tlw content

Saturday Sep 28: Sheff Utd 0 L 1 Jeez that was hard going. If we’d taken our chances it would have been comfortable, but that was a really tough game and they’re a much better side than I thought they were. They shut down a lot of the space we like to play in and we never got going at all. We’ve got so much talent that we’ll create chances even when we’re not playing well and Mo and Sadio both missed sitters, but I’m willing to bet that at the end of the season when we look back at the toughest games we had, this will be top five. There might be games where we have worse results, but few will give us a more difficult game than these. Not that Chris Wilder was taking any comfort in that. I like him so far. I like how he doesn’t like being patted on the head and told how plucky his team are. He says he expects maximum effort and doesn’t give credit for it. He rightly said this was a missed opportunity as we had an off day and they could have taken advantage of it but didn’t because they missed chances and the keeper fucked up. In other news today, a complaint has been made about Hillsborough chants from Man United fans - at a women’s match. I’m not even surprised as for years I heard them doing it in reserve games. They’d turn up in their thousands just to sing about scouser, the fucking obsessed weirdos. Looks like this Nike thing is going to happen and we’ll be taking a lower up front payment because we get a share of the sales. Nike are going to use their big stars like LeBron James and Serena Williams to help promote us. Interesting. You know who else is a “Nike Athlete”? Mbappe. And you must have seen the video of Klopp with him and his Dad at the FIFA Awards last week. There was a familiarity there between Klopp and Mbappe’s Dad that immediately jumped out at me. You don’t greet someone you hardly know in that manner. Those two know each other, which points to talks having taken place at some point. I’ve already convinced myself he’ll be playing for us next season and Nike will be helping to finance it. Sunday Sep 29: We might be thrown out of the League Cup after fielding an ineligible player. Apparently Chirivela didn’t have international clearance. Not sure why he’d even need it seeing as how he’s been here forever, but the club reckon it’s the FA’s fault. Worst case scenario we get kicked out, best case we get away scot free and middle ground is a significant fine. I could be wrong, but I don’t see any way we get kicked out because who the hell wants to watch MK Dons v Arsenal in the next round? Money talks and the TV companies and sponsors will want us playing Arsenal. There is a precedent for this too, Sunderland were fined for doing something similar, so I’m not worried about this at all. Actually, if they did kick is out I wouldn’t be arsed, so that probably explains why I’m not worried. Meanwhile, last week I said I wondered what Sterling made of all this Bernardo stuff. Well now we know. Or at least we know what he has said publicly about it. I find it hard to believe he thinks this way privately: "It's a situation between two friends, Bernardo and Mendy, as everyone knows. I can see exactly the point where some people can get touchy-feely on it but I feel in that situation Bernardo made a joke to his friend". The whole ‘joke to his friend’ thing just doesn’t wash because he did it on social media for the world to see. Send him it via text and its a joke between two friends and the only thing that matters is what Mendy thinks of it. Posting it on twitter takes it into a whole different realm and it’s no longer just about Mendy. "I feel it's really sad to see someone like Bernardo, the whole week, be kind of down about it because he's not that way inclined. I keep going on about it, they're really good friends, it's really sad to see. He's not in the wrong for me but at the same time I can see where people think it's wrong and we just need to be smarter on social media. "We understand in this day and age anything you say and anything you do can quickly be judged and it's really just a sad situation in this moment in time. There's not one moment he uses a negative term to speak about his skin colour so that's the most important thing. He tried to make a joke and that joke wasn't the best, but we've got to move on and understand it was not intentional." All of that is spot on, but this part seems fucking mental to me: "He's not referred to his skin colour, he's not referred to his lips. In both the pictures they've both got small heads, you know. The most important thing for me is he didn't refer to a colour." He didn't refer to a colour!!! He didn't need to, the fucking cartoon did that for him. Jesus Christ. I wonder how Sterling would have felt if some randomer on twiiter had sent him a message making a similar comparison? I get that he’s in a difficult spot here as it’s his team-mate who by all accounts is a nice fella liked by everyone. But fucking hell, ‘he’s not referred to skin colour or his lips’ is weak as fuck. Monday Sep 30: We’re bringing in some hot shot youth coach from Porto to take over the ‘bridging’ role that Ljinders had before he became assistant manager. I love this. It’s right out the Footy Manager handbook, I used to do this shit all the time when I played it. Bring in different coaches for different roles. Michael Edwards defo used the filter and this guy is nailed on to have 20 for ‘working with youngsters’. More of this type of thing I say. Interesting story today about Taribo West, who claims he would have joined us but for GH getting ill. I remember this and at the time I was all in on us signing him as I was convinced he’d be great. Mind you, back then I was convinced everyone would be great. You know the player I wanted the most back in the day? Karol Poborski. I was made up we signed Paddy, but I wanted Poborski as well. I was sure he’d be a superstar for us. The funny thing is that at the time we were playing 3-4-1-2 so fuck knows where he’d even have played. I had him pencilled in for the right wing back role and was gutted when the Mancs got him. As it turned out, they had no idea how to use him either and he was shite for them. I still wonder what might have been if we’d got him though. Him, Paddy and Vladi running riot, like a Czech version of the three Dutchmen at Milan in the 80s. I’m also glad I didn’t have a fanzine back then as some of my takes were excruciatingly shit and not something I’d want a written record of. Speaking of Milan though, that brings me back to Taribo West. I remember him playing for Inter but when he was linked with us he was actually playing for AC. I had no idea he played for them. Probably because he basically didn’t. He wasn’t getting a game and he reckons it was because of the mafia. No really. According to West, they didn’t want an African taking the place of the ageing Italian legends Baresi, Maldini and Costacurta, so they pressured the club not to play him and bribed the doctor to say West was injured when there was fuck all wrong with him. Still, that was 20 years ago, thankfully we’ve moved on from all that vile racist shit now.... Tuesday Oct 1: Jesus Christ what the fuck is wrong with Spurs? Well, Twitter reckons it’s Vertonghen banging Eriksen’s wife, players taking sides and now everyone hates each other. I didn’t believe it, then I watched them meekly surrender tonight against Bayern and now I’m not so sure. I mean, I’m not saying the Vertonghen / Eriksen thing is true (although this type of thing does occasionally happen), but there’s something fucking wrong there isn’t there? Maybe it’s just the hangover from losing the final last year or maybe they’re just stale, but it looks like they’re completely fucked. They had a good run but they won nothing, and now it’s over. Poch will leave and most of their best players will follow, and Harry Kane will be left on his own like Trigger in the Jolly Boys Outing when everyone fucks off to try and find somewhere to stay for the night. That reminds me actually, I have to tell you this. My daughter Adrianna had a footy match with the school yesterday away in North Wales somewhere. She was downloading stuff off Netflix to watch on the bus journey because she said her mates were doing the same. I can guarantee that none of her mates downloaded what she did though - a shitload of Only Fools episodes. She can’t get enough of it. She’s so like me it’s scary sometimes. The other day a lad in her class asked her who her favourite singer was. She likes loads of different stuff and has much more varied taste than me, but without hesitation she said “Bon Jovi”. The lad didn’t know who they were and said his favourite was Shaun Mendes. “Yeah I like him, but Bon Jovi are better”. That’s my girl. I’m so proud. Funny seeing Bayern run riot like that tonight though. I thought they were a spent force… not what they once were… over the hill…. in transition. That’s what we heard when we knocked them out last year. Guess maybe the stories of their demise have been greatly exaggerated and maybe it’s just that we’re fucking ace? Sadio did the pre-match press conference today and was asked about the thing with Mo. He didn’t shy away from it or try and downplay it, which was refreshing. Basically he said that he was frustrated because goal difference is important due to City scoring so many and he wants us to score as many as possible. He’s fucking right too and I’m glad he said it. He was laughing about it and then said ‘Yesterday I said ‘Gini, tell Mo why Sadio wanted to beat you in the Burnley game’. Gini is so funny, I always say these kind of things”. Sadio is really hard to understand as his English isn't great (at least he tries though *glares at Bobby*) but unless I've misunderstood, Salah didn't pass to Wijnaldum in training and Sadio told Gini to remind Mo why he wanted to snot him at Burnley, which is pretty fucking funny. I love Sadio, he's ace. Wednesday Oct 2: L 4 Salzburg 3 Ok so that’s not really how we envisaged this going down, but there are some positives to come out of how we won this. First, we had a big kick up the arse which will probably ensure we’re a lot more careful from now on, and secondly we didn’t panic after blowing a 3-0 lead and we just went out and won the game all over again. I don’t think we take these games all that seriously if I’m honest. The stakes aren’t that high because there’s always another chance, it’s not knockout football at this point and we thrive on knockout football. Absolutely no way do we blow a 3-0 lead if this was the knockout stages, but credit to Salzburg for how they played. They’re a good side with some really talented players. Hwang and Minamino were terrific. In the end it all worked out well for us and to be honest in a perverse way I’d rather have a game like this than if we’d just shut up shop at 3-0 and it ended that way. We won so the comeback didn’t matter, and if we learn from it then it’s a good lesson. The u19s were also involved in a ding dong battle with Salzburg and won 4-2. They were second best for much of the game but came from behind to get a great win. Curtis Jones was brilliant again and my boy Neco Williams scored a great header. Thursday Oct 3: The Mancs went to AZ Alkmaar tonight and didn’t manage a single shot on target. It’s amazing how shit they are. Where they are now is where we’ve been for much of the last 30 years but I’m not sure they realise it yet. They probably still think they’re close and just need a couple of signings to kick start it. They aren’t. They’re a fucking long way off and unless they get lucky with a genius manager they won’t be challenging any time soon. The one advantage they have though is money, but even they don’t have a bottomless pit of cash. When I look at their starting line up each week I’m always shocked at how awful it is. It crept up on them, like it did with us. One minute you’re thinking “we’re not that bad, got some good players here and just need to add to them” and then all of a sudden you wake up one day, see the line up and it hits home “oh my god, we’re fucking garbage”. Not only will they not make the top six, I’d say there’s a chance they might end up behind the likes of West Ham or Bournemouth. There’ll be one or two of those sides who have a good season, and that might be enough to leapfrog United. We never finished lower than 8th, no matter how big our problems were. United might though. In fact at this moment I’d say it’s likely. We go there in a couple of weeks and if we don’t beat them this time we might as well give up. The gap between the two sides has never been greater than it is right now. Alisson might be fit for the weekend apparently. I wouldn’t play him, there’s no point. There’s an international break after this so let him have the extra two weeks to recover and then if he looks sharp in training bring him back for Old Trafford. Personally I might not even bring him back for that one, as I’d prefer him to have less high profile one for his first game back. Adrian has been fine so there’s no panic, but as good as he’s been the fact remains that Alisson is regarded by many as the world’s best keeper, so having him back will be big for us. Friday Oct 4: Brendan comes back to Anfield tomorrow. I don’t think he’ll get any kind of reception, good or bad. Those around the dugout will probably give him polite applause, but otherwise I imagine it will be no different to any other manager coming here. He doesn’t really deserve stick or praise I’d say. I couldn’t handle it if he got a result though. He wouldn’t be smug or giving it the big ‘un, he’d be horrendously condescending which is even worse. Fuck that. We’ve got our hands full with Leicester though. They’re third in the table and that’s probably accurate as other than us and City it’s between them and Chelsea for who is next in line. Klopp loves Vardy almost as much as I do and he was gushing in his praise for him today, as Chilwell was for Andy Robbo. “Best full back in the world” he said. Knows his onions that lad. Meanwhile, Barcelona are releasing a behind the scenes documentary that will show the scenes in the dressing room after we spanked them. Can’t fucking wait for that if the still photos we saw today are an indication of what it will be like. Really want to see the grid on Suarez. Be ace if they’ve got footage of his dust up with Robbo in the first leg too. Speaking of behind the scenes footage, everyone seems to be buzzing off that video of the Salzburg coach and his half time speech. Just me who didn’t think it wasn’t all that then? I reckon 90% of the coaches that have been to Anfield said something similar at half time. All he did was tell them they were giving us too much respect and to fucking get stuck in. No difference in that and the fella who gave the famous “bring yer facking dinner” team talk, but I don’t see people describing that as ‘spine tingling’ and ‘inspirational’. Meanwhile, we’re still in the league cup after getting away with a fine. I’d probably start Chirivella in the next game just to add to the collective fume around the country. and that was the week that was….

Saturday sees the return of a familiar face to Anfield in former manager Brendan Rodgers. It will be the first time the Northern Irishman has faced the Reds since he was sacked in October 2015. The Foxes come to Anfield in impressive form sitting third in the table and with a real chance for a top four position come the end of the season Krystian Moson from @firstforlcfc discusses the emotional rollercoaster that the club has experienced over the past few years, the impact and confidence that Rodgers has instilled within the squad and some of the players that will be relishing the challenge of coming up against the ladder leaders. The last few years have been an incredible time in Leicester City’s history. There has been the incredible triumph with the title win, the sacking of a very popular manager combined with heartbreaking tragedy with the death of your club owner. As a supporter, can you sum up the rollercoaster of emotions you have felt during that time? It’s incredibly hard to sum up. The sheer extremes of emotions fans of Leicester City have experienced in recent years are so unique. Plenty of clubs stay under the radar consistently throughout their existence, and we were that club. But then out of nowhere things just went to an extreme with the title-winning season. Leicester City were suddenly a club recognised by people across the world. Of course, the turn of events that followed, with Claudio Ranieri departing the club and then the devastating loss of our beloved Chairman, Khun Vichai, provoked a whole different selection of emotions. But through thick and thin, our late Chairman’s legacy will forever live on and ultimately we are now a club heading in the direction he wanted us to, under the trustful ownership of his son, Top. Can you explain to our readers the impact that Brendan Rodgers has made on the Foxes since his appointment at the end of February? Brendan Rodgers replaced Claude Puel and there is a stark difference between the two managers. Ever since joining Rodgers has instilled positivity, belief and a hunger back in both the squad and the fans around Leicester City. The way in which he carries himself, speaks and ultimately sets his teams up has re-instilled belief in Foxes fans that we are on the up. The way in which we have started this season is certainly positive and we can only hope that with more time, will come greater success, and ultimately silverware under Rodgers. Liverpool fans know full well the attacking mindset that Brendan has as a manager. However it is fair to say that he neglected the defensive side of the game at times and that was to be his downfall at the club. Have you noticed a nice blend between defence and attack or is it still a work in progress? As things stand, both Leicester and Liverpool have the joint best defensive records in The Premier League this season (based on goals conceded). Whilst this is only a stat, it is fair to say that it does reflect an element of defensive stability Rodgers has instilled. We have two solid centre-backs in Jonny Evans and Çağlar Söyüncü, with width from Ricardo and Chilwell as attacking full-backs. Partnering this with defensive midfield cover in a player like Wilfred N’didi and/or Hamza Choudhury and I truly believe Rodgers has a system that does in fact balance defence and attack. Of course, this isn’t the finished product, but the development we have seen in N’didi alone, who used to purely renowned for his tackling ability, who is now a box-to-box engine suggests that Rodgers is working on something much bigger with this current crop of exciting players. It certainly can be claimed that one, and possibly two top-four spots are up for grabs this season. Do you believe that Rodgers has the kind of squad at his disposal that can stay the course during this campaign, or are there some areas that need reinforcing in January? In an article I contributed to pre-season, I boldly predicted Leicester would finish 4th. Right now, I would change that to 3rd when looking at the traditional ‘top 6’ all having issues on and off the pitch to contend with. We have no distractions. no European football., a squad that is content, a manager who is steering us in the right direction. Additions in January? A back-up to Jamie Vardy if you were to push me for an answer. Jamie isn’t getting younger and it could be argued that we don’t have a quality replacement in the squad. There has been a fair bit of change within your squad since the 2015/16 season. In your opinion, how important are the veterans like Wes Morgan, Jamie Vardy and Kasper Schmeichel in guiding the new boys and next generation of talent? I don’t think you can underestimate the influence our senior pros have amongst the current squad. Wes Morgan is now a squad player, but even then, his presence around the lads is likely to be massive. Both Kasper and Vardy are still massive players for us, and this is clear to see whenever they take to the field. With the loyalty these players have shown, rejecting moves to ‘bigger’ clubs we can only hope that it sets an example to players such as James Maddison (who is constantly being linked with a move away), that sometimes staying and growing into a key player can really reap rewards. Vardy has a terrific goalscoring record against the Reds, but who are some of the other players you believe can cause some problems for Liverpool on Saturday? Excluding Vardy, who I think will be relishing this trip, I’m going to focus on two key men who are influential. Maddison and Tielemans. When on-song, this duo have enough to slice through any team and I think that we are starting to see the best of both these players ahead of our trip to Anfield. If money was no object, which Liverpool player would you love to have in the Leicester line-up? Very good question, and not an easy one to answer. However, I think it would be extremely hard to ignore Mo Salah. Of course, players like Alisson, Van Dijk, Robertson, Alexander-Arnold, Mane and Firmino are all outstanding, but ever since Leicester sold Riyad Mahrez – we have lacked that magic man. It’s been evident since joining Liverpool that Salah has the skill to take a game to the opposition single-handedly, as well as produce moments of utter brilliance. This man would fit into any team in The Premier League, and he would be my choice for The Foxes. Even though he will not say it publicly, this game will mean an awful lot for Brendan. How do you believe he will set up and do you have a score prediction? How I believe he will set up and how I want him to set up are two different predictions! After our Newcastle victory I tweeted saying I’m going to call a 4-4 goal-fest at Anfield because I want us to go all-out-attack. Then look what happened midweek vs Salzburg… Admittedly, the chances of something like that happening twice in a week are slim, but never say never. Rationally thinking, I do think we are likely to set up closer to how we played Man Utd away, which ended in a lacklustre and uninspiring 1-0 loss that left plenty of fans frustrated. By this I’m predicting both Choudhury and N’didi start meaning a lot more defensive mindedness, with two players screening the back-four. Our game-plan would be realistically to grow into the game and grab a goal as we start to stamp our authority. Possession is a stat we have started to dominate under Rodgers’ and this could be one of the first games whereby we see less of the ball so it will be interesting to see if we try a few balls over-the-top for Vardy to latch onto as otherwise he can be very excluded (as per Man Utd). If we do set up like this, I have very optimistically gone with a 0-1 win for The Foxes. BUT, if we do see Maddison in that No.10 and only one holding midfielder, pencil me in for a 4-4!

So I said last week that Everton would get something against City. Most of you thought I was mad but the truth is they almost did. At 1-1 they were giving as good as they got and Mina missed a couple of really good chances with free headers from corners. Then what happened? I’ll tell you what happened. Jordan fucking Pickford happened. One of the biggest mysteries in football is that no-one ever seems to talk about how shit this fella is. I feel like I’m on an island all by myself here. Every week I see the goals Everton are conceding, and every week I’m saying “Pickford was shite there”. Yet somehow he’s still got a good reputation and isn’t viewed as the absolute calamity that he is. Why is that? I can only assume it’s because in between the fuck ups he does make some brilliant saves and he’s got a sledgehammer left foot. He's like an Aldi version of Ederson only without the vomit inducing face and neck tattoos. The main reason he escapes scrutiny is because he plays for a team that literally nobody other their own fans gives a shit about. You can make mistake after mistake when playing for a non-entity like Everton, as it barely gets noticed, probably because they’re usually on last on MOTD when most people have gone to bed. He’s shit though, and City won this game because he let in a soft free-kick from Mahrez. If Everton had a half decent keeper then we’d have extended our lead at the top, but more importantly I’d have been able to lord it over all of you this week. Thanks ‘neighbours’. Thanks for nothing. Walcott started the game but went off after a few minutes when the ball hit him on the head and he went off on a stretcher. Bit a fanny isn’t he? Big Virg took one full in the face the other week and barely flinched, but Walcott gets one on the head from Sterling (who isn’t exactly known for power) and he ends up in fucking hospital. Most pointless player in the world. The Blues fell behind when they gave De Bruyne the freedom of Goodison to pick a cross. That only ever ends up in one outcome. Have they never seen hm play before? When he crosses it there’s virtually nothing you can do, so it’s probably not a good idea to give him ten yards of space on the right hand side to whip it across. Some things you can see even without a UEFA coaching licence. I almost switched off at that point as I thought Everton would collapse, but then Calvert-Lewin equalised when he stole a goal from Coleman. He headed it in from on the line and Coleman wasn’t amused. He was either pissed off at him nicking the goal, or (more likely) because he thought it was going to be ruled out by VAR. Calvert-Lewin did look offside initially and Coleman didn’t celebrate the goal because of that. Instead he said something to the young striker, probably along the lines of “if that gets disallowed coz of you being a greedy twat, I’ll fucking kill you”. At 1-1 it could have gone either way but Pickford’s failure to deal with a routine free-kick proved decisive. Even at 1-2 the Blues had their chances but they couldn’t take any of them and Sterling finished them off late on (again, look at the state of Pickford on that though). The two take aways i have from this are that Everton actually gave it a go against City and looked like they wanted to win. Even the crowd were up for it for once and I have no complaints on that front. I knew they’d have a go this time though, that’s why I tipped them to get something. They badly needed a result and on the balance of play they deserved one. They didn’t get it because their finishing wasn’t up to scratch and their keeper has arms like a toddler. The second take away is that City gave up eight shots on target, which is the most anyone had against them in four years. They’re vulnerable right now and I just hope someone can take advantage of that before they rectify the issues they’re having and go on one of those mad winning runs in the second half of the season. Sadly they’ve got Wolves this weekend, and they’ve been pure Zlatan so far this season so I’m not holding out any hope there. You never know though, I guess. Next up, Spurs. Fucking hell. What’s going on there? They did win at the weekend but given the other results they’ve had of late I’d say that reflects really badly on Southampton. If you can’t beat Spurs at the moment, especially when they’re playing with ten men, then you need to have a long hard look at yourself. Either side of this one Spurs lost to Colchester and were humiliated by Bayern. All things considered, this was a terrible result for Southampton. Ndombele broke the deadlock and Aurier did a piss take ‘VAR check’ celebration. The smile was soon wiped off his face when he was sent off for two quick yellow cards. What a train wreck he is. Terrible full back. He’s on the wrong side so often he may as well be Boris Johnson. Spurs sold Trippier because they thought this clown could replace him. Madness. Lloris then gifted Southampton an equaliser when he tried a Cruyff turn on his own goal-line and Ings caught him out. You know how I’m always going nuts about keepers who take more than touch when Vardy is within twenty yards of them, because to me it shows that they mustn’t ever pay attention to what opposition players are doing? Well it applies almost as much with Ings. He’s not as dangerous at closing people down as Vardy but he’s up there with anyone else and Lloris has to know he can't take liberties with him. Lloris is prone to this kind of thing though. He makes half a dozen massive blunders every season. In between those he is a sensational keeper and he pulled off some great saves in this one to sort of redeem himself. I’m not sure there’s anything you can do to fully redeem an error like that though. To Spurs’ credit, or to Southampton’s shame, they retook the lead when Kane finished off a counter attack. The Saints pushed hard for an equaliser but Lloris kept them at bay and Spurs held on. There’s something not right there though, they seem to have lost whatever it was that made them so difficult to play against and half the team seem to want out. Still, they’ve won the “best stadium” title so at least they have that. Elsewhere, Chelsea just about took care of Brighton at Stamford Bridge. They had to wait until five minutes into the second half to make the breakthrough when Mount nicked the ball off a dawdling defender and was brought down. Jorginho converted the pen and Willian added a second via a deflection. Brighton had hit the bar when it was only 1-0 but overall they didn’t do much and Chelsea were well worth the win. Should have been four or five really, and you have to wonder why the fuck Brighton are trying to play out from the back when their defence is full of cart horses. Like trying to make an omelette when all you have are potatoes. Bournemouth and West Ham was a good game. Yarmolenko’s impressive turn and shot put the Hammers ahead but King equalised in contentious circumstances when his goal was initially ruled out for offside but was then overturned by VAR. Morally he was offside as the only point he was ever onside is the split second before the ball was played to him, and even then he was only on by millimetres. Callum Wilson fired the home side in front and Ake thought he’d made it 3-1 but Solanke was adjudged to have been offside and interfering with play. Probably was the right call but I’d be pissed off if I was a Bournemouth fan because we’ll definitely see goals like that given between now and May. Cresswell fired home to get West Ham a point and a draw was probably fair overall. Final note from this one. Pellegrini looked like he’d borrowed his blue suit from Trigger off Only Fools and Horses. Fair play. I like to think he kept calling Mark Noble 'Dave' all day. Villa thought they’d taken the lead when McGinn fired home but VAR had other ideas. They did score soon after when El Ghazi finished well from a right wing cross, but substitute Jay Rodriguez headed Burnley level. McGinn then volleyed Villa ahead once more. I like him, tidy player, if he didn’t play for Villa he might even be in contention for a ‘my boy’ title, but he does play for Villa so that ain't happening. Wood headed in from close range to deny Villa again. Don’t ever let those fuckers walk your dog, because they just can’t hold onto a lead. Every week they score first but they never win. Good. Finally on this one, the absolute fucking state of Jack Grealish. With his sunbed tan, waxed legs and soft cunt’s haircut. I ahe him, but not as much as my mum does. She REALLY hates him, for mostly the same sort of reasons she hates Lallana. Staying in the Midlands, and Wolves scored a lovely team goal to take the lead against hapless Watford. Doherty finished it off but it was great football and Wolves looked much more like last season’s team. It’s easy to look good playing Watford though. They might be the worst team in the league currently. They’re so bad they’re even resorting to picking Danny Welbeck. Talk about desperate. Janmaat’s own goal finally ended Watford’s faint resistance and gave Wolves their first win of the season. The one plus for them so far this season has been Traore, who is finally starting to add a bit of quality to the pace he’s always had. He's a handful. Norwich’s away day woes continued as they were beaten at Palace. They started the game with their second choice keeper and ended it with their their third. How spawny are Palace? If they aren’t playing against ten men they’re faced with a 30 something keeper who looks like he’s been dragged out of the local pub. The opener came from a penalty (of course it did) and was converted by Milavojevic (of course it was) before Townsend wrapped it up in stoppage time after great work by Zaha. Can’t believe how many points Palace have got considering how shit they’ve been. It’ll catch up with them soon. As for Norwich, they need to shape up away from home as they did virtually nothing in this one. They do have a shitload of players out at the moment though to be fair. Sunday now, and Leicester won again to remain third in the table. Ricardo’s brilliant solo effort broke the deadlock and Newcastle’s already futile looking task was made even harder when Hayden was sent off. He won the ball but caught the man with his follow through. Great tackle back in the day, obvious red card under the current rules. Vardy made it 2-0 with a trademark Vardy goal, running onto a ball in behind and lashing in a low shot. Keeper should have had it though. Dummett then deflected a cross past his own keeper to make it 3-0. Unfortunate, but fuck him. He was diving all over the place at Anfield the other week. He's one of those players I have a beef with and don't really know why. Vardy headed in from close range to make it four and Ndidi made it five in stoppage time. Leicester were great, Newcastle were terrible. Steve Bruce accused his players of a lack of fight. They're in the bottom three and will be there or thereabouts all season by the looks of it. Other than Man City, Leicester is the toughest game we could have at the moment so this Saturday will be a test. If it was away I’d be very concerned, but as it’s at Anfield I’m only mildly concerned. They’re good though, unlike the two fucking bums who were involved in a stinker of a game on Monday Night Football. I was quite looking forward to that United / Arsenal game as neither of them are relevant to us at the moment so I could watch it without any stress and it didn’t matter who won. I actually turned it off at half time though because it was pretty much unwatchable. I was offended by how bad it was. It was weird because them both being so bad should have made me want to watch just for the comedy value, yet for some reason I was getting angry and frustrated about the ineptness of it all. The standard of play was like League Two and it was doing my head in. Genuinely fucking dreadful and it was just mistake after mistake, shit pass after shit pass. Like two drunks having a scrap outside the Rubber Soul at 3am. These two teams are fucking shite. Really shite. Arsenal were less shite, but they couldn’t make that count because they’re Arsenal. United could have fielded their u18 side and Arsenal still wouldn’t have won, because they’re Arsenal and they can't win away against any of the big six, even when they're as piss poor as United. If we don't win at Old Trafford in a couple of weeks, we probably never will.

What is it with us and the Champions League Group Stages? Why do we make it so difficult for ourselves? This was ridiculous. We were 3-0 up and playing some spectacular football, and then suddenly in the blink of an eye it’s 3-3 and we’re having to go out and win the game all over again. Thankfully this team doesn’t panic and they know how to win tight games, but there are some things that need cleaning up because we’re not putting together 90 minute performances so far. We play in spells and those spells are usually enough because we’re so good. But in virtually every game we’re giving up clear chances. We’ve gotten away with it for the most part as until now no-one had been as clinical as Salzburg, but we don’t look as secure as we did this time last year. Salzburg are better than people realise though. They’re lively, they’ve got a positive way of playing and they’ve clearly got some good players. I thought we’d roll them over easily and for a while we did. At our best no-one can live with us and even when our level drops most still can’t compete. Salzburg did though. As soon as we took our foot off their throats, they came up swinging. I was really impressed with them but it’s beginning to feel like a recurring thing now. I've found myself praising our opponents quite a bit this season. Norwich, Chelsea, Sheffield United, Salzburg…. I’ve spoken about how well all of these played against us but now I’m wondering if it says more about us than them? I liked it better when we made good teams look bad. Now we’re making average teams look good. I do suspect that Salzburg are actually quite handy though, and I fancy them to turn Napoli over. Maybe they'll even qualify from the group. They certainly gave us all we could handle in that second half and they had their moments in the first half too. For half an hour though we were fucking brilliant. Some of the football was ridiculously good and two of the goals we scored were sublime. Salzburg got it wrong tactically and we made them pay. There was just so much space in wide areas that Mané, Trent and Robbo just ran riot in the opening half hour or so. Sadio looked in great nick. They couldn’t get near him early on. The opening goal looked so easy but it was brilliantly executed. The ease with which he went past two players, the timing of the run, the weight of return pass from Bobby, the finish… all just perfect. Goal number two was even better. Robbo started and finished a sweeping move from one end of the field to the other. One full back crossing for the other to score is the stuff Pep Ljinders dreams of. I remember him saying how that’s his ideal goal. Well now he has it. It’s one of my favourite goals in a long time too. Robbo scoring just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy. He had a great game I thought, although Klopp seemed to be on his case throughout the first half, constantly shouting at him to get forward. I mean fucking hell, it’s not like Robbo needs telling! Mo shot disappointingly wide after Fabinho’s ball over the top sent him clear, but he did got his goal when he converted a rebound. The keeper should have done better with Bobby’s header really, but Salah was in the right place at the right time. We were dominating and playing some lovely football, but Salzburg had carried a threat and the lad Hwang up front was very lively. Their movement and speed in attacking areas gave us some problems and we never looked completely comfortable. In the opening weeks of the season we were holding a high line, but I noticed a few times that Virgil went back in with runners rather than trying to play offside. On one occasion when he did hold the line Hwang got in behind because Trent was fractionally deeper. Adrian had to make a save as Hwang went on the outside and hit a shot with his left foot. That was significant because the next time he got in Virgil anticipated him doing the same and was made to look foolish, as he ended up on his arse, helpless as Hwang cut inside and lashed a shot past Adrian. Really good goal that, but it was avoidable from our point of view as it all came from Hendo losing the ball cheaply. They play in a similar style to us, pressing high and then hitting fast when they win it. Most of the problems we had were of our own making, losing the ball in the wrong areas and never really recovering our shape. Still, when it went 3-1 it felt like it was merely a consolation and we’d just roll them over in the second half and score another three or four. The funny thing was the scoreboard briefly showed 3-3 rather than 3-1. My first thought was that maybe that goal should have counted treble just for the way the lad beat Virg. Then I thought “I hope that’s not a sign of what’s to come”. Then I immediately brushed that off as nonsense. We weren’t giving up a 3-0 lead against these. The days of us doing crazy shit like that are over. Virgil is here now, we don’t throw away leads anymore. And then that’s exactly what we did. It was mad, we just lost all control of the game and when they got their second it wasn’t a shock. They’d changed their system after half an hour or so and it completely changed the game. They started to win the ball in midfield and grow in confidence. They caught us on the hop with the second goal. Gomez committed a foul but they took the free-kick so quickly we were completely on the back foot and out of position. Hwang showed good vision to pick out Minamino at the back of the box and he volleyed past Adrian to send the away end wild. Suddenly they believed. 3-2 and all the momentum was with them. Minamino was brilliant and Hwang's pace and movement also caught the eye. They then brought on Alfie Haaland’s lad and he scored with his first touch, tapping in at the back post. We were at sixes and sevens and he was left all alone. Trent was nowhere to be seen but it wasn’t just on him. The problems we had defensively were collective rather than individual. It’s easy to say we missed Matip but personally I don’t think it would have made a great deal of difference. Gomez wasn’t to blame for what happened and had Matip been in there he wouldn’t have prevented all the space they had in midfield. Klopp mentioned their change of formation, and if that truly was the catalyst for what happened then I’d have to wonder why he didn’t change things himself. At 3-3 he did. He got Milner on to shore things up and then soon after he sent on Big Div for Gini and went 4-2-3-1. After that we were fine, which again leads me to think that the midfield was more culpable than the back four. Hendo started the game brilliantly but he had a wobble early in the second half. Fabinho too. He was all over the place after half time. The question is what caused it? Were we complacent? Was it tactical? Or was it simply a case of us dropping the tempo and allowing them to get back into it? Maybe a little of all of it. I don’t know. If it was complacency then that’s the easiest thing to fix. I’m not sure it’s that though. I suppose it depends on how you define complacency. I don’t think the players just stopped working because they thought the job was done. Maybe they under-estimated Salzburg a bit but I doubt it. I think what can sometimes happen when you’re playing so well and are a few goals up is you start to try things you maybe shouldn’t. You get a little over-confident and sloppy. And if you give the ball away cheaply against good attacking sides, they can hurt you. I know Salzburg aren’t playing against top opposition every week, but they score a shitload of goals and that breeds confidence. So when we’re giving the ball away and we’ve got so many players in forward areas, teams like that can hurt you. Most of our problems were self inflicted and probably a result of a lack of concentration. It might do us the world of good actually. Klopp made the point afterwards that it’s better that we learned the lesson in winning a game than have to learn it after we’d dropped points. Ultimately it doesn’t really matter what happened here. We won the game and the only thing that really counts is getting out of the group. This result helps with that, and if we learn a lesson along the way and the next time we’re 3-0 up we make sure we control the game then this was well worth it. It’s also a positive that having been pegged back to 3-3 we were able to shrug that off and just go and get the goal we needed to win the game. It wasn’t pretty but it was fitting the way we scored it, as it came from force of will as much as anything. Not giving up, keeping the ball alive and just forcing the issue. Firmino was foiled, Salah’s cross was cleared but Fabinho lobbed the ball back into the box and Bobby produced a lovely little header down to set Mo free. This time he made no mistake with the finish. There was a delay while they checked VAR, and for some reason Bobby didn’t go back into his own half and was waiting in the penalty, almost like he expected it to be disallowed. I wasn’t worried at all as I sit right in line with it and knew there was no offside. After we got in front again we didn’t really have too many scares and it looked to me like Salzburg just kind of accepted their fate. They’d given it a go, caused us a big scare, but they seemed happy enough with a heroic defeat. Why do I say that? Mostly because of how they reacted when Adrian had the ball at his feet, taking his time over clearances. You’d think a team desperate to score with time running out would have been closing him down and making him get on with the game, but they didn’t. As I say, it looked like they were happy with a heroic defeat and ultimately we should be happy with a narrow victory. I say that because it doesn’t matter how you get out of the group just that you do get out of it. We’re on track to do that and if we get to the knockouts we won’t think twice about the scare Salzburg gave us. We won the thing last year and honestly, off the top of my head I don’t even remember what the score was when we played Red Star at home in the group stages, let alone anything about the game. There is work to do though, because we’re giving up an awful lot of chances this season. We’ve gotten away with it for the most part but defensively we don’t look as secure as we did last season. To me it’s more of a team issue that just being about the defence, but whatever it is it needs tightening up because we’ve got some tough games coming up, not least this weekend when we face in form Leicester. Jurgen joked afterwards that Brendan will have looked at this game and thought that Vardy would score five if we play like that. He’s not wrong either. Leicester are dangerous because Vardy is an expert at taking advantage of any space in behind and they’ve got players in midfield who can find him if we lose the ball in dangerous areas. At least the front three bounced back after ropey performances against Napoli and Sheffield United. When they’re sharp no-one can beat us, even when we make errors at the back. They weren’t at their absolute best in this one but they were sharp enough. Star man is Bobby, just ahead of Robertson. Team: Adrian; Alexander-Arnold, Gomez, Van Dijk, Robertson; Fabinho, Henderson (Milner), Wijnaldum (Origi); Salah (Keita), Firmino, Mané:

Jurgen Klopp has downplayed the prospect of Liverpool breaking Man City’s all-time league record for consecutive victories.Currently, Liverpool sit two wins shy of City’s mark of 18 that they set in 2017/8.But the Reds have some substantial tests that they have to pass if they are to set a record of their own.Starting against Leicester on Saturday, the Reds then play Man United at Old Trafford and Tottenham at Anfield. It is for that reason that the German is not thinking too far ahead.The Echo reported Klopp as saying:“(There are) interesting games coming up. It doesn’t sound too likely. But we will try and first and foremost Salzburg and then Leicester. “Then it is the international break and hopefully everybody comes back healthy. That is most important.“Sadio Mane and Mohamed Salah will play against each other in Singapore, very interesting game obviously, it’s not qualification for anything. “So hopefully everyone comes back healthy and then we try to prepare for Man United.Klopp says that records are nice to be a part of, but it is just a small piece of a much bigger picture.“I try to understand how other people think about things but from the way I think about things I’m not interested in the number to be honest. “It’s just a number. So, you only can create a streak like this if you’re always in the next job. “The next job is Salzburg which is a different competition and then Leicester City and that will be difficult." Having lost their opening group fixture away to Napoli the Reds need to get back on track with a win against Salzburg. Despite reaching successive finals in the competition and having made a 100% start to the Premier League campaign, Liverpool are only third favourites (behind Manchester City and Barcelona) to win what would be a seventh European Cup. If you fancy Klopp's side to retain their crown then check out the champions league betting with 888. After the outstanding success of last season, Klopp knows that Liverpool are the hunted in the mind of the opposition.Rather than playing it down, Klopp says his team must embrace this fact. “That’s what teams do anyway. And the next one is Salzburg and then Leicester in a very good moment, a very good team.“There’s always a story you can create. In our case, it’s always about how many games we’ve won. “Even if people don’t say it they think there will be a moment when you lose a game, or whatever.“When we play Salzburg or Leicester, people will talk about the last time we lost a competitive game at Anfield, but we don’t listen.”We try to make the best of the situation we are in. that’s how it is. Klopp pointed to the fact that while the build-up to the game might be fine, you have to take into equation what the opposition brings to the contest."Against Sheffield United, everything was fine. "We tried to use the week as well as we could to do the right things in training and still you face a team that is motivated to here, or higher. You saw that.“They really wanted to hurt us, in a football way. It was not a hard game. It was respectful. There were hard challenges but it was not a hard game."

Phew. That's the main thing to say about this. Phew. It was a tough watch. We weren't ourselves and they were a right handful. Unexpected it may have been, but we won't have many tougher games this season, but we survived. During the course of a season you get performances like this. There’s no point trying to analyse the whys and wherefores about it. They just happen. To every team, no matter how good they are. You can go back through history and look at every great team that has ever played the game and you’ll find a performance or two like this in even their most successful seasons. It happens, you never know when it's going to happen and there’s nothing you can do to prevent it. When it does happen all you can do is make sure you somehow find a way to get through it. That's how successful teams achieve success. And we did get through it. It wasn’t pretty, it probably wasn’t deserved and you can argue it was somewhat fortunate given the nature of the winning goal. The counter point to that though is we missed three absolute sitters, which on another day we’d have converted and ran out comfortable winners. So yeah, we were lucky with the goal we scored, but Sheffield United were lucky with the ones we didn’t. That’s not taking anything away from how well they played though. Without wishing to sound patronising, I thought they were great. I was really impressed. They gave us as tough a game as we’ve had in the league since…. I dunno, probably since the Etihad last season. I mentioned last week how there are only a few games on the fixture list now that I look at and think “that’ll be tough”. Chelsea last week was one, Leicester away is another. A trip to Bramall Lane wasn’t supposed to be one of them, but you just never know. City wouldn't have been expecting to get done over by Norwich. As I say, it happens from time to time and when it does you need to be able to deal with it. It had that awkward feeling about this one from an early stage. The first ten minutes or so were ok but then you could tell we were toiling. It was slow, pedestrian, predictable, and fairly quickly you could see that the Blades were growing in confidence. The home fans were massively up for it, and although it’s difficult to know for sure when watching on the telly, from what I could tell this was the loudest opposition crowd we’ve played in front of in this country in a long time. It might just be the acoustics or where the microphones are, I don't know, but that sounded loud to me. They were hostile, which we always come up against as it goes with the territory when you’re good, but they were also hugely encouraging to their own team. The crowd were rabid (in a good way), and their performance was matched by their team who gave us all we could handle. Ok, we didn’t play well and on another day we’d probably batter them, but they’re clearly better than a lot of people realised (me included) and Chris Wilder has done an incredible job there. I’d be surprised if we came up against a more well drilled side all season. They defended brilliantly and denied us a lot of the space that we usually thrive in. You know they did this well because we barely even saw Bobby for most of the game and the full backs weren’t able to make their usual impact either. That took a lot of our threat away. Yet despite their brilliant defensive effort, they still managed to cause us several problems at the other end and could easily have scored two or three themselves. It’s one of those games where you know when you get to half time that you just want to get the win, go home and forget all about it. And that’s what we can do. I know it’s a cliché, but a year or two ago we’d have lost this game. Ok, I’ll rephrase that. Pre-Virgil we’d have lost this game. We’ve lost shitloads of games like this over the last decade, but since Van Dijk arrived that’s virtually stopped entirely. It’s not JUST him (Matip was brilliant again too), but he’s been the catalyst for it. The way I see this team now is that if the front three are on their game we’ll win against anybody. It’s as close to a sure thing as there is in football. When they play well no-one can live with us. When they don’t it becomes much more difficult, but we still usually find a way to get it done, domestically at least. We’ve had several bad results in Europe when the front three haven’t performed but in the Premier League we seem to be able to overcome it. Often with the help of opposing keepers it should be said. Everton and Fulham last season immediately spring to mind. The way this game went it was almost fitting that we won it on a freak goal. We couldn’t score from the easiest of chances and it had “one of those days” written all over it. These lads don’t do “one of those days” though. They just fight through it until things go their way. The Blades had their chances but most of them were thwarted by excellent defending. Adrian didn’t really have to do a great deal. They had a few chances that they wasted but generally we kept them out through great defending, specifically from Van Dijk and Robertson. It was a little alarming how we kept getting undone by balls over the top for McBurnie and Robinson though. With all due respect, you’d expect us to be able to handle two bang average players like that, but they were a threat. Their gameplan worked well. They targeted the space in behind our full backs and had some joy with it, especially early on. McBurnie got in behind Trent, cut inside Matip but shot straight at Adrian. Then Robinson got between Robertson and Van Dijk but blasted a shot miles wide from a decent position. As fir us, we couldn’t really get anything going in attack and I was wondering why we were playing so many long balls. Maybe we were just keeping them honest, stopping them from pushing up to deny us space, or maybe it was a deliberate ploy to get Mané in, because he was making those diagonal runs in behind for most of the first half. Eventually one of them paid off as he raced onto a brilliant ball by Van Dijk and with everyone expecting the net to bulge, he sliced horribly wide. That’s not like him, he’s become much more clinical over the past 12 months so that was a surprise. Looking at the replay I think what happened is he just misjudged the bounce off the slippery turf. Still, even though he missed I felt better about the situation because at least we’d created something and it felt like we were starting to turn the screw. Mané missed an even better chance soon after. We won the ball and hit them quickly. Vintage Reds footy that. Salah initially messed up the intended pass to Wijnaldum, but the ball broke kindly to him and he fed Bobby. He could have shot, but unselfishly rolled it to Mané who was in a better position. His shot came back off the post and rebounded to Firmino, but he delayed his shot and a defender smuggled it clear. Really frustrating that we didn't score but I just assumed that we'd get to half time and Klopp would sort them out and we'd be fine. It didn't really go like that though. We didn't come out firing and in truth there wasn’t much happening in the second half, but they were looking more dangerous than us. Adrian made a decent save from a long range shot that was probably going wide, and then Robbo made a heroic block to deny Fleck after a superb move by the home side. Klopp eventually decided it needed shaking up. Origi came on for Hendo, although it could just as easily have been for Wijnaldum. We didn't ned both of them in a game like this. Another forward or maybe Ox breaking forward from midfield would have been much more use against this kind of opponent. It probably should have been Gini that went off based on who was contributing more to the game, but Hendo had taken a couple of heavy knocks and that may have influenced Klopp’s thinking. It worked out well because the change in system to 4-2-3-1 definitely helped us, and Gini was the one who scored the goal, albeit with a huge assist from their keeper. Absolute howler that, but I’ll take it. Salah then went clean through with the chance to ice the game but he was denied by the keeper. You have to score those, but the keeper did brilliantly and when you look at the replay there’s not really too much of a gap for Mo to hit. You still expect him to finish that though. Generally we defended well and didn't have too many scares, but the excellent Fleck did produce a sensational cross that Clarke ballooned over the bar from close range late on. That was their moment and they didn't seize it. When you win games like this it feels bigger than when you wipe the floor with someone. For example, City beat Watford 8-0 last week and it didn’t bother me at all because I fully expected them to win easily. They’ll have expected us to win this one without too much trouble too, so when the game unfolds like this and it looks like we might be in trouble, it’s much harder to take for City when we find a way out of it. Put it this way, I’d have been pretty disheartened if I watched City win a game like this. Hell, I've seen them win games like this and it's horrible. The other reason it’s bigger is because the more of these close, nervy games you can win, the easier it is to keep your cool next time you’re in that situation. We're good at this though, and it's an important weapon to have in the armoury. I’ve said before that one of the things we have over City is we’re battle hardened and have come through loads of these hairy games. They usually win so comfortably that on the rare occasions they find themselves in an actual game, they tend to struggle to get the result. They lost four or five games last season and they’ve already lost one this year. Flat Track bullies, just like their manager. Us on the other hand, we know how to get down and dirty, to work hard and graft and fight for everything we get. Just like our manager. So on we go, seven games gone and seven wins in the books. The next three are going to be tough because Leicester are a good side and although United aren’t, we do have some kind of mental block when it comes to Old Trafford and we always play shite there. Then it’s Spurs at Anfield, and our games with Spurs are always on a knife edge. We’re in a difficult stretch in the fixture list and City are coming to Anfield soon after. After that it gets easier so we just need to try and get through this run unscathed and with our five point lead still intact or even stretched. Star man was Van Dijk by some distance. Robbo defended well (not great at the other end though), Fabinho and Matip both played well and Big Div more than played his part when he came on, but Van Dijk was imperious. I also want to mention Adrian. Not because he did anything special, but just because I like the cut of his jib. He’s got a confidence and assuredness about him and he looks very much at home now. Alisson will come back in when he’s ready, but Adrian has at least ensured there’s no need to rush the big man back and we can err on the side of caution with him. Champions League next, and it's a game we must win because of the result in Italy a couple of weeks ago. I'd like to think Klopp will make a few changes, but probably not too many. Origi probably deserves a start so we can rest either Mané or Salah. Maybe we'll even see all four of the forwards starting? I doubt it, not against a decent European side, but the 4-2-3-1 might well be a useful option in some league games. Personally I think we need to get Ox or Keita integrated back into the side asap because the 'three grafters' approach is fine when the forwards are clicking, but on those days when they're a little off we just need a bit extra in midfield. Salzburg look decent but it's a good opportunity to get a few of the bench players some minutes and to mix things up a little to keep the legs fresh for the more difficult challenges that lay ahead. Team: Adrian; Alexander-Arnold, Matip, Van Dijk, Robertson; Fabinho, Henderson (Origi), Wijnaldum; Salah (Oxlade-Chamberlain), Firmino, Mané (Milner):

Saturday Sep 22: So six years ago we paid City a million quid after it turned out that one of the scouts we took from them still had all their log ins and was able to keep an eye on who they were scouting. How do we know this? Because City have decided to leak this info now, six years after the fact. Officially their stance was ’no comment’ but they defy fed that story to the Times. These cunts are so transparent. Last week there was a Premier League meeting with all the clubs. Obviously I don’t know what was said, but it’s a safe bet that we’ve brought up the whole FFP thing and this is how they’ve reacted. The funny thing is though nobody gives a fuck about it. And why should they? It’s not like we hacked into their system. The daft bastards didn’t follow the first law of business. When an employee leaves for a rival, you make sure you change all your passwords and disable all their log in privileges. We don’t know exactly what went on here but if it had been a hacking then they wouldn’t have just accepted a settlement, because that’s really serious and it’s the kind of thing you get heavily sanctioned for. This just looks like City being careless. Let be fair, if you’re a scout that has moved to a new job and you log in to your account and you still have access to everything from your old club, of course you’re going to have a look. It would be weird not to. Here’s the thing though, when you look at the players we actually signed that year then we either took no notice of who they wanted, or they should be fucking paying us for the shite they inadvertently recommended. Sunday Sep 23: Chelsea 1 L 2 Get the fuck in. Massive three points. Don’t care if we deserved it or not and anyone who says Chelsea deserved a point will get no argument from me. It doesn’t matter, we won. We got the three points and we’ve safely negotiated one of the most difficult games we’ll have to face. In terms of talent, Chelsea re probably the third best team in the country. They might not finish third, but its between them and Spurs as to who has the third best talent level. They showed it today. We had problems with them but I suspect a big part of that was because we were leggy after the Napoli game. We were flagging in the last 20 minutes and couldn’t keep the ball. That’s not really us, so that’s why I put it down to fatigue. The added bonus of this win is that as well as picking up three points, we’ve kicked Man City in the bollocks. They won 8-0 yesterday and will have been thinking there was a good chance this would be the weekend when they started to make inroads on us. When we had the lead last year, we had a few performances like this that ended up being draws and it cost us. They’ll have been watching this with a massive sense of frustration. In other news, Bernardo Silva is in trouble after a ridiculous tweet he made taking the piss out of his mate Mendy. I can’t believe he did that you know. I mean, in this day and age how daft do you have to be to think you can do that and not cause a massive shitstorm? Spare me all the “Bernardo is a racist” shite though. He’s not racist, he’s just fucking stupid. Incredibly, inexplicably stupid. He’s not “a racist” though and it’s just fucking lazy to throw that at him. How many racists have a black best mate? Mendy seemingly didn’t have a problem with the tweet and there was obviously no malice intended. That isn’t the point though. It was a joke between friends, so text him the fucking picture, don’t put it on social media for the entire world to see. As soon as you put it out there for millions of people, it no longer matters if Mendy is offended or not, as there’ll be countless other people who will be. I also wonder what Sterling thought? More to the point, I wonder what he’d think if it was some random fan sending the image and not his team-mate. I actually feel sorry for Bernardo here but ignorance isn’t really a defence. Has he been living under a rock? How can he not know that this kind of thing is no longer acceptable? It’s bizarre, but it’s not just this tweet either as there was some instagram stuff that was staggering as well. Intentional or not, he has to be banned for it otherwise the FA are leaving themselves open to all kinds of shit. Kick it Out are all over it, and I’m sure that Piara Power twat will kick up a stink to get himself a bit of publicity like he did with the Suarez thing. It’s an unfortunate situation but it should be a teaching point, and not just for Bernardo. Hopefully someone at LFC will use this to re-enforce with all of our lads that they need to think long and hard before they post anything on social media. Monday Sep 24: Klopp gets the FIFA coach of the year, Virgil is defender of the year and Alisson is the keeper. Big Virg didn’t get the Balon d’or though, Messi did. It’s disappointing and he probably should have won it, but it’s hard to argue too much about Messi getting it as right up until he came to Anfield he was incredible all season. Usually these awards are influenced by who won the big trophies, so Virgil can feel aggrieved. This shows that defenders are never going to win it when there’s a superstar forward involved. Maybe when Messi and Ronaldo are gone there’ll be a chance for a defender to win it, but probably not as Mbappe will be cleaning up by that point. At least Messi has taken the high ground and voted for Ronaldo the last couple of years. Prior to that he never had, and Ronaldo has still never voted for him even though you have to name there players, not one. It’s shameless behaviour, especially as Ronaldo has recently commented about how they are the two greatest players ever. So in all the years he’s voted, he’s never had Messi in the top three. Neither of them voted for Virgil this year, which is telling as they obviously didn’t want to help the competition. Messi didn’t vote for Klopp either, the snide little cunt. In his own way, he’s as much of a twat as Ronaldo. He’s just less obvious about it. Ronaldo didn’t even bother showing up, as he tends not to do when he knows he hasn’t won. The real bone of contention wasn’t who won the Ballon d’or, it was the fucking abomination that was the team of the year. Sergio Ramos, Marcelo and Modric all got in there. What the fuck? Madrid were shite last year. They didn’t win their league and they were embarrassed in Europe. Yet three of their underachieving ‘stars’ got in while Trent, Robbo and Sadio all missed out, and not a single player from Man City got in. Absolutely fucking bizarre that. Tuesday Sep 24: Also from last night, Megan Rapinoe reckons Virgil should have won it “just because of how cute he is”. Fucking hell, where to even start with that. If these awards were handed out based on “cuteness”, then sorry luv, you’d be watching Alex Morgan winning it ahead of you every year. I really can’t stand Rapinoe, the insufferable twat. Women footballers are in a constant battle to be taken seriously and to be judged on their skill and not their looks. Look at the comments any time there’s a women’s footy match on and there are always loads about who is the best looking or who has the best tits. It’s infuriating for those girls, yet here you have the most high profile female footballer doing exactly that. Yes, she was almost certainly being ironic (unless Virg is so hot that even lesbians can’t help but comment on it), but no-one got it and all she’s done is caused social media to go full on “yer da” with the “imagine if a man had said that” hot takes. Meanwhile, Klopp does a piece for the Player’s Tribune that was just incredible. The Rocky stuff in particular was brilliant, but the whole thing was just sensational. Not quite as great as the one Robbo did, but it was stirring stuff. He was absent from press conference duties today though and Ljinders stepped in. I enjoy listening to him, he’s so enthusiastic and gives you interesting tactical stuff. With Klopp having been away yesterday it’s almost as though Ljinders is in charge for this MK Dons game. I wonder how much say he’ll have in the starting line up? Just thinking aloud here, but it might be a good idea to actually let him discreetly take charge of these games to maybe groom him as Klopp’s eventual successor. Klopp himself is still talking about how Gerrard should replace him when he leaves. Firstly, I wish he’d stop referencing ‘when’ he leaves as it upsets me. Secondly, I’d rather have someone completely familiar with Klopp’s style and methods taking over if and when that time comes (otherwise you’re looking at a rebuild and fresh start, and we know that doesn’t tend to go well), and Ljinders would be top of that list. Maybe give him more responsibility now and see how it goes? Wednesday Sep 25: MK Dons 0 L 2. Good that. Entertaining game and just the outcome we wanted. In the next round, some useful run outs for the fringe players and a successful evening for most of the kids (Brewster the only one who didn’t excel). Jones looks a different player this season to the one we saw last year. He’s got his mojo back now. Elliott though, he was brilliant wasn’t he? 16 years old and he’s playing like that. Other than Milner he was the best player on the pitch and with a bit more luck he’d have had a hat-trick. Can’t wait to see him play again. Hopefully in the next round against Arsenal, but if Shaqiri is fit for that then Harvey will probably miss out. In other news today, the FA are looking into the Bernardo tweet, but Guardiola has gone on the offensive (quite literally, as what he said today was more offensive than what Bernardo did. Apparently it’s fine because the cartoon actually looks like Mendy and if this was a white fella no-one would be arsed. Well he’s right about the second part but there’s a reason for that. The fact he doesn’t seem to know what that is, is worrying. He should be charged as well, the twat, as his crime is more sinister than Bernardo’s. Thursday Sep 26: It was kind of lost in the shuffle because of how well the kids did last night, but the u23s had an EFL Cup game against Fleetwood last night and they drew 1-1. That doesn’t sound like much, but it’s actually a hell of an effort from the kids because it was basically our u18s playing against a League One side. Right back Neco Williams got our goal. I think he scored in their last EFL Cup game too. I’m a big fan of his and have been for a couple of years. He’s really good, but he’s a natural right back, and to make it here you almost need to be a converted winger or midfield player. So it’s going to be hard for Neco but he’ll have a good career somewhere I reckon. Talented kid with a great attitude. There was a penalty shoot out (which we lost) even though it was group game and not knockout. That meant Fleetwood got an extra point. I don’t like that, I hope they don’t bring it into Champions League games. It’s ok to have draws, this isn’t America. Meanwhile, in the Mirror: “Liverpool bottled the title last season and won’t win it this year either” claims El Hadji Diouf. Meanwhile, on TLW: “El Hadji Diouf is a useless spitting cunt, the worst number nine in our history, and his opinion shouldn’t be given any kind of publicity whatsoever” claims Dave Usher. Friday Sep 27: Barca are fined €300 for tapping up Griezemann. That’s not a typo. Its actually just three hundred. Incredible. The funniest thing is they’re appealing it! The balls on them. All this Nike v New Balance thing is a bit distasteful. Everything is about money these days. We had a good relationship with NB, they were happy to match Nike’s offer but because Nike are offering a percentage of all sales we want to go with that. I mean I get it, it’s probably worth more cash and Nike is a more prestigious name. It’s just such a “modern football” story isn’t it? Guardiola has doubled down on his defence of Bernardo, once again repeating the “it looks like Mendy” and “no-one would be arsed if he was white” nonsense. I’ll double down too. This twat should be charged for these comments. Finally, the club have had their application to trademark the word ‘Liverpool” rejected.... ....and that was the week that was

City won 8-0 on Saturday and frankly it didn’t bother one little bit. I laughed. There’s a few reasons it didn’t bother me. The most obvious one is that we’re five points ahead rather than five behind. The other team winning when you're doing the chasing is horrible. Another reason is that it’s too early to be stressing out too much about their results. The main reason though is that I’d already written this game off as an easy City win. There was no chance of Watford getting anything. In fact, I’d even go as far as to say that there has never been a top flight game in this country that was a more obvious home win. Watford are terrified of City. They’re mentally scarred from all the beatings they’ve taken, not least the utter humiliation that inflicted upon them in the Cup Final a few months back. Watford were beaten before they started and them conceding in the first minute was nailed on. Occasionally in a group chat with some of the lads we’ll predict what minute City will score. We didn’t do it this time but I’d have taken the first minute all day on this one. I'm guessing so would the other lads too though. It wasn't hard to predict was it? Still, I have to admit that even with my rock bottom expectations of Watford I didn’t see them being 5-0 down inside 18 minutes or whatever it was. That’s just shameful. Yeah City are great, we know this, but you’re a fucking Premier League side, you spineless twats. Letting in a goal every three minutes is outrageous. The only reason it didn’t end up about 15-0 is because they got extremely lucky with some near misses and the woodwork bailed them out a couple of times. City didn’t ease off and there was definitely an element of “sending out a message” here. After losing to Norwich someone was always going to get it, and Watford were just about the perfect opposition for them. Ben Foster (who was shite) said afterwards that they are by far the best team he’s ever faced. Is that right? When they come to Anfield we need to put nine past the prick. I’ve got no beef with Watford but I hope they go down this year simply because whoever takes their place can’t possibly put up less resistance against City than they do. I said last week that maybe other teams will see what Norwich did, how they exposed City’s only real weakness (a shite defence), and they might follow suit. What did Watford do? Played Deulefeu up front on his own and just tried to keep the score down. Shithouses got exactly what they deserved. In fairness to Deulefeu, he almost scored to make it 1-1 when he skinned the hapless Otamendi but was denied by Emerson. Even if that had gone it wouldn’t have made any difference as the lack of effort from his team-mates was appalling. No closing down, no tackling, no tracking runners, they were like rabbits in the headlights. It’s funny though really, because in a way I’m happier that City won 8-0 than if they’d edged a close game. It’s the psychological aspect of it. They win 8-0 and they know we’ve got an incredibly tough game the next day. They’ll have been smelling themselves, feeling great, and then we went and got a scrappy 2-1 at the Bridge. That’s demoralising. It’s what we’ve got to do though. They’re chasing, they need us to slip up, so let’s just keep winning until they wilt. And if they don’t wilt, just keep winning anyway. It’s mad how much better than everyone else us and City are. I know I keep saying it, but it is fucking mad. Spurs are arguably the third best team and we’re both going to finish about 30 points ahead of them again if the opening weeks are anything to go by. Spurs didn’t deserve to lose at Leicester though in fairness. I don’t tend to watch many live games other than ours as I prefer to just watch the highlights on MOTD. I watched most of this game though and it was a cracker. It could have gone either way and ultimately it was decided by the tiniest of margins courtesy of VAR. Spurs have benefitted from it a few times but on this occasion they were on the wrong end of it. Kane had given them the lead with a strange goal, improvising as he fell to the ground and somehow managing to smuggle the ball past Schmeichel. Great finish. Earlier Leicester had a goal ruled out by VAR. Ndidi put the ball in the net but it was chalked off because that Ayoze Perez loser was a yard offside. Correct decision and not even close really. The one that done Spurs in though in the second half couldn’t possibly have been any closer. To me that should not have been disallowed because you can’t know for certain that Son was offside when the ball was played, because it’s impossible to freeze the frame at the exact millisecond the ball is passed to him. It’s guesswork at that point really. It’s tough though and I don’t blame the video official for it, because he can only try and pause it as close to the moment the ball is played as he can, but it's not an exact science It’s just shit. Spurs thought they’d scored, they celebrated and then three minutes later it’s chalked off for the sake of one centimetre even though everyone knows that the technology isn’t accurate to that degree. It’s shit really. Spurs got completely hosed there. I don’t think the officials could have made any other decision though. They have to use the technology and because of that the goal couldn’t stand, even though morally it should have. Spurs were utterly deflated by it for a while and Leicester were given a new lease of life. They equalised almost immediately through Ricardo and then Maddison hit the winner with a few minutes left. Great result for them and another shit one away from home for Spurs. Back to the offside though, I don’t like how it’s interpreted. To me, the rule needs changing. I really don’t like this shit where they draw a line from the part of the body that is nearest the goal. It should just go from the feet. Until this video shit was brought in that’s actually how I thought it was interpreted. I don’t care if a striker is leaning one way and a defender the other, meaning the striker’s head or arm or shoulder or his dick is offside. It’s stupid. Just judge it from where his foot is planted. Son was adjudged to be offside because of where his shoulder was. That’s bollocks to me that. Measure by the standing foot of the striker compared to the standing foot of the last defender. Much more simple and fair. By that method, Son was actually onside. It won’t get changed though because the rule makers seem to want to ruin the game by making things unnecessarily complicated. So anyway, the upshot of all that was that Spurs were unlucky and Leicester took the points. I’m feeling good about my top six pick for Leicester. I’m almost certain they’ll do that, and the way some of the other top six sides are going they might even be pushing for top four. I’m not prepared to go there yet, but since Brendan got there in March they do have the fourth highest amount of points and it’s a fairly decent sample size. Moving on, and what about them Blues eh? Fucking hell. Their away form is enough to get Silva sacked, but they’d been good at home so the heat had been off him. Getting beat 2-0 at Goodison by Sheffield United though, damn. It was a bit of a freak result in fairness to Everton. The Blades had one shot on target but scored two goals. Everton didn’t play well by any means, but they had enough chances to win on another day. Chris Wilder’s side were awful with the ball but without it they were great. They were everything that Watford weren’t. They chased, they closed down space, they hurled themselves in front of shots, they did everything that a team facing a superior opponent needs to do. Mina’s own goal set the Yorkshireman on their way but no blame should be attached to the big defender. That was all on Pickford who weakly tried a punch and completely missed the ball. I’m starting to think he might be the most over-rated player in the entire league. He fucks up all the time but it hardly ever gets spoken about for some reason. He didn’t cover himself in glory on the second goal either, as Mouset’s shot went through his legs. The vultures are circling for Silva now, so much so that Everton might actually have to try and have a go against City this weekend. I know, imagine! I’m calling that one now. Everton will get something from that game. And by something, I don’t mean an absolute bumming. I mean they’ll get a draw or a win. I know, you’re wondering what I’ve been smoking. Shit, I’m wondering what I’ve been smoking as I’m reading that back and saying “what are you on about, you fucking biff”, but I’ve said it and I’m sticking by it. You can take the piss next week, or you can hail me as a fucking hero. We’ll see. It was a case of the dung pile after the Lord Mayor’s show for Norwich as they headed to Burnley and lost 2-0. It wasn’t as predictable a defeat as Watford at City, but it came as no surprise. After beating City you’d probably want to play someone that plays in a similar style. Instead they had to play Burnley. It’s almost like a different sport. It’s like beating Roger Federer and then the next week you’re playing snooker against Ronnie O’Sullivan. Chris Wood scored twice in the opening quarter of an hour as Burnley just had their way with Norwich. Barnes was hacked down in the box but the ref waved it away and VAR turned a blind eye, as usual. Well deserved win for Burnley who are well and truly back to their middle of the table selves now. Newcastle v Brighton was predictably shit. It was 0-0 but only thanks to Fabian Scher who made a stunning goal line clearance to preserve a point for the Geordies. Big Andy made his return and was given a hero’s welcome by the crowd. Remember the dog’s abuse they gave him when he went back there as a Liverpool player? Even though he’d been at pains to tell them how he never wanted to leave and he was forced out. Fucking Newcastle fans. I’m happy for Carroll though, I hope he does well in the dozen or so games he’ll be available for between injuries. There were loads of empty seats at St James’. You never see that, but maybe finally the penny has dropped and they’ve realised that boycott’s are the only way they’re going to make a difference. Before I forget, there was a game on Friday night. Bournemouth beat Southampton 3-1 in El Coastico. Ake headed the Cherries in front and Harry Wilson scored his third goal of the season to make it 2-0. So pleased for him and hopefully he can keep this going. Solanke seems to be getting some starts now and he thought he had an assist for Josh King only for VAR to rule it out. Again, we’re talking about a couple of inches but it was probably the right call. Southampton got a bullshit penalty when Adams knocked the ball past Cook and then kicked him. The defender didn’t challenge him but Adams made sure there was contact. Easy to see why the ref would be fooled by it, but VAR did him no favours again. A similar thing happened at the other end as King got his body in front of Cedric and was barged over. This time the ref waved it away and VAR, surprise surprise, backed him. For what it’s worth I don’t think either were penalties, but the one that wasn’t given was more of a foul than the one that was. Ward-Prowse converted the pen but Southampton couldn’t find an equaliser and Callum Wilson wrapped it up in stoppage time after a mix up between keeper and centre half. Bournemouth have got goals in them with the two Wilsons and King. My boy Ryan Fraser can’t even get in the starting line up at the moment. Onto Sunday now, and Arsenal got out of jail against Villa at the Emirates. Villa played well but as usual their arses went late on and they blew it. They went ahead through McGinn and it wasn’t against the run of play either. Maitland-Niles was then sent off for a second yellow card but Arsenal showed some rare balls to dig in and get the result even with ten men. Gendouzi drove into the box and was fouled. Pepe took the pen to claim his first goal for his new club. Wesley restored Villa’s lead following good play from Grealish. That goal came from Arsenal doing one of those daft short goal kicks and losing the ball. Villa had them right where they wanted them, but they didn’t kill them off and with nine minutes left Chambers equalised after capitalising on a mistake by Mings. Three minutes later Aubamayeng won a free-kick (looked like a dive to me) that he smashed in from 20 yards. Villa then wanted a penalty when the ball struck the arm of Sokratis. His arm was by his side, but it wasn’t tight to his side though. Probably 60/40 in favour of a pen so I can see why Villa feel aggrieved. You win some of those, you lose some. Bottom line is Villa had the lead against ten men, twice, and they couldn’t get the job done. Last week I wrote this about Palace: “Palace are dreadful and I can’t get over how high they are in the form chart. Genuinely baffling as it feels as though they lose every week. I think it’s because even when they win it’s usually 1-0 thanks to a late goal against ten men or some shit. They’re a terrible team and they might get relegated.” What happened this week? They were 1-0 up against 10 men and heading towards a typically unimpressive, unconvincing win. I was all set to come on here and pat myself on the back, and the soft cunts conceded in the 6th minute of stoppage time and allowed Wolves to pick up a point. The way Palace handled the last couple of minutes of stoppage time was beyond amateurish. It was staggeringly naive and they deserved to be punished. Finally, another defeat for United. The bigger shock would have been if they’d gone to West Ham and won. It was a terrible game lacking in quality, but West Ham were marginally less shite and therefore deserved the points. Yamolenko got the first and Cresswell finished them off with a quality free-kick. United are so bad. They’ve lost twice as many games as they’ve won since they had that flukey win over PSG last season. They can’t defend and they can’t attack. It’s the worst United side since the 80s and it’s not even close. Great isn’t it? They’ll probably throw a load of kids in as a desperation measure and to try and give the fans some hope. The one they seem to have the highest hope for is Mason Greenwood, who is a massive gobshite. I saw this video he posted last week and it was bad I reckon even Jesse Lingard was cringing. What a fucking embarrassing twat.

It’s been somewhat plain sailing for Liverpool since the start of the 2019/20 English Premier League (EPL). Six consecutive wins leaves Jurgen Klopp’s Reds five points clear at the top of the table, following Manchester City’s head-scratching 3-2 loss at EPL new boys, Norwich. Although there were concerns in pre-season regarding potential defensive frailties that were beginning to be exposed, Liverpool have conceded just five goals in their first six games. In fact, you could now argue that Liverpool have developed something of a steely rearguard action, ready for when the chips are down. In Oddshecker’s latest betting previews, it was revealed that Liverpool had won only one of their last seven encounters with Chelsea, so their recent gutsy 2-1 win at Stamford Bridge has further served to underline the Reds’ title credentials this term. Reds fans could be forgiven for becoming somewhat complacent about their title chances given that rivals City have looked a little less invincible so far in 2019/20. Nevertheless, there will always be bumps in the road along the way. This article looks at the potential hurdles and pitfalls lurking that could inadvertently derail Liverpool’s EPL aspirations. Poor depth in attack Former Liverpool and England striker Emile Heskey believes that the Reds’ lack of options in the final third could be one of the main dangers to their title dreams. Heskey believes that when the Reds “take Salah, Mane or Firmino out, it’s not quite the same”. Heskey feels that City’s “better blend” could eventually prove decisive, just like last season. Salah has scored four league goals in his first six games, along with three assists, to cement him as Liverpool’s number-one attacking threat. Nevertheless, Sadio Mane also has four goals to his name, and the increased rivalry between the pair should only be a positive for the team. Injuries to either Salah or Mane could have devastating consequences this term, although Klopp will have the January transfer window, despite it being a notoriously tricky period to get big deals done. An injury setback for Alisson Becker It was a bitter blow for the Reds' faithful watching star keeper Alisson Becker be substituted on the opening day against Norwich. Alisson admitted at the time that he felt his calf “explode”, which is never a good sign. Nevertheless, he has confirmed in recent days that his recovery is progressing well and he plans to return to action in October. Alisson’s presence and distribution are just two of the reasons why he is the newly-crowned Best FIFA Men’s Goalkeeper, so any setback in his rehab would be a blow to Liverpool’s title hopes – despite the valiant performances of deputy, Adrian of late. Issues regarding Jurgen Klopp’s future In recent weeks, Reds boss Jurgen Klopp has cast a huge shadow over his long-term future at Anfield. The club is reportedly keen to negotiate a lengthy new contract for Klopp’s services, putting their faith in him after last year’s Champions League success and narrowly missing out on the EPL title. However, Klopp has admitted that he couldn’t predict what would happen “in two or three years” when his current deal expires in the summer of 2022. Klopp’s agent, Marc Kosicke, had also jokingly claimed that the dreary English weather could have a bearing on Klopp’s decision to extend his stay on Merseyside. Although Klopp tried to pour cold water on those suggestions, labelling Kosicke’s comments as “German humour”, concerns are growing on the terraces that Klopp’s mission could be nearing an end. This in turn could have a negative bearing on the squad, who have shown tremendous faith and loyalty in the former Dortmund coach. Nevertheless, Klopp is right in some aspects. Two or three years is a long time in football. The pragmatic German will continue to take it one game at a time in his quest to bring Liverpool their first title in 30 years.

This is exactly how the early rounds of the League Cup is supposed to be. Lower league opposition that allows you to field a mixture of fringe players and kids while still progressing to the next stage. We haven’t had that opportunity in recent years as we kept getting difficult draws. The same thing has happened now as we face Arsenal next, but at least we had this game to blood some youngsters. And all in all, it was a resounding success. Harvey Elliott was brilliant, Curtis Jones was very good too, Ki-Jana Hoever scored and Kelleher was very assured in goal (didn’t mention his first name as I can’t spell it and I’m too lazy to look it up). You’ve probably noted that I haven’t mentioned Rhian Brewster. I’ll get to him in a bit. It was a good game with chances at both ends. I enjoyed it. It’s always nice when a few kids get a chance and perform well, plus we had the added bonus of giving run outs to the senior lads who haven’t played much. Being able to do all that and still win is just what you want. It wasn’t all plain sailing though, MK Dons had four or five really good chances and some of our defending wasn’t what it should be. Lovren blundered in the first half and Gomez was beaten far too easily in the second. Other than that they were alright, but it’s fair to say neither of them did anything to put pressure on Matip. Keita was back for his first game of the season and Ox got another run out to help with his sharpness. Naby was alright but didn’t do much, and Ox was generally disappointing other than a trademark run and shot from distance in the second half that came back off the post. Lallana was given a chance in his new “controlling” role and he played well for the most part. The problem with him in this position is that he just can’t help himself from holding onto the ball and doing turns that will occasionally get him dispossessed. 90% of the time he’s fine, but every game I’ve seen him in this role he’s lost the ball once or twice in dangerous areas. He got away with it because it’s MK Dons, but you could never play him there against anyone decent. With Fabinho, Gini and Hendo ahead of him that’s unlikely to happen anyway, but I’m just saying. Playing him in the League Cup is fine by me though. He was heavily involved throughout and saw a lot of the ball as we dominated possession. You’d expect that of course, but with so many changes made to the side you never really know how we’re going to play. We started well though and had little trouble creating openings. Elliott should have scored when he arrived at the back post to meet a Milner cutback, but his shot struck the underside of the bar. As I say, should have scored but it wasn’t as easy at it looked as he saw it late and the ball was a bit behind him. Bit unlucky really. He then turned provider with a perfectly flighted ball to the back post that Milner headed wide. The window to play that ball was tiny as he had to drop it over the head of the last defender but needed to get it down quickly enough to keep it in play and find Milner. Brilliant that was, just pure quality. The lively Jones had a snapshot saved and Brewster had a chance from a quality Milner cross but he failed to get anything on it. They had two glorious chances but blasted both of them high over the bar. As a lower league side, you have to take your chances when they come along and they didn't do it. They paid the price when their keeper spilled a powerful drive from Milner into his own net just before half time. Jones had a really good first half but Hoever wasn’t at his best. That was a role reversal from the last time they both played for the first team, when Hoever earned rave reviews and Jones had a really hard time in the FA Cup loss at Wolves. Hoever was better after the break though and capped a good night with a goal. I’m a huge fan of his but some of his crossing was dreadful and he looked a bit frustrated with himself at times. Thankfully he scored so he’ll be feeling much better about things now and he should definitely start against Arsenal. He took the goal really well. The header itself wasn’t difficult but I liked how he drifted into the box and timed his run perfectly to get on the end of Milner’s superbly stood up ball to the back stick. 17 years old and he’s scoring for the first team. Let’s hope his career pans out better than Ben Woodburn, the last kid to do it. Klopp made a couple of changes in the second half as Keita and Ox made way for Chirivella and Herbie Kane. Happy to see those lads get a run out as they’ve kind of been marooned here this season. Both are too good for the 23s and probably should be out on loan (or in Pedro’s case permanent). I don’t know what happened there. Kane was brilliant on loan at Doncaster last season so won’t have been short of offers, but somehow the window closed and he was stuck here. Maybe he was injured, I can’t remember. He's a good player him though. Chirivella is a weird one. I think he’s boss. I’ve always liked him and I can’t work out why there aren’t loads of clubs in for him. The loans he’s had have all been to clubs that in my opinion are way beneath his talent level, but I guess I must just be over-rating him because no-one seems to want him. It baffles me as he’s such a tidy little player. Great on the ball, good passer, seems like a sound lad too. I’m happy he got to play for the first team again and hopefully he gets a decent move in January. He was good when he came on, he looked very comfortable and confident. The last 15 minutes or so saw MK Dons have a real go and they probably should have scored. They had chances but Kelleher made a couple of good saves (he looked very assured all night) and Lovren headed one off the line. They also had an effort that skimmed the post and they probably deserved a goal on the balance of play. We almost bagged another from a superbly worked counter attack that ended with Lallana finding Elliott and him being denied by the bar again. Deserved a goal that, quality move and a lovely effort from the kid on his weak foot. He’s such an exciting talent and definitely the best 16 year old we’ve had since Michael Owen. Ok, so Brewster then. Have to say I was disappointed. After all the hype, all the interviews, all the LFCTV coverage of him, he finally makes a first team appearance and this was what we got? It’s not like he was bad, he was just very ‘meh’. And if I’m being honest, I wasn’t surprised. Klopp loves him, the staff all think really highly of him, he’s a superstar in the England youth ranks, he’s been hyped up for two years and everyone I speak to tells me that he’s special. Yet I’ve never been blown away by him. In fairness it’s not like I’ve seen that much of him as he missed so many u23 games through injury, but what I have seen of him has not made me think he’s this wonderkid that people say he is. I spoke to Neil Mellor over the summer and asked him what he thinks. I’ve known him for a long time and spoken about countless youth prospects with him over the years, and he’s not easily impressed. Generally he’s quite sceptical over all these ‘next big things’ but he rates Brewster highly. I told him I wasn’t convinced and he assured me that I’m wrong, which was what I wanted to hear. He knows far more than me and Klopp obviously knows more than me too. So even though I’ve never seen anything myself to convince me he’s that good, I’m willing to accept that he is on the basis that people who’ve seen him a lot more than I have, and who know far more than I do, think he’s special. So I want to believe in him. I really do. I want to see something from him that makes me go “wow” and to convince me that he is this sure fire young prospect who will establish himself as a first team calibre player and save us a fortune in the transfer market. A good performance in this game would have helped with that but he really didn’t do much at all. That’s a problem, because not only is he behind Salah, Bobby, Mané, Shaqiri and Divock, he may just have fallen behind Elliott too. He looks like a penalty box striker to me, but that’s not really what we have in the first team. Even Origi can play wide, I’m not sure Brewster can. I don’t like being this negative and I do feel sometimes like I’m too harsh on Brewster. I’m not sure why, as usually I’m as supportive of the young kids anyone, I always have been. I think in this case it’s because we’ve had him forced down our throats for so long, even though he’d never even played a single minute of first team football. It annoyed me. He’s front and centre in every dressing room video and he’s going the barbers wearing a medal that he did nothing to earn and he’s posting it on instagram. Maybe it’s an age thing, but my first instinct is “maybe actually play a game before you’re carrying on like you’ve made it”. So because of all of that, I’m probably holding him to a higher standard than I normally would with young players. Maybe it’s fair, maybe it isn’t. I’m not saying I’m right, I’m just explaining how I feel. I genuinely hope he is the player I keep hearing he is and I hope he starts showing it soon. If that turns out to be the case I’ll be made up. I want him to be brilliant, I’m just waiting to see something that makes me believe he will be. He’s got his work cut out though because he’s got some of the best players in the world ahead of him and the only way to improve is to play, and he’s not going to play much. Even though we’ve got Arsenal next I hope that Brewster and others will get another chance to play. I look at it like this; just because we’re playing a top side doesn’t mean we need to go full strength. If we lose, so what? The League Cup is not important to us. If we were to win it, great, but I wouldn’t be risking any senior players to do it. Maybe we will go a little stronger next time, but essentially it should be a second string team with not a single regular starter playing. Shaqiri, Adrian and Origi may well be back for Arsenal, but the likes of Hoever, Jones, Brewster and Elliott deserve to play because it’s the only way they’re going to improve. In my eyes, that’s more important that trying to win the League Cup. Star man is Elliott. Jones got it on Sky and I’m happy for him because he wasn’t good on his only previous senior outing at Wolves last year. He had a dip after that but he’s started this season in great form for the 23s. It was great to see him show what he can do and hopefully he can kick on from that. He’s a huge talent, the only question I have over him is where does he play? He’s not a flyer, which rules him out of being a viable front three option in the first team, but he could go on to be a really good midfield player. Elliott on the other hand, looks like he could be a viable back up to Salah even now. He won’t be, because he’s behind Shaqiri, but if we had injuries and needed to put him in for some Premier League games I have no doubt he could handle it, as the lad looks like being one of those rare generational talents. If his attitude is right, he could be a superstar. While we’re all understandably praising the kids for how they played, if we’re being completely fair about it then the best player on the pitch was really Milner. He scored one, made one and was involved in everything. He even made a goal saving block. He should have been the star man but he wouldn’t begrudge Elliott getting it as he’s been there himself, the 16 year old making a big splash on his debut. Milner was great though, as you’d expect. Give him a new contract, for fucks sake. So Arsenal next. I think they played some kids in their game too, so maybe Jurgen can get on the phone with Emery and come to an arrangement where they both field similar sides again. It’s always a worry when you play another top side, because if you pick a load of kids they can screw you over by going full strength. I don’t think Arsenal will do that and hopefully we’ll see both teams give their second string a run out as that could be a cracking game. Team: Kelleher; Hoever, Gomez, Lovren, Milner; Lallana, Oxlade-Chamberlain (Kane), Keita (Chirivella); Elliott, Brewster, Jones:

That was really tough. We were hanging on and we didn’t play particularly well, but this is probably one of the three or four most difficult fixtures on the calendar and we’ve come away with three points. Psychologically that’s huge, especially given that City had won 8-0 the day before. Given how dominant both us and City are now, there are only a handful of fixtures you look at and think “that could be a tough one”. Chelsea away is right up there and City will have been hoping that we slipped up in this one. For us to come through it - especially given how hairy it was in the last half an hour - feels like a real hurdle we’ve overcome. Imagine if we’d drawn or lost this game after City had won 8-0. It would have cancelled out the buzz from last weekend when they lost at Norwich and we went five points clear. City bounced back and sent a message, and we went and won at Chelsea to let them know they can shove their message up their financial doping arse. Much had been made about our recent record away at fellow top six clubs, but these are the toughest games any team has. You’re not going to be taking maximum points from trips to the best teams in the country. The key to success is winning the games you’re supposed to win. Away games at the top six do not really come into that category. We can’t “expect” to win at Chelsea, so the fact we have done puts us ahead of the curve. Just as the fact City lost at Norwich puts them behind it. Both teams are so far ahead of everyone else that there are only a handful of games that they shouldn’t “expect” to win. Both games against each other, Spurs away, Chelsea away and probably Leicester away are games where a draw would probably be seen as acceptable. Every other game is one that both ourselves and City ‘should’ win. So far we’re doing that and they aren’t, which is why currently we lead by five points. So winning away at Chelsea is great, not least because it came after such a tough away fixture in midweek. Even if we’d won in Naples this would have been tough, but coming off a loss in such disappointing circumstances, to go to Chelsea and win is a terrific achievement from the lads. The way we finished the game certainly suggests to me that the midweek trip to Italy had a bit of an impact on the legs. Ten of the starting eleven at Chelsea had played in midweek, so it’s probably not a co-incidence that our level dropped in the last half an hour. We couldn’t keep the ball and we were wasteful with some good counter attacking opportunities. What we saw once more though was that even when these lads are not at their best, even when they’re under the cosh and the pressure is on, they seem to be able to just get the job done. Chelsea had the bit between their teeth after they got back to 2-1 and they were really pushing for that equaliser. They were picking up every second ball and we were hanging on, but they only created two chances after that and missed the target with both. We defended pretty well in those closing stages and while much of our focus is naturally on our own performance and how we struggled in the second half, I don’t think we should overlook just how difficult it is to win at Chelsea and what a dangerous side they still are. They aren’t title contenders anymore and they’ll finish a long way behind us come May, but on their day they can beat anyone as they still have some top players. They had Pulisic and Pedro on the bench, and Giroud couldn’t even make their match day squad. Chelsea are still capable and I thought they played well. The thing is though, we’re so good now that for anyone to beat us they’re going to have to play out of their skin. We’ve played Chelsea twice this season and we’ve had their best effort in both games. They’ve probably played better in those two games than they have in any other. Yet they didn't win either because it’s fucking hard getting anything against us. Even Napoli the other night. They got the win (fortuitously) but it took so much out of them. They were cramping up with 15 minutes to go because of the sheer effort they had to put in to stay with us. Beating Liverpool takes a herculean effort for most teams. That’s how far we’ve come in such a short space of time. We could have made life much easier for ourselves in this one if we’d scored the third goal when we were well on top at the start of the second half. We were flying in that spell but Chelsea weathered the storm and after that it became difficult. Even in the first half though Chelsea posed a threat. We scored twice from set-pieces but I didn’t think we dominated the half or anything and the score flattered us. Chelsea paid the price for conceding two cheap free-kicks and then not defending them properly. The first one was a clumsy challenge by Christensen on Mané, who had cleverly made sure he got in front of the defender and forced him to make the foul. It was in a great position but free-kick specialists generally prefer to be five or six yards further out than this. Initially it looked like Henderson was pulling rank, but thankfully common sense prevailed. No-one wants to see Hendo on free-kicks. Credit to Trent, not only for the brilliant strike but also for having the presence of mind to ask Mo to roll it to him to give him a better angle. He’s a quick thinking bastard is Trent. The strike though... fucking hell. The keeper is actually stood in that corner of the goal but it was past him before he could even move. Just a brilliant hit, perfectly placed and full of power. Not sure what the weird celebration was all about though. I was a bit disappointed he didn’t just run to the bench and let Gomez know who the fucking daddy is. Joe had wiped the floor with Trent in a free-kick contest a couple of weeks back and had understandably rubbed his nose in it, but this was Trent re-marking his territory. Chelsea almost levelled when Abraham got in behind, but Adrian stood up well and made a great save. I thought it was offside but replays showed that Trent was a yard behind everyone else and played Abraham on. Adrian is fucking boss isn’t he? He’s got the makings of a proper cult hero. He’s made some key saves for us and other than that one mad moment at Southampton, we’ve not really suffered from not having Alisson It’s a good job he was on his game because defensively we were getting caught out quite a bit. Chelsea thought they’d equalised through Azpilicueta but VAR came to our rescue. I didn’t suspect any offside at the time and just thought it was a goal. A scrappy, fortunate goal that we could feel aggrieved about, but a goal nonetheless. It was a lucky rebound of Fabinho that let Willian in, and even though Adrian had made another brilliant save the ball ended up in the net via another spawn rebound from Fabinho’s challenge. Then we saw there was a VAR check for something in the build up. I was watching the game with a mate who’s a Chelsea fan, and at this point I went all Clive Tyldesley in Istanbul: “Hello! Hello! Here we go.” The replay showed Mount was offside and we were out of jail. There’s been a lot of crysarsing about it, but there’s no miscarriage of justice here. It was the correct decision and if the linesman had flagged there’d have been no discussion over it. Because the linesman didn’t flag (either because he thought it was onside or because he felt it was so close it was best to let the video decide) all the discussion is over VAR once again. As I'm sure you all know by now, I hate VAR and I’d scrap it if I could. There are so many things wrong with it I wouldn’t know where to begin complaining, but on a list of shit things about VAR the offside stuff is pretty low down. In some respects it’s almost like goal-line technology. It’s not quite as black and white as that as there are occasional areas of grey (second phases of play and restarts and other such shit), but a lot of the time it’s either offside or it isn’t and the technology can determine that better than the naked eye. And the bottom line here is that Mount WAS offside. There’s no doubt about that. People seem to be upset that he was only a little bit offside and if you take VAR out of it then yeah, you’d feel hard done by because it’s such a marginal decision. But this is what the video is for. If you’re using the video then whether it’s an inch or a foot it’s the same outcome. If you’re using technology then it becomes much more objective and much less subjective. Now, there is an argument to be had about how accurate it actually is in determining the exact moment a pass is played, but as things stand with how the technology is right now, Mount was offside and the correct decision was made, and no amount of crying from Martin Tyler changes that. Seriously, what a fucking prick that fella is. His commentary of this game was what you’d expect when England are playing in a World Cup game. Chelsea were obviously England in that scenario. We score and he sounds gutted, grudgingly admitting the free-kick was “wonderful”. Chelsea score and he’s made up, until VAR get’s involved and he’s almost crying into the mic “it’s not going to count…. it’s not… going.. to count”. He’s actually worse than Motson. The disallowed goal was fucking huge though. Just as it was in the Spurs / Leicester game the day before. It’s a double whammy effect, The team that thinks they’ve scored have it ripped away from them and it’s almost like conceding a goal. For the team that benefits it’s like scoring. We got a lift from it and I thought Chelsea looked like their heads had gone for a bit afterwards. We took advantage by making it 2-0. Gini lobbed the ball over Azpliciueta who impeded him. Chelsea didn’t think it was a foul because there was nowhere for the full back to go. I’d agree with that if he hadn’t put his hands up and hit Wijnaldum in the throat. It was a foul. The ball was rolled to Robbo who whipped in a good ball onto the head of Bobby. 2-0 just like that. Terrible marking from Chelsea, and in particular Alonso. Chelsea fans seem to hate him these days. He’s an awful defender like, but he is a big threat going forward. Much of what Chelsea did in the second half came through him and I don’t think we handled it particularly well. Time and again they were looking for that long switch of play out to Alonso and usually they found him. Salah was just letting him which gave Hendo a lot of space to cover. Normally I’m ok with that because Mo just hanging around in the space vacated by the full back usually leads to some devastating counter-attacks. The problem comes when he’s playing as badly as he was in this one. He was shite, and given the lack of attacking quality he provided we may as well just have had someone who could have shut down Alonso. Klopp did change that eventually, but he waited until stoppage time to do it when he brought Gomez on and went five at the back. Prior to that we’d seen Milner replace the injured Mané and Lallana came on for Hendo. Strange one that. Ox would have seemed the more likely choice but Klopp probably felt we needed to keep the ball better so went with Lallana. None of the subs helped us. We kept giving the ball away and inviting Chelsea to come at us. And they did. Kante got them back into it with a terrific solo effort that gave Adrian no chance. Fabinho should have done better and just looked really heavy legged as the spritely little Kante just turned away from him effortlessly. He’s a fucking great player him though. Other than our own lads, I’d say that along with De Bruyne he’s the best player in the league. The goal gave Chelsea renewed hope and they dominated after that. Batshuayi put a free header wide and Mount blasted over the bar from a good position. Adrian made another great save to deny Alonso but he was offside anyway. Our defending was a concern though. There seems to be some miscommunication between the two centre backs at times. Bathsuayi should never have been in that much space, and Mount’s opportunity came because Matip let him run while Virgil was tracking another runner, meaning he played Mount onside. We’ve seen quite a lot of these little breakdowns already this season and we’re struggling to keep clean sheets. It needs cleaning up, but equally I think it’s worth pointing out that we’ve still got the best defensive record in the league so it’s not that bad. We know how to see games out now and the lack of game management appears to be a thing of the past. I noticed a few times late on that we played on for a second or two after the whistle just to cause a little delay in Chelsea restarting. Robbo did it two or three times where the ref had blown for a Chelsea free-kick or throw and he just carried on playing long enough to get the ball away but not long enough to get a booking. The ref was a bit of a tit though wasn’t he? Trent was booked for time wasting even though he didn’t take any longer than you’d see for any standard throw in. The ref was influenced by the crowd, who were kicking off any time Adrian didn’t take a goal kick within a couple of seconds of the ball going out. The Chelsea fans were at their odious worst throughout. Sign On, Liverpool Slums, Demba Ba… and that was inside the first five minutes. Funny when they unveiled a big Eden Hazard banner though only to admit afterwards it was a mistake. Apparently the club gave the fans the wrong banner, but by the time they realised it had been unfurled and it was too late to do anything. That might just be the most Chelsea thing ever. Actually no, the most Chelsea thing ever was when they shamelessly ripped off our Torres flag, complete with Shakily Gates! Anyway, while we were understandably in no hurry, there was no genuine time wasting going on. Michael Oliver was just playing to the galleries there. Of course Martin Tyler was livid about it and was even trying to get Hendo red carded for putting his hands on an official. Laughable. Players do that all the time, especially captains. He put his arm around the ref while he was listening to him. He didn’t give it the Paolo Di Canio and knock him on his arse. Fucking Tyler, what a twat. So we held on for the win and you could see in the reactions of Klopp and the players on the pitch at the end that they knew this was a big one. It was a tough one but only because we didn’t kill them off when we could have. The way we started the second half was great, we were all over them and only a brilliant save from Kepa prevented Bobby making it 3-0 and ending the game. We had other moments too but we were just wasteful. Mané wasn’t himself and Salah looked like he was trying too hard to stick it to his old team. If they’d been at it we’d have won easily, but then I feel like that every game. If they click, we’ll smash any team on the planet. My expectations of them are too high really, as they’re not going to run riot in every game they play. The bottom line here is that we’ve won away at Chelsea and that puts pressure on City to do the same when they go there. We’ve come through a real test here and we’re still five points ahead. Now we just need to keep winning the ones we’re supposed to win and see where we are when we play City in November. Star man is Robbo, just ahead of Adrian. I thought Fabinho was great too other than that one moment when Kante gave him the runaround, and Matip impressed again. I’m going with Robbo though, not least because of that driving run at the end that saw him go past four players, carry the ball 80 yards upfield and then win a free-kick that effectively allowed us to play out the rest of the game in Chelsea’s half. I fucking love Andy Robbo. What a hero. Team: Adrian; Alexander-Arnold, Matip, Van Dijk, Robertson; Fabinho, Henderson (Lallana), Wijnaldum; Salah (Gomez), Firmino, Mané (Milner):