A horrible 2nd half miss by David Silva, a ‘howler’ by our Captain along
with some poor & inconsistent refereeing saw us slip-up at Anfield in a game, where, a draw would have been a fair
result. But the glaring fact remains that we’re now reliant on other teams to
do us (and themselves of course) a favour…
No class
As though it was pre-planned and most-certainly orchestrated
for some bizarre reason; every time we had possession – huh…not often for much of the first half I will admit – almost
every Liverpool
supporter booed their hearts out. This puzzling behaviour continued into the
second half but promptly ceased when we scored…and then scored again.
Not content with the peculiar treatment dished out to every
Manchester City player, the home crowed then roundly applauded Jordan Henderson as he trudged off the field
following a studs-up, red card in injury time. Yeah, that makes sense doesn’t it?.
Liverpool fans might point to the fact that they ‘clapped
off’ Yaya as he hobbled off the pitch – yeah of course they did, they were glad to
see the back of him after just 19 minutes of play!
After displaying perfect silence and having joined in
impeccably with the pre-match ‘holding up of remembrance cards’; what DID
we do to deserve their obvious aggression?
Game analysis
The beginning of a game fuelled by high emotions was always
going to be high octane; we were always going to have to handle a 10-minute or
so initial onslaught. But, having conceded IN those first ten minutes, we were
slow to react and simply allowed Liverpool to
dictate the next 20 minutes too. Having then gone 2-0 down to a fine Skrtel header, we woke up as their adrenalin
subsided…but even then they could have
gone 3-0 up before the break.
Their energy levels were never going to last into the second
half; they were playing above themselves as they were carried by an Anfield
crowd high on sentiment and passion, when
they weren’t booing us that is…
So I fully expected a reaction from our lads and that’s what
we got. Silva, who had largely be waiting for the ball to arrive in the first
half as he was being played as a secondary striker, dropped deeper and, thankfully,
got more involved. Once he did, he pulled the strings and got us going. BANG! 2 goals in 5 minutes
and we were back!
And we were still buzzing as Silva came oh so very close to
making it 2-3! IF ONLY!
Just as Liverpool owned the
majority of the first half we possessed most of the second. Milner, who for me should have started this
predictably high-energy game, made a huge difference. Then, THAT mistake from
Kompany.
The Manchester Evening News
gave a damning, cruel and unrealistic 5/10 for ‘our Skip’ in my opinion; they
sighted his injury for his below-standard performance. I didn’t think his knee
problem hindered his general play and the M.E.N.’s assessment that he was at
fault for all 3 goals is way off the mark in my opinion.
Having been passed by the in-form Sturridge,
Vinny was effectively one-on-one with the England
striker (with Hart bizarrely tucked in behind
him) and so you have to say ‘well done’ to the Liverpool
man there I think. As for the second, there were 3 City men (Vinny included) close
to Skrtel who ‘failed to deal’ with the corner for Liverpool
to double their lead.
Okay, so Vinny then produced a terrible moment to forget
(but he won’t of course – he’ll use that to drive himself on even further) but
the error could hardly be blamed on his injury.
The rest of the defence did okay; perhaps Clichy
As for ‘up front’, Dzeko
just wasn’t in the game at all. Why would he be; just as much as this was a
game custom-made for the highly mobile and energetic Milner; those 2 words simply
don’t exist in Edin’s world and so this game was just NOT for him. Aguero clearly wasn’t going to be risked too soon and
although much more mobile than the Bosnian; I suppose Negredo
isn’t exactly ‘Mr nimble’ either. So I have to ask – and was asking on the day – what happened to Jovetic, who didn’t even make the bench? Please don’t tell me he’s injured again.
Of course you can’t pack the bench with forwards – Dzeko to
start, Aguero, Negredo and Jovetic wouldn’t have left too much else in reserve.
But that's why, if Aguero wasn’t fit to start, there was a good case to play the
more-mobile Montenegrin forward just in front of Silva.
But I suppose it’s all
‘if onlys’ and ‘what ifs’…and hindsight is a wonderful thing of course.
Aguero’s contribution? He was on the pitch 27 minutes, had
no shots and touched the ball just 5 times. One
of those touches did set up Silva but, as I’ve bemoaned, the Spaniard just
didn’t finish it.
The ref was poor. Suarez
should have walked early on in the game for repeated offences after his early
yellow and we had penalty claims (including a replay-clear handball) turned
down. But then again so did they…
C’mon the rest!
So, I have to demean myself now – as do we all – and look to
Liverpool ’s remaining 4 fixtures to see who
might take points from them; giving us a chance, once again, to regain our Premier League trophy from Manyoo.
At first glance, 2 wins in the last 10 games as well as being
the lowest scorers in the league doesn’t bode too well for them (nor us) in taking
anything from this game. But there are some encouraging signs to [desperately?] cling on to.
1. Norwich
2. Following the recent and bizarrely-timed dismissal of Chris Hughton, they have a highly motivated, stand-in
Manager in the form of former youth-team Coach, Neil Adams; a man who stated that he’s been ‘chomping at the bit’ to take the
reigns of the first team for a long time.
His first two games have seen 2 defeats but, I would add,
both have been very close one-nil reverse scorelines against
relegation-threatened rivals. In fact, the weekend defeat at Craven Cottage saw Norwich
3. It’s a 12-noon kick off. Although, of course, Liverpool
will be staying at a ‘locale’ close to the ground the night before, very early
kick-offs don’t often favour the away side. I don’t know what it is but it can
often be an upsetting factor (I told you I
might sound desperate here).
4. They held us to a draw. Although we enjoyed a
whopping 68% of possession and had 15 shots to their 7, they defended like
lions [and not canaries]; reducing us to just 2 shots on target of those 15. I
recall the frustrating game clearly; not only did they defend very well, they had – and wasted – great chances to take all 3
points! After 90-odd minutes I recall being reasonably happy with the point gained...
It might have been 10 league games ago and under a different
Manager but if they can do that to us, surely they can repeat it against
the Scousers!
A draw is all we need
to get a chink in their armour…
Chelsea (H) – Sunday 27th April:
Manuel Pellegrini doesn’t do mind games. Yeah right. Although he didn’t mention them by name in the
Over to you Mourinho…
This is about the best chance we can hope for of Liverpool dropping points and, at the risk of me
repeating myself, we only need them to draw [and not necessarily lose this one].
I say the
AT home – and like Liverpool
had - they have their own 12th man in the form of the crowd; they
make an awful but brilliantly orchestrated din! The only problem is, we have to go there too…
Well something good for us had better happen in the previous
3 fixtures because this one is surly a shoo-in for the home side. I don’t need to say anything else on this
game…
Other factors in our favour
Ever-present midfielder Jordan Henderson is now
suspended for 3 games; the 3 more-difficult ones too. As for Sturridge, who
limped off clutching his hamstring, there’s no firm news as I type this. But ‘hammies’ being
as they are; that COULD, indeed, see him miss the remainder of the season.
Ya-YAAGH!
We’ve got our own injury concerns though. Whether it’s his
hamstring or his groin; Toure left the field of play after just 19 minutes. Once
again there are no firm reports as this Blog-entry goes out but that could well have been his last kick of
a ball this season too.
And although he played out the full 95 minutes, I’m sure
Vinny was playing with pain killers on Sunday. We’ll see…
Next up…
So, as fruitless as it might now seem (OF COURSE IT ISN’T!)
we take on the first of our two ‘games in hand’ tomorrow night. Whipping boys
and relegation-doomed Sunderland
come to the Etihad and they just cannot be
looking forward to it at all.
Ironically, if we’d gotten some kind of result against Liverpool then I might be waving a flag of warning [of
complacency] against these. This, after all, is also THEIR first [of two] games
in hand over their relegation-threatened neighbours.
The last time we attempted to play this fixture a terrible
storm forced officials to postpone the game an hour or so before kick-off. I
think Sunderland can expect a different kind
of climatic event on Wednesday night. With no wins in 8 (losing 7 and drawing
1) and with our lads wanting to get that 3-2 out of our system ASAP; I can’t
see anything other than a emphatic win for City.
This is how I think he’ll set up to do it…
4-4-2
__________Negredo____________________
____________________Aguero___________
Nasri_____________________________Silva
_________Milner_____Fernandinho________
Kolarov___Demichelis___Kompany___Zabaleta
__________________Hart_________________
Subs: Pantilimon, Clichy
Moving backwards then…
With Yaya out for this game at least (I’m sure), surely
Milner gets his place. And although our manager could well stick him out on the
right wing I’m hoping he sees sense and puts him where he’s best. That would mean
Silva would have to move out to his slightly-less-effective wing position but
it’ll be a fluid system I’m sure; he and Nasri will 'float around' and will get the
support of Kolarov and Zabaleta at home to 'this lot'.
At home, the back 4 and the goalie pick themselves (I’m assuming Vinny is going to be okay of
course).
Strong attacking options on the bench if required.
Result? I’ve
already stated my predicted outcome. Perhaps we have to be slightly wary of them playing either with
a ‘final push’ of determination [to survive] or an almost resigned, ‘free-abandon’ - both are
dangerous. But we should be able to take these with enough effort and desire to
win ourselves.
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