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Liverpool 2 Leicester City 1 (Oct 5 2019)


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Dave Usher

 

Is there no limit to the resolve of this team? While the rest of the traditional "Big Six" are finding new and more amusing ways to lose games, our lads are just digging deep and pulling wins out of the fire and overcoming whatever setbacks they face.

 

The scoreline might have been close but the game really wasn't. We won't face many better teams than Leicester this season but in terms of how difficult the game was we had far more trouble with Sheffield United last week. That's a measure of how well we played in this one.

 

The first half was really good but we didn’t have the goals to show for what was a dominant effort. Defensively it was almost a flawless display in the opening 45. Leicester didn’t have a sniff. They like to play more of a possession game these days but that’s difficult to do when you don’t have the ball! They still have it in them to play on the break using Maddison’s vision and Vardy’s pace, but we snuffed out any of those opportunities too.

 

Our two centre backs were outstanding. We expect that from Van Dijk of course, but Lovren was a surprise inclusion and had the more difficult task because Vardy was always going to try and pull onto him rather than Virgil. Klopp said afterwards that he’s never seen a team defend Vardy as well as this.

 

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The key to defending Vardy is to not have to defend him. Don’t let them get the ball into the spaces he exploits. For the most part we did that brilliantly, but on the couple of occasions he did get something to run onto Lovren was up to the challenge. 

 

I thought Leicester defended really well too though, especially Soyuncu. He didn’t do anything spectacular but he just always seemed to be in the right place to snuff out potential danger. He read the game well and any time we tried to get in down the right he was across on the cover. Selling Maguire for £80m without weakening the side is a great bit of business. Maybe United should have bought this lad instead.

 

He will have been expecting to come up against Salah but for some reason Klopp switched his front three around and none of them were in their usual positions. Mané started on the right, Firmino left and Salah through the middle.

 

Initially I thought maybe Klopp wanted Mo’s speed through the middle. On reflection I think he wanted to restrict the threat of their full backs by using Bobby wide. It worked a treat defensively, typified by Sadio frequently getting back and stopping Chilwell getting crosses in on several occasions.

 

It did take a little away from us in attack though and for me it’s not a co-incidence that when we finally made the breakthrough it came in a brief spell when they all went back to their usual positions. That’s not to say we didn’t create anything prior to that, because we did. 

 

Milner missed the target with a couple of very presentable chances (one following some brilliant play by Trent) and Bobby just couldn’t get enough on another top drawer delivery by Trent. We also had a good penalty shout I thought when Van Dijk looked like he was shoved in the back while in mid-air attacking a corner. There was a big shout but the ref gave nothing, and VAR doesn’t over-rule refs. I haven’t even seen a replay of it, it’s just what I thought at the time and I might be wrong.

 

Our goal was a work of art though. It started with keeper and as Leicester tried to press we just played our way through it. Milner’s movement was great, moving into space and making angles for the pass. The whole thing looked like a rehearsed move that they’ve worked on time and again in training. 

 

Milner knew where Mané was but finding him wasn’t going to be easy. The window to make that pass was tiny and not only did it need to be inch perfect, it needed to played at the right pace too. I don’t actually think there is anything that Johnny Evans can do to prevent that. He was in a good position but the pass was too good and once it was past him it was game over.

 

Sadio never looked like he was missing that did he? He was in total control of that situation at all times and took it in stride before rolling it into the corner. Brilliant goal but from Leicester’s point of view I don’t think there’s a thing they could have done to prevent that, other than not try and press us to begin with.

 

 

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  • dave u pinned this topic

We win, citeh lose, the shite lose, bitters lose and drop into the relegation zone. Is that a royal flush?

 

I love that about always thinking this is our year. Ohhhhh riiiiiiight. Sat next to a guy who turned out to be a Newcastle fan on the train today. Thanked him profusely for yesterday's wonderful result, commisserated with him over shitty owners and then he said "you've got it wrapped up already" (at least that's what I think he said; it might actually have been something about when the boat comes in, but I wasn't about to quibble). Aaaaanyway, I told him in very clear queen's english (no, please don't) that I doubted any of us would dare to presume such a thing. We've been there once or twice too often over the past few decades eh?

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There's talk that Pep's missus and kid have moved back to Barcelona. There's people discussing that he only ever has three good seasons. There's City fans talking about just concentrating on the Champions League - if we can just carry on turning the screw for the next month they could almost give up!

 

Long, long way to go, but so far, so good!

 

Nice to see Harvey Elliott on the bench. He's very young, but I feel like he'll have a role to play this season!

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Spot on. I've seen some weird reports on this game, mainly fuelled by the penalty and 'Luckypool' narrative, but I sat through that match thinking - 'this is a 3-0 type of game, how come we're not winning 3-0?' because that was the level of our dominance. The scoreline flatters Leicester massively and I feel they're being over-hyped right now because of how crap United and Spurs are and how bang average Arsenal are.

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Great report, as always. Against Sheffield United Mané was fouled in the box and didn’t make anything of it. No penalty given. Funnily enough I haven’t heard anyone bring that up when discussing whether he dived. If officials (and fucking VAR) had the balls to give fouls in the first place then players wouldn’t feel the need to point them out by falling over. 

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Mane was fouled. Ergo, a penalty. Whether he dived or took a dump on the penalty spot thereafter shouldn't matter. He was fucking fouled.

 

The utter shite spouted by the pair of slapheads on Match of the Day about that (and the foul on Salah) was embarrassing.

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Not enough made of Milner's pass for Mane's goal for me.  One of the passes of the season, if not THE pass of the season.  Kept it in play, bent it round the defender with perfect pace - and all that with his weaker foot.

It might as well have had a written invite on the ball "Sadio, please put me in the fucking net now".

A bowling champion couldn't have delivered that better if he'd stood on the touchline and rolled it to Mane.

It would have been a fucking travesty if we'd have dropped points after the sheer majesty of that goal.

And it was clearly a tactic to be trying to haul the shirt off Salah's back too, the whole Leicester defence were at it.  At least two of the snide cunts got a yellow for it, they'd obviously been briefed to do it.

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The thing about last season is we didn’t just bank the experience of challenging for the title and missing out by a hair’s breadth. We also banked the experience of being front-runners with a big lead and feeling City chasing us down. The players already know what it is to live with the extra pressure of being Liverpool in that position without a league title in 29 years, plus the hype and talk of potentially bottling it which comes with that.

 

We didn’t know it then of course but it effectively constituted a dry run for where we are now. Not in terms of how long was left in the season, but certainly that inevitable “it’s theirs to lose” sense from everyone else. That’s not saying we’ll definitely win it now, for obvious reasons, but how could already having experienced and learnt from a situation with strong similarities to this one so recently not help?

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I'm the only red in the job and that's all I hear now “it’s theirs to lose  "another dive" "They're luck will run out" as dave says" fuck everyone that isn't us "and" the fume "is unbelievable. Never seen so much boiling piss cunts, it's brilliant. 

As said above lessons have been learnt from last season,we've been here before. 

 

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Dave: "Selling Dave Maguire for £80m without weakening the side is a great bit of business. Maybe United should have bought this lad instead"

 

Ed Woodward: Now he fucking tells us. Scouse twat!

 

The treatment of Salah on Saturday was a disgrace. He was held by the shirt and grabbed round the neck numerous times before getting hacked down by Choudhery, and not a thing was done. Klopp is right to be furious about it and make a fuss. They'll probably do nothing about it. If we just keep quiet and take it, then we'll certainly never get anything. So much for the Blues' delusion that the PL and the media have it all arranged we have the red carpet rolled out for us.

 

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Spot on as ever.

Mané is just a terrific footballer and getting better which is stunning. His defending was excellent in the first half, he took the goal well and when he was fouled in the box (and he was kicked on the ankle) he made the ref make a decision whereas Kavanaugh had bottled out of those all day.

When I saw Lovren's name I was worried but full credit to the bloke. He's never moaned and complained, he was excellent in this game.

And Milner, I've praised him before but he's such a great leader. That pass was exceptional, his calmness for the penalty admirable and his game management very clever. (Should have scored first half mind).

A word for Salah, he wasn't great but he never hides and makes himself available, always running and trying.

I heard stories about Perez and his brother when they were in the NE and your view of him is spot on, I hope Robbo got a chance to smack him

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1 hour ago, Lizzie Birdsworths Wrinkled Chopper said:

We didn’t know it then of course but it effectively constituted a dry run for where we are now. Not in terms of how long was left in the season, but certainly that inevitable “it’s theirs to lose” sense from everyone else. That’s not saying we’ll definitely win it now, for obvious reasons, but how could already having experienced and learnt from a situation with strong similarities to this one so recently not help?

 

If we take all the lessons from last season's league campaign that we did from the previous season's Champions League campaign and final defeat, we can only be benefit from it. Whether that culminates in the ultimate prize, we may only know in the closing games of the season.

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5 hours ago, DaveT said:

Spot on. I've seen some weird reports on this game, mainly fuelled by the penalty and 'Luckypool' narrative, but I sat through that match thinking - 'this is a 3-0 type of game, how come we're not winning 3-0?' because that was the level of our dominance. The scoreline flatters Leicester massively and I feel they're being over-hyped right now because of how crap United and Spurs are and how bang average Arsenal are.

Bang average arsenal are 1 point behind city. They have 4 very winnable games out of the next 5. The one they might struggle with is Leicester away. Course they may struggle in a couple of others too, time will tell.

 

Im not suggesting arsenal will be contenders but it would be a little unwise not to keep a respectable eye on them for now.

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55 minutes ago, Chocoholic said:

Dave: "Selling Dave Maguire for £80m without weakening the side is a great bit of business. Maybe United should have bought this lad instead"

 

Ed Woodward: Now he fucking tells us. Scouse twat!

 

The treatment of Salah on Saturday was a disgrace. He was held by the shirt and grabbed round the neck numerous times before getting hacked down by Choudhery, and not a thing was done. Klopp is right to be furious about it and make a fuss. They'll probably do nothing about it. If we just keep quiet and take it, then we'll certainly never get anything. So much for the Blues' delusion that the PL and the media have it all arranged we have the red carpet rolled out for us.

 

Exactly re Salah, one time he nearly had his head pulled off! Didn’t get anything for it!

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