Liverpool 0 Marseille 1 - CL (Oct 3 2007)

[TLW]

LIVERPOOL 0 Marseille 1

Report by Dave Usher at Anfield

Scorer(s) - Half Time - 0 -0 Venue - Anfield Date - Wed 3 October 2007 Star Man - Pepe Reina

 

 

 

 

It’s been coming for a few weeks. Since the international break, we’ve been woeful in every game bar one, and that was the Carling Cup game at Reading. Other than that, we’ve been terrible, and there is clearly something seriously wrong at the moment. Marseille are a poor side, yet they looked like a crack European outfit with the ease that they handled us at Anfield. They fully deserved this win, and we look like we’re teetering on the brink of being in serious trouble.

I know we’re still unbeaten in the league, and only four points off the top with a game in hand, and we haven’t conceded in open play etc and blah blah blah. I also know that disregarding the Reading game, our last five performances have been absolutely rank, with this being the worst.

I’d like to say it came as a shock, but it honestly didn’t. I posted on the forum that I thought we’d struggle, and I said the same to a few people before the game. We’re in a terrible run, and I couldn’t see us just suddenly snapping out of it just like that. I’d love to be able to offer an explanation why we’ve suddenly gone so shit, but I don’t have one. I bet Rafa doesn’t have one either, and that’s the worry.

There’s a number of possible reasons, ranging from Pako’s departure to rotation. It’s probably a combination of everything. We’re missing Alonso and Agger, and against Marseille we were really hurt by the absence of Pennant too. We’ve got ome players low on confidence, some low on form, and others who simply aren’t up to the job. Throw in some strange selections and substitutions by the manager, and you’ve got one big fuck off mess.

When we hammered Derby to go top of the league, comparisons were made with the last time that happened, under Gerard Houllier. We went to Boro and lost, and from that moment on it was a downward spiral. “It won’t happen this time, we’ve got a much better squad and we’ve got Rafa” was the general consensus. I still feel like that, but there is a growing number of people who don’t. Sunday’s game with Spurs is absolutely huge now, win and we’re back on track and it’s crisis averted. Lose, and there’ll be all kinds of flak flying Rafa’s way.

He’s getting a lot of criticism at the moment, and some of it is fair, but it’s pissing me off that the players seem to be escaping the same kind of stick when for me they are more to blame than the manager for the terrible performances of late. How is it Rafa’s fault when highly rated, highly paid players suddenly lose the ability to control and pass the ball to a team-mate. Instead of pointing the finger of blame at under-performing players, it’s all directed at Rafa and his rotation policy. Of course, sometimes he doesn’t help himself.

His team selection to face Marseille was a bit strange. I don’t think anyone expected Leto to be starting, but I must admit I didn’t have a problem with it prior to kick off. Midway through the first half though it was obvious the lad was having a mare and needed to come off. Problem was, he wasn’t the only one having a stinker. Sissoko was terrible, and Aurelio was not much better either.

We hit far too many long balls to Crouch and Torres, and the frontmen are largely free from blame as far as I’m concerned after this. They had no service, but both worked hard and I felt sorry for them. Crouch was made to look bad by his midfield. Basically, the only service he got was either a long high ball that he was expected to flick on (admittedly some of his flicks were shit), or it was hit long and high for him to chest down, and then dribble backwards before laying it off to his centre halves. It was so reminiscent of Heskey in the latter part of Houllier’s reign.

Some people are moaning about Crouch, but what else is he going to do? He can’t turn and then go past three defenders from the halfway line because he has no pace, and at the moment he’s struggling for confidence. He couldn’t give it to his midfield because they were all having mares and weren’t helping him out at all. So he has to go back, and then people have a go at him. Crouch desperately missed Pennant in my opinion.

Our midfield were absolutely appalling, all four of them. Sissoko and Gerrard have very really been selected to play as a pairing, and after this I can see why. I always thought it would work pretty well, but it’s obvious Rafa has always had reservations about it because he’s hardly ever gone with it. We may have the ‘best midfield in the world’ but not when these two are in tandem.

Momo seems to have lost the ability to pass the ball to a team-mate, and Gerrard has been shit since he decided he’d play twice in a week for England. They were outplayed by a Marseille midfield that included Bruno Cheyrou’s brother for fucks sake.

Gerrard played too deep for a lot of the game, but that’s because he had to really. Someone has to collect the ball off the defence and try to get us moving, and you wouldn’t want it to be Sissoko. The defence played too many long balls, but when the alternative is to play it in to a player who you can’t trust to keep the ball, it’s somewhat understandable. We needed Gerrard to get forward to support the strikers, but he couldn’t do it often enough because he also had to try and be the playmaker. In the end, he did neither and could have been sent off when he went in with raised studs when he was already on a booking (an incredibly harsh booking it should be said).

He was poor, but he was still miles better than the other three. He seriously missed having Alonso or Mascherano alongside him, because to be honest he just looked lost to me. I think some people may now start to realise exactly how important Xabi Alonso is to this side, because without him we’re like an orchestra without it’s conductor.

Our midfield four absolutely stank the place out against Marseille, and we were crying out for Mascherano to come on to give us that steadying influence that we were lacking. He should have been on at half time, along with Babel. They were the two players we needed, but instead we got Riise, Voronin and eventually Kuyt. I don’t understand why Voronin was brought on to play on the wing, when Babel was available. It’s baffling.

Marseille were the better side in the first half, and they were the better side in the second too. They had a goal ruled out for offside in the first half that I thought was perfectly legitimate. I haven’t seen any replays, so maybe the linesman was right, but it looked onside to me at the time and I was relieved to see the flag go up.

They’d made their intentions known early on, when the lone striker (don’t know his name but he impressed me a lot) got in behind and Reina saved his snapshot. The lad who played on the right looked very useful, as did the little fella who played in the hole. Both of those, along with the striker, gave us a lot of problems with their movement and skill.

We offered nothing at all in terms of goal threat in the first half. They were comfortable at the back, and kept the ball when they had it. It was a very accomplished display from Marseille, who were backed by a large, vocal travelling support who also put us to shame on the night. They sang from start to finish, we didn’t. The poor form of the team has transmitted itself to the crowd now, and this was one of the poorer European atmosphere’s of recent seasons.

I sat there at half time, and I said to myself “this isn’t going to get any better”. I thought we’d probably hold out for a draw as the one thing we are still doing is keeping clean sheets, but if I had to say who was more likely to get a goal I would have said Marseille.

Had Mascherano came on, things would have improved, as even though he’s been giving the ball away a fair bit recently, it’s nothing compared to Momo. It’s painful to see what’s happened to Sissoko over the past 12 months. He came back from the eye injury and picked up where had left off, but strangely he has never been the same since the shoulder injury he sustained against Birmingham.

He looked like he was getting back into the groove earlier this season, but then along came this game. He was horrendously bad, and should have been subbed for his own good, as well as that of the team. He must feel absolutely dreadful after that, his confidence will have been shot to pieces, and I feel for him. Will he bounce back from it? I doubt it, as most of the fans don’t have any faith in him any more, and worse still, his team-mates probably don’t either.

You could see that sometimes the players didn’t want to give him the ball because he kept losing it. I just couldn’t see the sense in keeping him on, and in the end it cost us, as he lost possession and Marseille broke upfield and scored. Why would you keep him on? Why? It is madness. Fair enough, you might indulge someone like Luis Garcia when he kept giving the ball away because you are hoping he’ll produce a moment of magic. Momo isn’t going to do that, and when he’s playing like this he’s a liability.

Leto got the hook first, and he can have no complaints. He was dreadful, and got progressively worse as the game wore on. He’s only a young lad, and you could see his confidence being sucked away with every poor touch or misplaced pass. Although they obviously play in different positions, I couldn’t help thinking of Paletta against Arsenal last season when I saw Leto struggling so badly.

Riise came on for him, but he did nothing either. He is another player struggling for form, and there are simply too many of those at the club right now.

Aurelio was the next one replaced, and again he can have no complaints as he was terrible. He’s coming back from injury, so he has an excuse I suppose. Voronin was his replacement and he went to the right wing, meaning Benayoun moved to the left wing with Riise dropping in at full back. Babel would have been the more logical choice for me.

Finally, Crouch was replaced by Kuyt, which was fair enough and few could question the logic behind that decision. The changes didn’t really improve things, at least not until we entered stoppage time anyway. As soon as the fourth official raised the board informing us there would be four minutes added on, we suddenly came to life.

We could have scored three times in that four minutes, after doing fuck all in the previous ninety. All those blaming the manager should maybe ask how come the players waited so long to show any urgency? When they did, Marseille wobbled badly. Hyypia headed wide from a corner when he should have at least hit the target. Benayoun had a header turned round the post, and Torres somehow had a shot cleared off the line when a goal seemed certain. We bombarded their goal in stoppage time, which begs the question why they couldn’t do it before then?

Marseille held out, just, and like I said in the opening paragraph, they were worthy winners. Good luck to them, their fans were superb and their players worked incredibly hard closing us down and fighting for every ball. They were clever in possession, and were simply the better side on the night.

Even in their wildest dreams Cisse and Zenden couldn’t have imagined a better return to Anfield than this. Both got good receptions, and their team belied their status as the fourth from bottom side in France to outplay Liverpool at Anfield.

They are in prime position to reach the knock out stages now as group winners. We’ve got a lot to do to even qualify, but I still think we’ll do it. We need to beat Porto at home, and beat Besiktas twice and that should do it. Any more performances like this however, and we can forget it.

Only Reina and Finnan played well, and to a lesser extent Sami and Carra who defended ok but struggled in possession due to the increased pressure on them to make the play in the absence of Alonso.

I’m giving Pepe the star man, as he did well with everything he had to do, and had no chance with the goal.

We’re at a crossroads now in Rafa’s reign. The flak is flying from all sides now due to his rotation. He’s lost his trusted right hand man, and his players look disinterested and clueless. It could just be that one good win will turn everything around, or it could be that our problems run much deeper than that. I don’t understand a lot of the things he’s doing, but my faith in him hasn’t started to waiver at all. His players need to stand up and be counted now. Some of them are hiding behind this ‘rotation’ stuff and seem happy to let the manager take the blame for their shortcomings. It’s time for them to stand up and be counted, starting this Sunday when we simply must beat Spurs.


Team: Reina; Finnan, Carragher, Hyypia, Aurelio (Voronin); Benayoun, Gerrard, Sissoko, Leto (Riise); Crouch (Kuyt), Torres: