That was the week that was (Feb 1-7 2020)

Saturday Feb 1:

L 4 Southampton 0. Imagine being an opposition manager trying to prepare a team to face us right now, especially at Anfield. It’s virtually impossible. Usually, even with the really good sides, there’s a weakness you can identify and try to exploit. Maybe they aren’t good defending crosses, or they’re susceptible to pace. Or perhaps the left back isn’t the best or one of the centre backs gets dragged out of position too easily. 

These are always things the analysts would spot and you’d try to take advantage of, but so many knowledgeable people are saying this Liverpool side has no weaknesses and we’re seeing this on a weekly basis. How the fuck do you beat us?

The only way a team is going to beat us is if we have a huge off day (like at Old Trafford), and even then they’d have to produce their best game of the season to still win (unlucky, United!). Southampton were superb today. I couldn’t have been more impressed with them. They had a go, they played on the front foot and they were really well drilled in what the coach wanted them to do. 

For 45 minutes they gave us all we could handle. And then they lost 4-0 because that’s what we can do. At least they went in with the approach that they would stand or fall by doing what they do.

One of things that isn’t really talked about but for me is one of the key factors in why we’re able to do what we do, is the level of analysis we do on the opposition. The Southampton boss said we’re so great because we never underestimate anyone, and that’s true. It’s also true that we study the shit out of everyone we’re going to play. I guess those two things are linked together.

Look at today. Southampton caused us so many problems in the first half, but Klopp says that at half time his boy Pete picked out three examples of passages of play where we just needed to do something a bit different to open them up. 

This no doubt involved changing how we used Fabinho when playing through their press, and lo and behind in the second half we were just popping it around them and then finding space to run at them. This is what I mean. No stone is left unturned when it comes to preparation and as a result of that we can adjust to overcome any type of tactics or style.

Of course it helps when you’ve got world class players all over the park, but other teams have had that too. They’ve never been able to do what we’re doing right now though.

Meanwhile, the Hendo for POTY campaign is really rolling now. Shearer threw his weight behind it on MOTD tonight, Lineker agreed and Ian Wright offered up no argument against either. It might actually happen you know.

Sunday Feb 2:

What’s this bullshit? Juve ready to bid £150m for Virgil, apparently. Biggest load of clickbait shite since… since… well since that Richarlison story last week. Who in their right mind is swapping us for Juve, especially after seeing what happened to Big Sexy who is now at Dortmund. You don’t leave us and better yourself. Not any more.

Meanwhile, City lost again. I’ll be covering this in the Round Up so won’t dwell on it here. One thing I want to mention though is how fucking frazzled Guardiola is. His post match interview with Sky was really uncomfortable viewing as he had that weird kind of forced smile you see from movie bad guys before they slit someone’s throat.

He then went off on one about something Peter Scudamore said two years ago. Even leaving aside the way he’s twisted what Scudamore meant, this was fucking nuts. I’ve been telling you for ages how there are people behind the scenes at that club who are utterly obsessed with Liverpool and this is just the latest example of it.  There’s no way Guardiola thought of that by himself. 

He’s not someone who sits there reading all the papers to see what’s being said about his team and I doubt he even knew who Scudamore was before today. For him to have said what he did after the game just tells me he’s been fed that by someone else there. Probably in the press office, as if you talk to anyone who’s had dealings with them they’ll tell you that they’re batshit fucking mental over there.

So someone has told him he should bring that up and they’ve made him look like an absolute fucking tool. Not that he needs much help, but still. I reckon he’ll quit at the end of this season as he knows he’s beaten and unless he’s given another billion pound to spend (which he won’t be, as the FFP scrutiny on them is such that not even they would dare to be so brazen again) that City squad is not closing the gap on us any time soon.

We’ve broken him like we broke Barcelona. Maybe he’ll go back and they can try to fix each other while sharing their traumatic experienced at the hands of the Mighty Reds.

Monday Feb 3:

Saw a City fan account on Twitter today clutching the straw that the way we’re winning the title isn’t as satisfying as their “Aguerooooooooo” moment. Gary Neville mentioned something similar a few weeks ago, but I don’t get it at all. This is way better and way more satisfying. It literally does not get any better than this, I wouldn’t swap this for the world.

Take last season for example. Those last few months were torture, both for us and for City. It wasn’t enjoyable at all. It was for them in the end because they won on the final day, but it’s as much relief as anything else at that point. To win it on the last day, even with an ‘Aguero moment’, means months of stress beforehand. Yes, you get that incredible moment of elation at the end of it, but frankly I can do without that.

Maybe it’s an age thing, but I’m enjoying this season way more than last because we’re miles ahead. We can save the drama and iconic moments for Europe. The league is about getting it won as soon as possible. It always has been.

Tuesday Feb 4:

L 1 Shrewsbury 0. That was FUCKING BRILLIANT. I loved it. From first minute until the last the kids were incredible. There was no let up, no dodgy spell, it was just utter dominance from the opening whistle until the closing one. Shrewsbury never had a spell in the game where they were on top.

I thought we’d win the game but i never expected it to be as one sided as this. It really shouldn’t be when you take everything into consideration. A team of kids, talented as they are, should not be taking a League One team to school like this. It shouldn’t happen. But it did.

Part of that is because Shrewsbury’s manager is clearly a bum. How can you set a team up so negatively to play against a load of teenagers? And the first corner they got they took it short and ended up back near the halfway line! Honestly, I’d have sacked him on the spot for that. 

You know what I was saying about our preparation and how good we are with that stuff? This is the opposite end of that scale. They were up against Sepp Van den Berg and the Ten Dwarfs and they took a short fucking corner. Honestly, he should be sacked immediately for gross incompetence.

What about our lads though? Incredible performances right throughout the team. Neco Williams is a fucking machine, he absolutely owned that entire side of the field and could have scored four goals. From right back. He’s brilliant.

Hoever is class, Sepp - who I’ve not been sold on at all - had by far his best game for the club (like a young ginger Sami!), Adam Lewis had a storming game at left back, Pedro was his usual classy self, Cain and Clarkson (who I’ve been raving about for for the last 12 months) acquitted themselves very well, Jones oozed quality, Elliott was boss and Miller ran himself ragged without really getting any joy.

For all the shite we’ve had to listen to about how we’re ruining the magic of the cup and disrespecting the traditions etc I just think it’s funny how once again we’ve delivered a massive ‘fuck you’ to everyone. Klopp wasn’t there and he’s getting stick for it, but what would have been more ‘magical’. Klopp turning up with a load of senior players and knocking the living shit out of the minnows, or a team of kids managed by an unassuming, hard working coach who has spent his entire career trying to improve young players, going out there and performing like THAT and setting up a mouth watering tie with Chelsea.

Oh and by the way, there were more people at Anfield tonight than there were at the other three replays combined. So instead of slagging us off, the traditionalists should kissing our hairy beanbags for single handedly saving this season’s FA Cup and making it interesting, because without us this tournament would be dull as shit.

Wednesday Feb 5:

Saw an interview with Curtis from last night and the lad absolutely fucking cracks me up. There’s this completely unintentional, endearing cockiness about him where he says things that seem completely normal to him but make you stop and go “what???” 

He did it the other week after Everton when he said that it can be frustrating that he isn’t playing. He’s a teenager who thinks he’s good enough to play in the best team in the world. He’s right actually (he is good enough) but the problem is there are six or seven top class, experienced, full internationals ahead of him!

Anyway, in this interview he was talking about how proud he was to become the club’s youngest ever captain last night, and he said “I never thought I’d get the opportunity so early to captain the team”. 

Hahaha you’ve got to love that “so early” part of it. It’s completely unintentional and he’ll have no idea how that sounded, but he’s just told us that he’s always expected to one day be captain of Liverpool and the only thing that has surprised him is that it came so soon. 

I love this kid, he’s got that Robbie Fowler Toxteth quality where he just believes he’s the greatest, but not in an arrogant, dislikable way. Jurgen needs to find a way to get him some meaningful minutes, and I don’t mean the token garbage time minutes that Phil Foden gets at the end of City games.

Id expect him to get half a dozen league starts between now and the end of the season because we’re so far ahead and will eventually prioritise the Champions League. Also, I think Jones and Williams should start every FA Cup game even if we go all the way to the final. The way they’ve played they deserve to see this competition through to the end.

Thursday Feb 6:

The final podcast of Carra’s brilliant series dropped today, and it was the best of the lot. That’s saying something because some of them have been absolutely fantastic (the Bellamy one was probably my favourite until now, although Hendo, Stevie, Southall and Merson all ran it close) but this one was just compulsive listening. So much so that I’m going to listen to it again later in case there’s anything I didn’t fully catch the first time around.

It was Michael Owen, and never before has Michael been grilled like this. It’s what he needed too as finally he was able to get across exactly what his mindset was and the thought process he had when he was leaving for Madrid and then signing for Newcastle, and later the Mancs. Everyone will have their own opinion as to whether he was able to justify the moves he made, but the one thing I’d say he did is shine a lot more light on what was going on at that time and why he arrived at the decisions he did.

So many times I’ve heard him asked a question, answer it and then there being no follow up. It’s done my head in because the interviewers seemed to be missing the point. I’d hear him say something and my reaction would be “yeah, that’s all well and good but what about x, y and z?” But no-one ever pressed him into answering x, y and z. Until now.

Only Carra could probably get away with that line of questioning without Owen becoming overly defensive. Because it was two mates chatting it worked and Owen was able to describe, and in my mind at least, go a long way towards justifying a lot of the things that happened. I’m not even going to go into the specifics here as it’s been done time and again, but if you haven’t listened to it then I can’t recommend it highly enough.

Have a listen, it’s well worth it, and if you still bear a grudge towards him after this then you must have a cold, cold heart! Seriously though, I understand people not loving him, I understand them not even liking him. Indifference is probably the most common feeling for most fans, but the one thing I can’t really wrap my head around is the active dislike and in some cases hatred towards him. Life’s too short. Fucking hell, some of the best days we’ve had as fans came because of him. How can you hate him?

Ultimately, Michael himself even admits that the lack of love he gets from fans of the clubs he played for is largely of his own making (although he only seems to care what we think of him), but I just think it’s sad that any time he comes back to Anfield he feels on edge in case someone shouts abuse at him. 

I think his quote was “There are 60,000 people there and any one of them has the capacity to break my heart”. That just made me feel sad, because as I say, ultimately this fella is directly responsible for some of the best days of my life. They wouldn’t have happened without him and for that I’ll always be grateful. 

I don’t necessarily agree with everything he ever did, but life’s too short for holding grudges over petty shit like this. If I were to see him on the street I’d go over and hug him and just tell him thanks for the good times. And I’d also tell him to stop referring to United as ‘we’ when he’s on telly. Hopefully Carra already did that, as that’s what mates are for.

Friday Feb 7:

I don’t tend to pay much attention to European footy these days, but there are some interesting rumours coming out of Barca at the moment. They’re a dumpster fire. They have been since we broke them. Now there’s a lot of talk about Messi wanting out, which I don’t really buy but who knows.

Messi is incredible and although I doubt I’ll ever concede that anyone is better than Maradona, I’m not going to argue with anyone who says Messi is the greatest ever. The whole Messi / Ronaldo thing was never even a debate ifor me because, irrespective of the numbers they both put up, my eyes always tell me that Messi is just by far the more gifted footballer, even though Ronaldo does have the edge over him in certain areas.

One thing you have to say about Ronaldo though is he’s never just remained in his own little comfort zone. He’s tested himself and gone out and done it in the top three leagues in Europe. He’s also led an average Portugal side to major championship success, something Messi has not been able to do with Argentina.

So Messi now has a really big decision to make. He can stay at Barca in his comfort zone, complaining about how they keep buying shite players and no longer have the money to push the rest of Europe around in the transfer market, or he could move on, to the Premier League, and show that he can be the greatest regardless of who he’s playing for. 

I think he’ll stay put, but if he were to come over here he’d end up at City or United because I don’t think Klopp would be interested in him and the Manc clubs are the only ones who would come close to matching the wage he’s on. Obviously there’s the Guardiola link too, but I’m not sure how much weight that carries as having worked with ‘Pep’ for several years Messi probably thinks he’s a bad weirdo.

I’d love to see him over here (and if it was for us then I’d be buzzing like you couldn’t even imagine) because I think it would be fascinating to see if he could have the same impact in this league as he’s had in Spain.

I don’t think he’s got the balls to try it though, and I also think he’s smart not to. If he came to play for us then Klopp would bring the best out of him because that’s what he does, but if he went anywhere else then we’d see the Argentina Messi rather than the Barcelona one.

Finally today, Ashley Young flew his favourite barber out to Milan to give him a haircut. Now this story annoyed the fuck out of me far more than it should. If it had been Pogba for example, it wouldn’t have bothered me because he has his own unique (another way of putting it would be shit) style where he wants something different. 

I could see why Pogba would want his own guy, but Ashley Young has a fucking number one all over!!!! It’s bad enough he did this, but what makes it worse is he’s broadcasting it. Flaunting his wealth, the massive helmet.

and that was the week that was….