Liverpool F.C. Official Thread

the team has been plagued by injuries from the start of the season... thats not an excuse.. but a reason for all the shitty performances

anyway... i really hope u guys beat manU... i'd die if they won the league again!

i wanna see them draw, that would be perfect for everybody chasing. but if i had to see a loser in that game, then no doubt i want Man Utd to lose.

Kewell could make his first start of the season against Cardiff City
tonight when Liverpool go in search of a victory which would take them
into the quarter finals of the Carling Cup.


Having impressed during a 45 minute run-out for the reserves last
week, Benitez has welcomed Kewell's return after a lengthy lay off and
believes the midfielder still has an important role to play at Anfield.



"He played well for the reserves and scored a good goal last week," said Benitez. "He is in the squad for tonight's game.



"He is confident and now wants to play some games in a row. He is
training really well and I'm pleased to see him back again because he
has been out for a long time.


"When you talk about Harry Kewell
you talk about pace, ability, experience and about somebody who can
score goals and play in different positions so it is clear he could be
like a new signing for us."


Benitez is expected to ring the changes for tonight's Anfield
clash, with a number of his fringe players likely to figure from the
start.


"We have to be careful because we have so many injuries and we are
playing a lot of games at the moment so we'll have to see who plays,"
he added.


"It depends on which players are fit. Lucas Leiva needs to play, Sebastian Leto needs to play and so does Fabio Aurelio.



"So I don't know how many players we can use from the reserves, but I know I will also need some of the senior players."

i hope the players start playing more often and coming out of their injuries..

as long as we keep it as 6 points difference... we're safe

if the gap increases to over 10 .. and we reach december.. i'll say we lost the race :r

good luck tomorrow

8 - 0

history was made

bring on porto

if we score an early goal we should kill them off. problem is they only need a draw.. do you think they'll sit back and rely on counter attacks? i think they'll try go for it..

porto looked good :r damn

we have to up our game against them ... i REALLY HOPE AGGER GETS BACK ... hyypia wont cope with their fast strikers

but other than that .. we're covered

players are coming back.. and looking GOOD

fabio aurelio
arbeloa
kewell
babel
crouchy

and the monster masch.. with his sidekick lucas

I missed Alonso, played so wel against arsenal

this is it ... its now or never man

if we manage to win all our games till jan... i think we'll have a very good shot at winning the epl this year.

fingers crossed... no more injuries.. and everyone is coming back

especially agger

come to think of it

who would u like to add to our squad? do u think rafa will buy a CB?

he wanted Heinze... imagine if heinze was here to cover for agger..

fuck manUtd for ruining the deal

For me, and a number of fans, it's important how the Reds are treated
within the media. I don't expect glowing praise, but I do want to see
some balance. Just a little credit where it's due, as opposed to
undeserved criticism and petty snipes.


The Daily Telegraph match report on Monday was a case in point. It
was basically written from the point of view that Liverpool, had they
not scored two late goals, would have drawn another game. (Wow,
really?) And the piece suggested that drawing another game was not good
enough, and certainly not championship form.


Of course, let's not forget the awkward fact that it wasn't
a draw, and that matches last at least 90 minutes. The last 10 minutes
are where the best teams often make it count. Anyone who has watched
football for more than a month knows that.


Somehow it's okay for Manchester United to unconvincingly beat
Spurs, Sunderland and Everton 1-0 with late or very late goals ––
that's "the sign of a great team". But Liverpool deservedly winning 2-0
with late goals is somehow just not good enough and the equivalent of a
draw.


To put things into context, Alex Ferguson believes that his current
crop is the best squad he's ever had. Yet the Reds, on their coattails
(only three points behind when level on games on Saturday evening), are
widely portrayed in the media as some second-rate outfit with no chance
of the title in a million years.


Something is wrong with this picture. If United are ever-improving
(and to my mind they are), and Chelsea have the most expensive squad in
the history of the English game, and Arsenal are playing "the best
football ever seen" (slightly facetious, but you know what I mean),
then how come the Reds aren't getting at least some credit for still
being unbeaten and within touching distance, while experiencing far
more medium- and long-term injury problems?


(All of a sudden Chelsea have a few players injured, and "injury crisis" has started appearing in the press.)



This Liverpool side is improving. The top four in England has been
close to being the top four in Europe since Benítez arrived in England.
Five years ago that was nowhere near the case.


Even when Liverpool hammer someone, as they did against Besiktas,
it's down to poor opposition; no-one said the same when Arsenal
thrashed Slavia Prague.


The Telegraph piece, which said Fulham failed to get the point they
deserved, ignored that the Cottagers are the best team in the league
when looking at half-time scorelines, so it was likely to be a case of
wearing them down –– tiring them out as they chase the ball –– and
striking late on.


Indeed, that's precisely what the great Liverpool sides of the past
had to do on plenty of occasions. Or are we forgetting that? (And if
late goals suddenly don't count, can we please have our league title
from 1989 back, Mr?) Earlier this season Fulham were actually winning
at Arsenal until the 84th minute, and then drew 0-0 at Chelsea. So
their obduracy when visiting the big clubs is obvious. That's their
style.


I also fail to see precisely what Fulham did to deserve a draw on
Saturday. They defended very well, as they set out their stall for a
goalless encounter.


However, they offered nothing going forward, and did not stop
Liverpool, on top of the two goals, creating several undeniably
clear-cut chances: two for Voronin, one of which was well saved, the
other fractionally wide; Torres' shot that was saved; Crouch's header
off the bar; Benayoun's wonderful dinked chip that was just tipped
round, and his miss from a yard as two Liverpool players dived in at
the loose ball. Only one keeper was actually involved in the game
(unless it was creating assists).


While I'll never lose sleep over what's said in the papers on the
telly, views expressed in the media do still irritate me; they can
become the mantra of many fans –– particularly those who don't pay
close attention to the facts but are quick to pick up their mobile and
dial a phone-in –– and add to the pressure on a manager and the team.


One of the drawbacks of not being able to get to many games these
days is that it leaves me, and my sanity, in the hands of the
commentators.


I frequently switch off the sound during live games, only to
quickly need it back on to either hear the crowd (as it's unreal
without them) or for an explanation of what's happening when the
pictures aren't clear (such as when the director focuses on a vaguely
attractive woman in the crowd; wow, a woman! –– at a football match! ––
and she doesn't look like a man! Unbelievable!)


These days, rather than write straight match reports, I concentrate
on the bigger picture, and what surrounds each game: the form overall
of the team and players; the tactics and systems; the short- or
long-term patterns that can picked out with statistics, or from
watching games over and over on the video; and so on.


And I guess I also look to provide what could be called a
'mediawatch' service, where I look to redress the balance from some of
the more outlandish things said about the team.


For instance, on Sky's The Sunday Supplement, Paul Hayward of the
Daily Mail accused Rafa of rotating because of his ego –– "it's all
about him and his rotation"; rotation that is undertaken, he said, to
prove how clever he is.


Presumably Benítez's two titles and Uefa Cup with Valencia, and his
European and FA Cups with Liverpool –– while using these methods ––
were merely to prove how clever he is? (Well, actually, it does suggest
he might be fairly clever when it comes to this management lark.)



Quite what gives a journalist, whose cleverness is confined to the
keyboard and who has never picked a team in his life, the right to make
such an accusation is baffling.


I've never known of a manager who'd rather prove his cleverness in
any other way than in winning games and, subsequently, trophies.
Managers are obsessive winners. They'd feign a heart attack if their
granny was going to beat them at tiddlywinks.


In three years, Benítez has reached four finals and achieved the
Reds' highest points tally since 1988 with rotation. With just five
unchanged teams in his 200 games, Rafa's win-rate of 56 per cent bears
comparison with the club's greats. It is fractionally behind Bob
Paisley's, at 57 per cent, but quite a way ahead of Bill Shankly's, at
51 per cent. Only Kenny Dalglish's, at 60 per cent, is significantly
higher since John McKenna's 61 per cent way back in the 1890s.


As for Benítez's ego, we're not talking about another Jose
Mourinho, for whom the limelight was the only place to be, but a far
lower-key man, who preaches the power of the collective, not the
culture of the individual. But because he has 'ideas' –– ideas that he
has the temerity to stick to in the face of press criticism –– he's an
egotist? It's laughable.


"The fans are fed up with his rotation" said Hayward. Well, some
fans may well be. But that doesn't mean we all are; or that those who
are fed up are right and the rest of us wrong. The trouble is if you
listen to phone-ins for the opinion of 'real fans', you are likely to
get the most controversial opinions, as that's what the producers want.
The views of the fans of any one club vary quite wildly; as such I've
never tried to represent "the fans" as a whole, just present my own
views.


Another theory espoused by Hayward –– which the Daily Mirror's
Oliver Holt did well to debunk –– was that the European Cup now means
nothing to Liverpool fans, who want the Premiership title.


Holt was spot-on when he argued that the European Cup has a special
place in Liverpool's history and in the hearts of its fans. It's almost
being treated as if it counts for nothing now, in order to find a
reason to slate Benítez as a failure in his three years.


I'm sorry, but the European Cup meant plenty to Liverpool fans
while the Reds were winning it, and arguably even more between 1985 and
2005, when repeating the feat had become the most spindly of pipe
dreams as we looked on in envy. Yes, the Premier League is desired
after such a long wait, but the Champions League cannot be devalued as
a result.


It may sound paranoid, but if Manchester United had been doing as
well in Europe while they weren't winning the league there would be no
such criticisms of the competition meaning so little.


I mean, Ferguson has only made one final in the 15 years United
have been consistently qualifying for it. This from a man whose first
five seasons in the English league ended with United 11th, 2nd, 11th,
13th, and 7th!


And while the league title has yet to return to Anfield, before
Rafa arrived the Reds' league form meant the club weren't even
qualifying for the Champions League every season –– something he has a
100 per cent record with.


I do think as fans we can be oversensitive to some criticism of the
club we hold dear, as it can be like hearing someone criticise your
wife or your mother –– but while some of it will be fair (no manager,
player or club gets everything right), so much of it can be ludicrous.


When it comes to televised games I don't tend to watch the
pre-match discussion as it just winds me up ahead of the game, and adds
to the nervous energy which I need to control.


Last week I was invited to be interviewed by Setanta, for use in
the pre-match build up to the Fulham game, which was an honour, but too
much for me to manage.


I also get asked to do a lot of radio and podcasts, but unless my
health is 100 per cent I can struggle to think and speak as quickly as
I'd like, as at times I can be affected by 'brain fog'. (Brain fog is
described as "the sensation of a physical obstruction to clear thinking
in the brain, often extended to apply in general to neurocognitive
symptoms experienced by many people who suffer from neuroimmune
diseases such as ME/CFS, fibromyalgia, Lyme disease and multiple
sclerosis, amongst others.")


I have visions of coming across like Forest Gump's dim-witted
brother, without my sibling's supposedly witty aphorisms about life and
boxes of chocolates.


I trust that this platform gives me enough of a chance to get my
views across to a wide audience of Liverpool fans, and that I can at
least make some sense when it comes to answering the excessive
criticisms of the club.


Paul Tomkins


14 November 2007

3-0

we're back on track!!!

nice nice

i hope we dont blow it this time.. coz every time we get a chance to catch up, something fucks up.

no no my friend

stay positive

think positive

and good things will happen

like bolton beating man utd 1-0

the race is on

even if we get knocked out of the cl... i dont care

we got bolton next week you know!

porto wednesday

lol

yeah.. tough matches

but if we wanna compete.. we must rise to the occasion

bolton and porto are tough... but im worried about marseille

i doubt we'd win in france.... i think we'll probably draw

which is why i think rafa shouldnt waste his time with the CL and just concentrate on beating bolton and the next epl game

we're 6 points off the leaders.... unbeaten .. we're very much alive and kicking

http://www.petitiononline.com/amg83ds/petition.html

PLZ SIGN THIS PETITION TO KEEP RAFA IN LIVERPOOL !!

4-1

RAFA-RAFAEL .. RAFA-RAFAEL.. RAFA-RAFAEL.. RAFAEL BENITEZ

8-0, 4-1 ?? Is it more or our Chances of Advancing looking very good?

11+ goal diff in last 2 CL matches!!!


Now Lets get one and the Stad de Velledrome!!!!

4-0!!!!! Crouch x2 Torresx2 !!!

i dont mean to be pessimistic... but playing marseille.. away.. when they just lost to bestikas.. is gonna be tough

the group is crazy... everyone can advance

but the only way we can end up in 1st place.. is if bestikas beat porto.

i always thought the marseille game would be the most difficult out of the lot.

looking at the porto game, 4-1 is quite flattering, up until the 75th we looked pretty ordinary. Babel is known for taking on players as well as his ability to shoot- he did neither.. and that is frustrating.

Benayon missed chances and looked ineffective. I just hope, and pray we'll get that result. We have a habbit of getting over confident after we score.

yeah

the more realistic score would be 2-1

we still deserved to win .. but i agree, it wasnt the best performance.

what do you think we should do with our midfield?

you expect any changes?

crouch to start?

i think he's better being a supersub... once he gets in, you feel like the defenders are lost and not sure who to mark.