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Monday Nov 22: So OGS has gone then. Goodnight sweet prince. The fun might not be over for us yet though as Michael Carrick has taken over and please God, let him get off to a flyer. Let him win his first 10 games and let’s have Rio campaigning for him to be given the job and let history repeat itself. I’m not sure even the people who run United are THAT stupid but I’d like to find out. It’s times like this when you see just how utterly clueless the media are though. Initially most were telling us that Zidane was taking over. Then he said he wasn’t interested. Now they’re saying Pochettino is “desperate” for the job because his family are in London and he’s in Paris. Hmmm. It’s a hell of a quicker getting to London from Paris than it is getting a train (or driving) from Manchester so that’s clearly bollocks too. If Poch ends up taking that job it’s because working with the PSG squad is a hell of a lot more unbearable than we think, because there’s just no way you’d make that move otherwise. Sure, United are one of the world’s biggest clubs, they’ve got some really top players in the squad and they aren’t short of transfer funds. But to be successful there you not only have to get that team in order, you somehow have to overhaul THREE great teams. Probably the three best club teams in the world in fact. And all the while you’re having to deal with the expectation that Manchester United should be winning titles, which frankly is a load of bollocks. Pre-Ferguson they were a cup team that was never anywhere near the title. Post Ferguson it’s been the same. This is actually who Manchester United are and Alex Ferguson is the only one who broke that cycle. The Ferguson years are the outlier, not the norm. At least our period of success came under four different managers so we had more justification in thinking it was ‘normal’. One thing has been really funny about all this is how the United players have been kissing Solskjaer’s arse and thanking him for everything he’s done for them. Even Maguire, the tit. While there’s no doubt the little goblin was out of his depth and United are probably the worst coached team in the league, does that excuse some of the gross incompetence we’ve seen from some of them players? Is it Solskjaer’s poor coaching that caused Maguire to get caught dribbling on the edge of his own box and then lunge in to get a second yellow and leave his team in the shite? They were well and truly in that game when he did that. They’d got back to 2-1 and had momentum, and then he does that and it’s game over. Others too. Like Fernandez, who’s been shite all season. And Pogba too. Pretty sure Fred was sincere in his thanks though as unless United appoint the Brazil coach as their next boss he’s not no chance of ever being picked regularly again. Tuesday Nov 23: I watched some bits and pieces of the United game tonight as I was hoping to see them lose. I’d long since switched off before they eventually scored twice late on to win, but I checked back later thinking Chelsea would be on, but it was still Scholes, Ferdinand and Hargreaves waffling on (Chelsea were on the other side). I heard them going on about how different and so much fitter Sancho looked. Fuck off, Solskjaer has been gone two days! Not even Mr Motivator could transform someone’s fitness levels in that short a space of time. Also tonight, Chelsea twatted Juve 4-0. While I don’t think Juve are all that anymore, it’s still pretty concerning that Chelsea just never seem to concede goals and don’t have any problem scoring. I’m officially more concerned by them than I am City, even though City’s best (and our best) is definitely better than Chelsea’s best, they probably won’t have the same number of off days as we both have, and when they do they will still probably get a result because they never concede. Meanwhile, Ancelotti throws some shade the Blues when asked how difficult it is managing Real Madrid: “It’s better to have a Ferrari than a Fiat 500”. That needs to be on a banner. Wednesday Nov 24: L 2 Porto 0. Yep, very good. Performance was decent, we got to rest some players, we got to give games to some who needed games and we won. Generally these group games are not especially memorable but this one was. We’ve had loads of boss wins in the group stages but very few stand out. This one will just because of the Thiago goal, which was remarkable. It isn’t going down as one of the greatest Anfield goals or anything like that, but it might be the most unique as I’ve never seen a strike like that. So fucking pure. It’s arguably the sweetest struck shot I can remember seeing and it got better with each replay. The incredible thing is that it doesn’t actually bounce, even though it looks like it does. It isn’t the ground that caused the ball to rise off the turf, it’s the swerve. I’ve never seen a ball swerve upwards before. It swerved that way because it was struck with the outside of the foot, only because he was getting over the top of it and not striking it face on, the swerve didn’t go left to right, it went down to up. Just an unreal goal. Atletico lost at home to Milan and dropped to bottom of the group. Milan have gone from looking like the weakest team in the group to possibly finishing second if they can beat us in the last game. It would be nice for us to win and finish with six wins so hopefully we can do that and Porto can avoid defeat against Atletico. I badly want them out, partly because Simeone is such a tit and partly because I don’t want to potentially have to play them again. I’m not worried that they’d beat us, I don’t see that happening at all. I just don’t want to play them as it’s not a pleasant experience is it? It’s not enjoyable playing them because their sole intention is to fucking ruin the game. So yeah, come on Porto. Thursday Nov 25: Kinell, I’m not sure how Klopp kept his cool as well as he did last night when that African journalist was accusing him of all sorts. I’m fucking livid about it. The cunt should have been thrown out for shit stirring or for just being thick as fuck. If you missed this, the background to it is that Klopp was asked the other day about how he feels now that there are no more international breaks, and he said “well there is a little tournament in January”. It was so obvious that he meant it in a “well there’s the small matter of…” type of thing. He’d have said the same thing about a World Cup or a Euros as he wasn’t calling it ‘little’ or diminishing it in any way, yet this cunt shows up on the bounce accusing him of disrespecting an entire continent and demanding an apology. Klopp handled it well but he was clearly shaken by it, as you would be really when someone throws a completely unfounded accusation at you like that. The irony is that AFCON is fucking dogshit but nobody in football wants to say it because they don’t want to be disrespectful. Klopp didn’t say what he was accused of but if he had said that he’d have been right. Because it is shit. Meanwhile, Ralf Rangnick is the new interim United boss and he’s going to move to a DoF position when he eventually appoints their proper manager. Everyone seems to be creaming themselves over this and making out it’s going to fix all of their problems. I don’t know much about him but I know footy hipsters love him so for that reason I’m not worried at all. He’ll be shit I reckon. Meanwhile, ESPN report that we’re interested in signing Aaron Ramsay from Juve. 30 year old injury prone midfielder on big wages. As if FSG are sanctioning that move. And nor should they. That would be a really stupid signing. He’s got Newcastle written all over him. Assuming they stay up, which hopefully they won’t. I’d imagine West Ham would be sniffing around him too. They love an over the hill signing on big wages. As for ESPN, they've gone to the dogs since they let yours truly go. Friday Nov 26: We’re ‘leading the chase’ for Villa teenager Carney Chukwuemeka, according to numerous reports. I’ve seen him play a couple of times but don’t really remember too much about him as Villa completely outplayed us in the youth cup final and had four or five lads who looked boss. This kid was one of them but I don’t remember anything specific about him. Anyway, he’s stalling on a new deal with Villa because he thinks he should be playing more. If he’s not getting a game with them he’s not getting one here. We’ve got eight senior midfielders plus Tyler Morton, so I don’t see this one coming off somehow. Unless Gerrard tells him to sign for us because “I’ll meet you there in three years” of course. Klopp spends half of his presser having to field questions about the new manc fella. Obviously he was very complimentary, that’s what he does. When do you hear him say anything bad about anyone? I mean fucking hell, listen to how he described Southampton today and you could be forgiven for thinking we are facing 1970 Brazil tomorrow. This just makes me all the more mad about that twat giving him grief the other night. Finally, the club posted an image of Hendo with the rainbow captain’s armband. I knew what to expect when I went into the replies but I went in anyway out of morbid curiosity. Sure enough, fucking loads of religious nutjobs (both islamic and christian) from thousands of miles away expressing their disgust and trying to force their warped prejudices onto a football team on the other side of the planet. I’d love one of our lads to come out as gay just so we can rid ourselves of these fucking bigoted gobshites once and for all. It’s bad enough they feel that way but it’s the sheer fucking arrogance of the cunts to expect our football club to bow down to their prejudice. Social media is a fucking plague on society as without it we'd never be subjected to these fucking knobheads and their backward views. ….and that was the week that was.

That was an enjoyable afternoon despite the baltic conditions. An early goal ways helps, as does being three goals to the good by half time. It was just a stress free, fun Anfield experience, the kind we’ve been treated to an awful lot over the last three or four years. There was a point late in the first half when I thought to myself “don’t take this for granted, it won’t always be like this”. This team is special, in my view the best we’ve ever had. But they have a shelf life and Klopp isn’t going to be here forever. That’s something I’m well aware of but it’s not something I often think about, because it’s fucking depressing. I am going to savour all these games at Anfield though watching this team, because it wasn’t that long ago it home games were fucking miserable (the final 14 months or so of Brendan). We may or may not win the title this season, but if we don’t it will be because either Chelsea or City have done something incredible that we couldn’t quite match. Whatever happens, it doesn’t change how incredible this squad of players have been for us and there’ll be many more wins like this one and the Arsenal one a week ago. Of course it helps when the opposition actually wants a game of football and aren’t solely focused on spoiling. Southampton didn’t come to just roll over, sit back and hope for the best. They tried to take the initiative and show intent. They just aren’t good enough to do that against a team like us, but fair play for trying. If they’d tried to just sit back and keep the score down I doubt they’d have fared any better as that isn’t their style. They’re a high press, attack minded side so that’s what they did. For some reason though, old Ralph changed their usual 4-4-2 set up and brought in an extra centre back. I say for some reason, but I assume the reason is that his centre backs are useless so he felt like three gave him more chance than two, but it backfired on him fairly spectacularly as they were wide open in that first half. He admitted afterwards that he got it wrong and it does seem mad that you’d do something like that without working on it extensively in training. I’ll be honest, I didn’t even notice that they were playing three centre backs because 1) I sit down the other end 2) at times it looked like they didn’t have any defenders, let alone three. Look at the opening goal. Not the goal itself, but the break seconds before it. One of their centre backs misjudged a bounce and all of a sudden we were free and clear running at them. Jota should have played in Mané but he didn’t play the pass when it was on, and then it was too late so he had to go on his own. He so nearly did it but he was denied just as he went to shoot. It was pretty bad like. Not passing it was terrible, but he got away with it because seconds after he was tapping in from close range. The build up to that was so fucking good though. The interplay between Robbo and Sadio was great. It feels as though we’ve not seen enough of that, not just this season but last season too. The previous couple of years it was happening all the time, it was such a productive outlet for us but it tailed off a bit, first with Sadio’s huge drop in form and then with Robbo falling off a bit. This was really encouraging though. Robbo played a pass and then made a run into the box, pointing to where he wanted the ball. Sadio played a perfect pass through the legs of one defender and that one ball took three Southampton players out of the game. Robbo runs onto it and two more defenders had to commit to it but couldn’t get there in time. Robbo crossed and both Jota and Mo were there to finish it but Jota got there first. Five defenders were taken out of the play by one pass and run. Glorious. We had some sloppy moments in that first half too though. Thiago got caught dallying on the ball and Alisson needed to smother at the feet of Ward-Prowse. Then Trent sold Konate short with a throw in. He probably still should have got there but he hesitated and Broja ran by him into the box and Alisson needed to save again. He made another good stop to deny Armstrong as well. It’s a little concerning that in a game we dominated so much, Alisson has still had to make three big saves. The flip side of that coin is that teams only seem to be able to create chances against us when we give them the ball cheaply. Nobody really plays through us, we just have issues when we make a stupid mistake and get caught with players out of position. I don’t think Southampton really created anything of their own accord. Maybe the Armstrong chance, but from what I can recall every other moment they had was because we made a daft mistake. Against better opposition that could be an issue but when we’re playing this well teams like Southampton have no chance. I don’t mean that in a disparaging way either. By ‘teams like Southampton’ I pretty much mean anyone outside the top five or six. What we did to Southampton we’d do to most teams. Some of the football played was sublime. Take the second goal for example. It starts off a bit scrappy as Thiago’s ball to the right wing was too short. Trent had to commit to a challenge, which he won, and suddenly we’re bearing down on goal again. Mo was stopped initially but popped the ball off to Hendo, who produced a lovely little disguised left foot ball to send Mo in behind. He fizzed it across goal with his right peg and Jota was on hand to slot in his second. The third was nice too. The deflection took a bit of the shone off it but the first touch from Thiago to create the opening for himself was glorious. His shot looked to be fizzing towards the far bottom corner but it struck a defender and flew in the opposite side, leaving the keeper with no chance. Imagine if Thiago actually starts scoring regularly. That’s not something you bank on as it isn’t his primary role in the side, but if he adds goals to his game it’s almost unfair. We almost had one of my favourite ‘red arrows’ goals too when we broke from a Southampton corner late in the half. Out of nowhere we were suddenly flying at them with Mo on the ball and Jota and Sadio haring through the middle. Mo did the right thing in trying to lay it on for Jota’s hat-trick but the defender’s position made the cross somewhat tricky and he didn’t get his angles right. Frustrating as it would have been a hell of a goal. There’s nothing quite those mad counter attacks. We’d had other chances in the first half too and 3-0 almost felt like Southampton had got off lightly. But they could have scored a couple themselves as well. It was an enjoyable game, which was important because we needed something to distract us from how fucking cold it was. The game was obviously over at half time though and the only question was how hard would we push to score more goals. My expectation was we’d add one or two more before taking our foot off the gas, bringing on some subs and generally just conserving energy for Goodison on Wednesday. My hope was that Jota would complete his hat-trick and Mo would get himself on the scoresheet. Jota should have completed his hat-trick and Mo was clearly desperate to score but it just wasn’t happening. Jota’s best chance came from a perfect Robbo delivery but he couldn’t keep his shot down as he stretched for it. Mo had a few sights of goal but nothing clear cut. Alisson had to make another good save but generally Southampton didn’t cause us any real problems after the break. They changed back to a back four and they’ll probably feel like that helped to stem the flow. In reality, we just eased off because the game was won. Ox came off the bench and had a good effort saved by McCarthy, who also tipped over a dipping 25 yarder from Sadio. We did increase our lead when Virgil volleyed in from Trent’s corner, but at 4-0 we were understandably happy enough to just see the game out. If we didn’t have a game in midweek I’d have wanted us to really step on their throat and go for goals, but with the heavy fixture load I’m good with conserving energy. Our goal difference is great at the moment anyway so it isn’t a pressing need. Keeping everyone fresh and fit for the upcoming grind is the priority. We’re in a nice groove now and have bounced back really well from West Ham. There are no international breaks to disrupt us now either so it’s just a case of playing twice a week, staying in a rhythm and picking up as many points as we can, starting on Wednesday. Everton are so fucking bad that there’s no excuse for not swatting them aside, and after what happened in this fixture last season I expect our lads to be absolutely foaming at the mouth for this one. I don’t usually look forward to derbies but I can’t fucking wait for this one. Star man is Robbo, who just edges out Jota (and Alisson, weird as that seems after a 4-0 win). I said in the Porto report Robbo looked like he was right at it again and he didn’t disappoint. Top performance from him. I thought everyone was good though. Konate had a couple of ropey moments but was generally sound. Matip has to come back for the derby though, that’s a no brainer. Ox was a little unlucky to lose his place but that midfield three looks like something special doesn’t it? We’ve hardly seen it so far for various reasons but if this is a taste of what’s to come then we’re in for a fucking treat. Final word is on the Kop bestowing the “Dalglish” chant onto Jota. Firstly, he needs a chant so that’s obvious. But he shouldn’t be given THAT chant. Salah should be given THAT chant, because it’s generally reserved for the star player. Toshack would be one exception, Sturridge another (although he was tearing it up at the time he got that chant, and his name wasn’t exactly easy to fit into another chant). But St John, Dalglish, Fowler…. yeah Salah is the natural successor there and although in time Jota might earn the right, it’s too soon for me. So can we come up with something original for Jota (and Matip) and let’s give Mo the honour he deserves? Team: Alisson; Alexander-Arnold, Konate, Van Dijk, Robertson; Fabinho, Henderson (Milner), Thiago (Oxlade-Chamberlain); Salah, Jota (Minamno), Mané: