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Saturday Aug 31: Burnley 0 L 3. Terrific win that. We made a difficult fixture look like a stroll in the park. There aren’t many fixtures I look at these days and think ‘this has the potential to go wrong’ but this was one of them so it’s brilliant seeing the lads take care of business with no real problems. I actually went to this one, which is rare for me as I don’t do many aways these days. I really enjoyed this though, not least because Turf Moor is a dump. I mean that in the nicest possible way though. It was refreshing going to a ground that actually felt like a football ground. It’s full of character and it felt like stepping back in time. give me a match day experience like this as opposed to going to Boro, Bolton, Sunderland, Wigan etc Not sure about the pub called ‘The Royal Dyche’ though. Even had a picture of Dyche’s face photoshopped onto a King’s head. Mad. I’d have taken a photo but it was a ‘home fans only’ pub and the locals hanging around outside didn’t look the friendliest. The only blemish on the afternoon was Sadio’s tantrum after being subbed. I think it says everything that virtually everyone I’ve seen commenting on it is completely on his side and understood his frustration. Mo was bang out of order there today. No doubt all the stattos will be out in force though telling us how the numbers disprove the notion that Salah is greedy. Fuck that, I know what I see with my own eyes and stats can’t disprove anything when it comes to things like this. I don’t even care if they show that Salah passing to Mané is the top combination between our forwards (not that they will, I’m just saying) because no matter how many passes he may have made, stats aren’t going to show the times he should have passed and didn’t. Mo can be a right greedy bastard at times. Not all the time, not even most of the time, just some of the time. There are occasions when you can see he’s just decided that he’s going to get himself a goal and he won’t let anything stand in the way of it. Today was one of those occasions and he’s lucky that Sadio and Bobby didn’t actually make more of it than they did, because if he was pulling that shit playing alongside Suarez all hell would have let loose. Just ask Sturridge. If he’s got a clear sight of goal on his left foot I have no problem with him backing himself. When he’s ignoring unmarked team-mates to drag it back onto his and trying to force things though, that’s not on. Klopp should have subbed him because at 2-0 he was playing for himself, not the team. That’s probably what Mané was saying. Sunday Sep 1: Just read today that Seb Coates (remember him?) had himself a right Jon Walters yesterday. He plays for Sporting now, and he gave away THREE pens and was sent off in the same game. Amazing. His manager was probably like… Oh, I was right about the stattos defending Mo. Seen loads of shit flying around today to try and show he’s not greedy, and like I said yesterday none of those numbers mean a damn thing. Nobody is saying he NEVER passes or that he doesn’t contribute to other people scoring goals. Of course he does. This desperation to show he isn’t occasionally a selfish bastard though is cringeworthy. You can shove your stats when it comes to this. For example, he got an assist for Bobby yesterday even though what actually happened was he was dribbling and over-ran the ball, taking him away from the goal, only for Bobby to run up and lash it in the net. The most ludicrous assist at Turf Moor since the ball his Aquilani on the back and Stevie smashed it in from 30 yards. There were two occasions yesterday when what Salah did was actually pretty fucking scandalous. Is there a stat for ignoring a wide open team-mate and instead trying to go with a very low percentage effort on your weak foot? If there is, Mo would lead the league in that, or at the very least he’d be putting pressure on Harry Kane. It’s not a big issue, but it is an issue and there’s nothing wrong with admitting it. His desire for goals is part of what has made him so successful, but he needs to balance that with what’s best for the team. I bet there’s not much that can make Sadio lose his rag, so if that was me that had made him so angry I’d be having a long hard look at myself. Imagine making Sadio mad. Monday Sep 2: Bobby Duncan gets his wish and is sold to Fiorentina for £2m. Great stuff by the club, made up they did this. I said initially I’d just sack him, but that if they could get money for him then great. The one thing I didn’t want was him getting a second chance and us being fed a load of bollocks about “redemption”. He’s a good player but as I’ve said before, he’s not well rounded enough to be anywhere near our team. He’s a number nine, a penalty box player, and we don’t have room for one of those in Klopp’s system. So he either needs to be able to play wide (which he can’t as he’s not quick enough) or he needs to add to his current skillset to do some of the things Firmino does. Maybe he’ll do that, but I’d be amazed. I actually think his career is at it’s highpoint now and it’s all downhill from here, because he seems as thick as he is cocky. Maybe he’ll prove me wrong but I doubt it. He’s going down Jerome Sinclair Boulevard quicker than you can say “Jordan Rossiter”. Tuesday Sep 3: Hahahaha that row between Owen and Shearer was fucking great wasn’t it? I don’t know who is in the right and don’t really care. I’m with Owen all the way though simply based on him saying: “I don’t have to justify myself to fucking Newcastle fans”. The Geordies hate him anyway, and frankly who can blame them? That being said, it’s kind of their own fault as they were the only people on earth who thought that Owen actually wanted to sign for them. Deluded bastards. I remember being told at the time by a very good source close to Owen that he was in tears on the night he joined them. He’d desperately been trying to get hold of Rick Parry to see if there was any way he could come back here, and when there was no joy on that front he signed for Newcastle, who paid him a King’s ransom to make the pill a little bit less bitter to swallow. In fairness to Owen, he couldn’t help the fact that his body began to break down and he couldn’t live up to the ridiculous salary they were paying him. Newcastle fans have every right to hate him though, just as he has every right to not be arsed what they think. My opinion on him hasn’t changed at all by any of this. I have no ill will towards Michael Owen but I don’t love him either. I’m indifferent with a leaning towards liking him for all the great memories he gave us. The Shearer bombshell he dropped was interesting though wasn’t it? I wonder how close he actually was to moving here in 2003? If that had happened, it’s mad to think how different things would have been. We might have had more of a shot at the league but then Istanbul would never have happened. Sliding doors and that. Meanwhile, Milner has his say on the Salah / Mané thing…. Just brilliant, and as usual the use of hashtags is top drawer. Sadio’s reply was great too, it’s just a shame Mo didn't get in on it, as it would have been a good chance for him to completely diffuse the whole situation. Wednesday Sep 4: There’s a 17 year old scouse kid at Wigan who we’re meant to be after as a replacement for Duncan. No idea if he’s any good but based on what I read about him today he’s already a better fit for us than Bobby was because he can play on both wings. The 23s could have this lad and Harvey Elliot playing either side of Brewster. In other news today, Lovren had some interesting things to say: “Yes, I did consider the move, I knew I gave my best for Liverpool and won the Champions League, and I am not kind of player that likes to be benched and earn money. Yes, some people around me advised me ‘what do you care, you are in big club, shut up and take the money’, but I am not happy sitting on the bench. “Milan contacted me, but Roma was most persistent, but the negotiations didn’t go well. I don’t want to go somewhere and prove someone who I am and how do I play and am I ready or not. “I am a professional, I have won the Champions League, won a World Cup silver medal, I achieved big things in football and don’t deserve to go anywhere on loan and to have someone checking me and my quality. “I feel very happy because all the time I felt Liverpool was by me, and I respect that a lot. Klopp told me: ‘Listen, buddy, you are top-class player, we will not let you go on loan. We need you’. “When he told me that, it was unclear to me because I know currently I am in worst position of all centre-backs in the team. But there will be a lot of matches, some injuries are possible too. I wanted to leave, it didn’t happen, I was told Liverpool needs me and I accepted that. It was not meant to be for me to leave. “I feel I am in my prime age, in great shape, mentally ready and you can’t buy experience. Not many players have played in the World Cup final and Champions League final as me. I didn’t want to force my way out from Liverpool. Two years ago I signed four-year contract, enjoyed every moment in Liverpool, achieved big things and that could not be possible had I not been in such big club as Liverpool.” That’s my boy. Personally I’m made up he’s still here. So that makes two of us, me and Mo. Meanwhile, Emre Can is left out of Juve’s CL squad and Luis Suarez says he didn’t want to leave the house for weeks after he lost at Anfield. Thursday Sep 5: Rumours that Shaq pulled out the Swiss squad because he had the hump that Xhaka got the captaincy and not him. Seems a bit unlike him and if it’s not true then he’s got every reason to be pissed off with Xhaka after he said this: “If the captain’s band really is the problem, then we can sit together at one table. We are grown up enough to talk about it. If he really has a problem about that, then he may like the captain’s armband. That’s no problem for me. It does not matter to me if I have it. I want to give everything to the team, whether that’s with the band or without.” That’s made Shaq look like a right little diva. Maybe he is, who knows. Doesn’t really seem the type to me, but something is going on because I’m not buying that “I want to concentrate on my club” excuse, when he never even gets a game for his club. There is beef between them though if reports are to be believed. It’s probably nothing to do with the captaincy and more to do with Shaq thinking Xhaka is fucking turd. Meanwhile, Can puts out a strong statement about Juve’s treatment of him, and then later puts out another statement about how much he respects them so he’ll shut up now. I'll tell you this, my estimation about ‘Big Sexy’ as a man, just fucking plummeted. Friday Sep 6: Roy Keane, fucking hell. Loads of people hate him, especially anyone Irish who isn’t from Cork, and I’m not going to launch any kind of defence of his character. What I would say is that I don’t think there are many people out there who I enjoy listening to as much as this fella. Any time he starts talking I want to reach for the popcorn, because it’s going to be gold. His attack on Ferguson was glorious, especially because everything he said was true. The thing is, it’s “Sir Alex” and he’s virtually untouchable. Nobody says shit about him, but Keane is just genuinely not arsed about anything is he? He’ll just say whatever he wants. His outburst about Jon Walters made me a little uncomfortable though. Few people have given Walters more shot over the years than me, but mocking him for crying on TV when discussing some personal tragedies he’s had in his life is a bit much even for me. Not Keane though, he just went in with both feet on him. I plan on watching the entire thing as like I say, Keane is just fascinating viewing for me. I’m not sure I’ll be able to get through it though because Neville’s little high pitched laugh and his constant egging on of Keane, like some snivelling little schoolyard sidekick, was making me sick. He never said a word when he was going off on Ferguson though. Sat there and didn’t react at all, even though Ferguson was like a second Dad to him. Shithouse. Going back to Walters for a second though, I watched a clip of him talking about a bust up he had with Keane and it was a funny story. He does some show with Kelly Dalglish for Joe.co.uk and it’s really good. I watched a couple of episodes of it today and some of the stories are brilliant, especially the Kenwynne Jones / Pigs Head one. Go to 28:50 on this, trust me it’s worth it. …. and that was the week that was

Burnley away is supposed to be one of the tricky games. For most teams it is. Hell, for us it usually is. This time though we made it look routine. At no point did this ever look like it was going to be anything other than a comfortable win for us. Even when it was 0-0 it felt like only a matter of time before we scored. Burnley tried to do what they do. They had the two physical lads up front and they hit it long long to them at every opportunity, but they got nothing out of Virgil and Joel. Those of you who have been reading the Premier League Round Ups over the last 12 months with know I’m a big Ashley Barnes fan. He’s a handful and will cause problems for most defenders, but he never had a sniff in this game and was eventually subbed having done nothing. The easy thing is to give Van Dijk the credit for that but for most of the game Matip was the one dealing with Barnes, while Virg took care of Chris Wood. The two centre backs, ably supported by Fabinho, were the bedrock on which this win was based. They were so dominant they basically just removed Burnley’s teeth. The Clarets were yapping but they had no bite. This was just such an impressive performance, but we’re so good these days that wins like this are almost taken for granted now. They shouldn’t be. It’s not easy to do what we did here. There are some opponents that are tailor made for us and I just expect us to swat them aside. Teams that try to play football against us, especially in their own half, we’ll murder them every time. Burnley though, they present a fairly unique set of problems and we’ve often had trouble dealing with them. This shows just how strong we are now, and I’m not specifically just talking about the players either. A lot goes into wins like this that we fans don’t really see. The untrained eye just sees a good performance and an impressive win, but without the right gameplan we wouldn’t be seeing that, regardless of how much better our players are than theirs. I feel as though we’re just incredibly well prepared for games these days. We know what the opponent wants to do, and we know how to stop them doing it. It’s rare that we get outmanoeuvred by anyone nowadays. That’s because Klopp and his team of analysts have a plan for each opponent. Obviously I don’t know the specifics of what the plan was here, but you could tell from watching the game and also by what Klopp said afterwards that one of the keys was to make sure we had players around Van Dijk and Matip when they were dealing with the long balls. If you don’t have that you’re going to have all sorts of problems against Burnley, because even if the defenders win the header, Barnes and Wood are generally backing in and making it difficult for them to get a clean contact. Their midfielders then pick up the bits and they build from there and get plenty of crosses in. It’s simple but effective, and they’re very good at it. Usually. Not this time though. Virgil just completely dominated Wood all day, and although Matip had the tougher assignment in Barnes, he dealt with him very well too. That was a good battle between those two, with a little bit of needle there too. That’s how Barnes likes it, but Matip was up to the challenge. Fabinho constantly being around his centre backs any time there was a loose ball helped massively too, and between the three of them they just dominated. That being said, Burnley did still manage to force Adrian into a few saves, even though most of them were moot as they were offside anyway. Adrian didn’t know that anyway, as in the first instance the flag didn’t even go up. I had a moan about that last week in the Arsenal report and the same thing happened again. I mistakenly thought last week that the lino didn’t flag because they’ve been instructed not to do so and to just let VAR deal with close calls. Apparently that’s only in the CL though (thanks to @RobbieOR for that). So last week when Aubamayeng went through, the lino didn’t flag not because he’s been told not to, but because he either thought he was onside or he took the shithouse approach and decided he’d leave it to VAR rather than risk getting it wrong. And the exact same thing happened in this game. Wood was offside when he went through but the linesman kept his flag down. Adrian made a good save and the ball was smuggled behind for a corner. Had they scored, it wouldn’t have counted because VAR would have ruled it out, but because they didn’t score it couldn’t bemused and Burnley got a corner (just as Arsenal did last week). What if they’d scored from the corner? How is that fair? It’s bullshit. VAR is giving the linos a safety net that only encourages them not to make decisions in case they are wrong. I don’t blame them as it’s a sensible approach, but it’s asking for trouble and I feel it’s going to creep in more and more. Anyway, Burnley didn’t score from the corner so no harm done, but there is going to come a time when a team does score in these circumstances and all hell will break loose, especially if it’s a decisive goal in an important game. That was the only real moment of concern in a one sided first half though. We almost took the lead when Mané picked out Salah in the box and he struck a first time shot onto the post. Looked in all the way that. It was a really good effort. We had other chances too, most notably when Salah ran through but was beaten to the ball by Pope, only for the ricochet to go inches wide. Both of those were unfortunate, but lady luck smiled on us eventually when Trent’s cross flicked off the back of Wood and looped over Pope into the top corner. Complete fluke but who cares. Trent wasn’t arsed that they took the goal off him because he got the assist anyway, and assists are the new goals now for him and Robbo. Mané made it 2-0 when Mee passed the ball straight to Bobby on halfway, and he drove forward and then rolled the ball into Sadio’s path for him to stroke it first time into the corner. There was never any doubt he was going to score that was there? He’s just in sensational form. All credit to Bobby there though, because he slowed down his run enough to allow Sadio to get ahead of him, and the pass was timed and weighted perfectly. It was pretty much game over at 2-0 but you always want to get the third just to be sure. We had loads of opportunities to do so but didn’t make the most of them and had to wait until 80 minutes to finally wrap it up through Firmino. Some of our football had been sensational at times but the final pass rarely matched the build up. That’s when the final pass was actually even played of course. *looks accusingly at Salah*. Salah could have put one on a plate for Firmino but instead checked onto his right foot and attempted an off balance shot from 18 yards. It barely even reached the keeper. Appalling that was. Bobby said nothing though, he just looked at the floor and probably muttered “greedy fucker”. Soon after there was a similar situation when Salah should have rolled it to Mané but once again checked back and into trouble. That had been a sensational team move and would have been one of the goals of the season if Salah had fed Sadio. Both of those incidents annoyed the shit out of me at the time, but as annoyed as I was it was clearly nothing to how furious Mané was. I didn’t see it at the time and only found out what happened after I checked my phone at full time on the way out. I saw a few of the lads talking about it on whatsapp but I had no idea what had really gone on until I saw the videos on social media when I got home. My first thought was “fucking hell, that’s mad” as it was so out of character. My second thought was that it was hilarious seeing Mané just yelling and gesticulating at everyone! What makes it even funnier is seeing Bobby’s reaction walking down the tunnel. He’s a fucking case isn’t he? So funny. He just loves life doesn’t he? He works hard and he plays hard. Does anybody in football have more fun doing what they do than Bobby Firmino? The way he leaned over and patted Sadio on the head sympathetically spoke volumes too I reckon. It smacked of “I know lad, fucking greedy bastard didn’t pass to me either”. Sadio was on one though, he was letting everyone have it! Klopp, the Kloppelganger and Hendo all got an earful. Luckily Milner was on hand to sit down next to him and calm the situation. It’s not what you want to see but these things happen and it’s not a big deal. In a perfect world Salah would have passed the ball. In a slightly less than perfect world he might not pass it but Mané keeps his cool. In the real world though, sometimes people let emotions get the better of them, and Sadio was massively pissed off! It’s funny watching how angry he is, because that’s not him. The only player less likely to show a reaction like that is probably Gini, who’s just the nicest guy on the planet and has probably never lost his temper with anyone. Really though, who can blame Mané in this instance? The last time I saw a reaction like that to someone not passing was when Suarez looked like he wanted to kill Sturridge during a derby game at Anfield. My memory is shit these days, but from what I recall we were destroying Everton and could have put seven or eight past them the way the game was going. We got a pen and Sturridge took it off Gerrard because he was on a hat-trick. He missed, and then spent the rest of the game desperately trying to make up for it and to get his hat-trick, much to the annoyance of Suarez who just wanted to batter Everton and didn’t care who scored. After one particularly bad selfish moment from Sturridge, Suarez went apeshit and turned to the bench and was screaming at Rodgers to get Sturridge off. Soon after he got his way. Klopp went a different route. He probably ought to have taken Salah off and had a quiet word to tell him to stop being such a greedy twat, but instead he took off Sadio and Bobby to give them a rest. That’s probably what tipped Mané over the edge because if that was me I’d have been saying “I’m out there playing for the team while he’s playing for himself, but you take ME off? And fucking Bobby too??” He let rip at Hendo as well, and again I can understand where he is coming from on that too. Apparently Hendo bollocked him last week for something he did wrong against Arsenal, so Mané is probably thinking that the captain should be pulling Salah into line too. Only problem with that was Hendo had already been subbed by the time Salah didn’t pass to Mané. He was on when he ignored Bobby though, and that one was actually much worse, so yeah, have a fuckin’ word Jordan lad. This isn’t a big deal in the grand scheme of things and I’m sure it’s all been straightened out now. It is something that everyone is going to be looking at now though, so ideally in the next game they’ll both put a goal or two on a plate for the other and we can all move on. I’d like to think that this might have shaken Mo a bit (seeing the normally mild mannered Mané going postal ought to give him pause) and make him realise that it’s fine to back himself when the odds are in his favour, but he needs to knock this other shit off where he’s trying to dribble past five players or taking low percentage shots (and ANY shot on his fucking right foot is low percentage). The two incidents in this game were inexcusable, and I only reckon he did it because he figured the game was won so he was entitled to try and get himself a goal. Even the ‘assist’ for Bobby wasn’t pass. He just over ran his dribble and Bobby ran up and smacked it in. Still, the stat nerds will use that as proof he isn’t greedy when the eyes tell a completely different tale. It’s not acceptable really. This happened quite a bit last season too. He needs to play the game as though it’s 0-0 and if a team-mate is in a better position and he doesn’t have a clear sight of goal, then pass the fucking ball. You know that Bobby sure as hell would, and although Sadio has had his greedy moments too, he never really looks like someone who is just on a one man crusade to get a goal, as we’ve seen sometimes with Mo. Ultimately though, if this was going to happen then better it happen now in a routine 3-0 than in a game when it could cost us. The win maintains the 100% start and keeps us top. We couldn’t have asked for more at this stage. The thing with this team now though is it doesn’t really seem to matter who they’re playing and where. Barring two or three exceptions I see pretty much every game now as an almost certain three points. When was the last time we were able to think like that? The late 80s probably. The standards currently being set by us and City are unprecedented. Both teams seem to win every week now. It’s unrelenting. This win gave us a club record for consecutive wins and also equalled a club record for consecutive away wins. We’ll lose or draw eventually and it might be in a game where we least expect it. I doubt it though, this team is just too good and too well prepared. I wouldn’t be surprised if we’ve won every game by the time we play City in November, and I’d be even less surprised if they’ve won every game between now and then too. The Champions League will be well under why by that point though, and playing twice a week might make things trickier. That’s when the likes of Origi, Gomez, Milner, Shaqiri, Ox and co are going to be needed. Star man is Bobby. Could easily have been Virgil or Fabinho, or even Matip for that matter. I thought Adrian had a good game too, even though he wasn’t called into action too often. He made some good saves and I’m made up for him that he got his clean sheet. I reckon he might be the happiest footballer on the planet right now. He probably can’t believe his luck. He’s loving it though, you only have to look at his instagram to see how much he’s buzzing off being a Liverpool player. He’s replying to every post by any of his team-mates or the club, it’s funny as fuck actually. He doesn’t look like losing his place any time soon either based on how Alisson looked last week at the UEFA awards. A mate saw him hobbling down the steps and described it as “like a fella going to the social to put an invalidity claim in”. He didn’t look like someone on the verge of a comeback, put it that way. Team: Adrian; Alexander-Arnold, Matip, Van Dijk, Robertson; Fabinho, Henderson (Oxlade-Chamberlain), Wijnaldum; Salah, Firmino (Origi), Mané (Shaqiri):