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The easy thing to say here is that the damage was done in the first leg. Obviously it was, but that’s not what I want to hear today as I feel like it’s excusing the clueless, lifeless and gutless second half we saw here. This tie was not over after last week. It certainly wasn’t over when we pulled a goal back within seven minutes and I don’t think any of us thought it was over when we went in at half time with a one goal lead, primed for a second half charge.

So to just say now “yeah the damage was done last week” feels like it’s excusing the inexcusable. We had a chance to still turn this around and had we got a second goal Atalanta would probably have folded under the pressure. So that second half was inexcusable, because I don’t think we even mustered a serious shot did we? Atalanta out-thought us and they out-fought us, and their defence and goalkeeper have probably not had an easier 45 minutes all season because of the job their midfield and forwards did in stopping us playing.

They were terrific, I’m taking nothing away from them. Fully deserved winners and they did an absolute number on us in both games. That said, we made it incredibly easy for them last night because that was one of the least intelligent halves of football I have ever seen from any Liverpool side. Ever. We can talk about the poor form and lack of quality too if you like, but the thing that was jumping out at me in that second half was that this team is utterly reliant on having Klopp and Lijnders hold their hand through games and solve problems for them, and when they don’t have that they can look utterly lost.

I’ve been saying it for a while now, usually because they’re shite in the first half and only start playing when Klopp tells them what to do at half time. There’s nobody on the pitch capable of sorting these problems. That second half has shaken me far more than anything else I’ve seen from us all season. Far worse than the United debacles or the loss to Palace. Worse than last Thursday at Anfield too, which you could maybe *maybe* put down to an off night caused by Atalanta’s unusual tactics that we’re not used to facing.

We knew exactly what we were facing this time though and in the first half we clearly had a plan to try and cause them different types of problems than we did last week. The movement was fluid, players were popping up in areas we’re not used to seeing them and although it wasn’t great, you could see we were trying to do something different. It was alright and it felt like we were building up some momentum ahead of a second half push.

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Urgh. What a sickening weekend. Literally in my case, I missed the Palace game after being up all night spewing and shitting. I maybe could have made the game but I was worried about shitting myself. Maybe some of the players should have been as cautious as me and stayed away too. It wasn’t just our players shitting all over themselves though, Arsenal’s did too. I’ll get to them in a bit.

The early game on Saturday saw Spurs get their pants pulled down at Newcastle. 4-0 flattered them in the end, they were woeful and their high line got utterly dismantled. It amazes me this doesn’t happen to them all the time, Same with Villa. I watch them defend and think they should concede three, four, five a game yet they hardly ever do.

They could have actually scored first in this game which might have seen it go in a completely different direction. The stands at St James’ Park are really fucking high but the fans at the back of the Gallowgate still had to take cover from Timo Werner’s volley. The German Stuart Barlow. I’ll take all of this back if he helps them beat City, but the more likely scenario is that we let him sink us at Anfield.

The first goal is pathetic. Spurs looked like they were dealing with the counter but then Udogie meekly lost out to Gordon and then van de Ven just fell over and allowed Isak to score. The second goal is even worse. Romero’s blind pack pass went straight to Gordon, who cut inside and once again van de Ven just inexplicably fell over and allowed him to score.

Van de Ven looked like he was playing in his bare feet on an ice rink as he couldn’t stand up. Goal number three is him again, this time he’s trying to play offside against Isak. In the Newcastle half!! Isak ran clear and finished with ease, as he tends to do in those situations. He doesn’t miss many. Goal number four was a Schar header from a corner.

Spurs have fucked fourth now haven’t they? Especially when you look at their fixture list. We need the pricks to be up for it when they play City but at this rate they’ll have nothing to play for then. And if Arsenal are still in the title race then we can forget about Spurs doing anything against City as they’ll be rolling out the red carpet for Guardiola. Not that we even have any right to complain, we can’t help ourselves so it’s bit rich to moaning about others potentially not helping us.

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The Reds bowed out of Europe with barely a whimper. Technically they won on the night, but nobody was fooled by that as Atalanta out-thought and out-fought Klopp's side, who once again failed to muster a goal from open play.

Chris Smith is joined by John Brennan and TLW Editor Dave Usher to briefly pick through the bones of this stinker before trying to lift the mood a little by reminiscing about some of our greatest European moments under Jurgen.

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Can we just go back in time eight days and have a redo of everything? What heady days they were. Top of the league with eight games left and looking forward to a European Final in Dublin. Then it all fucking collapsed around us. It’s not over and it would be overstating it to say we need a miracle, but we’ve really put ourselves in a shitty spot now.

This is what happens when you keep conceding first though. Eventually it catches up with you. Our chickens finally came home to roost. Everyone has been saying it all season. You can’t keep giving teams a goal start and expect to win every time. Even teams like Palace, who hardly ever win games. They’re dangerous if you allow them to be, and boy did we allow them to be. They played really well in the first half and we were lucky it was only a one goal deficit.

We were considerably better in the second half and could/should easily have won the game given the chances we had. The performance was laboured and we were far from free flowing, but we did enough to win the game and if two of those chances go in then this game feels an awful lot like Brighton, Sheffield United, Fulham or any of those other close ones we’ve won at home.

Those chances didn’t go in though and the reaction has been somewhat visceral. Finger pointing at specific players (mostly the forwards and Dom), talk of how they’re not good enough and that the new guy needs to replace his forward line. I mean, I get it, but it’s really not that simple. Our five forwards have scored 82 goals this season. The midfield has transformed us from the jaded, slow mess we were for most of last season into a team that got to mid-march still chasing a quadruple. As a team we’ve got, I’m not sure exactly, I think 130 goals or so. Up until 8 days ago things were going swimmingly but three games have completely torpedoed everything and we’re all lashing out wildly, particularly at the forwards, with some justification even though I think our front five have more than the forwards of Arsenal and City.

Despite the goals though we all know this is not a clinical, ruthless team. The opposite in fact. We score loads because we create loads, and the forwards are responsible for creating a lot of the chances they waste. Replace them with clinical, hardly ever miss forwards (if there even is such a thing, as even the likes of Haaland and Son miss shitloads of chances too) and you might not be creating anywhere near as much. So it’s a conundrum in that sense.

The wastefulness against United cost us badly and we had to be much better in front of goal that day than we were. Against Palace I thought for the most part it was clearly just a case of it being one of those days where we were just never going to score, probably because everyone was just a little too tense and not relaxed. The only miss I had a real problem with was the Jones one. That’s just awful. The other ones were just the kind of frustrating thing that happens on days when it’s not going for you.

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It goes from bad to worse as a second home defeat in four days has put the Reds right up against it now in the title race. Arsenal's defeat softens the blow somewhat but City are the big winners this weekend and now sit top. We've seen how this movie ends.

TLW Editor Dave Usher is joined by Paul Natton and John Gallagher to try to make sense of it all. 

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Monday Apr 8:

“Amorim has verbally agreed to join us”, say a load of twitter bluffers. “No he hasn’t, the Reds are still doing their due diligence” say the LFC reporters. I know who I believe, and it’s not the likes of that Pletigoal jabroni from Sky Germany, who two weeks ago said Alonso was joining Bayern. It probably is Amorim, it feels inevitable now, but it won’t be finalised as up until a couple of weeks ago we were still in talks with Alonso.

Sporting are going for the title, he won’t be finalising anything with us for a little while. He’s probably said he’s interested and now his agent will be dealing with most of the talks while he gets on with winning a title, while Klopp tries to do the same with us. I like Amorim’s chances better at this point, but at least we don’t play United again so there’s that.

Everton get another points deduction, although it’s beginning to feel like the determining factor in what punishment they get is “what’s the most we can hit them with without it relegating them?”. Two points for a second offence is a fucking joke. It was bad enough they got four points back from their initial penalty, but this just sends out an awful message. Break the rules and get punished. Cry about it and we’ll reduce the punishment even though there are zero grounds to do so. Break them again and we’ll give you an even smaller punishment.

I’m so sick of Everton fucking crying about this shit and how it’s PL Corruption, it’s the Sly Six trying to keep them down, it’s Covid, it’s the war on Ukraine…. No, it’s none of that shit. It’s that Kenwright sold your club to a dodgy as fuck Russian who wasn’t allowed to own the club, so he put his accountant up as a frontman and you all lapped it up thinking you were oh so clever and would be the next Chelsea or Man City.

He ploughed in a load of dodgy money, illegally, and although he didn’t cover his tracks very well (those artificially inflated sponsorships paid for by Usmanov were straight out of the Man City playbook) none of you cared because you were splashing the cash, buying the Liver Birds and acting like you were going to be relevant again.

But the players you bought were fucking shit and massively overpriced, the managers you hired were shite, then sacked and needed to be paid off and then the dodgy money tap was turned off when Usmanov got sanctioned. Yet still you bought players when knowing you’d be in breach of the rules. These are the facts. You cheated, blatantly, and this is nobody’s fault except the people who were running Everton. Who really should be in jail for what they’ve done to the club. If Evertonians were targeting their anger at those people I’d be supporting them. Instead they’re blaming everyone else and crying about how unfair it all is. They should be thanking the PL for going easy on them.

Finally today, Serge Aurier has launched a bizarre but amusing attack on Zinchenko. The Ukrainian had said that if he was called up to defend his country and fight the Russians he would do. He also said he was going to go over and fight but his family talked him out of it. Leaving aside the fact that Ukraine probably don’t trust him to defend anything, it does feel like he’s full of shit. I’m not judging him for not fighting, as I wouldn’t either if I were him. He just seems to talk a lot more than Mudryk and Mykolenko for example, and Aurier has had enough, saying 'Stop your cinema and go there right now [to Ukraine]. A real volunteer doesn't need anyone to call him up.'

I’m a little conflicted here as I agree with Aurier, but I also think it’s one of those things a lot of people will have thought but we all know better than to go public with it, especially when you’re a fellow footballer. Seems like a dick move, but it did make me laugh and I think he’s got a point. Imagine Zinchenko in the war. They’d send him to defend a specific location and you’d find him everywhere else but there, and in the end they’d have to call in that big Polish lad Kiwior to take over from him.

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Tell me, could you possibly be the same Liverpool Gladstone Trotter who, in 1992, fell down the cellar of Spartak Moscow, and received one hundred pounds compensation? I can’t remember that far back sir.

Well, let’s try a more recent case then. Could you be the same Liverpool Gladstone Trotter who, in 1995, fell down the cellar of Brondby, and received a two hundred and twenty five pound out of court settlement?

Me mind’s a blank!

Maybe you were the same Liverpool Gladstone Trotter who, in 1997, fell down the cellar of Racing Strasbourg? How about Celta Vigo, or does Sporting Braga, ring a bell?

Whilst we haven’t been more down holes than Tony Jacklin, boy have we made some huge fuck ups in the UEFA Cup/Europa League over the years. I actually researched the litany of exits listed above to make sure they were in the right order and it just made me shudder. And so, the cup match reporter returns for another outing – join me, Dan Thomas, as I try to pick apart the latest UEFA Cup/Europa League fiasco.

I have been very dismissive of this competition over the course of the season, and I stand by everything I’ve said. The Europa League is laden with nothing teams as well as 5 or 6 really good ones. We have gotten to the quarter finals without even needing to go into first gear, we’ve been in neutral in fact. And the first time we’ve drawn a good team, we’ve got our arses handed to us on a silver platter.

Assuming that is the last European action we see at Anfield under Klopp, it’s a grim way to end it. A really unfitting way for this glorious period to come to an end, drifting away into nothing. I have this down as being one of the worst performances during Jurgen’s time at the club. It’s definitely the most costly.

Yes, I know it’s just five years since one of the greatest footballing miracles of all time when the mighty Barcelona were overwhelmed by a raucous Anfield. But this team is not that one – we will go to Bergamo next week, and we might win on the night. Will we go through? Not a chance for me – we simply aren’t playing well enough. Thursday night was a result in the post, a result that has been coming after a string of performances where we were just asking for it.

Atalanta played the game perfectly – they contained us with ease after 20 minutes, quietened the crowd down from a quiet whisper to total silence and it’s comfortably their best result in European football. Fair play to them – they man marked us into nothing and got men forward when they had the ball. Gasperini is an experienced manager who knew exactly what he was going to set up to do and his team played it to perfection. They stitched us up a treat.

Us on the other hand…. This would be a very brief match report if I used some suitable adjectives – and I have plenty in mind. However, let’s deep dive. Firstly, the atmosphere was dreadful. I wholeheartedly blame the owners for this. I think a second price rise in 12 months is crass, insensitive and reprehensible and has been communicated awfully. You’re already getting your two extra Champions League games next season – there’s your increase in revenue. Get in the sea.

And anyone who is saying “it’s only £x” or “give me your ticket then” you can also get in the sea. The cost of living has not come down, bills haven’t come down, going to the match isn’t something we need to go up in price in addition to everything else. And to announce this after that scandalous United result and before a home quarter final. Some real thinking, that. Boneheads.

The atmosphere was flat before the game and during it and it’s of no surprise. The club have to own that. I do also think there was some complacency from fans as well – it didn’t feel like a quarter final at any point. It frankly had the feel of a group game when you’ve already qualified with a game to spare. Flat, passionless, barely above a whisper for the majority of the game.

We were just awful from start to finish. We were lucky to not go behind inside of three minutes when Kelleher made a great save with his face. I thought it was a foul on Elliott personally but it wouldn’t have been overturned had they scored. Kelleher did all he could – make himself as big as possible, use his body as a goalkeeping glove, and kept it out with his grid. It was another slow start, the same as the Sheffield United game when we could have been behind inside of 5 minutes. It is a pattern, it badly needs addressing, and we will not achieve the heights we can until this absolute plague has been cut right out.

We did actually recover from that terrible start, apart from Kostas who had his worst game for the club – possibly the worst game of his entire career in fact. He was so bad he could have been substituted at half time twice – once to get brought on and once to get taken straight off. He was wretched. Again though, it was final ball and decision making that let us down. Gakpo, who I thought was our best player by a mile in the first half, was lively on that left hand side and he could have put Elliott in but didn’t get his head up.

Now that I am thinking and looking back, we actually created a few chances at 0-0. Nunez went through and inexplicably stuck it wide. I haven’t seen it back (and I never will) but did he kick the ball onto his own foot or something? It went well, well wide and I was expecting a lovely little clip over the keeper into the net a la Brentford. And from that moment, we barely created a better chance. This is just who Darwin is unfortunately – you don’t know what you’re going to get and this match was one of those days where nothing went right.

Elliott did hit the bar and post with a great effort cutting in from the right, really unlucky and it did start to feel like we were building up a head of steam. And then bam, behind. We lost possession far too easily, Atalanta countered quickly and Scamacca’s shot squirmed through Kelleher and in answer to the age old thing, yes “Alisson saves that.” The manner of the goal was frustrating as much as it was concerning – they cut through us way too easily. We nearly went further behind after Kelleher gave the ball away too easily but he atoned for it with a good save as the impressive Koopmeiers closed in on goal.

We got to the break and the word “ragged” was being thrown around at half time as well as “disrespectful” and “arrogant.” The sentiment around me was that we should have gone full strength to try and finish the game off and then make changes. Whilst we rotated, I had the team that we put out as capable of winning the match. But we played so poorly the whole thing has spectacularly backfired. You could in theory have made 11 changes at half time. Well, 10, no situation can be saved by bringing Adrian on.

As it turns out, it was Tsimikas, Jones and Elliott were the ones who were taken off. Tsimikas was the worst player on the pitch by a mile, Jones has not looked sharp since returning from injury and I think Elliott was a bit unlucky to be honest. But with Salah on the pitch we’ll make at least 5 or 6 chances for him to miss, right?

Wrong! We did start the second half well and were pressing for an equaliser. We should have had it as well but Nunez lifted it over the bar. Again. Very frustrating because that puts us right back in it and Atalanta don’t have experience of Anfield on the up with the Reds pursuing a winner. I think we’d have rolled them over.

We then got sucker punched. We weren’t building up a head of steam don’t get me wrong, but we were definitely on the front foot and then Atalanta broke down the right, De Ketelaere just stayed onside and swung an absolute peach of a ball across. All Scamacca had to do was guide it with his foot – Kelleher was flat footed and had no chance. Tidy finish, great ball in. 2-0 and getting towards famous European night in the second leg territory. It also caused all of the Atalanta fans in the Upper Kenny to celebrate and cause the usual trouble. I have no idea why that happens but it does in every European home game. It just ends with a load of stewards standing around their fans. But I digress.

As that goal went in, Darwin went off. I have no idea if that was pre-planned or what, but bringing Nunez off when you need a goal is not what I’d be doing. As frustrating as his finishing can be, he looks like he is going to make something happen at all times. Diaz came on and played with plenty of endeavour but there was just nothing in and around him. It was such a flat performance we were lucky to end up with 0. Salah was unlucky though, his shot forced the keeper into a good save.

We then had the ignominy of a Dejan Lovren moment. The SHOOOOOOOOT dickheads in the crowd got their way as the ball fell to Joe Gomez outside the box. Instead of trying to lift the ball back into the packed box, Gomez decided to blaze it into the Kop. Yet again, playing Joe Gomez’ Shooting Challenge.

May I suggest a cross into the box?

You have selected POWER DRIVE!

Ball is in THE KOP. Would you like to play again?

You have selected NO.

That just summed the game up, it was a terrible decision when much better options were available. That’s the story of our last month really, since that FA Cup game. We are wasting chance after chance, or not creating a chance because of making a terrible decision. It’s going to kill us if we don’t sort it. Not that I am blaming Joe Gomez for that. I will blame the knobheads in the crowd shouting SHOOOOOOOOOOT though.

At 2-0 down in the first leg, you’ve always got a chance. Given the absolute state of how we played, I’d have been happy to take 2-0 and get back to Bergamo still in the tie. It briefly looked like we’d go back at 2-1 but Salah just went too soon – and I don’t think he needed to. He did look just off as the ball went in and I spotted the flag right away – a long time before several people around me did.

Jota came on with 15 minutes left and the first thing he did was win a free kick on the edge of the box. But the reality of the situation is that we were putting way too much expectation on someone coming back from months out injured. The fact he’s back for the run in is a bonus full stop as I was worried he was gone for the season.

Atlanta should have scored a third before they did, with Koopmeiers firing a good chance across the goal and someone missed a great chance with a header. But it didn’t matter in the end, they were rewarded for the way they set up and the way they played with a third. Ederson (not the dipshit with the neck tattoo) was afforded way too much time to shoot, and Kelleher could only parry the ball into the path of Pasalic who gleefully tapped in. Game over. Tie over? Almost certainly.

As the third went in, commence Operation Anfield Exodus. And I don’t blame anyone – but that is as big a mass exit as I’ve seen and as far as the performance goes it was well deserved. It was an absolute shambles – we had the chances for it to be 3-0 the other way but didn’t take them, we shipped a couple of awful goals and it is just a terrible way for Jurgen to sign off in European football at Anfield.

You could not rule out us going out there pissed off, fired up and winning 5-0. We’ve done exactly that in the last 3 years. But for me, we’re not playing well enough, we have key players out of form at the exact wrong time and we will end up going out.

Star man? The full time whistle. But our “best” player on the night was arguably Gakpo and that is up for discussion because he fell off a cliff second half.

Team: Kelleher; Gomez, Konate, Van Dijk, Tsimikas (Robertson); Endo (Jota), Jones (Szoboszlai), Mac Allister; Elliott (Salah), Nunez (Diaz), Gakpo: 

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Well, that was unexpected. An abject performance against Atalanta, on a night when Anfield pageantry was already in short supply, left the Reds' Europa League hopes in tatters ahead of next week's second leg in Italy.

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Another weekend dominated by refs and VAR as controversial decisions for Arsenal and Man City, plus yet another one against Wolves ensured the officials were the biggest talking point of the weekend once more. It’s par for the course now and even when they’re right it’s still a shitstorm.

I’ll start with City’s trip to Palace. The only thing I’ve seen from the game are clips on twitter of the Palace opening goal by Mateta (who looks a different player since the managerial change) and the stonewall penalty they were denied just before half time. Nothing will be made of it because it never is when it’s City. Can you imagine the inquest if that was us though?

It should be a penalty but because refs have been allowing stuff like that all season (usually from set-pieces rather than open play like this one) it’s easy for pundits to just gloss over it as one of those “you won some you lose some” calls (which it is) instead of asking how come these decisions ALWAYS go in City’s favour. It’s virtually the same as the one Everton were awarded at Newcastle last week, and I haven’t seen anyone claiming that wasn’t a pen. Even Newcastle fans didn’t dispute it. Yet no-one in the media cared that Manchester’s own Paul Tierney dismissed it and that VAR looked at it for all of 5 seconds before clearing it.

City would probably have gone on to win the game anyway as they usually do, but every fucking year it’s the same. Every set of fans in the country thinks the refs are against their team and they all have countless incidents they can point to as to why that is. It doesn’t mean they’re right, it just shows that every team gets fucked over from time to time. Every team except one. The one with the most money and who pays for refs to fly over to the Middle East on lucrative side gigs. As Matt Le Tissier would say, makes you think.

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Not beating this dogshit Man United side once can be put down to bad luck. Not beating them twice is careless. Failing to beat this fucking horrendous shambles of a United side on THREE occasions is embarrassing and inexcusable. It’s going to take a long time for me to get over this one, unless of course we somehow still end up winning the title.

That’s no longer in our hands though. It was before this fucking debacle. Everything that had gone before this weekend was irrelevant as it was all just setting us up for this, an eight game sprint to the line where we had a three point start over City and a two point start over Arsenal. Win all eight and we’d be Champions. Our games aren’t even that hard. The starting pistol went and we smashed into the first hurdle and we're now face down on the track.

I keep seeing people say that this was our most difficult fixture remaining. Why? Because of history, nothing else. United are SHITE. We’d seen it first hand ourselves twice before and this proved it even further. Proper shite, a genuinely bad team just begging to be humiliated. These are even worse than when we beat them 5-0 and 7-0. All this voodoo bullshit about how we never win at Old Trafford so this is a difficult game. Fuck that. Play the opponent, not the occasion. And the opponent is fucking shit. 

Don’t take my word for it, just watch all three games we’ve played against them. 87 shots we’ve had in those three games. Plus countless situations that would have led to shots had we actually PLAYED THE RIGHT FUCKING PASS. That works out at a shot almost every three minutes. I bet we don’t have that kind of number against anyone else we’ve played, so spare me with your “most difficult fixture” superstitious nonsense as I'm not buying it. 

A shot every three minutes!!! And we did not win even one of those games. It falls mostly on the forwards but the midfielders and full backs are not blameless either. Difficult game? It was actually the opposite. Gary Neville absolutely nailed it on commentary when he said that people are saying it’s our toughest game but that in terms of the actual play we won’t have an easier game in the run in. This was while we were fucking battering them and their crowd was ready to turn as soon as we got a second goal. He was absolutely right, it was so fucking easy.

We won’t dominate another side like that in this run in, we didn’t even dominate bottom club Sheffield United like that the other night because, unlike Ten Hag’s rag tag bunch, the Blades actually made it difficult for us. This wasn’t difficult, it was easy as fuck and that’s part of the problem. Tortoise and the Hare, the Viper vs the Mountain, the same analogies I used after the FA Cup game. 

This was slightly different in that I don’t think we were anywhere near as laid back about it and I do think the intent was really there to get the second goal and to finish them off, but the wastefulness was the same and I do think we got lulled into a false sense of security again just by how fucking easy it was. Put it this way, Quansah does not do that against Man City. Not a chance.

It’s actually scandalous that we ended this game with only two goals and that neither were from open play. How fucking incompetent is it to not score a goal in open play against a team that was giving up a shot at their goal every three minutes? And yet this is exactly what some of us were afraid of. I said it before the cup game and I said it before this one. There was absolutely no doubt that we’d dominate the game and the only danger was if we were not clinical. And surprise surprise, we fucking weren’t. 

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Another game where the Reds completely battered a sorry Manchester United side, but criminally failed to win. That's three times now, with this one potentially the most damaging of all as top spot has been relinquished to Arsenal.

TLW Editor Dave Usher is joined by Paul Natton and Stu Montagu to look back - mostly in anger - at a wasteful display that may prove to have dire consequences in the chase for the title.

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Monday Apr 1:

Been thinking about what I said last week about not having any better suggestions than the managers that have been linked with us so far, which is basically Amorim and De Zerbi as there hasn’t really been any credible links to anyone else. It’s a sad state of affairs that neither of those feel right at all and I don’t want either, but there isn’t anyone else who ticks all boxes either. So if there’s no-one who ticks every box, no clear outstanding candidate, then shouldn’t we just go with someone who we at least know understands the club? My first choice would be Pep Lijnders, but for whatever reason he isn’t even getting any consideration from the club and he’s definitely leaving. So how about, and hear me out here, we at least speak to Gerrard and sound him out?

I know he was shit at Villa and that they’ve gone from strength to strength without him, but you can’t just dismiss what he did at Rangers and he did spend time here with the 18s learning about Klopp’s methods. He played a big part in developing Curtis so at least we know the kids coming through would be in good hands. I know it’s far from ideal, but put it this way, if he’d stayed at Rangers and the Villa debacle had never happened, he’d be by far and away the obvious choice to succeed Jurgen, so in the absence of any clear and obvious better option, should we not at least be giving him an interview?

There are obviously reasons against it, but I can give you reasons against De Zerbi, Amorim or whoever else you want to mention too. And none of them are Liverpool legends who get the club, know what it means to play for this club and who have won trophies with the club. If you take away his time at Villa his CV is actually very similar to Alonso, and we all wanted Xabi so is this such a mad shout? It’s no madder than going for Italian Brendan who was single handedly responsible for letting Everton stay up last season. 

It’s been Stevie’s dream to manage us and what could be better than Gerrard finally getting his Premier League winners medal as our manager? Just imagine! We’re an emotional club, an emotional fanbase and we need to be able to connect with our manager. I’ll take Gerrard over some beardy Portuguese fella none of us had heard of up until a couple of months ago.

I was always dead set against him being manager even when he was doing well at Rangers, so I accept that this is a big change of direction for me, but these are desperate times and you also have to figure in what date it is today. Boom! Gotcha.

On a serious note though, replacing Klopp the manager is something we might be able to do if we get lucky. It’s not inconceivable that we find a coach who really knows his shit and can maybe get the team playing even better. It’s not likely, but it’s definitely plausible. Replacing the Klopp the man on the other hand is impossible. There’s no-one like him, before or since. Shanks is the only one comparable and he was a one off too. 

Watching that video today of Klopp with Sean Cox just brings it all home. There’s no-one like him, never mind the football side of it, he’s just such a special human being. The way he is with people, it’s all just so genuine, heartfelt and warm. You can’t fake how he is, he’s just a genuinely great man and we can’t replace that. When people talk about how difficult it will be for someone following on from him, they usually mean because of the on pitch success and the results we’ve had, but that’s really not the hardest thing. Of course it’s a challenge and it won’t be easy, but Paisley followed Shankly and outdid him. It can be done. The real difficulty for whoever comes next is being judged against Klopp the man. 

Also today, Guardiola was being a bellend again because he didn’t like a question he was asked. The question was a legitimate one too. The reporter asked him why he gave Grealish such a public and animated dressing down on the pitch and could it not have waited until they got back to the dressing room. Passive Aggressive Pep (might actually start calling him “Pap” from now on) did that horrible sarcastic tone he does and was saying something along the lines of “it’s because of my ego, I need everyone to be looking at me and talking about me”. Which is funny because that’s EXACTLY what it is. 

He also had to respond to Keane’s comments at the weekend about Haaland looking like a League Two player (can’t think why Keane would have a grudge against Haaland….). Obviously he went overboard, as he tends to do, but there is an element of truth to what he said. Haaland is the best in the world at what he does, but he’s pretty shit at everything else. It’s kind of like me in a way. I discovered tonight that I’m actually number one in the world at something. No joke this time, I’m deadly serious. You know how on Call of Duty there are little extra games you can play, like Zombies? Well the machines at the driving range have it too. Zombies appear on the screen and it shows you the distance and direction they are located and you then have to hit a golf ball out onto the range to kill them. I played it last year and was there for about 20 minutes until I ran out of balls and had to stop playing. I had the top score, and not just at the range where I was playing, I’m talking worldwide. 

Every Foresight Sports fitted driving range throughout the world that has this technology linked up and I had the best score (which was double the next best one by the way) but I didn’t think much of it at the time as I assumed it was just because the game was new and not many people had played it yet. Tonight I decided to play again, and guess what? My name was still at the top and nobody had beaten my score. Until tonight that is, when I beat it. So now I’ve got the two best scores in the entire world on ‘Wave’ and I’m also top on ’Survival’ mode too. I reckon I could beat Rory McIlroy at this game. So I might be League Two at everything else, but like Haaland I’m the fucking top dog at the thing I’m good at. 

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Another weekend completely skewed by referees and VAR. So many games were unduly influenced by it, with West Ham and Burnley getting especially fucked over.

I don’t understand referees at all you know. If I was a ref and I was watching games that I wasn’t in charge of, I’d be making a mental note of who the biggest cheating cunts are and I’d be making sure they don’t get anything from me unless it’s absolutely stonewall. 

Top of that list, even above Richarlison and Fernandes, would be that Myra Hindley looking twat at Newcastle. I’d never give him anything, because his first thought in any situation is to cheat. He’ll only cross or shoot if the dive isn’t on, and he’s not even very good at it. You can tell immediately what he’s done. Most of us can anyway. 

That soft cunt ref at the weekend needs his arse kicking, and even more so the bellend on VAR. Gordon does the same thing for both pens. Since when has just sticking your leg in front of a defender as he tries to clear the ball been a foul? I don’t mean when you’re the one in possession and you step in front to shield it, I mean just coming from nowhere, completely ignoring the ball and just planting your foot there as the defender is about to kick the ball.

He did it twice and got two penalties. He’s a horrible, cheating little shitbag but if refs are going to reward it then I don’t blame him. He’s won that game for his team with his cheating, so as long as the refs are too stupid to realise then he’ll keep doing it. Maybe they’re after side gigs in Saudi, or maybe they’re just incompetent. Either way, Moyes had a right to be furious after this but he was fairly restrained under the circumstances.

Isak converted the first penalty to put Newcastle ahead but the Hammers came roaring back. Antonio equalised when he ran onto a pass by Paqueta and finished well. Kudus made it 2-1 with a goal that had Newcastle’s players protesting. Nothing wrong with that, Kudus was fouled by Schar who was rolling around on the floor feigning a facial injury. Ward-Prowse took a free-kick and Kudus ended up scoring. The ref did the right thing in letting that free-kick be taken, as why should Newcastle benefit from committing a foul? 

Bowen made it 3-1 with a composed finish after being picked out by the lively Kudus. Cracking counter attack goal that, but Newcastle’s defenders were nowhere to be seen.

Kudus isn’t consistent but when he’s on it he’s fucking boss. With him, Bowen, Paqueta and Ward-Prowse the Hammers have got some real talent. They need a centre forward though badly. Antonio is not the answer, unless the question is “which striker has a handful of great games a season, spends the rest of the time being injured or shit and mocks other fellow professionals on a podcast with fellow crock Calum Wilson?”

Longstaff made a mess of a good opportunity and the crowd turned on Newcastle. Then VAR got them back into it. The ref didn’t give the penalty but VAR sent him to the screen and then he did. Here’s the huge problem I have with this. All season we’ve been told that VAR doesn’t get involved with penalty decisions unless it’s a howler. Yet somehow this foul by Gordon on Phillips was seen as a penalty the other way. It’s a fucking disgrace really.

Isak buried the pen again and then sub Harvey Barnes bagged a brace to win it for Newcastle. Moyes is getting pelters from the Hammers fans because he subbed Antonio for Phillips and that’s when it all started to go wrong, but the penalty changed everything really.

Gordon was sent off for two yellows. Should have been at least four considering the two penalties he cheated to win, the horrible cunt. He’s destined to end up at United him. Mark my words. He’ll be there in a year or two, going the full Rooney See No Evil Hear No Evil as their fans are chanting about scouse this and scouse that.

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I was really looking forward to this game. Not because I was expecting a goalfest (would have been nice of course), just that I thought it would be one of the few games we have left that should be fairly stress free and comfortable. Maybe even the only one.

If you look at the 3-1 scoreline and you don’t know the time of the goals, it probably looks quite comfortable. It was anything but though. We went through the ringer again.

There’s no harm done, we won the game and went back to the top of the table, so it feels a bit entitled of me to be unhappy about this. Unhappy is too strong a word anyway, I’m definitely not unhappy, but I am somewhat irked. Irritated even. It’s not that I was demanding we score loads of goals, I just didn’t want to go through the mill again, you know? Can’t we just have an easy, stress free win for once during a run in? If you can’t have it against the worst team in the league then I guess not. This is how the next eight games are going to be isn’t it? This was supposed to be the easy one.

My problem with this game is the first half. We just didn’t do anywhere near enough, despite having virtually all of the ball. How many saves did their keeper make? I can think of one, but maybe there were others. We broke the record for possession apparently, but barely threatened. I just think it was too easy, especially after we went 1-0 up. When it’s like that we often see a lack of urgency. An attitude of “it’s fine, it’ll come eventually”. That’s not how it works though, you have to make it happen.

The urgency we saw after they scored, where was that before? If we’d shown that in the first half we could have gone in 3-0 up and put our feet up in the second half, made a load of subs and kept everyone fresh for the weekend. Instead we had to go to the well again to win it late. 

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The Reds returned to the top of the table after a 3-1 win over bottom club Sheffield United, but it was considerably more stressful than it needed to be and it needed a late thunderbolt from Alexis Mac Allister to break the deadlock before Cody Gakpo wrapped it up in stoppage time.

TLW Editor Dave Usher is joined by Julian Richards and Paul Natton to reflect on the night's action as well as to discuss the ongoing manager search and preview the huge game at Old Trafford this Sunday.

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There are some games where beforehand I’d happily snatch your hand off for a one goal margin of victory. Not many, as usually I’d roll the dice on us getting more than that, but sometimes I think in the build up to a game that I’ll happily take any kind of win. This was one of those games.

Klopp had not beaten De Zerbi in the previous four attempts. I’m not sure exactly why, but Brighton have always given Klopp trouble and especially so since De Zerbi arrived there. Maybe Klopp could have given Dyche a call and asked him for the secret to beating the little gel headed Italian.

So going into this, with the stakes as high as they are, any win was fine by me. I didn’t think for a second it was going to be easy and I was expecting 3-1 or 3-2 with a lot of nervy moments and for the game to be in the balance until late on. I was close enough. It wasn’t comfortable at any point.

Of course we conceded more or less straight away. What was it, 80 seconds or something? Feels like this happens every other week. I know it doesn’t, but it feels like it. It’s tiresome isn’t it? Having to come from a goal down all the time, it’s great when you do can do it but fucking hell, it’s not good for the blood pressure.

It was avoidable from our perspective but it’s a brilliant finish by Danny Welcrap. It starts with an inaccurate pass by Mo. As soon as he shaped to play that pass I thought it was a bad idea, but I’ve seen the replay now and I’ve changed my mind. I thought it was a bad decision at the time but it’s not. Sure, it’s not the safest pass he could have made and there was risk to it, but it wasn't reckless and it defo shouldn’t be leading to a goal.

Bradley was miles up the field and I think he may have even been the intended recipient of Mo’s pass. So Brighton broke up that side with Odingra and although we got enough players back to deal with it, we got pretty unlucky as Dom got a foot in to take it away from Welbeck, but Virgil then had to stretch to cut it out and the loose ball fell nicely to Welbeck who leathered it home. 

I don’t think we could do a great deal to stop it other than to not give the ball away in the first place. It’s just one of those things really, but it’s annoying as fuck to keep falling behind in games.

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The Reds returned to thePremier League summit after goals from Diaz and Salah erased an early setback to see off a tricky Brighton side.

Chris Smith is joined by TLW Editor Dave Usher and Paul Natton to discuss a potentially pivotal day in the title race, with a draw in the City and Arsenal game putting us in pole position for the only fitting end to the Klopp era.

We'll discuss the many permutations of the run-in and (mostly) keep the disappointment about Xabi Alonso's decision to stay with Leverkusen in check.

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Monday Mar 25:

It was the legends game at the weekend. They’re not for me, I’m not a fan of them personally but they seem to make a lot of people happy so that’s sound, each to their own. There was a full house for the game and loads of money was raised for charity, while fans got to see some old favourites and some former players got to play at Anfield again. So it’s all good, it’s just something I want to watch.

I did put it on for the last few minutes though just to see Sven at the end, and I was pretty choked up. The older I get the more sentimental and emotional I’m becoming and I could easily have cried watching Sven out there at the end. I didn’t, but only because I made an effort not to. He fucking loved it didn’t he? Such a nice experience for him to have and well done to the club for sorting that.

It’s also easy to get all sniffy about some of the ‘legends’ and yeah, fair enough, Nabil El Zhar is kind of scraping the bottom of the barrel, but it’s necessary. You’re never going to get 15 or 16 of our greatest ever players, that’s not how it works. So if Gregory Vignal, Mark Gonzalez and Bjorn Kvarme get a game, who’s arsed really? They played for us, they tried their best and if they’d have been good enough they’d probably have wanted to stay here for the majority of their career, so in that regard this is nice for them to come back I think. I’d rather watch them than that fucking Torres rat anyway…. 

You may recall that I mentioned last week how we beat City in the u21 league. Turns out they showed up at our training ground for that game in the first team bus, which is emblazoned with all of the trophies they cheated their way to last season. I’d like to know if they use that bus to travel to all of their games or if that’s just the latest example of how obsessed they are with us. Soft cunts.

Staying with them and their cheating, the M.E.N ran a story over the weekend that’s a little disturbing, as clearly it was fed to that Simon Mullock stooge by City. It was along the lines of how Etihad Airlines are floating on the stock exchange or something, which means they need to make their accounts public. Why is this relevant? Well remember those Der Spiegel leaks when City’s emails were hacked? Some of the most incriminating stuff was how their sponsors were not actually paying the bulk of the money. It was being paid by the Sheik. I don’t remember the exact figures, but the emails showed that Etihad were sponsoring City for massive money, but were only having to pay £8m and the rest of it would be covered by Mansour. We know this is true because why the fuck would City be sending emails saying that kind of thing and potentially incriminating themselves if it wasn’t true?

So it’s a bit of a co-incidence that NOW, after all these years, Etihad are suddenly making this move which will oh so conveniently make their accounts public just in time for City’s hearing with the PL. Those accounts are going to be doctored as fuck, we all know it. If Etihad cook their books, who are they answering too? The state. Who runs the state? The same people who run Man City.

This being leaked to the M.E.N. and the smug tone of the piece makes me think this is just the start of the shit they’re going to pull to cheat their way out of these charges. How can the PL prove any of this if all the companies who sponsor City can just show false accounts because the Abu Dhabi tax office is not going to give a fuck? They’re going to beat these charges because how can you take on a nation state? The only way to stop City is for the other clubs to forfeit games against them. They should have done it years ago, but if they blag their way out of these charges then it needs to happen.

Meanwhile, Richard Keys says Alonso to Liverpool is agreed and that if he was a Liverpool fan he’d be excited. That’s me convinced anyway. Seriously, obviously he knows nothing because whatever talks are taking place will be kept completely under wraps. Liverpool in particular are pretty fucking great these days at playing their cards close to their chest, and Xabi and his agent aren’t going to be running their mouths to people who Keys know either. So Keys knows nothing, which puts him in good company alongside that Pletigoal fraud from Sky Germany.

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Monday Mar 18:

Trying to avoid the fallout from yesterday as I’m still angry and gutted about it. As I said in the match report, I’ve made peace with being out of the cup, as winning everything was always going to be a tall order and this was bottom of the wish list for most of us. It’s getting beat by them that stings, and specifically the manner of it. It’s not so much about us losing that way, it’s about them winning that way and the joy it brought them. Their joy bothers me far more than our disappointment. I fucking hate the idea that they went home happy, those tragedy chanting cunts didn’t deserve a happy ending but we gave it to them anyway.

That’s probably the best moment they’ve had since Ferguson left you know. I just hope they think it’s some kind of turning point, because it absolutely isn’t, they’re still shit. As for us, we better fucking learn from this and put it right in three weeks, because honestly I’ll struggle to forgive these players if they fuck up Klopp’s farewell by failing to beat these losers three times. I know that sounds melodramatic, but that’s how I feel. Failing to beat them in a few weeks, combined with the other two results, would effectively cost us two trophies and ruin Klopp’s happy ending, because quite frankly, fuck the Europa League. If we win the league then the Europa will be the cherry on the top of that, but without the league then sorry, winning the Europa is going to mean fuck all in the grand scheme of things. So yeah, in three weeks they better fucking go there and win as it will take a lot of forgiving if they don’t.

A little bit of good news today as Egypt haven’t called up Mo and good ol’ Bielsa has given Darwin time off too. He’s a good egg him. Would have been nice if we’d been able to get a few more players out of it too (Diaz, Macca, Endo and Robbo especially), but Darwin and Mo getting some time off and then spending the week training here with us is helpful, so I’ll take that small win. 

Elsewhere today, Forest have been docked four points. We knew it was coming, the only question was whether it would be more than that. Four isn’t bad, they should be quite pleased with that I think. Everton will get at least that I assume, so basically the four points they got back will be taken off them again. Some rumours that Chelsea will get an even bigger one than Everton’s initial 10 point one. What’s the point though? Doesn’t matter, they’re not in contention for Europe and won’t go down, so essentially there’s no punishment for them cheating really is there? You could take 20 points off them and they’d be fine. Even if it’s next season (which actually, when I think about it, it will be) I don’t see much changing. Not gonna be top four, not gonna be bottom four. Somewhere in the middle so the deduction won’t mean anything. Still funny though I suppose.

The U21s beat City, which initially had me thinking was quite an impressive result. We tend to struggle against them at the Academy levels so this felt like a feather in the cap, only it turns out that City are second bottom of a 26 team table and are proper shit at u21 level. They’ve only won two of 17 games this season. I’m not actually sure how that’s possible as they’re always really good at u18 level and have loads of kids in their first team squad. How can their u21 stink? I’ve just had a look and they are second in the u18 league this season (we’re third, miles behind them) so what happens to their players between the ages of 18 and 21? They sell them to Burnley for vastly inflated fees, probably. 

Anyway, Kone-Doherty and Rhys Williams got the goals in a 2-0 win. Isaak Mabaya made his return from injury too. He’s been out for ages, to the point where I’d forgotten about him completely. Shame, as he’d have almost certainly had a chance in the first team by now. You know who else I’d forgotten about? Oakley Cannonier. Where the fuck has he been all season? He’s fallen behind Koumas and Danns now through no fault of his own. Injuries really can make or break a career for young lads. Get one at the wrong time and it can fuck everything up. I fear for Kaide Gordon now, he’s fallen behind and it’s a long road back, and even Ben Doak as he’s missed so much football this season where he could have really established himself. Now he’ll have to prove himself all over again to a new manager, who might not play a system that suits or who might not be big on promoting youth when he’s trying to prove himself at a new club. You get an injury at the wrong time as a kid, it can absolutely change the course of your career drastically. 

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Short one this week as there were only four games and none of the big boys were playing. Unless you count Spurs in that, which nobody does.

Some weird goings on at Burnley v Brentford. The home side took the lead early on from the spot after Reguilon had fouled Vitinho. The ref didn’t give it initially, even though it was blatant. No idea who the ref was as I’ve never seen him before. Maybe that’s why Paul Tierney was happy to send him to the screen to show him the error of his ways.

So he then gives the pen, but also sends Reguilon off. What am I missing here, how is that a red card? I thought they scrapped the whole ‘double jeopardy’ thing? Does it only count on keepers? If so, that’s fucking stupid. That punishment does not fit the crime. It’s a clumsy foul but not deliberate and since when are red cards being given for standard penalty calls? Gross wasn't sent off for fouling Szoboszlai in the box and that was worse than this. 

And why is it different for keepers compared to defenders? Ederson wiped out Nunez last week and got a yellow. Now that was fair because I don’t think Darwin is reaching that ball and getting a shot away, but the point is that even if it was an area where he would have had an empty net it is no longer a red card.

Actually, the Jota one against Newcastle is a better example. A penalty is given against the keeper and Jota had an open goal, but that’s not a red card. So why the fuck is Reguilon getting sent off when the Burnley lad still has to beat the keeper? As I say, am I missing something here, because this seems wrong. So the decision was apparently right, but the rule is shit.

Anyway, Bruun Larsen buried the pen and Brentford were now having to play almost an entire game with only ten men. No wonder Burnley were able to finally win a game. Mind you, bombing James Trafford to the bench helped too. He’s been dropping clangers all season and Kompany finally ditched him in mid-March. Still, at least he was able to help City maintain some sort of pretence about trying to comply with FFP. Bulb headed cunt.

Some moustachio'd cat named Muric took his place and was almost embarrassed by O’Shea who played a blind backpass that the keeper needed to scramble across and clear off the line. Burnley have been doing this kind of shit all season. Absolute clown show back there, trying to play like Man City with Championship level players.

They do play some decent stuff though and Fofana should have scored after a nice move, but he somehow put it miles wide from three yards out with an open goal. Look at the goal he scored last week and then look at this. Some serious Darwin vibes about it.

He did find the net in the second half with a nice finish, seconds after Vitinho had made a goal saving tackle to deny Lewis Potter on the break. That kind of thing is a proper back breaker, Brentford thought they were about to get back level and then just like that it’s 2-0.

Brentford pulled one back through Ajer as a VAR check was taking place for two penalty appeals Brentford had. Tough game for the officials this because every time there was a corner the penalty area resembled a Royal Rumble. Usually that’s because of Brentford, who are one of the worst in the league for holding on set-pieces. This was mostly Burnley though, who got away with fucking murder. I don’t blame them though, unless you’re playing Man City then the refs are not calling these no matter how blatant they are so why wouldn’t you do it? May as well if they aren’t going to call them.

Brentford had an equaliser ruled out right at the death when Toney was adjudged to have fouled the keeper. Yeah, he did foul him, correct decision even though I’d have died laughing if that one had counted against Kompany. Never mind, he’ll be back in the Championship soon enough and we can forget he exists again.

Brentford are quite close to that relegation battle too and they’re on a terrible run, but I just don’t see them being in any trouble, especially now my boy Mbuemo is back alongside my boy Toney and my other boy Maupay.

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What an absolute sickener. It’s an all timer for me that, just because of who it was, how it happened, and the fact that it was all so fucking unnecessary. We’ve lost here in the cup to a couple of late goals before and it hurts like fuck, but when that happened they were better than us and it would have been a great effort for us to have beaten them. It hurts but it’s understandable. That’s not how it is now. They’re shite, we should never be losing to them and I don’t feel any better about it today than I did yesterday. I'm still fuming.

That said, having been able to sleep on it and collect some thoughts, I can compartmentalise this to some extent. With the dust having settled on it, I’m not that arsed we’re out of the FA Cup. I’d have loved to have won it, obviously, but going out of the cup in itself isn’t bothering me today. I can easily find a positive in that because not having to play in the semi final means the Fulham game takes place at the weekend and does not need to be crammed in somewhere late in the season when we’re already going to be overstretched. 

We still don’t have a date for the Everton game unless I’ve missed that. So does going out of the FA Cup help us when it comes to the league? To a degree, yes it does. Is the league more important? Fuck yes is it. I’d like to still be in the cup but it’s the manner of the loss and who we lost to that hurts today, not the fact that we’re out of the FA Cup. 

There’s a reason quadruples don’t happen and it’s not because no team is good enough to do it. It’s because competing on four fronts takes a monumental effort and you need a huge amount of luck. Trying for four actually makes it harder to win any because the mental and physical toll on a squad is huge late in the season. And when you’ve got as many players missing as we’ve had (and still have) then it’s even more unlikely. So yeah, I can make my peace with no longer being in the FA Cup quite easily. 

The thing I can’t make my peace with is losing to them. They aren’t a serious football team. They do things that proper football teams just don’t do. Honestly, look at the number of screenshots doing the rounds showing countless instances of how much space we had. We don’t get that kind of room to play against anybody. Maybe that’s how they’re as high as sixth, they just lull you into a false sense of security by being utterly fucking inept tactically.

They’re the worst Manchester United side I’ve ever seen. If we’d been beaten by Fulham or Palace or someone of that ilk I’d be over it already. It wasn’t Fulham or Palace though. It was a shite team with cunt fans who spent all afternoon chanting about Hillsborough. We can’t do anything about that (the FA have put out a statement saying it’s not acceptable though, so I’m sure that will ensure it doesn’t happen again), but the players can. They need to fight that battle for us by inflicting misery on those cunts. Instead they gave those Hillsborough mocking lowlifes the best memory they’ve had in a decade. Nice one lads, thanks for that. Good job. *slow hand clap*

We beat these cunts 7-0 a year ago. Seven fucking nil. They somehow escaped from Anfield with a 0-0 draw this season but we should have been going there and spanking them and - I don’t say this lightly because they’ve been incredible and I love them - but for once the players let us down. I don’t mean in effort as they gave absolutely everything, they always do. I mean in execution, in focus. I mean in just making the right fucking decisions. 

You just can’t not win this game. Can’t happen. Not acceptable. Not the way the game played out. Look, if we just hadn’t been at it and they’d played well, then of course we can lose to them. Shit as they are, it can happen. We almost lost at Luton and needed a last minute equaliser to spare our blushes. You can have an off day and when that happens you can lose. This wasn’t that though. We didn’t have an off day, we dominated the game. But you have to beat them and make your superiority count, and instead we thought 2-1 would be enough. 

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The Reds paid the price for not finishing off the opponent when they were on the ropes and suffered the most heartbreaking of Old Trafford losses right at the death.

TLW Editor Dave Usher is joined by Julian Richards and Stu Montagu for a healing group therapy session and to try and make sense of what happened.

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Monday Mar 11:

Kyle Walker is doing the media rounds today for some reason or other, and for some reason Sky are asking him for his thoughts on the ref's performance yesterday. Of course he was effusive in his praise of Michael Oliver (or “Mike” to his friends such as dirtbag Kyle) because he showed great “character” to not be swayed by Anfield yesterday. This isn’t normal and I can’t believe Sky are putting shit like this out. What’s going on? I feel like we’re in a footy equivalent of a Black Mirror episode. This is even worse than someone slagging a referee off, as the next time he’s involved in a contentious incident and Oliver is the ref, this interview is going to do him a lot of good I reckon.

PGMOL needs a massive shake up and I don't mean with the refs on the pitch, as their job gets harder by the week because of the "protocols" they have to adhere to. What needs looking at is how VAR is implemented and how it seems to exist for the purpose of backing up the on field decision rather than getting to the right outcome. Yesterday is a prime example really. Oliver doesn't give the pen and Attwell is coming out with complete horseshit to try and validate the decision. Foot not in an unnaturally high position apparently. So studs up into a players chest is normal then? Fuck off. You didn't want to tell Oliver he was wrong, that's why you let it go. We all know it.

The technology is there but they don't use it properly. It's used to rule out goals for the most stupid of reasons (Solanke had one disallowed this weekend for a laughable 'handball' for example) and not used when it would be really useful. They need to work together to get the right outcome, but there's ego involved here. VAR rarely wants to tell the ref on the pitch he's wrong and the refs on the pitch don't seem to ever ask for help. It shouldn't be there to tell the ref he's made a mistake, it should be there for the ref to get a proper look at it and decide for himself what the decision should be.

What should have happened yesterday is Oliver should have said "could that have been a foul, should I take a look?" and VAR should have said "yeah have another look and then make your decision". But that doesn't happen because of the protocols they have. All this 'clear and obvious' bullshit. If PGMOL aren't going to use the technology to help themselves then they need it taking out of their hands. Maybe like the NFL where the coach can challenge a decision and have it reviewed. But it can't be reviewed by the ref on the pitch as there's too much ego involved with some of them. Oliver for instance. He's not going to take kindly to a manager challenging his decisions and is likely to dig in even further. He doesn't even like his own colleagues questioning him when they've got access to angles he hasn't.

Richard Keys (I know, I know) claims Oliver has told his colleague to never send him to the screen. The last time it happened was September 2022 and he stuck with his original decision. Keys reckons he's been told that Oliver was furious about that and at the next refs meeting told them to never send him to the screen again. Could be bollocks of course, Keys isn't the most reliable of witnesses after all, but he does have contacts within PGMOL and his claims have not been dismissed (not yet anyway, and he's been saying it for a while). All I know is Attwell's explanation for why VAR wasn't recommending a review was absolute nonsense.

If there is even a shred of truth in what Keys is saying, then this cunt needs reigning in. A ref on the field gets one look at an incident and its therefore a really tough job. So it’s the absolute height of arrogance to refuse the help and advice of colleagues who have access to different angles, replays and slo motion footage. Oliver is either the most egotistical ref to have ever lived or he wants to influence results without the interference of colleagues correcting his wrong calls. Either way, it needs looking into. 

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I don’t think I’ve ever felt uncomfortable about us battering a team before but when the fourth goal went in and we hadn’t even reached the 15 minute mark, I was squirming a little bit. It just felt awkward. Like that video when Michael Owen was blasting volleys past a 12 year old keeper.

I felt a bit sorry for Sparta but I was also annoyed with them too. It’s hard enough playing against us without doing the stupid shit they kept doing. It was the same last week too. How many of the goals we scored over both legs came from us winning the ball from them when they tried to play out from the back? At least four, probably more. Yet they kept doing it and we kept punishing them. It was uncomfortable and if we’d continued to play at full intensity we might have scored 20. I’m not even joking.

Of course we were never going to do that because it would have been stupid. After that blistering start we dropped down to third gear and stayed there. Except Harvey, who came on at half time as was in sixth gear for the entire second half while everyone else was cruising along.

I’m not going to say we shouldn’t be in the Europa League as we’re there for a reason, but it’s almost unfair to the other teams in it because we’re a Champions League calibre team and if we were in that competition we’d have a great chance of winning it. At this time of year we’re usually playing Porto, Barcelona, Inter etc so teams like Sparta are always going to be overmatched, especially when Klopp is putting out such strong line ups.

In an ideal world I think most fans would have wanted every first teamer rested for this, but it just doesn’t work like that as managers tend to not operate that way. Klopp certainly doesn’t. There have been times when I think that’s cost us needlessly (Jota a couple o years ago in a dead rubber, Konate last week) but when I saw the line up I didn’t see too many surprises.

I actually think given the scoreline from the first leg, Klopp was able to treat this almost like a kind of 11v 11 training match. We didn’t need to be flat out but it was a good session and an ideal tune up for the weekend. Players who needed a rest got it, players who needed minutes got them, everyone played well and the attacking five all got goals. Just what we needed.

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Arsenal have been bitching about refs all season which really fucking winds me up as it’s not like they’ve suffered much, although I wouldn’t say they’ve benefited much either. In terms of the top three and officiating, you’ve City at one end of the scale, us at the other and Arsenal are somewhere in the middle.

Yet their fans were some of the most vocal on twitter last week (they always are) after the drop ball nonsense at Forest, but this week they weren’t happy when people rightly pointed out that their winning goalscorer against Brentford should not have even been on the pitch when he scored.

As great as last week’s win at Forest felt for us, and will have been a massive kick in the nuts for City and Arsenal, this week we were the ones getting kicked in the nuts as Arsenal got that contentious late winner against Brentford when it looked like they were going to drop points. There was nowhere near the same furore as there was about the drop ball nonsense though. Maybe if Brentford hired Uriah Rennie or Paul Durkin to bitch about it afterwards we'd have seen a bit more fuss made of it.

Arsenal went in front and no doubt their fans were expecting another landslide. After all, these are the smug, smelling themselves wankers that had #prayforbrentford trending on Twitter before the game. It’s happening before all of their games now. They just make me cringe so much that my toes are permanently curled these days.

Everything about Arsenal is getting on my tits now, from that God awful "North London forever" anthem they've just adopted this season to the bad try hard celebrations of Arteta and the players and pretty much everything else in between. There’s a lot of annoying faces in that team too... Ramsdale, Ben Shite, Gabriel, Saliba, Martinelli, Saka, Odegaard, Trossard, Jesus, Zinchenko… all massively annoying faces. 

Arsenal were so busy enjoying the smell of their own farts after Rice headed them in front that they forgot that it was only 1-0 and that Brentford aren’t really a side you want to fuck with. They certainly aren’t the soft touches that Burnley and Sheffield United are, so Brentford fought back. Ably assisted by Diet Pickford in goal it should be said.

There’s a reason Arteta doesn’t like picking him and Ramsdale himself gave it away in an interview he did when he said he needs to get involved with the crowd during games because he gets bored and can’t concentrate otherwise. Not even David James had that bad of an attention span.

So Ramsdale fucked up to let Brentford get back into it through Wissa, but he made a couple of saves in the second half so that’s all fine apparently and it showed what great character he has. Yeah, I think they should play him in every game now, let him prove just how great his “character” is. 

My boy Toney almost scored the goal of the season with a brilliant first time left foot half volley that was inches away from going over the despairing dive of Ramsdale, but he just got his fingers to it to keep it out. Brentford had other chances too and the second half was edgy as fuck for Arsenal. 

They were getting desperate and every time the ball went in the box an Arsenal player would hit the deck wanting a pen. Some of them were iffy and could have been given, but not the one from Havertz that should have seen him booked for cheating. It was obviously a dive, the ref knew immediately which is why he waved away the penalty appeal. He bottled out of giving him a second yellow card though and VAR can’t get involved unless it’s to overturn a penalty decision and then tell the ref it’s a dive and to produce a card. 

All these stupid fucking protocols they have just get in the way of them making the right decision. Attwell wouldn’t send Oliver to the screen at Anfield and they hide behind the “high bar for overturns” bollocks. There’s also been strong rumours that Oliver has given his colleagues strict instructions to not send him to the screen. Either way, this kind of shit just keeps stopping the officials from getting big decisions right.

I’m not particularly arsed about the Havertz thing, this kind of shit happens all the time and Brentford had chances to win it and they had chances to stop Arsenal winning it. In the grand scheme of fucked up decisions this is low on the list. The thing that does annoy me is how little was made of it in relation to the shite we had to endure last week. 

Ultimately though three points is three points and it doesn’t matter that they were lucky and left it late. One way of looking at it is that they found a way. That’s what we’d say if it was us. Its not the first time they’ve done it either, so I don’t blame Arsenal fans for thinking like that. It’s not how I see it though. I see a team that was battered some shit teams lately and had people going over the top about how impressive they are and how they might win all of their remaining games. Scraping past Brentford at home and failing to beat Porto over 210 minutes tells me they will drop points. They’ve got tough games, so they’re dropping some points, I’m not concerned about that. My concern is only what we do.

Ultimately it comes down to this. There’s 10 games left and we need to get more points in those ten games than Arsenal, and we need to ensure that City don't get more than us. Can we do that? Of course we can. Over the course of the season so far we’ve done it as the only reason, THE ONLY REASON, Arsenal are ahead of us on goal difference is because of PGMOL fucking us in games against Spurs, Arsenal and City.

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