Copy, Paste and Repeat

I get a familiar feeling now pretty much every time I write a new blog. Sorry I shouldn’t say every time, its maybe every third time or fourth time. Its been a theme that’s been running throughout this season. It feels like I’ve written this blog before, and in all fairness I pretty much have. The Stoke game at home was another one where we dominated possesion, were barely threatened but failed to come away with the points. There were a few decisions from Kenny in this one that I couldn’t get my head around, I think most Liverpool fans would say the same. His tactics of course may have been dictated somewhat by the very tough game against Manchester City, perhaps he felt Andy Carroll couldn't do it over 90 after chasing shadows in that game. We know Bellers has to be managed carefully, Agger was injured, Maxi too and Suarez is banned of course. Still it felt like maybe we gave Stoke a little too much respect. 3 Centre halves to mark Peter Crouch seems a little excessive at least. I feel doing my usual post match blog would be, as ive said above, simply a matter of repeating myself so instead i’m going to do as I have done before. I’m going to take this opportunity to look at a few positives, from the game itself and the season. At times like this it can be hard to not get wrapped in negativity, so for readers of this blog, and probably as some form of self-therapy too here we go



GAME:





Defensive Solidity:


I know that we have one of the best defenses in the league over the last few months so you might think this is a strange thing to include, but this was very much a changed set, from 4 at the back we moved to 3/5. Out went Agger and in came experience of Carra and the youth of Coates. Playing 3 centre backs against the bustling Stoke side is nothing new of course, it was something Rafa did a few times. It was good to see Carra get a came to keep his chin up. As has been the case throughout the season Skrtel was our best defender. He dealt brilliantly with anything that came his way, the other centre half…..






Coates:


A first home start and a full 90 minutes from our young Uruguayan. He’s not the finished article by any means but its clear to see the potential he has. He looks very comfortable on the ball and strode forward to great effect at times during the game. A full 90 minutes against a strong side will help him settle and get used to life in the Premiership. Once he is acclimatised we will have a very strong defender in our hands and another to put pressure on our current first choices. On this point isn't it mad how a centre half carrying the ball up the pitch always seems to cause such mad panic to the opposing team. I mean realistically, as a defender, would you rather have Gerrard or Coates running at you with the ball? But when Coates did run with the ball, Stoke seemed to lose it with tackles flying in everywhere and defenders leaving their positions to make a challenge. You would think this would be something they would be used to but we’ve seen the panic before with Agger and when Rio does it for Utd. its the same thing, I just think its funny really.






Stevie’s road to recovery:


Our talisman and captain took another step forward in his recovery. Another 90 minutes and another good performance. Again, he’s not 100% yet but he’s getting there and he certainly has kept himself fit. We have more big games coming up and each game that goes by Stevie is improving. Its going to be a hard run in and we will need our best players to be operating to the best of their abilities, with Gerrard think that is assured. It was a pity that in this game Stevie seemed to be under instruction to sit back, but again maybe this was due to Wednesday nights efforts and he needed to conserve energy.






1 game closer to the return:


At the very least we can take comfort from the fact that this is another game of Suarez’s ban gone. We definitely miss some inventiveness and guile with him out of the side. This was exactly the kind of game were you feel he could have been the difference, It was not to be of course but we are closer to seeing him wearing red again and Reds all over the world cannot wait for that!



SEASON:





Were still in the running for 4th:


That’s the crazy thing about this eason. Weve not had a great season so far, there have been frustrations and disappointments’ and very costly decisions by the powers that be. We could be higher in the table, even without more effort just through better luck, be “would have” and “should have” have no place in football . We are were we are and that’s that. Arsenal also dropped points again and so were not out of the running yet. We need to get our performances together of course if we want to start climbing the table, but if we can do that there is no reason that we cannot get up to fourth.






Cup’s:


We have a 1 goal advantage going into a semi-final second leg at Anfield. People might say its only the Carling cup, you can say that to me if you like, I’ll tell you to fuck right off. it’s a competition that has been a favourite of ours for the last 30 years or so. We are the record holders for times won. With no European football this year I always thought it would be great to get a run in this competition, and while it doesn’t make up for Europe it goes someway to helping you cope. Like a European Cup patch if you will. We have an amazing fixture ahead and what promises to be a truly amazing night at Anfield, one which I’m proud to say I will be sitting in the Kop for. Don’t forget, this time last year we were out of both domestic cups!






Possesion football:


If the cutting edge has been lost from the team this season, one thing that has clearly been gained is an ability to control games. I think this can be perceived at times as a negative because it leads to such frustrations when watching your side dominate but not win. I’ll be honest I actually wanted to break something….. anything! after the final whistle on Saturday. That’s all part of the match though. it’s the reason why I wait a while before posting anything, particularly after this type of game. You have to cool down before making judgements. Nobody can expect to be cool headed during, or just after such a game. But when you have perspective and look at the whole picture things dont seems so bad. we’ve had plenty of big performances this season that show we are not a bad side. We’re not a great side by any means but we don't need to add much to become one. a little more inventiveness and an ability to finish if added could move us on leaps and bounds.

Liverpool FC is NOT Racist

I didn't want to write a blog on the current issues surrounding my football club. The situation deals with some major issues which as an amateur writer, I thought I wasn't qualified to comment on and so decided to refrain from doing so. The accusation, the following report, the decision to not appeal are all issues which need to be commented on but I think they have been discussed at length by people more qualified than me. This changed for me on Friday night though when I was watching the Oldham game. We saw that Oldham player Tom Adeymi was near to the Kop when something offensive was said to him by a member of the crowd. He was clearly hurt by what had been said, he seemed upset and was visibly distraught by what he had heard. While this incident occurred, the Kop faithful were signing the name of their current superstar, one of the most exciting players seen at the club in years, and the man who had just been found guilty by an FA appointed panel of Racially abusing Patrice Evra, Luis Suarez. Whats moved me to post about this is the reaction of people to this second incident, as if the two are related in any way. It seems that anybody now, no matter how unqualified, is allowed to now take this incident pack it together with the Suarez one and deem that all Liverpool fans, and the club itself is inherently racist. This is simply not true and it has changed my decision regarding commenting on this whole thing.

First of all lets look at the case of Luis Suarez, on the face of it, it seems pretty straight-forward. There was an accusation of racist abuse, there was an investigation, Suarez was found guilty by an independent panel and punished accordingly. If you choose not to look any further into the case, and if it suits your agenda, that's pretty much all there is to this whole scenario. This isn't a case of Liverpool fans simply defending their man blindly, its because as the party who feels hard done by in this, we have looked into the case and the 115 page report on the ruling more extensively because we need to understand what has happened. Unfortunately when you do take the time to look into the report closely you see that there are a lot of holes in the case. You discover that as this ruling was made by tribunal the burden of proof was not as high as it would have been for a trial in court. You discover that Luis Suarez was found guilty on the basis that he was “on the balance of probabilities” guilty, whereas if this had been a trial in front of a jury, he would have had to proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. The balance of probabilities is where those who defend Suarez base their opinions. Its a fact, from the report which was released, that absolutely no further evidence came to light to prove either party right. The accusation it seems is what was deemed enough to find Luis Suarez guilty and see an 8 Match ban handed down. An accusation which of course could not be proven, it was found to “probably” be right. Lets be clear on this point, either before or after the release of the findings, no man or woman on this earth can be absolutely certain of what was said between Evra and Suarez, in the report it is clear that Nobody else saw or heard Luis Suarez racially abuse Patrice Evra. What is clear, and has been admitted by Suarez, that the word “negro” was used at least once. It is also important to remember that the exchange of words was initiated by Patrice Evra, and when he initiated the exchange he chose to do so in the Spanish language. So the word negro was used, but not the English word negro (nee-gro) but the Spanish word negro (neh-gro), these are two completely different things and without getting into the complicated arguments of intent and the nuances of culture we can accept this, as it has been accepted by both parties ,as fact. The only evidence that this word was used more than once comes from Evra himself, and has zero independent corroboration of any kind. What is not clear from the report is why they have chosen to accept everything Evra says as fact in spite of inaccuracies in his evidence, but chosen to deem Suarez’s evidence untrustworthy as a result of perceived inaccuracies in his. In the report small inaccuracies in Suarez’s evidence are given weight and used to paint him as an untrustworthy witness. The panel seems to take a completely different view with regard to Evra. His offensive behaviour, and frequent changes to his account of things are accepted as nothing more than mistakes. At different stages of the proceedings Evra claims he was called “a black,” “a fucking black”, “a nigger” only to settle eventually in the report on “Negro”. He also initially claimed to have been insulted “10 times” but the report found this number to actually be 7, the panel eventually write this off as a nuance of the french language “10 times” it is said is just a figure of speech in French. Hilariously (or at least it would be hilarious if it were not so serious) the report actually says that testimony from Liverpool’s Director of Football Damien Commoli back up this “figure of speech” claim. However, when you actually look at Comolli’s testimony, it absolutely does not back this up. Comolli is asked if a frenchman may use this phrase in a general term and he answers, well you might use it to a child i.e ive old you ten times already, but if you were dealing with an adult you would certainly apply greater accuracy. This, in absolute contrast to the report’s claim of it backing up Evra’s statement, actually contradicts it.
You also have to wonder why when translating Evra’s comments the panel chooses to accept the lightest translation, changing a comment which can be translated as “your sister’s cunt” to “fucking hell”, whereas when translating Suarez’s words they change what can be translated as “calm down pal” to “Because your black”. Evra and the report itself both state that they do not believe that Luis Suarez is not a racist yet they believe that a man who, according to them, is not racist and has no record of racist offences suddenly decided to abandon this and fly into a racist tirade. The decision to translate the Spanish word “negro” to literally mean “Black” is very strange as well as the words used around it greatly change the meaning of this word.
The main problem with the whole case is that it still boiled down to one mans word against the
other and the panel decided to not only back up one mans claim without it being substantiated, they also handed out the most harsh possible punishment. It is for this reason that Liverpool choose to back their man to the hilt. It is for this reason that Liverpool fans defend a man who has been found guilty of such a charge. The insinuation is that if you dare to defend Suarez, certain people will label you a racist and presume you are condoning it. The reality is if there were evidence to back up the accusation or to increase the probability of Suarez being guilty, then we would have to accept this and revise our opinion of the man, but this evidence has NOT come to light and that is why we choose to defend our man. What should also be highlighted is that the fact that Liverpool chose not to appeal this decision is not an admission of guilt. It is stipulated in this case that Liverpool, or Luis Suarez do not have the right to appeal the ruling in this case. They do have the right to appeal the length of the ban but this seems a bit pointless. Liverpool's intention from the start has been to clear Suarez’s name the ruling effectively means this is no longer possible and so rather than risk increasing the ban it was decided it was best to just get it over and done with.


What happened on Friday night was something completely different and must be viewed as such. Yet again there is an accusation but in this instance there are witnesses to corroborate this. As of right now all we know is that there has been an accusation. The complainant, Tom Adeyemi, said he was racially abused by a member of the crowd. I think there is no doubt that what he heard hurt him in a really bad way, you could clearly see how it cut him and the upset it caused. Liverpool FC released a statement to assure everybody that they would assist with investigations in any way possible. The police have taken statements from witnesses and have arrested a man in connection to this. In this instance the case will go to court and will be proven “beyond a reasonable doubt” If found guilty he will rightly be punished by the courts and will be banned from football ground for the rest of his life. There is no right minded person would defend a man who has been found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt!

Liverpool FC Official statement on Suarez's ban

All Liverpool fans will be shocked and saddened to hear that the FA have found Luis Suarez guilty of the charges put against him. As of now he has been given an 8 game ban and a £40,000 fine. Liverpool will appeal the decision and I can say with some certainty that we have not heard the last of this story. I am not going to make much comment on this, judging by the comments i've read on Facebok and Twitter I would only be wasting my time as its at time like this that idiots are at their most vocal and whatever I say will be ripped apart. Instead I have just put the Official Liverpool FC Statement about the ruling below. This discloses a lot of facts which were until today unknown about the case, and may show that there may be plenty more to be disclosed over the coming weeks.

STATEMENT:

Liverpool Football Club is very surprised and disappointed with the decision of the Football Association Commission to find Luis Suarez guilty of the charges against him.

We look forward to the publication of the Commission's Judgment. We will study the detailed reasons of the Commission once they become available, but reserve our right to appeal or take any other course of action we feel appropriate with regards to this situation.

We find it extraordinary that Luis can be found guilty on the word of Patrice Evra alone when no-one else on the field of play - including Evra's own Manchester United teammates and all the match officials - heard the alleged conversation between the two players in a crowded Kop goalmouth while a corner kick was about to be taken.

The Club takes extremely seriously the fight against all forms of discrimination and has a long and successful track record in work relating to anti-racist activity and social inclusion. We remain committed to this ideal and equality for all, irrespective of a person's background.

LFC considers racism in any form to be unacceptable - without compromise. It is our strong held belief, having gone over the facts of the case, that Luis Suarez did not commit any racist act. It is also our opinion that the accusation by this particular player was not credible - certainly no more credible than his prior unfounded accusations.

It is key to note that Patrice Evra himself in his written statement in this case said 'I don't think that Luis Suarez is racist'. The FA in their opening remarks accepted that Luis Suarez was not racist.

Luis himself is of a mixed race family background as his grandfather was black. He has been personally involved since the 2010 World Cup in a charitable project which uses sport to encourage solidarity amongst people of different backgrounds with the central theme that the colour of a person's skin does not matter; they can all play together as a team.

He has played with black players and mixed with their families whilst with the Uruguay national side and was Captain at Ajax Amsterdam of a team with a proud multi-cultural profile, many of whom became good friends.

It seems incredible to us that a player of mixed heritage should be accused and found guilty in the way he has based on the evidence presented. We do not recognise the way in which Luis Suarez has been characterised.

It appears to us that the FA were determined to bring charges against Luis Suarez, even before interviewing him at the beginning of November. Nothing we have heard in the course of the hearing has changed our view that Luis Suarez is innocent of the charges brought against him and we will provide Luis with whatever support he now needs to clear his name.

We would also like to know when the FA intend to charge Patrice Evra with making abusive remarks to an opponent after he admitted himself in his evidence to insulting Luis Suarez in Spanish in the most objectionable of terms. Luis, to his credit, actually told the FA he had not heard the insult.

Liverpool 1 - 1 Man City (Talking Points)

Prior to the game I think most Liverpool fans would have been content with a draw in this one. Everyone knew the type of form that City have been in. They were unbeaten and yet to score less than 2 goals in any of their previous games in the Premier League. They had recently recorded an astonishing victory over the reigning Champions and their fierce neighbours and they were playing the kind of attacking football that had journalists and pundits searching for superlatives to describe them. Liverpool’s form had seemed to be improving too. Fresh from a strong victory over Chelsea we were hopeful and believed it might happen rather than full of confidence that it would. The game opened with City looking the stronger of the two teams. The game plan seemed to be to cede possession with confidence that we could repel their attacks. After soaking up some pressure we would hope to hit them on the break. Suarez looked a little isolated at times as the lone front man during this opening spell. Before the half hour mark we had began to gain better possession and looked to try to take control. Unfortunately it was about this time too, when Kompany rose with his shoulder to give City the lead. It never felt like disaster though and the players clearly had belief.  Parity was restored moments later from Charlie Adam, via a massive deflection off Former Everton player the eleph....   Jolean Lescott. The second half was very entertaining. Liverpool clearly felt they could win the game and played without much restraint. City went down to 10 men when Balotelli lived up to his reputation somewhat by being sent off. There were more chances for both teams, with Joe Hart taking off a couple of brilliant saves in the dying minutes to help earn his league chasing side a point. After the game, the pre match acceptance of a point gave way to a sense of frustration that we couldn’t win the game when overall I think our performance could easily have deserved more. Its times like this though that it’s important to look at the bigger picture. A draw against this City side is no poor result. And if we look at the context of the last 2 weeks 4 points from consecutive games against Chelsea and City is a decent return. We go into a decent run of winnable fixtures and in all honesty picking up 3 points in each of our next few games will mean more than this one result. In the last few years we have struggled when expected to win and flourished against the bigger teams. This season so far has been true to form, but we now have a very good chance to correct that. Next up is the quarter final of the Carling Cup away to Chelsea but that’s followed by Fulham, QPR, Villa, Wigan and Blackburn. If we maintain our standards each of these games is winnable, but after 3 high intensity contests it will be difficult to maintain the form. Its times like this when the form might drop off slightly, hopefully Steven Gerrard will be back in during this period, and this alone can help keep the players intensity high.

The Defence

Yet again Carra remained sat on the bench, and yet again it didn’t seem like we missed him too much at all. I think a lot of people are being a bit premature in writing off his Liverpool career but there certainly has been a change in his status as an automatic pick. People have been talking of the Skrtel and Agger combination as the future of Liverpool’s defence for a while now but we’ve never really had an extended chance to witness this due to Agger’s injuries and Skrtel’s form at times. Now though we are starting to see this fledgling partnership start to blossom and I think they look better in tandem that any other possible pairing in this position. There is no doubt that Carra will return to the starting line-up soon. Probably in the Carling Cup on Tuesday night, or if not the next time Dagger breaks down but when he does at least we know that we have promise for the future in this area of the park. Sebastian Coates has looked promising in his few appearances too so there is genuine cause for optimism in this area of the park.

Substitutions

I must admit I find myself getting quite frustrated during games when were pushing to win and Kenny seems to wait an age to make a substitution. Even more so when the substation comes and its not the one I was calling for. Of course the obvious question is why do I think I know better than Kenny on this front. When it comes to these changes it’s a lot more complicated than simply saying “well player a is playing shite so bring player b on and well get the winner”. There are a myriad of things which go into these decisions, form being just one. It depends on what the other team are doing, whether a player is an injury concern, how a players been doing in training etc. In this game again, when the substitution came it was after a sending off and made sense, it also helped us keep control of the game. Carroll even came very close to netting the elusive winner with a header close to the end of the game. I would like to have seen Maxi introduced at some point as Downing seemed to put in another sub –standard performance, but all in all I think the shape helped us keep control so as ever it seems Kenny was proved right.

Zonal Marking

I can’t let the opportunity pass to point out that Liverpool conceded a goal from a corner in this game, and I didn’t hear one commentator or read one journalist talking about our defensive tactic as blame for giving away the chance. Cast your mind back to when Rafa was in charge, everytime we conceded from a corner the “experts” were lining up to point to Zonal Marking as the reason for this. Completely ignoring the fact that we had a superb record in relation to defending corners during this period. I’m not pointing this out to try to explain the virtues of either Zonal or Man to Man marking on corners. I’m saying it more to point out the idiocy of said “experts”. On Saturday, contrary to the lack of criticism, you could see that Man to Man marking may very well have been to blame. Dirk and Glen both make a move in the same Zone because they are following either ball or man, they trip each other up which leaves Kompany unmarked to shoulder home. Neither style of defending corners is faultless and from time to time no matter how you defend you will concede from set pieces due to excellent delivery or fantastic execution, I just thought this was a decent opportunity to point this out.

Liverpool 2 - 1 Chelsea (Talking Points)

I must admit I was nervous about this fixture. It just felt like we needed things to click in order for us to win this one. Everyone will be aware that we had suffered a few poor home results recently and our profligacy issues were getting highlighted more and more over the last few weeks. It really felt like we would need to convert our chances in this game. We haven’t been at our strongest at the back in the last few weeks. Okay, we’d not conceded a lot of goals but we had conceded a fair few chances. Chelsea would punish us if we gave them opportunities to score, so we had to make sure we took our chances. I got more confidence when I saw our starting line-up though. In was Maxi and Bellamy, out went Carroll and Downing. We started off brightly and at times in the first half I felt this could reasonably be described as one of our best performances so far this season. We dipped a bit in the second half, Chelsea got into the ascendency and pushed back hard. They took control of the midfield and controlled things for a spell which culminated in an equaliser. There were some sensible tactical changes though which restored our control eventually leading to a great winner from Glen Johnson.

Maxi, Maxi Rodriguez goes down the wing for me!

It seemed a little unfair on Maxi that he had been out of the first team picture for pretty much the whole season so far. He was one of the most dependable players available for Kenny when he took over and he scored important goals as our season turned last year. It was great to see that his time out of the frame hadn’t diminished his goal-scoring form as his fine opener took his current scoring run to 8 goals in his last 5 league starts for Liverpool. A lot more people had started to question Dalglish’s decision to marginalise the player, the theory being that his intelligence, movement, creativity and finishing ability were exactly what we were lacking from midfield. Such theories are easy to trot out in pub conversations between amateur tacticians but often prove fruitless when an opportunity to prove them are presented. But in this case, the amateur theory was proven to be correct, and how! There was a lot to be admired in Maxi’s play. His very presence seemed to give the team more confidence when passing the ball, particularly in tight situations. The interchange in the lead up to his goal showed some evidence of this. His sharpness from the off was testimony to his professional attitude, a lesser player might have become lazy or distracted when out of the side but Maxi looked fit and alert and he deserves kudos for this. He certainly tired in the second half, due to a combination of lack of match fitness and his very high workrate. All big teams need to have players who while they want to start every week, must be prepared to be out of the side and be professional enough to be 100% ready when needed. Its something we’ve struggled with over the years, but in Maxi we seem to have this quality. I hope his attitude is rewarded with a prolonged return to the team.

The battle of the Ex's

A lot of talk and focus before the game had obviously been centred on Meireles and Torres. Two successful players for Liverpool who both left in acrimonious fashion were expected to be fired up and raring to kick-start their Chelsea careers against their former club. As it turned out, neither player was deemed worthy of a start by Andre Villas Boas. I saw something come up to say Torres had been brought on as a sub, but maybe that was a mistake because I didn’t notice him out on the pitch. Instead of these two it was another player playing against his old club that stole the headlines - Glen Johnson. Johnno’s return to fitness has been progressing nicely so far, and this performance certainly showed that he is now back. He had a great game all round but his finish for the winner was fantastic. He may have been helped a little by John Terry’s poor positioning but his run, confidence and the precision of his shot was worthy of winning any game. One or two people in fact pointed out Johnno’s own poor positioning for the Chelsea equaliser but I think its fair to say he made up for that. I was a bit surprised that he got man of the match from Sky, but I certainly don’t begrudge him the award.

Changes

As I discussed last week, the pressure had been building on our new signings over the past few weeks. When the results aren’t going the way we wanted, it is easy to look for scapegoats. If the scapegoats also have big transfer fees it makes it even easier to pick on them. Carroll, Downing Hendo and to a lesser extent Adam have been the scapegoats of choice for many over the last few weeks. Regardless of the fact that it made tactical sense I thought it was a very good decision to take these players away from the limelight a bit for this fixture. We’ve all spoken about the strength in depth we have this season and this game provided some evidence to back up that claim. It provides some breathing space for those in the firing line. Hendo came on and put in a really stong performance, much the way he did against Man U a few weeks ago. With Man City up next followed by another game against Chelsea, this time in the Carling Cup, There will be ample opportunity to spread games around and hopefully the new boys can rediscover their form under the radar.

Subtle Revelations

It seems strange to say it but something which doesn’t seem to have been mentioned by many people since the game is the absence of two of our Heroes. Two men who have been the epitome of everything that Liverpool stands for over the last few years. I’m talking of course about Stevie and Carra. Stevie’s injury luck has continued to be poor this season meaning he has featured very rarely this season and he again wasn’t available to be part of the squad for this game. Carra is further along the recovery road but wasn’t considered ready for a return to the first eleven. What’s not clear is whether the decision was based on fitness or form. Certainly Carra has been coming in for stick lately where he has been untouchable in previous years. Dagger has returned to fitness (touch wood) and Martin Skrtel, to my mind anyway, has been one of the best Centre Halves in the premiership so far this year. Either way, what is encouraging is that where in previous years Carra returning to fitness would mean an immediate return to the line-up, we are now comfortable enough to bide our time and the result we achieved certainly proved this. As for Stevie, there is no doubt that he remains one of the best players in the league. When he returns to fitness I have no doubt that he will strengthen the team in any position across the midfield, or further advanced. But what’s been striking about his absence is how little people have been talking about it. We achieved a fantastic result on Sunday, and it didn’t seem like we missed our talisman at all in the game. The fact that the absence of two such legends is worthy only of a footnote, not a headline, can only be taken as another mark to prove the strength of our squad.