Huddersfield 0 Liverpool 1 (Oct 20 2018)

[tlw content]

 

 

 

Report by

Dave Usher

 

Terrible performance but a huge three points. If Huddersfield didn’t have a useless attack led by the worst centre forward in the history of football we probably wouldn’t have gotten anything from this game, but thankfully we managed to take one chance and that was enough for the win. 

 

The goal was one of only a handful of moments of quality we produced. Mo took it extremely well with his weaker foot, but it was lazy of BT Sport’s Chris Sutton to give him man of the match, as other than the goal I thought he was well off it once again. Thankfully we aren’t conceding any, because the goals have dried up big time.

 

As pleasing as the three points are, this performance worries me more than anything else we’ve seen this season. The Napoli game was hideous and we never even had a shot, but they’re a decent side and it’s known as not being the easiest place to play. There were other factors that went into that too, things that I’m not sure Klopp went public with but privately he was pissed off about. 

 

The grass was too long on the pitch and we weren’t allowed to train on it beforehand. It doesn’t excuse how shite we were, but it makes it easier to dismiss it as nothing to be too concerned about.

 

City wasn’t good either. I think we had one shot on target and barely threatened them at all. But it’s City, they’re the best team in the country and given how poor we were in attack (and that they missed a late pen) that was a great point and again, quite easy to dismiss. 

 

We’ve had a brutal run of games recently and come through it relatively unscathed. Huddersfield are terrible though, we should be looking good against them, surely? Ok, the international break muddies the water a little and it’s never easy playing an away fixture off the back of it, but I don’t think that fully explains how poor we were and I don’t think Klopp sees it that way either given how pissed off he clearly was during the game.

 

This was the start of a pretty easy run that should see us again begin to resemble the runaway attacking juggernaut we were last season. Ok, two thirds of the front three were missing and we had Lallana making his his first start since I don’t even know when. I know he’s had at least three bad hairstyles in that period though. At least he’s ditched the gremlin look now.

 

 

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[bigal]

Surprised at that Robbo pick, thought he was fairly poor again tbh. That Mouniet chance was a blot on Virgil and Lovren too, lucky to get away with it, Alisson getting caught with the ball another example. It was dire stuff tbh.

Worrying thing for me was how easily we got muscled off the ball again, it's like they expect other players to stand back and admire their flicks and tricks and seem surprised when they get tackled. Sturridge, Salah, Gini and others were all guilty of that, Bobby when he came on too. His form is alarmingly bad. He's had bad spells before and come out the other end, we need him to very soon as he makes us tick.

[Anubis]

I'm also surprised you picked Robertson. I'm a big fan of his but I thought Pritchard got a little too much out of him during the game.

[Einch]

I remember when the comments were that we couldn’t keep expecting the forwards to keep going to the well. Now it’s the opposite. We need the midfield and particularly the forwards to sort their shit out. 

[dylstar]

Lallana's last start for the reds was Burnley away New Year's Day...Dave a mere 10 months ago

[dave u]

Ok, 10 months, so the point stands about the amount of bad haircuts he's had since then.

 

As for the Robbo pick, I don't feel strongly about it at all. I thought he was a 7 out of 10 but no-one else was higher. Could just as easily have given it to Gomez. 

 

Gini was probably our best player but only played a half, so I didn't pick him although maybe I should have.

[Stickman]

I think it was on Sky that I saw it that some teams that lose the Champions League final tend to struggle early doors the following season. Now I know it's a push to say that as are joint top with more points per games than we have had before but being brutally honest we could quite easily be at least 8 points or more worse.

Having said that haven't we wanted for years a team that can grind out results,

I think we'll learn a hell of a lot more when they play Arsenal as anything less than a top performance won't escape like Saturday 

[johnsusername]

Bring back Buvac.