have seen better seasons.

Hyppia's getting on and we really should have prepared more than Agger to replace him but Sami's been a real trooper for us. Still, it's time to say goodbye I think. I don't understand why Hobbs has been sent out on loan too when obviously we have insufficient cover.

Finnan's been shit this season. Mr consistency has only been consistently bad. Poor control and keeps losing the ball. Not sure if the pre-season court case had a part in his confidence and mental state of mind.

Riise isn't a defender. Really. He's so poor at defending though I think he's good as a midfielder. Unfortunate that Aurelio and Arbeloa are out but why'd we sell Warnock then if we didn't have the replacements?

I was glad Momo left. After the early promise shown, I saw no signs of him improving his control, passing or shooting. Other than the fact he eats up the ground with his lanky strides, Momo caused more trouble than assists. Nevertheless I don think he was given a fair run out and the eye injury must have halted his development. I hope he succeeds at Juve. Having said that Lucas is a revelation. Him and Masch for the future is a solid pairing.

Kuyt's a good worker for us but he's a striker. He needs to score. Why is he running the lines when he should be getting stuck in in front of goal and sniffing out chances. People tend to forget these things when they play out of position so long.

Kewell's gotten his chance and has shown no signs that he should stay on really. He seems unable to beat defenders anymore although he's still lethal from set pieces.

Sigh. It's been 18 years since I pledged allegiance to Liverpool and I doubt I will ever give it up. It sucks though. You'd have thought being a supporter for so long, I'd be used to such heartache but it still rankles me. Especially after the promise of the last few seasons. Torres was supposed to complete the picture but everything's falling apart at the seams isn't it.

I think there really may be some truth to Jose taking over from Rafa. That'd be something seriously.

rob styles is a cunt

Aug 20, 2007
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we were robbed. literally. poor decision by the ref. not to mention the fuckup with the yellowcards for Essien. What the heck was that about?? the FA or the referee's association seriously has to review the incidents and make a statement. I swear Rafa was going to cry during the post-match interview.

otherwise it was a decent game. it was nice to see torres score and a classy goal it was too. the boy will do well for us I think. We dominated the first half. We kinda gave it up in the second after the pen and I can't blame the boys. Why try when the referee's wearing a blue jersey underneath the black?

Despite how the game's grown professionally and financially, one thing still remains backwards in the premiership.

Refereeing.

In other news, the scums lost to Citeh. On other days, I'd be mighty pleased but I'm still peeved about the 2 points loss. I do think that Sven's doing a good job with the side though. And Micah was awesome. We should get him for Pool.

Anyway, yeah, Rob Styles is a fucking wanker.