And it was all going so well wasn't it? A thumping derby win followed by the Mancs and Spurs dropping points and a 1-0 lead at half time at the Hawthorns. Good times. Then sadly, the second half started. Kolo Toure's howler may have been the key moment that caused two points to be dropped, but that error was symptomatic of a sloppy, casual, tired looking second 45 minutes from the team.
The first half wasn't great either in all honesty, but defensively at least, it was about as comfortable as you can get. West Brom were woeful in the opening 45 minutes, they offered no threat whatsoever and had we stepped it up at the other end even a little bit and got to 2-0 before the break there's no way the Baggies were capable of getting back into it. At 1-0 though they always had a chance, regardless of how poor they were.
Rodgers unsurprisingly went with the same side that had demolished the Blues in midweek and seemingly went with the same tactics too, with counter attacking the obvious plan. It was a lot more disjointed than it had been in the derby though. Gerrard was incredibly deep, almost operating as a third centre back at times, whilst Coutinho seemed to be a little too far forward which left Henderson in no mans land and unable to get into the game. The plan was presumably to do what we did against Everton, but that's not easy to do when the opposition aren't leaving the huge gaps that the Blues did and when the players don't hit the same heights.
Take Coutinho for instance. He was brilliant in the derby but he was just frustrating against the Baggies. We were caught between two stools I thought. We couldn't play a possession game and dominate the ball because the midfield was set up to counter attack, but we couldn't play on the break that well either due to a lack of execution and a much more streetwise opponent that was happy to just commit a foul any time it looked like we were going to break away.
The net result was a dull first half in which we scored from just about the only decent chance either side created. It was a fine goal, the impressive Sterling broke into the box, fed Suarez who delayed and delayed before conjuring what looked like an impossible ball to pick out Sturridge at the back post for a tap in. It was a moment of quality that did not fit in with the rest of the game.
That said, I wasn't too unhappy with the first half though. Clearly we'd not performed as well as we could but you're not going to play well in every game and it was somewhat understandable there'd be some kind of derby hangover. We'd defended well and - although it had not translated into chances - we did look threatening in attack especially through Sterling.
We had the lead at the break and with our forward line you always fancy us to do something, so we just needed that second goal and the points would surely be in the bag. There didn't appear to be anything to worry about from West Brom who had looked totally clueless in the first half and completely lacking in any threat up front. But no matter how shite the opposition are, a one goal lead is easily wiped out and we needed to come out and kill them off quickly after the break.
Instead we did the opposite. We were flat, complacent and careless, and whilst it's also true that West Brom raised their game, that was always going to be the case and we should have been ready for that. It looked as though we thought we could protect what we had and the second goal would automatically come because.. well y'know… Suarez and Sturridge are there aren't they?
We weren't exactly under the cosh but Albion certainly had more belief about them and we gave them plenty of encouragement by constantly giving them free-kicks and corners. I don't care who you're up against, if you give them enough set-plays they're going to get some chances, and Mignolet had to make two excellent stops to deny McCauley and Brunt. The save from McCauley was brilliant, absolutely superb reflexes from the Belgian. The one from Brunt was smart handling as that could easily have squirmed out. At least his recent wobbles don't seem to be affecting his confidence.
He had no chance with the goal although I've heard it argued that he shouldn't have passed the ball to Toure in the first place. I can't go along with that though, he's playing the way he's instructed to. If the pass to a defender is on he's supposed to take it. If the defender then fucks up in the kind of catastrophic fashion Toure did, that's not on Mignolet for me. It's not as though Toure was under any real pressure, and how the hell can you not see Victor Anichebe? We're not talking some little short arse here, and he's as wide as he is tall.
It's galling that 'Alehouse Vic' got the goal, the useless Blueshite twat. He'll probably not score again all season but we always seem to do this. If you're a crap striker who never scores goals, a game against us is like Christmas morning. When I think about it, it's pretty incredible that Torres hasn't scored against us since he left.
Anichebe? Fucking hell Kolo. I can't say I was that shocked though, I'd even sent a text to a mate at half time ripping into Toure saying he was making me nervous. In the first half he caused panic a few times with his tendency to run forward with the ball, carry it into trouble and then give it away. West Brom's ineptitude meant he wasn't punished for it, but not even Anichebe was going to pass up an opportunity like that.
Rodgers eventually reacted by making a double change, bringing on Kelly for Flanagan and Allen for Coutinho. Allen should have been on much sooner as we had no control of the midfield at all. It wasn't so much that West Brom had control of it either, but we needed to start keeping the ball to build a platform for our attacks instead of rushing everything, and Allen is the best player we have at doing that. We improved when he came on, but not enough to make it count.
As for the Kelly change, that made no sense to me unless Flanagan is on a minute count, as he was doing fine and didn't need replacing. To be honest I don't trust Kelly too much these days, I'm not entirely sure why but he just isn't particularly convincing anymore in my opinion. He makes me nervous, not as nervous as Toure or Cissokho, but I don't have confidence in him.
The game ended in a fairly tame stalemate, neither side looked like winning it and aside from one effort from Suarez that was brilliantly saved by Foster I'm struggling to think of us even coming close to a winning goal. West Brom seemed happy enough with their point and didn't really make much of a push to get a winner, and the keeper was wasting as much time as he could.
It's incredibly frustrating, not just because we missed out on an opportunity to really put ourselves in pole position for that fourth spot, but we could have gone within a point of third placed Chelsea who have to play Man City on Monday night. I was genuinely thinking before this game that catching Chelsea (and maybe Arsenal who we play next week) is a realistic goal for us, but every time I start thinking along those lines we seem to piss down our own leg.
The squad size is definitely an issue, for example we're relying on Sterling and Coutinho to produce the goods every week but they're young lads and that means there'll be some dips in form. That may explain the prioritising of a winger over other positions that are seemingly more pressing. Sterling is flying right now but Coutinho is a bit erratic. It looked like the derby game had signalled a return to his best form but he took a step back again at the Hawthorns.
The biggest problem we have though is this habit of conceding stupid goals due to our own mistakes. There was a stat flying around twitter that we've made more defensive errors leading to goals than anyone else in the league. That includes Fulham who've actually conceded 53 goals to our 29. How is that even possible? And how do we fix it? It's not as though it's just one or two players making the mistakes either, it's scattered around a load of them so what can be done about it?
Brendan's head must be done in by it. Take away just three or four of those stupid, costly mistakes and we may even be top. You can't emphasise enough just how much these fuck ups are costing us, whether it's Mignolet flapping at Negredo's weak arse shot, Agger and Johnson losing people on corners or Toure passing the ball straight to the opposition, all these things have cost us and will continue to do so as there's only so many cracks Sturridge and Suarez can paper over.
As disappointing as this draw was, it's not the end of the world as we're still in a good position and at least we didn't lose. This wasn't good, but it wasn't a Hull away type display either. With Arsenal coming to town next week though we could really have done with the three points here as under Rodgers we've not matched up well against the Gunners and that's going to be tough.
Star man for this one was pretty easy, with Sturridge and Suarez not being at their brilliant best it was the turn of the third member of our strike force to shine. West Brom's answer to Sterling was to just foul him as much as possible. On a day when most of his team-mates were below par, he stood out like a beacon I thought.
Team: Mignolet; Flanagan (Kelly), Skrtel, Toure, Cissokho; Gerrard, Henderson, Coutinho (Allen); Sterling, Sturridge, Suarez:
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