That was the week that was (March 7-13 2020)

Saturday Mar 7:

L 2 Bournemouth 1 The result we needed if not the performance we wanted. It wasn’t bad and we deserved the points, but on the way home I was thinking how mad it is that a team that is so far ahead and has such an incredible record, has hardly battered anyone all season. We seem to win by a single goal all the time don’t we?

I’m not complaining of course. I just think it’s funny how things have worked out. I think we all expected that when we finally won the title it would be dramatic, heart stopping and would probably go down until the final kick of the season. That’s how we tend to do things after all.

So this is weird. The biggest lead any team has ever had at the top. The title could even be wrapped up already in the unlikely even that City lose their next three games. So, from that perspective it’s been a stress free ride, right? Wrong. We don’t have the stress of the overall race (just the stress of whether we’ll all be allowed to finish it) but we’ve had a shitload of games that we haven’t been able to enjoy because they’ve been tight!

We needed the heroics from Milner to preserve the points today, although I do feel that had that been a goal we’d have rallied again and won it. This shouldn’t have been as close as it was, especially as I was under the impression that VAR was brought in to help us win the title. Where was it today when Wilson shoved Gomez in the back? Absolute farce.

Thankfully we forced a couple of mistakes and that was enough for us to overturn the deficit and record our 22nd straight home league win. What an incredible achievement that is. These last couple of years have been unreal. Man City set a bar that was higher than anything we’d ever seen, and Klopp just pole vaulted right over it.

Three more wins now. Two actually, as City won’t beat United tomorrow. We’ve broken City, they’ve given up and aren’t playing with any intensity at all in the league now, plus United’s negative, counter attacking style has given City kittens twice already this season. Almost there now. Almost there.

Also today, there was a good interview with Harry Wilson on BT before the game where he spoke about the decision he’s going to have to make this summer. Ordinarily I’d be happy for him to make that decision himself and for the club to just go along with his wishes. I don’t think it’s that straightforward though because of some unusual circumstances.

Firstly, if Mo goes to the Olympics then we’re short on the right wing. Shaqiri will probably leave and Elliott is probably a year or two away from pushing for that starting spot. Secondly, we’ll be without Mo and Sadio for 5-6 weeks in the winter due to AFCON. We’re going to be short handed and personally I’d keep Wilson around even if it means he won’t play much when everyone is available. It’s not fair to him but needs must I’m afraid.

Something else from today that I didn’t notice until watching the highlights tonight. The handshake thing was excrutiating to watch because the players didn’t know what to do. Instead of scrapping it altogether they made them go through the whole routine only without shaking hands, so what you got was a load of lads looking really uncomfortable and not knowing whether to make eye contact with each other or just walk past. 

The Bournemouth keeper was wanting to make eye contact and you could see him looking at all our lads as they went past, and if anyone looked at him he gave a little nod. Everyone else just looked embarrassed.

I was telling Adrianna about it and she said “that’s nothing, you should have seen what happened at our game this morning”. Her footy team played but I couldn’t watch because I was at Anfield. So she tells me what happened and it’s fucking hilarious. Just like the PL teams, they didn’t do the handshake, but just like the PL teams they still went with the charade of one team having to walk past the other. 

Where they differed was instead of just walking by, they were told to touch boots instead of a handshake, and it made for absolute carnage, as they had to hop from player to player and half of them ended up losing their balance and falling over. I wish I’d gone to her game now instead of Anfield.

Sunday Mar 8:

As I expected, City lost again, meaning it’s now just two wins required. Unless Arsenal actually do something worthwhile for once in midweek and beat City, which would mean we only need one more win. So yeah, two more wins then. Always nice seeing City lose, but not so much when it's United beating them. I'll take it of course, but I was enjoying the misery of United fans and this little run they've had has got them all chesty again. 

Meanwhile, Werner is dropped by Leipzig amid claims it’s because he keeps fluttering his eyelashes at Klopp. Surely a more likely explanation for them leaving out their top scorer is that they’re keeping him fresh for the Champions League game with Spurs on Tuesday? That doesn’t make for a juicy headline though, I guess.

Monday Mar 9:

Sterling is getting stick for dismissing the notion that the Reds are going to dominate for years to come. What do people want him to say? Look, I know he’s a bad tit and there are plenty of things to pull him up on, but this is just silly. He says City will have a massive response next season and it’s going to be more difficult for us. If he said anything less than that he wouldn’t be doing his job.

The only thing that made me raise my eyebrows was him talking as though he’ll still be at City. The only way that’s happening is if Aidy can’t talk anyone into buying him and matching the salary he gets at City. Actually, thinking about it, he’s probably not going to have a choice about staying there. No-one is paying the fee and wages it would take to land him, so for once he isn’t going to be able to jump ship at the first sign of bettering himself. He’s David De Gea’d himself hasn’t he? 

Speaking of De Gea, his future has been called into question after Solskjaer said he wanted Dean Henderson back at United next season. He’s been better than De Gea this season, no question. But that 350k a week salary is going to be difficult to shift, especially for a keeper who has been a bit shit for the best part of two or more years now.

Meanwhile, Werner is talking again. Not just about us this time. Fuck me he was hedging his bets. Publicly discussing the pros and cons of moving and using different teams for examples of what he’s thinking. He also mentioned the possibility of staying put. Not gonna lie, he’s annoying me now. Just shut up as you’re coming across as a right attention seeking tit. 

And speaking of attention seeking tits, Solskjaer reckons United’s performance yesterday would have been good enough to beat Liverpool. Shame you weren’t playing us then, eh? Why is he even talking about us anyway though? United are fucking embarrassing these days, constantly trying to claim these tiny little victories. 

Their fans were bouncing round twitter with their dicks swinging tonight because Carra described Wan Bissaka as the best one v one full back in the world. When’s the parade, you fucking losers? Funny how the protests have stopped in recent weeks though isn’t it? Guarantee the next time they lose, it’ll start up again.

In all seriousness, I think it’s probably for the best if that entire club just gets closed down now to save them further embarrassment. As a fanbase they just aren’t equipped to deal with not winning. They can’t cope and they’re just making everyone else cringe at how pitiful they’ve become.

Tuesday Mar 10:

I watched the Leipzig game tonight to run the rule over Werner. I decided before the game I was going to watch it and make a definitive judgement one way or another as to whether I want him or not. And my verdict is….

*drum roll*

avoid him at all costs. Not good enough. 

Ok, I’m not entirely serious as it’s too small a sample size for me to be making sweeping statements about a player who everyone seems to think is quality. However, tonight was the first time I’ve watched him since the World Cup when he was massively underwhelming. Apparently he’s come a long way since then, but tonight he looked exactly like the player I remembered - Dirk with pace.

Some would see a faster version of Kuyt as being a dream player and in some teams he would be. Not this one though. I want us to sign a player as good as or better than what we have, and Werner isn’t even close despite his goal record. Now, if Klopp has plans to tweak the style or system then maybe he would be as good an option as what we have, but I don’t see how he comes into this team right now and improves it. 

Why do I say that? Because he’s not very good technically, hence the Dirk comparison. He’s not bad, but he’s a bit too ’bull in a china shop’ for me. That approach in most teams, but we’re faced with blanket defences every week and to break them down takes skill and guile. It gores without saying I’d prefer Mbappe but I think Sancho is a better fit for us too.

Of course I look forward to you all being able to drag this up in a year’s time to poke fun at me when Werner hits his 30th goal of the season for us. I’ll take it on the chin happily. As of now though, he’s shite and I don’t want him.

In other news, the corona virus has hit it’s first Premier League as tomorrow’s game between City and Arsenal is off. Now, while this is a serious issue and I shouldn’t be making light of it, I have to say that this is the most Arsenal thing ever. All the talk has been about postponing games or playing them behind closed doors to protect the fans but it ends up being Arsenal’s players who brought football to a halt.

I made a quip in a group chat that Ozil is no doubt locked away like the boy in the bubble, sat there in a fucking deep sea diving suit complete with helmet. I was well pleased with myself, until one of the lads (Browny) completely trumped me by saying “Ozil will have rung Kolasinac and asked him to fight the virus for him”. Upstaging bastard. Maybe he should be writing this diary seeing as how he’s such a funny cunt.

Wednesday Mar 11:

L 2 Atletico 3. Fucks sake. What a massive kick in the balls. Not so much the going out part, but actually losing the game. If we’d gone out on away goals then ok, but to actually LOSE a game in which we played like this is really hard to accept. 

That was a brilliant performance. Almost perfect. Right up until the moment Adrian gifted them a goal this was such a mature, dominant, accomplished display from the lads. We bossed the game and never lost our composure or patience. We just kept playing our footy, kept knocking on the door and eventually we put ourselves in position to go through.

Ox was sensational and Gini was like Superman. Everyone was good but those two (and Mo) were on another level. It was shaping up to be another great Anfield night that we’d remember for years to come, and then Adrian happened. I feel so sorry for the players who have been absolute heroes for years in this competition but instead of having three winners medals they have one because of inferior goalkeepers undermining all their good work.

I don’t want to dig out Adrian too much as he’s the back up to the world’s best keeper and that’s a difficult job. He did well for us at the start of the season and if he’d not been called upon again then he’d have left a favourable impression. Unfortunately he’s had to play again and he’s been found out. He cost us against Chelsea in the cup and he’s the reason we’re having to relinquish our crown as Champions of Europe.

Usually I’d take the view that it’s a team game and there’s always plenty of blame to go around, but not this time. It’s him. Just him. No-one else. I don’t like saying that but there’s no getting away from it. We’d fought tooth and nail against the most resilient opponent we’ve faced in years and we finally got ourselves in front, and then Adrian does THAT. Under no pressure.

The kick was terrible on two counts. Firstly the kick itself was crap, but even worse was the decision to even kick it away first time when he had time to take a touch. It just looked like panic. That was bad enough, but the pitiful attempt to save the shot was something else entirely. All keepers will have kicks like that from time to time, but the basic lack of fundamentals in that attempted save says much more about him. That’s not a mistake, it’s just awful technique, which tells us he’s just not very good.

What can you do though? Really good keepers don’t want to sit on the bench, especially when there’s no hope of winning the shirt because of the quality of the number one. Who actually has a top class back up? City’s back up isn’t all that. Spurs have been moaning about Gazaniga all season. Caballero at Chelsea is shite. I don’t even know who Arsenal’s back up is. Romero at United is meant to be the best, but if he can’t beat out the mess that is De Gea these days then he’s not that great is he?

Loads hated Mignolet and thought he was shit. I didn’t, but it doesn’t matter anyway because he was too good to sit on the bench and we couldn’t keep hold of him. I don’t know what the solution is other than to hope that Alisson never gets injured again.

I hated losing this game but I have a weird feeling about going out of the competition. I wouldn’t say it’s relief, as I wanted to go through. But I am thinking that going out relives us of the headache of what’s to come in terms of completing the competition. Put it this way, there’s absolutely no way people are going to Istanbul for the final and we wouldn’t be having any special Anfield nights either as it’s only a matter of time before we won’t be allowed in.

Thursday Mar 12: 

Ok this is starting to look bad now for our title bid. Most of us assumed we’d go to the behind closed doors option before the games stopped altogether, but now players are getting it and so Arteta has too. Initially the PL declared that games would go ahead but after the Arteta news they’ve ordered an emergency meeting tomorrow. 

There’s no way games are getting played any time soon, and with players now getting it then the behind closed doors option isn’t there anymore either. 30 years we waited for this and we get within touching distance and a fucking worldwide pandemic gets in the way. And there we were thinking the Gerrard slip was the worst way of having a title taken away from us.

I can’t get my head around this, it just doesn’t seem real. I dread to think what we have ahead of us for the next few months. I just hope that our title bid is the main thing I have to worry about and nothing more serious happens.

Friday Mar 13:

So they had that meeting and footy is suspended for a few weeks. Virtually nobody thinks it’s starting back up at the proposed date though and the general consensus is it will be months before we’re in a position to resume. What a fucking nightmare.

18 clubs said they wanted to play the season out to it’s conclusion whenever that is possible. Two clubs wanted to just void the whole thing. Spurs and West Ham. Absolute fucking “I’m alright Jack” Tory cunts. Fuck both of them. Spurs want it scrapped because if this season doesn’t exist in the record books then it means they’d be in the CL when the new season starts.

West Ham obviously want it abandoned to save their fucking worthless Tory arses. I badly wanted West Ham relegated anyway solely because of their owners and that Karen Brady twat, but after this I reckon most of the country will want them down too. It shows them up for what they are when you have other clubs like Bournemouth, Brighton etc who would benefit from that but they instead wanted to do the honourable thing.

I saw one of the lads from the forum make a quip on Twitter that he wants footy to restart asap because he now wants to see West Ham relegated even more than he wants to see us win the title. He was joking, but I can relate to it because them going down is now a close second to us being crowned Champions. I feel bad for West Ham fans as it’s not their fault, but as long as that cunt Brady is there along with the Dildo Brothers, I wish them nothing but misery.

This may be the last diary for a while because I don’t know if there’s going to be anything to write about. I’ll play it by ear and if stuff is still happening that’s worth commenting on then I’ll do it, as with no match reports or round ups on the horizon I need to do something to keep myself busy.

and that was the week that was….