So far this season has just been a series of kicks to the balls. It’s like we’re being punished for winning the title. A title that we weren’t even able to celebrate by the way. And now it’s just one setback after another. It all seems to be getting to Klopp, who is growing tetchier by the week.
This was enough to test the patience of a saint though. It’s not even about whether the decisions are right or wrong (technically they were all right in this one), it’s about the stress and emotional turmoil that players, managers and fans are being subjected to on a weekly basis by this fucking video shit.
Klopp’s main grievance may be with the broadcasters and their penchant for having us play at 12.30 on a Saturday following Champions League fixtures, but that would be a lot easier to take if we didn’t keep getting slapped around by fucking VAR too. The boss was in a bad mood BEFORE this game. By the end of it he was positively fucking seething. He wasn’t the only one.
Hendo was massively pissed off in his post match interview, while James Milner, JAMES FUCKING MILNER, spoke about falling out of love with the game. I mean fucking hell, when someone as dedicated to and as obsessed with football as Milner is talking like that, you know something needs changing.
It won’t be changed though. They won’t put the genie back in the bottle and we’re stuck with this now. Football as we know it is dead. What we’re left with is this joyless, reality TV show in which all decisions are being completely distorted by super slo mo replays and forensic over analysis of every incident.
It might sound like sour grapes because we’re on the receiving end of it rather than being he beneficiaries. That definitely plays a part in how angry I am about it, but my overall opinion on this issue has nothing to do with how it impacts LFC, it’s about how it’s completely destroyed the game we all love.
The VAR virgins (most if not all of whom have never set foot inside a stadium in their lives and their entire football viewing experience is done either online or on TV) will argue that if all the decisions were correct what’s the problem?
Well it isn’t even about whether they get them right or wrong. It’s the fact that there is no joy in watching football anymore because VAR has killed it, just like I knew it would. It ruined the last World Cup and now it’s ruining top flight football across Europe. It was a terrible idea from the start and I never wanted it. And this is why.
Take the disallowed Salah goal for example. Under the current rules that was offside so the decision was correct. I could go into one about why it ‘shouldn’t’ be offside and that it’s only offside because the nerds got overly excited with their technology that can draw lines on a pitch to determine whether a player is a centremetre offside or not, but I won’t do that.
Actually you know what, I will, because I need to get it off my chest. Salah was offside by the tiniest of margins but he was offside and the decision was correct. I actually find it easier to stomach that one because it was measured by where his foot was in relation to the foot of the defender. That’s how it should be, rather than this top of the arm, head, knee, armpit, ballbag or whatever other body part they occasionally use.
So in terms of close offsides this is one I don’t have a massive issue with, but I do have some issue with it and with offsides in general. If it’s so close that you need to get those lines out then it’s level and the right way to do this is to allow the goal. Do we really want to see goals like this disallowed? The control and pass by Bobby to set Mo clear was fucking amazing but we’ll probably never see it again now because the goal was wiped out.
We want to see goals like that but because of this warped new reality we’re having loads of goals disallowed needlessly and even worse, they’re making up for it by awarding a shitload of penalties for nothing incidents. Football has changed massively since VAR, and not for the better.
We’ve benefited from these tight offsides before and we will again, especially because of the high line we play defensively. I’m not arsed if we’re on the right end of it or the wrong end though, I just want offside judged the way it used to be, preferably just by a linesman but if we’re stuck with the technology then at least change the rule. Just draw one line across the defender’s foot and if its not clear that the attacker’s foot is ahead of the line without having to zoom in and check it to the millimetre, then he’s onside. Simple.
But leaving that aside, here’s the real issue here. Let’s say that Salah was onside and the goal had stood. I hadn’t even celebrated it and I bet many of you didn’t either, because any time there’s even a possibility of it being offside you just don’t celebrate now. So even if VAR then says it’s a goal, the moment has gone anyway. And that is the problem. It was much better when the linesman was making the call because at least you knew if it was a goal or not. If the flag is up then you don’t celebrate. If it isn’t, happy days. I miss that.
The best thing about football is that explosion of joy when your team scores a goal. That’s why we watch. That’s what makes it special. It’s why we love it. And now it’s gone. They’ve taken it away because they got excited about technology and what it could do for the game. I’ll tell you what it’s done. It’s fucking ruined it as a spectacle.
I’d say that currently I probably don’t celebrate around half of the goals we score because I’m always wary about a possible offside or maybe an inadvertent handball or foul in the build up. That in itself is reason enough to fuck this shit off, because even if it got every decision right (which it doesn’t), the price for that would be too high anyway. Give me shit refs making bad decisions in real time rather than the same shit refs making some right and some wrong with the ‘benefit’ of video.
We should have won this game and without VAR we would have. I’m not talking about the two disallowed goals as we’ll never know whether the linesman would have flagged for those. There’s a chance Mo’s would have stood but 99% of the time a lino is getting the Sadio one correct. Having the safety of VAR is only going to lower the standards of the linos because they don’t need to be right anymore.
The penalty at the end though, there is not a referee in the league giving that one in real time, except that David Coote piece of shit. Hell, even Dermot Gallagher said that wasn’t a penalty and he never disagrees with any decision. Likewise Peter Walton, who at the time said there is not enough to overturn that and he didn’t think a pen would be given. When those two are disputing a call you know you’ve been hard done by.
Graham Potter said it wasn’t a pen. Even Danny fucking Welbeck told Hendo it wasn’t a pen, and according to the skipper four or five other Brighton players said the same thing. Yet here we are, with one point instead of three and once again left feeling as though we’ve been screwed over.
As for the game itself, Klopp said he was really pleased with the performance. I didn’t see it quite like that myself as I thought we below par, but in view of the injuries we have, the amount of games we have played and the fact you could see how tired we looked towards the end, all things considered I can see why he was happy with the lads.
We started brilliantly and had more sights of goal in the opening two minutes than we had in the entire game against Atalanta in midweek. We were bright and inventive early on but then it faded away and Brighton came more into it. We dominated the ball but they looked a threat in behind with the pace of Connolly.
Klopp said it was due to the backline not being familiar with each other and that they figured it out before half time. It looked that way. We had a rocky spell in the first half when they got in behind us a few times but after that we looked comfortable enough.
We did have a massive let off when Maupay missed a penalty though. He was subbed immediately with what looked like a pride strain.
No complaints about the decision as Neco was naive as fuck there. You could see when he went charging back into the box he was going to do something rash. Connolly knew it too, which is why he just stepped across his path in anticipation of the challenge that was coming.
Clever from the striker, I’ve seen him do this kind of thing before and he’s obviously learned from the master while on international duty. Pure Shane Long that was. Hopefully Neco learns from that. He’s not having a great time of it recently. In fact, when I think back, the turning point for him was the first lockdown. He was doing great up until then but since footy came back he’s found it difficult.
The strange thing is it doesn’t look like it’s a loss of confidence as he isn’t exactly playing it safe is he? He still takes chances with the ball in his own half and he isn’t afraid to try things. Confidence doesn’t seem to be his problem. He’s just not playing well and making mistakes.
He isn’t being helped by the barrage of shit heaped on him by social media cunts after every game, but really that’s something the club or some of the senior players need to deal with. Tell him to stay off social media because there is literally nothing good can possibly come from it. I don’t understand why any player would be on there, but especially a young lad trying to make his way at a massive club.
He’s struggling and it was no surprise he was brought off at half time. It could just as easily have been Minamino who got the hook though as he wasn’t doing anything and looked lost in that midfield three. On paper I like the idea of him playing in there. In practice it looked awful. He worked hard but didn’t seem to know where he was meant to be half the time.
Taki survived though and Neco made way for Hendo with Milner switching to right back. And immediately we looked more in control of the game. The first half was disjointed and we didn’t keep the ball well enough. The forwards were wasteful in possession and it had the look of one of those frustrating days about it.
After Hendo came on though I felt it was only a matter of time before we made our superiority count. And we did. And how. What a fucking goal. Like Fowler against Alaves that. Jota has been so good since he arrived that I knew that was a goal more or less as soon as he picked the ball up. Fantastic finish.
Klopp made another change when he brought on Sadio for Mo, and Mo was not impressed at all. Tough shit. Fucking deal with it. You’ve missed 10 days training because you got Covid and we’re in the midst of a massive injury crisis. You think Klopp is going to take any chances by overplaying you?
The balls on him spitting out his dummy like that. I actually like what Klopp did there. Firstly, he needs to protect the players from burn out so getting Sadio on for Mo made sense. Secondly, as I said last week I’d be wanting to make a point to Mo that he isn’t above reproach. Subbing him lets him know that there are consequences to certain actions. I want him sat there thinking “you know, maybe I won’t go to the next party and jump in the mosh pit”.
It looked like a genius move when Sadio headed in what we thought was the second goal. Funny thing about that one, I kind of half celebrated as I didn’t see any hint of offside on first viewing. Then you see the replay and he’s well off. I don’t know if the linesman flagged or not but I’d be surprised if he hadn’t seen that.
Something I’ve thought for a while but not sure if I’ve ever said it. While I think most refs are garbage, the linos are generally really good when it comes to offsides. It’s a difficult job but they get it right almost all of the time. Sure you get the occasional really bad one (Sterling against City and Suarez at Goodison still hurt to this day) but most of the time they get it right.
It’s a bit rich me saying that given the amount of energy I use screaming at them when I’m at the match, but a lot of the time when I’ve been hurling abuse at them I’ve got home and seen the replays and they’ve been right! I guess what I’m saying is I’d rather they were making decisions with the naked eye than having it done by some knobhead in Stockley Park with his stupid etch a sketch lines.
So anyway, no goal for Sadio but we were still in the lead and looking comfortable. Then Milner did his hammy and we ended up with Jones at right back. Bit of a weird one that. Tsimikas was on the bench, and Rhys Williams. Either one would have made more sense given we were defending a lead.
The injury thing is getting daft now. Not just with us either. Brighton lost two players to muscle injuries as well, although one of them was poor Ads and that’s not exactly surprising. When that happened, I had to message my Mum. The response was predictable….
This is Klopp’s argument for five subs. It isn’t just about the clubs in Europe, although we’re going to be hit the hardest because of all these extra games. Even the sides who are playing once a week are getting more injuries than usual, because players had three months of doing nothing, then they came back and played, then they had a ridiculously short pre-season and are now cramming games into a shortened season.
These lads are so finely tuned and the demands on them are so great now due to how fast the game is that it’s inevitable they’re going to break down. Even super fit James Milner succumbed to it because he was playing his third game in six days. Thankfully Klopp was sensible enough to tell Joel Matip to stay home, because the odds of him making it through a third game inside of a week would be astronomical.
Losing Milner hurt us massively. We were in control of the game and then we weren’t. It’s not like we were hanging on, but it felt like it and I was watching the clock anxiously. Curtis was high up the pitch and didn’t seem to have any idea where he should be when defending. That didn’t cost us but it could have done. Surprisingly it was the other full back who got caught out. If you can call it that.
Technically it was a penalty as Robbo missed the ball and kicked Welbeck, but no-one thought anything of it at the time and it was only when VAR got involved that it became an issue. Brighton players didn’t even appeal and Welbeck only went down because he figured it was worth chancing his arm with VAR.
He took two steps before deciding to go down. I don’t blame Welbeck one little bit. He WAS kicked and even though it had no bearing whatsoever on the play, it’s stoppage time and you’re a goal down so of course you’re going to draw attention to it and hope you get something.
I’ve seen it compared with Salah’s pen against West Ham. There is a similarity in the sense that contact was minimal but where they differ hugely is that Mo was still in possession of the ball when he went down. Welbeck had lost it. He got there before Robbo but could only touch it onto Robbo’s knee and the ball went in the opposite direction to where he did and Robbo cleared it up field.
The ref saw it clearly and waved play on because in real time you can see that is never a penalty. Once you start with the super slow motions though everything looks different and because we are now in this situation where “contact equals foul” then this is nearly always going to be given. And that’s completely fucked up.
Much is being made of the “clear and obvious” thing but that’s a red herring. Whether something is clear and obvious is largely subjective isn’t it? Do they even apply that anymore anyway? It seems like old news to me. Last season they trotted out the clear and obvious line to justify overturns they didn’t make. Now they seem to just overturn everything.
I actually think the ref had to give that penalty once he saw that slow motion replay because Robbo missed the ball and kicked Welbeck, albeit only just. Without VAR you can factor other things in, such as Welbeck not keeping the ball and how late it was in the game. Because that is an issue too. If you’re giving a penalty in stoppage time it better be a clear one.
Now that VAR is there all of that has changed. There is no longer any room for common sense or referee’s discretion. After being told to look at the video by whoever the goon in Stockley Park was, Chris Kavanagh would have taken more criticism if he hadn’t given that than if he had. So I don’t have any grievance with him at all.
That’s four points we’ve had taken off us now thanks to stoppage time VAR calls. We won the derby. The record books say otherwise but we won that game and we all know it. This one didn’t leave me feeling anywhere near as furious or as cheated as the Goodison debacle did, but it is depressing and leaves me just wondering what the point is anymore?
Do you actually enjoy watching football anymore? I don’t think I do you know. Of course there are still lots of things I love about it, but I don’t love the game anymore. I actually hate it. Or at least the top flight version of it. Lower league footy is still sound. Those fans don’t know how lucky they are really.
It seems to me that most fans hate VAR and I’m fairly sure the majority of players and managers would happily fuck it off. So why do we have it? Who is this benefitting?
At the end of the season there should be a massive survey carried out. Clubs across Europe’s top leagues can ask their fans, players and manager whether they think we should keep VAR or not and let’s see what the results are. It would be easy enough to co-ordinate, and if the majority don’t want it, then scrap it.
Star man is Phillips. He seemed at full stretch on a couple of occasions but he always found a way to get the job done. I really like him. I’m not saying he’s a long term solution for us but I love his commitment and his self awareness. He knows what he is and what he isn’t and he plays to his strengths. I especially like how when he attacks those long balls he does so with such force and aggression that it looks like he’s actually trying to score!
Next up Ajax. How do we approach that one? Players are dropping like flies and if we go full strength in that we may need to leave some big names out of the Wolves game. Which one do we prioritise? There’s an argument to be had that we prioritise the Wolves game because if we lose to Ajax we still have that Mdjityland (defo spelled that wrong but can’t be arsed checking) game to secure qualification.
Usually that’s how I’d see it, but I think I’d go the other way this time and go all out to beat Ajax, even if it means a weakened side facing Wolves. That way, if we win (or draw, that’s enough isn’t it?) we can send the youth team over for the final group game and give some much needed rest to key players.
There is a lot more wiggle room in the league than usual because you don’t have Man City picking up 100 points a season. If we did come unstuck against Wolves there’s plenty of time to make up for that because no-one is running away with it.
We’ve played 10 games and we’re joint top. So to put it another way, we’re about to play a 28 game season and we have a head start over everyone other than Spurs (and possibly Leicester if they win their game in hand). Dropping points in the league isn’t the catastrophe this year than it has been in previous years. With that in mind, I think I’d prioritise Ajax.
I see both sides of this one though and whatever Klopp decides I’m good with. It’s tough at the moment though isn’t it? It’s not enjoyable and we’re running out of players. The sooner the CL group stage ends the better because no sooner have we finished one game than there’s a press conference previewing the next one. It feels never ending.
I can’t wait until we get back to one game a week again and we get some players back because this is too much. We’ve done incredibly well to be where we are all things considered, but it is starting to feel like it’s catching up with us.
Klopp is clearly not himself at the moment but he needs to circle the wagons. Stop picking fights with the TV companies and other managers because it isn’t going to change anything. Plenty of other managers agree with him (15-5 voted for five subs) but none of the cunts (other than Guardiola) are willing to stick their head above the parapet. They’re letting him fight the fight and take all the heat.
Forget all that shit now, Jurgen. Focus on the things you can control rather than getting pissed off about stuff you can’t. Fuck everyone who isn’t us.
Team: Alisson; N Williams (Henderson), Fabinho, Phillips, Robertson; Wijnaldum, Milner (Jones), Minamino; Salah (Mané), Firmino, Jota:
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