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The weekend kicked off with a controversial game at Molineux as Wolves found themselves on the wrong end of another bizarre VAR decision as they were held to a goalless draw by Leicester. When Willy Boli headed in there was not a soul inside the stadium (or watching on TV) thought for a second there was anything wrong with it. Usually you have an inkling that VAR is going to take a look. It doesn’t always mean the goal will be ruled out but usually you have an inkling if something might be looked at and it's enough to make you hold off on the celebrations. Sadio’s winner at Norwich for example. I didn’t think it was a foul but I knew they’d be looking at it. This one though, there was hint of anything and not even the Leicester players appealed for a possible offside. For all the cryarsing about it though, technically it was the correct decision. You can argue all day about whether goals morally should be disallowed for that, but by the current laws of the game that was offside and Wolves don’t have a leg to stand on. Nuno Holy Spirit handled it with his usual good grace, and Conor Coady handled it with his usual arrogance and bitching. He remonstrated with Mike Dean as they left the field at half time and the ref admitted he didn’t know who was offside or why, he was just going by what he was told in the headset. Seeing Coady continually whining about VAR decisions this season has been a guilty pleasure of mine. He’s arguing about black and white shit. Offside is offside, regardless of whether he likes it or not. He was crying about the one that was disallowed at Anfield, and also wanting a handball when there wasn’t one. I’m sick of him spouting off when the officials have gotten the decisions right. What does he want them to do, ignore the rules just to suit him and his team? The disallowed Boli goal was a bizarre one but when VAR looks at it and puts their little lines in and the player is offside, there is no other option than to disallow the goal. Do we want to see goals disallowed for THAT? No, of course not. It’s ridiculous and there are probably at least 20 goals this season that have been disallowed that would never have been ruled out in the past. That’s a problem but haranguing referees over it is stupid as it’s not their fault. I'm all for giving them shit over their own mistakes, but this isn't that. The law definitely needs to change but until then VAR can only enforce it as it is, and like it or not (and I don’t think anyone does), Neto was offside. What does Coady want them to do, ignore the laws of the game just to make him happy? Fair play to him though, being in a shot with Mike Dean where you’re the one who is more arrogant and full of yourself is pretty much impossible for most people, but Conor pulled it off. Ronaldo might be the only man on the planet who can beat him on that front. Not gonna lie, if I had my way then Wolves would be on the wrong on VAR every week as I find it funny as fuck, albeit I do have sympathy for Nuno as he’s a top fella. Anyway, in summary Wolves had the better chances but couldn't score, and Choudhury finally got a red card that’s been months in the making. Reckless bastard him. Onto Saturday now and Southampton were surprisingly beaten at home by Burnley. I didn’t see that coming, but Burnley are fucking weird aren't they? They’re even more Bournemouth than Bournemouth. Seven games unbeaten, eight losses on the bounce, six game unbeaten run, seven games winless and rinse and repeat every season. I heard someone on the radio describe Burnley as a team that loses every game it’s expected to lose and wins every game it’s expected to win. That’s pretty accurate, although winning away at Southampton isn’t something I’d have expected them to do. Generally though that's what they do. They took the lead direct from a corner when Ings inexplicably moved out of the way of Westwood’s inswinger. No idea what he was thinking there but it was an embarrassing moment for him against his old club. Naturally he soon made amends with a thumping equaliser from 20 yards. 18 goals for the season now, great stuff from him. Southampton were doing all the attacking but they couldn’t make it count and out of nowhere Vydra blasted in a superb winner. That was his first goal since September 2018, which makes Benteke seem like Gerd Muller. In fairness he hardly ever plays. He plays more for the Czech Republic than he does Burnley, which is about as damning an indictment of the current state of Czech football as you’ll find. Onto Sunday now where both North London clubs were in action against relegation threatened sides. At Villa Park Toby Alderweireld put through his own net to give Villa the lead but then scored at the other end to cancel it out. Spurs were (correctly) awarded a pen by VAR. Reina saved from Son but was beaten by the rebound. Dean Smith wasn’t happy about it and he repeated an argument I’ve heard a few times lately but makes no sense to me. He said “forty thousand people in the stadium didn’t think it was a penalty, but it goes to a sterile environment and two minutes later a penalty is given”. What does the environment have to do with it? A foul is a foul, and that was a foul. Smith said it wasn’t a clear and obvious error, but it was. Refs can’t always see fouls clearly (especially when they’re registered blind, like Martin Atkinson) but it’s precisely for incidents like this that VAR was introduced. Fat Jon Moss was the VAR and he got it right, no doubt while saying “it’s not VAR’s fault you’re in a relegation battle”. (see what I did there? Gold that is. That’s why you pay your money). The one point Smith made that I agree with is that Atkinson should have taken a look at the monitor himself as that decision should really be made by the ref on the field. All VAR should be for in that situation is to tell him he might want to have a look as there’s a reasonable case that it was a foul. And it was a foul. It took a replay to show it as you can’t possibly tell in real time, but a foul is a foul. No point crying about it, but I do think it’s probably easier to take if it’s the referee on the field who makes the decision. Maybe that was the point he was trying to make, but as I say, I’ve heard it said a few times lately that it’s not right that someone who isn’t involved in the ebb and flow of the game is making decisions. I don’t really see how it makes any difference to the decision itself but I’m in total agreement that I’d rather the on field referee look at the monitor for any ‘judgement’ calls and leave the black and white issues to VAR. Engels (who had conceded the pen) headed the equaliser from a Grealish corner, but Villa’s hearts were broken in stoppage time when Engels missed the ball and Son ran through to win it. Mad how Spurs have had so many 3-2 wins since Mourinho came in. I don’t see them getting too many more though, not now that Son has joined Kane in the treatment room. That bus of Jose's won't be clocking up much mileage between now and May. As for Villa, the more I watch them the more I have to confess that Jack Grealish wins me over. I know I know, you’re disappointed in me but I can’t help it. I’m doing my best to fight it, as I’ve been ripping him for years and he looks like such a bad knobhead. The hair, the tan, the shinnies…. the fact he plays for Villa… all of that goes against him and it’s why I’ve always slated him. Yet it’s really hard to keep disliking him as he’s fucking brilliant and he gives everything he’s got every time he steps onto the field. I love his commitment and attitude. At the end of this game he went over to console Engels and it was just a genuine, heartfelt gesture. He’s been an inspiration to that team and if they stay up it’s entirely because of him. I feel as though this new found respect and grudging admiration I have will be short lived though, as come the end of the season he’ll be on the move and unless we buy him (unlikely, as we don’t need any more midfielders) then he’s going to be playing for the likes of United or Spurs and normal service will be resumed. He’ll be back to being a Poundland Lee Hendrie again. The other game on Sunday saw Arsenal wallop Newcastle at the Emirates. I watched the first half and Arsenal looked abysmal, so I was shocked when I checked back in later with a couple of minutes to go and they led 3-0. Even Ozil scored. That's how bad Newcastle must have been. Lacazette added a fourth in stoppage time and the celebrations for that were, shall we say, a little excessive. You’d have thought it was a winner in a cup final. Stuff like that really annoys me. That’s the problem with Arsenal’s players. They have zero self awareness. So often I find myself squirming at their lack of awareness of their reality. Look at where you are in the table lads. You have nothing to celebrate, you fucking bums. Arsenal’s squad is jam packed with fucking losers who just don’t get it. They’re genuinely embarrassing and it angers me far more than it should. Monday night was a fucking farce. I have no love for Chelsea but what a stitch up that was. A referee from Manchester and a VAR ref from Manchester. Seriously, how is that allowed to happen? Chelsea had two goals disallowed by VAR (one correctly, one not) but the main issue was that neither Anthony Taylor nor Neil Swarbrick felt that Slabhead Maguire should have been sent off for kicking Batshuayi in the balls. I’ll give Taylor a pass on that one because he might not have seen it and also because at least his shitness is consistent. He didn’t give a red card to Son the other week for more or less the exact same thing so at least there are no double standards there. He missed the Son one on Rudiger but VAR corrected his mistake. When that happened, virtually everyone other than Mourinho said it was the right call. So how come Maguire got away with it, especially as if anything the intent was even more clear in this one? Of course Maguire would later score, as he tends to do. The cunt did the same thing at Anfield last season when he also escaped a clear red card. What is it with this big fucking dope, has he got diplomatic immunity on red cards because he plays for England? Chelsea should be kicking up all manner of stink over this as what happened just wasn’t right. Their first disallowed goal was a scandal too. Fred pushed Azpilacueta into Williams. Yes, Azpilacueta then shoves the United defender in the back, but he couldn’t stop himself after being shoved by Fred. I don’t understand how you can give a foul against Azpilacueta there. I’ve seen it justified on the basis that Fred’s push isn’t enough to justify a penalty, so that has to be ignored and it’s the foul by Azpilacueta that has to be given. Bollocks. One foul only takes place as a result of the other. If Fred doesn’t push him then Azpilacueta can stop himself from running into Williams. I had missed the start of this game but I tuned in seconds before Chelsea 'scored' to make it 1-1. I was watching the replay as they did the VAR check and it seemed so obvious to me that I didn’t think there was anyway they’d disallow that goal. I was genuinely shocked but at that point I had no idea the VAR was a manc. I actually felt sorry for Chelsea and it takes a lot for that to happen. I want to hate Lampard but he’s made it really difficult as he’s been such a good guy all season, and even their team these days doesn’t really have any villains. Under Mourinho the first time around I hated every single one of the fuckers, but now? There’s no-one I actively dislike. They really can’t beat shite teams at home though and they seem to come unstuck in the same way all the time. Shit teams sit back and frustrate them, and then take advantage of set-pieces or counter attacks. That’s exactly what happened again. United are fucking shit and it seems like the only gameplan Solskjaer has it to sit back and try and play on the break. He’s had some decent results playing that way, especially against Chelsea, and it’s a black mark against Lampard that he hasn’t been able to figure out how to overcome that. In fairness to him though it’s not easy when you’re up against twelve men as well as the VAR official. Until someone actually lodges a formal complaint about manc refs being allowed to referee manc teams though this will continue. Mike Dean isn’t allowed anywhere near Liverpool or Everton unless we’re playing each other, and he isn’t even from Liverpool, he’s a Tranmere fan from the Wirral. So how come mancs are allowed to do City and United games? That’s the question other clubs should be asking, as Chelsea aren’t the only ones to have been on the receiving end of the manc mafia. Staying with the dishonesty amongst mancs theme, City had a predictably comfortable time against sorry West Ham at the Etihad on Wednesday. They won 2-0 without breaking sweat and Moyes seemed content to just not get battered. I often joke about Phil Foden and his token ‘eight minutes at the end of a game’ appearance stat padding, but it’s amazing how often it happens. He got six minutes at the end of this one. I mean, if the kid is as good as they’re trying to tell us he is, why don’t they ever let the little scrote play? There were more seats than fans on view, although obviously it’ll be listed as a full house on City’s books as the Sheikh buys up any unsold tickets. Apparently that's ok though. After the week they'd had I thought there'd be a show of defiance and the fans would show up in force to back their team. Maybe they stayed away in disgust at the cheating? What? It could be that. Ok ok I'm taking the piss. I'd actually respect any of them who did stay away on those grounds. The reality is they didn't show because it was West Ham in midweek in a re-arranged game. The ones who did show up sang “Fuck off UEFA, we’ll see you in court”. Always the victims, eh? Laughable that they think they’re being hard done to. Their own club hasn’t even denied any of the allegations, they’ve just launched a scorched earth campaign about how everyone has it in for them (and some are even playing the ‘islamophobia card’). Firstly, they’ve cheated. For years. They’re still cheating now in fact and the only reason nobody is talking about that (or investigating) is because the leaked emails only go up to 2016 or something. I read something about how they’ve been operating within FFP parameters these past couple of years but based on what? The fact there are no leaked emails to prove otherwise. Don’t believe for one second that they aren’t still paying people off the books, over inflating the value of sponsorship deals and having their owners subsidise the payment of those deals. Had it not been for their emails being hacked though they’d still be getting away with it. Secondly, not only are they cheating, but they’ve repeatedly lied to try and cover it up. And that’s what UEFA are getting them on. They cheated and they tried to deceive the authorities to cover it up. They haven’t denied it because they’re bang to rights. Yet their sportswashed fans think UEFA are the bad guys in all this and it’s a conspiracy to hold them back and protect the ‘big club cartel’. Fucking idiots. Looking at all those empty seats against West Ham I can’t help but wonder what some of the players must be thinking. Sergio Aguero and Kevin De Bruyne for example. They must be getting even more money than anyone realises, as these are players who could grace any club in the world, yet they’re playing in front of 25,000 morons for a club that nobody outside of Manchester gives a shit about. We got a full house for an u23 side playing League One opposition. If you’re a player at a top side you must look at that and then compare it to your own fanbase. Same with the trophy parades. I saw a quip made on Twitter that the difference between us and City is that the video of their trophy parade has a third of the views that one of Robbo and Milner talking about biscuits had. I’m sure our players know how good they have it here, but I reckon City players have to have noticed it too. It’s human nature. We know they’re well paid but I’d be willing to bet they’re making well more money than anybody ever suspected. If the ban is upheld and there isn’t a mass exodus, then we’ll know for sure, because realistically there’s no way ANY of those top stars (or Guardiola) would stay there without Champions League football. Still, maybe the ban will be a good thing for them. Those fans who were there in League One but have mysteriously fucked off might return, and who knows, maybe if all the rats flee the sinking ship then Foden might finally get to start some games.

It’s been so long I’d forgotten what a defeat felt like. It’s not nice. I don’t like it and I’m not taking it too well. I actually started writing this immediately after the game, which is not my usual approach as I normally like time to reflect before I do the report. I need to get stuck into this just because it’s cathartic. There’s a lot to get off my chest here and a shitload of things I need to vent about. Currently I’m trying to decide who I’m most angry with. Is it the ref? Their shithouse players? Simeone and his jack in the box shite on the touchline? Maybe it’s Steve McManaman. Yeah it’s Steve McManaman. He did my fucking head in all night, completely buzzing off Atletico, Simeone, Diego Costa… you name it he was kissing the arse of it. I see loads of Reds ripping him after our games but until now he’d never really bothered me (other than the ridiculous over pronunciation of any word ending with ‘ing’). Tonight though, Jesus Christ I wanted to strangle him. But if we’d played the way we can then I doubt I’d have even noticed how massively irritating he was. That’s the main thing here really. We didn’t play well enough and despite all the other things that got right under my skin, none of it excuses our lack of goal threat. We sometimes have games like this away in Europe. I can’t explain it but it’s definitely a ‘thing’. We’ve lost six of our last ten or something, which shows you it’s a ‘thing’ because domestically we’ve lost one game in the last hundred or something mental. I don’t know, I’ve lost count. This wasn’t one of those horror shows like we saw last season in Naples and Belgrade though. The performance wasn’t bad in a lot of areas but we just never looked like scoring. No shots on target apparently, although I’m not sure how they work that out when Mo had a goal bound shot headed away by a defender? I guess it only counts as a shot on target if the keeper saves it. They defended well and they’re probably the best in the business at that sitting deep and frustrating approach. That’s the reason they were the last team in the draw I wanted. I still expected us to go through comfortably enough and nothing has changed, but they are fucking horrible to play against and them scoring so early was the worst thing that could have happened. Proper fucking spawny goal it was too. I thought it was offside until about the fourth replay when I finally saw that it had come off Fabinho. Things like that can happen though. All it takes is one lucky ricochet or fortunate bounce and any team can concede, no matter how strong they are defensively. We responded well and took control of the game, but equally you can say they were happy for us to have the ball as they had their goal and were happy to keep what they had. It was all out defence for them from that moment on. I’ll be honest, after about 15 minutes I couldn’t have been more confident. There was no way they could keep us out for an entire game playing like that, surely? They did though. And I can’t even say they rode their luck either. They were as comfortable as it’s possible to be when the other team has virtually all of the possession. We did a great job of preventing them getting out and their counter attacking opportunities were extremely limited. That side of our game was good but we had no cutting edge at all, especially after Origi came on for Mané. Taking Sadio off at half time was a risk but I agreed with it. I’d have 100% done the same thing. He’d been booked for catching the right back with a stray arm and then he caught him again soon after. He was a proper fucking shithouse that right back and he was desperate to get Sadio another yellow. Scruffy twat. Bet Sadio can’t wait to tear him a new one in a few weeks. He was skating on thin ice here though. There wasn’t much in the second foul but the Atletico players were doing all they could to get him sent off. Sadio can get wound up on occasion and this was a bit like that Club World Cup final when Flamengo targeted him. Would he have got through the second half unscathed? I doubt it. Klopp was having none of it and subbed him to keep him for the second leg. Unfortunately Origi came on and looked like he’d never played football before in his life. The first 15 minutes he was on the field he was so bad that I’d genuinely have subbed him off. He was absolutely killing us. Every attack ended up with him either running the ball straight out of play or just passing it one of their players. In his defence, he’s looked fucking awful on the left wing all season. At centre forward he makes things happen but on the left he stinks. The problem is so does Ox. In fact, other than Sadio there’s no-one who looks good out there. I’m being deadly serious here when I say Curtis Jones needs some game time in the Premier League now to see if he can be a viable back up for Mané, because none of Ox, Minamino (early days I know) or Origi look like they can do it. Anyway, Origi was brutal but over on the other side Trent wasn’t much better. We were never going to get through the middle as they’re too strong and had too many bodies in there. The space was out wide, but we didn’t use it enough and when we did the quality wasn’t there. I’m trying to think of any real chances we had but I’m struggling. Mo fucked one up in the first half when the keeper kicked it straight to him. If he meant to pass to Bobby then it was a braindead decision as Firmino was ten yards offside. If he didn’t mean to (and I don’t think he did) then it was as heavy a first touch as you’ll ever see. He also had a shot headed away by a defender and missed with a header that went narrowly wide from a Gomez cross (showing Trent how it’s done), while Hendo had a couple of efforts that narrowly missed the target. We had two or three penalty appeals for handball but I didn’t think there was anything in any of them and I have no complaints on that score. So basically, we created fuck all really. We had loads of the ball but we did virtually nothing with it. The delivery from out wide wasn’t good enough, the passing from the midfield was too safe (did Gini or Fabinho play a ball forward all night?) and the forwards never really got into it. It was just complete and utter frustration. You could see our lads getting annoyed by the antics of Simeone and his players, but because it was only the first leg I also felt as though there was also a sense of calm. We didn’t get desperate and try to force things and that’s a good sign of the maturity in the squad. The attitude from the players is that it’s only half time and there’s an awful lot of football still be played in this one. Clop’s approach to substitutions also showed his mindset. In a one off game there’s no way he’d have taken off Mané and Salah when we were losing. No way. But he was able to do that because of the second leg. The ref though. Fucking hell. So, so bad. There were so many things he got wrong but two really stand out to me. The foul on Ox on the edge of the box, and the handball out wide by their defender which he inexplicably didn’t give and resulted in Klopp getting a yellow card for finally snapping and yelling abuse at him. The ref also stopped the game in the first half at one point because one of their defenders decided he needed to get his breath back after a sprint with Hendo. He wasn’t even injured, he was just out of puff and sat down for a breather! I couldn’t believe the ref stopped the game for that. It wasn’t the only time he did it either. As soon as Atletico’s players realised what they could get away with, they just became insufferable. Every single time we went near them they hit the deck, and 90% of the time the ref blew for a foul. In fairness, it really is a fucking hard job. Take the free kick he gave against Mo early on in the corner, when he dragged the ball away from the left back who just hurled himself to the floor and screamed. On first viewing I thought it was a dive but I wasn’t sure. It’s only when you see the replays that the magnitude of the cheating is really laid bare. That was fucking scandalous, but I find it hard to blame the ref for that because they make it look so convincing. Trying to determine what’s a foul and what’s a dive isn’t easy, and when there are sixty thousand fans screaming for free-kicks the pressure is enormous. So I can accept a lot of the mistakes he made, but the two I mentioned above are just inexcusable. You can’t get them wrong as they’re as clear as fucking day. Hopefully that inept cunt is nowhere near the second leg. I wish we were playing that game today. Having to wait so long is frustrating because I’m itching to see the lads tear into the cunts at Anfield. They are too, you can tell. The interviews with Robbo and Klopp were bristling with needle. They can’t wait to get them back to Anfield and nor can I. Let’s see if they can defend like that and shithouse their way through 90 minutes under the lights at Anfield. I can’t see it myself, I reckon the lads will be so up for that game they’ll just trample them underfoot and we’ll have to peel Simeone and his players off the turf, but we’ll find out in a few weeks. The praise they got from BT was way over the top. Don’t get me wrong, they defended brilliantly and their organisation and resolute, dogged, determination is to be admired. I have no problem with them being so defensive because you play to your strengths and that is theirs. I’ll be fucked if I give them any credit though because of all the other shit that goes with it. This reminded me of playing Mourinho’s Chelsea in 2014. The Gerrard slip game. It felt really similar. The great defending, the time wasting, the shithousery. The frustration I felt watching it. The big difference this time is we get another chance to put it right. And we will. Star man is Robbo. He didn’t have much competition to be fair. Hendo was decent, Gomez was good, and everyone else was below par (other than Alisson who did what he had to do well). Team: Alisson; Alexander-Arnold, Gomez, Van Dijk, Robertson; Fabinho, Henderson (Milner), Wijnaldum; Salah (Oxlade-Chamberlain), Firmino, Mané (Origi):