Manure 1 Liverpool FC 0 Sunday 9th January 2011
Let’s start with the positives from this game:
1. We played better than we have done for quite a long time.
2. We seemed much more together than we have for quite a while.
3. The players seemed to want to play for the manager and to win the game.
4. We played a system that actually works. 5. We used our subs
quite judiciously.
I thought that we started well under our new (former) manager and this bodes well for the future league and
Europa game this season. However the end result was typical of our season so far, but was not necessarily all of our making this time.
Manure weren’t great, they were definitely beatable today and they didn’t really control the game the way that they can do. Having
said that, they did have more shots on goal than we did, and they did have the ref in their back pocket, which always helps so the
end result was almost inevitable.
There were two decisions given against us that pretty much lost the game for us. The first was the penalty decision given against Daniel Agger after just 30 seconds of the whistle being blown. Now whilst Agger did tackle Berbatov in the penalty box, and Berbatov did fall to the ground, there was actually minimal contact between Agger and Berbatov and the Bulgarian, in clear view of everyone watching, performed a
perfectly executed dive, no doubt practiced on the training ground. I half expected a row of cards marked with the number six to be
raised by a panel on the Manure bench. Of course with Manure being at home at Old Toilet, there was never any doubt that this wouldn’t
be given up and up stepped old man River and Manure were 1-0 up with less than a minute gone.
The next decision really did kill the game stone dead with Steven Gerrard being sent off for a tackle on Michael Carrick. Carrick milked the challenge for all he was worth, knowing full well that Gerrard would be sent off and the result sewn up for the cheating scum. Now whilst I will admit that it was a bit of a reckless tackle by Gerrard, it could easily have been given a yellow card by the ref rather than a straight red, but predictably Howard Webb sent Gerrard off and handed the result to Manure. To make matters worse Rafael had done a two footed challenge earlier and that didn’t even merit a foul being
given, so it’s a case of one rule for them and another rule for us.
Despite Howard Webb doing his best for his favourite team we did play some good football today, and it looks like we might undergo
some sort of resurgence starting next week at Bloomfield Road, as long as the players want it, that is.
Berbatov got the man of the match award as well. That says it all really!