TLW

DANIEL STURRIDGE PROFILE by Dave Usher Date of Birth - 01/09/89 Nationality - English Position - Striker Squad Number - 15 Cost - £12m Club Hons (Lpool) - Intnl Hons - England Caps Other Clubs - Manchester City, Chelsea, Bolton Wanderers (loan) Daniel Sturridge was one of the most highly rated teenagers in Europe when he broke through at Manchester City. He'd caught the eye against the Reds in the FA Youth Cup, scoring twice in the second leg of the final as City almost overturned a 3-0 deficit from the 1st leg at Anfield. With City having been taken over by Sheikh Mansouri, they went on a spending spree that convinced Sturridge his future was best served elsewhere, and he made a surprise move to Chelsea in 2009. Opportunities were limited at Stamford Bridge but he was a regular part of the squad and impressed when called upon. It was a loan spell at Bolton in 2011 when Sturridge really announced his arrival as a Premier League player, scoring 8 goals in 12 appearances for the Trotters. At Chelsea he was often used wide in a front three, but he craved the opportunity to play centrally. With Drogba around, that wasn't going to happen. Chelsea's £50m purchase of Fernando Torres pushed Sturridge further down the pecking order, although Andre Villas Boas selected him often on the right of the forward line. The departure of AVB and subsequent arrival of Roberto Di Matteo did Sturridge no favours and he found it difficult to force his way into the side. With the Reds desperate for a pacy forward to link up with Luis Suarez, Brendan Rodgers swooped for Sturridge in January 2013, and despite speculation that he'd employ him in one of the wide positions either side of Suarez, Rodgers was adamant that Sturridge would play centrally and that Suarez would be moved to accommodate him. Eyebrows were raised, as Suarez had been in incredible form as the main central striker, but Sturridge repaid the faith of Rodgers immediately by making a sensational start to his Liverpool career. He scored within minutes of making his debut at Mansfield, and he scored again the following week when coming off the bench at Old Trafford. Another goal followed in his next game, a 5-0 rout of Norwich at Anfield, and after drawing a blank at the Emirates he bounced back with a great goal and stunning performance away at former club Man City. He made it five goals in seven starts when he converted a penalty against Swansea.

Philippe Coutinho PROFILE by Dave Usher Date of Birth - 12/06/92 Nationality - Brazilian Position - Attacking midfield Squad Number - 10 Cost - £10m Club Hons (Lpool) - Intnl Hons - Brazil Cap Other Clubs - Vasco Da Gama, Inter Milan, Espanyol (loan) Coutinho was snapped up by Italian giants Inter Milan when he was just 16 years of age. Brazilian law meant he was unable to leave his homeland until he turned 18, so the prodigious young talent stayed with Vasco until he was able to make the move to Europe. Former Reds boss Rafa Benitez had taken charge of Inter and Coutinho initially saw regular first team action under the Spanish boss. Benitez didn't last long however, and over the next year or so Coutinho found his opportunities more limited. A successful loan spell in Spain with Espanyol in 2012 brought him back into the spotlight, and although the Spanish side wanted to make his transfer permanent they could not raise the funds and he returned to Inter for the start of 2012-13. He struggled to establish himself in Inter's first team once again, and when the January transfer window opened he was a player in demand, as both Southampton and Liverpool were keen on recruiting him. The appeal of Southampton would have been the manager, Pocchetino, who Coutinho had worked with at Espanyol, but despite the Saints reporting outbidding Liverpool, Coutinho was only interested in a move to Anfield and he got his wish on the last day of the window when he was handed the number 10 shirt by Brendan Rodgers. His debut came as a late sub in a home defeat by West Brom, and he scored on his first start six days later when he found the net in a 5-0 rout of Swansea City at Anfield.

LIVERPOOL 5 Swansea City 0 Report by Dave Usher at Anfield Scorer(s) – Steven Gerrard (pen), Phillipe Coutinho, Jose Enrique, Luis Suarez, Daniel Sturridge (pen)Half Time - 1-0 Venue - Anfield Date - Sun 17 Feb 2013 Star Man – Luis Suarez That was just what we needed. It doesn't make up for losing against West Brom, far from it, but at least it prevented a drama becoming a full blown crisis. The two defeats we suffered this week had really set us back and undone a lot of good progress that had been made in recent weeks, but the fan reaction still seemed a little excessive to me, at least in cyber-world anyway. If we'd beaten West Brom as we should have done, we'd be in decent shape and primed to make a run at a top four spot. Of course we didn't do that, and people were understandably pissed off about it. I was pissed off too, just not specifically with Rodgers who I retain a great deal of faith in. I wouldn't say that puts me in a minority as such, but there are clearly plenty who don't share that faith in him, especially on the internet. You only have to look at twitter and the forums after bad results to see that. It's up to him to win those fans over, and performances like this won't do any harm on that score. Failure to beat Swansea and the knives really would have been out for Rodgers, so it was nice to not only win, but win in real style with a performance that sent everyone home happy, not to mention a little excited. People were buzzing on their way out of Anfield after this, the third goal especially had people purring. The mood couldn't have been more different than that of six days earlier. The opposition may not have been the best, but what we saw from the front two in particular was something special. They took Swansea's makeshift backline to the cleaners, and in the limited games they've played together they already have ten goals between them. Those two are electric together, and any time that pairing is on the field we look capable of holding our own against anyone. Sturridge's absence against West Brom has really cost us as I honestly think we'd have twatted them had he been available. I'm not putting that forward as any kind of excuse as you have to be able to win games like that even without him (and the poor play by the two full backs was also a massive factor in what happened against West Brom), but it's not an exaggeration to say we look at least 50% more effective when he plays. The transformation to the side when he's in it is remarkable, we're a real handful for anyone and look like we can score at will. Having said that, it's too early to be able to make any kind of judgement on how good we can be, as Sturridge has only played half a dozen or so games. It's certainly hugely encouraging how well he's settled in though, and even more encouraging how he and Suarez have hit it off. There's a lot they can improve on too, as partnerships take time to fully develop and these two are just starting out. They've linked up very well so far, but there's still been occasions when they've been pissed off at the other for not passing. Even against Swansea you could see that, Suarez let Sturridge have both barrels for not cutting a ball back to him and then in the second half Sturridge looked mightily pissed off that Suarez went on his own and scored rather than play a simple pass to him. Those occasions show there's still room for improvement in the partnership, but overall they seem to play great together and both are benefitting massively from playing with the other. The team as a whole are benefitting from it too, having that extra player up there helps everyone, especially as Sturridge offers the threat in behind because of his pace and he also likes to hang around the six yard box when we attack, that's two things we don't get from Luis who obviously brings many other things to the table. The first half was all about Suarez. Everything we did seemed to have him at the heart of it. He was finding space between their defence and midfield and he was driving at their centre backs or he was releasing Sturridge down the channels. It was surprising how long it took us to make the breakthrough as we had numerous chances prior to Gerrard's penalty. Coutinho started quite slowly but then came alive after one moment of real quality. As a ball dropped out of the sky he killed it stone dead, and then played a gorgeous ball between two defenders that Sturridge looked as though he probably should have reached. He just missed it and the keeper gathered, but there was a collective murmur around the stadium as we all muttered "aye aye that was a bit good wasn't it?". Coutinho's confidence grew after that and he was lively and bright. Playing on the left wing may not get the best out of him in the long term, but he's clearly fairly comfortable out there and provides us with a useful option. At least for league games anyway, unfortunately like Sturridge he's cup tied in Europe. We should have had an earlier spot-kick too when Suarez released Sturridge over the top, and as he cut across the six yard box he was clearly flattened by a defender. Webb waved play on and Coutinho shot wide. We looked dangerous every time we attacked, Gerrard had a shot deflected just wide and Sturridge really should have buried a header at the Kop end after a delicious right foot cross by Downing, who enjoyed another good outing, especially in the first half when he gave Davies a torrid time, whether it was running at him with the ball or tracking back and dispossessing him. Good stuff from Downing. The goal eventually came when Suarez won a penalty in front of the Kop. At the time I thought it was soft, having seen it again it was a clear pen and a stupid, clumsy challenge by the Swansea man. Completely needless too as I don't think there was much danger. I'd initially thought it was a shoulder charge, which is what the Swansea players were also claiming. The replays showed it was just a clumsy lunge though. Webb didn't give actually it, the linesman in front of me did. Had he not flagged I doubt that Webb gives it, especially having waved away a far more blatant one on Sturridge earlier. Gerrard bravely stepped up having missed the other night, but it took an age before he was able to take the kick. Vorm got very close to it but thankfully it found the net. Gerrard's muted celebration suggested he was feeling what we were all thinking too, if only he could have buried that one the other night. The goal was huge for us, because as well as we'd played there was the danger that we'd go in at half time goalless again, and who knows how the second half would have played out. We had chances to add to it before the break, the best of which came when Suarez blocked a clearance and sent Sturridge clean through. His first touch was a little heavy and Vorm was out at him very quickly, forcing Sturridge to try and dink it over him but a couple of defenders had got back to cover. Suarez threw a proper strop about not getting a return pass, but to be fair to Sturridge I don't see how he could possibly have found him, as Luis was six yards behind him and the keeper was right on top of him. The second half started perfectly for us with a goal for Coutinho within seconds. Suarez did superbly to set it up, and whilst Vorm didn't cover himself in glory by essentially diving out of the way, credit to Coutinho for driving at the defence and getting his shot away. He almost added a cheeky second immediately after when he flicked Suarez's cross inches wide. We swarmed all over them in the 20 minute period after that, and could have scored six or seven easily. Enrique added a brilliant third after some proper Harlem Globetrotter fancy shit down the left hand side. Sturridge, Coutinho, Enrique, Suarez, Enrique, Sturridge and finally Enrique again. Breathtaking football. 3-0 and game over. Downing then fed Suarez who danced around two defenders, ignored the wide open Sturridge and then curled a shot into the corner to make it 4-0. Henderson came on for Coutinho and created two openings for Sturridge with good defence splitting passes. The first saw Sturridge bring it down on his chest brilliantly and get a good shot away only to be thwarted by Vorm. The second was good movement by Sturridge who laid it off to Henderson and spun off into the space. Hendo played him in, but the finish wasn't great and Vorm saved with his feet again. Sturridge was getting frustrated, and when Routledge inexplicably handled in the box, the striker was in the ear of Gerrard asking for the pen. Gerrard obliged, only after initially offering it to Carragher who wanted no part of such nonsense. Good call by the captain letting Sturridge have it though, we need to keep him and Suarez scoring and it's good for both of them to get on the scoresheet again. Sturridge then hit the bar with a lovely curler, and Johnson bent one a couple of inches wide. Rodgers brought Suarez off late on to give him a bit of a breather ahead of the Zenit game, and Suarez was proper pissed off about it! He wants to play every minute of every game, and having got within one goal of Van Persie he wouldn't have wanted to come off in this one. The right call though, we need him for Thursday if we are to have any chance of turning that around. Poor Fabio Borini though. He came on, was inches away from taking a ball in stride and having a great chance to score, and then he somehow managed to dislocate his shoulder whilst closing down a defender. Really unfortunate for the lad, and you could hear his blood curdling screams from where I sat forty yards away. That was the only negative on an otherwise highly enjoyable afternoon. I don't think we learned anything new though, other than discovering a bit about the qualities of Coutinho. We've been playing good stuff like this for much of the season, but we've been prone to shooting ourselves in the foot far too often. That didn't happen against Swansea, but could quite easily happen next time out against Wigan or whoever it is we have next. And there's certainly a case to be made that we only perform when the pressure is off. Put us in a position to make a run and climb the table, and we blow it. Give us a game with less pressure and we can look like world beaters. Aston Villa was a chance to make a statement and we made the wrong kind of one. West Brom the same. So until we start winning games that really matter, it's an accusation that can be thrown at us. You can justifiably point to Swansea's team selection as a big factor in this performance. They left out key men and many of those who did play had an eye on next week's Wembley Final. Of course that was a factor and unquestionably made things easier for us. Yet let's not forget that this was our third game in six days and we'd just got back from a difficult trip to Russia. This had letdown written all over it, but not only did we get the job done, we did it in some style and I'm taking nothing away from the performance. There's no point getting carried away though, as well as we played on the day you do still have to acknowledge that Swansea gave up once the second goal went in and it was little more than an exhibition game after that. There's also no way of knowing how the game would have panned out had we not been awarded - and scored - that penalty in the first half. We'd missed some chances up to that point and had it reached half time with no breakthrough then you never know how we'd have reacted. That's as irrelevant as saying that we'd have beaten West Brom if Gerrard's penalty had gone in. We lost to West Brom, we battered Swansea. Unfortunately losing to West Brom kind of ruins any kind of buzz the Swansea game provides, because we should now be above Everton and we're not. Losing to the Baggies really killed our momentum, and also made it difficult to trust this team. You have to worry that the next letdown is just around the corner, but at least it didn't come against Swansea. You have to be able to enjoy a 5-0 win, even if ultimately it doesn't mean that much. In terms of a one off performance it was very good. With better finishing Sturridge would have had three or four and the team could have hit double figures. Various reports claim that 35 shots represents the most by any side in any Premier League game all season. Apparently we've had more shots than any team in any of the five main European leagues this season. More shots than Barcelona, Bayern, Real Madrid, the Mancs…. it doesn't mean a great deal at the end of the day, but it does show that we're an attacking side and we're well coached. Yes, we're obviously flawed, the last week has given further evidence of that if it were needed, but there's a lot of things right with us too and there is something to build on. It's not as though we're complete shite, but we are painfully inconsistent. Nights like West Brom notwithstanding, generally I really enjoy watching us play and feel we are heading in the right direction, we're just not getting there as quickly as we want and that is bringing a lot of frustration. Individual errors have often undermined the good play of the team, but considering how a few months ago every one of us would have said the team's main flaw is goalscoring, it's encouraging that we're now the fourth top scorers in the division, with just one less than Arsenal who are the third top scorers. Of course our record at the other end leaves a lot to be desired, and that needs addressing for us to progress to the next level. I'm just going to enjoy this for what it was, a good win against weak opposition. I'm not falling into the trap of looking ahead and working out what points we need to pick up and where other teams may drop some, because every time we get into that situation we end up getting punched on the nose. We won, we played some great stuff, now it's onto the mammoth task of trying to salvage our last remaining hope of a trophy. We can beat Zenit, but I'd be a lot more confident about our chances if Sturridge wasn't cup tied due to Chelsea's ineptitude. Still, at least this win means we go into that game in good spirits and it's a great chance for someone to make a hero of themselves, a Sterling or Henderson perhaps? Rodgers should sit the whole squad down and let them watch the DVD of the Auxerre game and witness how Mike Marsh and Mark Walters wrote themselves into Anfield folklore. If we get an early goal I think we'll do it. If we don't get an early goal, I fear it will be a long, depressing night. I can't wait though, bring it on! Team: Reina; Johnson, Carragher, Agger, Enrique; Downing, Lucas (Allen), Gerrard, Coutinho (Henderson); Suarez (Borini), Sturridge:

Zenit St Petersburg 2 LIVERPOOL 0 Report by Dave Usher Scorer(s) – Half Time - 0-0 Venue - Petrovsky Stadium Date - Thu 14 Feb 2013 Star Man – Jamie Carragher Once again we found a way to lose a game that we looked to be in control of, and now we're on the brink of being knocked out of the only competition we still had a chance of winning. Out of both domestic cups early on, doing shite in the league and now facing elimination from Europe at the first knock out stage. It sucks to be us right now doesn't it? All isn't lost just yet though, it is still only half time and we've come back from worse situations than this before, but the teams that have done so generally had something that this one seems to lack; Balls. Still, with the crowd up for it we could still overturn this one as Zenit didn't look any great shakes at the back and should have conceded several times in this one. Had Suarez not reverted to last season's form they would have. An early goal next week will be crucial though as we struggle badly when we don't find an early breakthrough. Yet again we've lost a game in which I don't think we've even played particularly poorly. We had some bad spells in the game but it's not like Zenit completely outplayed us as overall I thought it was pretty even. Not that it matters, teams know they don't need to outplay us to win, all they have to do is keep it tight and wait for us to gift wrap something for them. We've turned 'not winning' into an art form, we're like the anti-Man Utd. Most times when I watch the Mancs I find myself thinking "they didn't even play well there but they've won." I watch us and it's the opposite; "we played pretty well there, how did we not win?". Steve Clarke said last week that Liverpool play the best football in the country. Personally I'd say Arsenal still do, but Clarke's statement wasn't that far fetched and if points were awarded for performances and not results we'd have little to worry about. We know how to play football, but we don't know how to get results. Good teams don't need to play well for ninety minutes to win games. Most of the time they play in spurts, win the games during those spurts of good play and just see out the rest of the game. That's what United have been doing all season, they'll get outplayed by Southampton at home for long spells but it doesn't matter because they'll have a ten minute spell where they do enough to win the game. We're the polar opposite, we seem to play well for long periods of games but don't do enough to win, and then we'll have a bad ten minute spell where we'll lose it. For 80 minutes the other night West Brom didn't have a shot, then we have a bad period in the last ten minutes and lose 2-0. Against Arsenal we were 2-0 up then had a bad spell and drew. We battered Man City for long periods but found a way to not win that too. It's a recurring pattern, our bad spells and needless mistakes are absolutely killing us. Against Zenit we had two bad spells, one in the opening ten minutes where we looked all over the place and Reina had to make two stunning saves. The first one was absolutely brilliant, the second was excellent but was one I'd expect him to make. That first one though, stunning it was. The best save I've seen him make in a long time. In between those saves Suarez should have scored when he collected Johnson's fine pass, turned his marker inside out, then outside in again only to drag his shot inches past the post. It would have been an incredible goal that. After that initial storm was weathered we were generally comfortable and should have scored twice, but unfortunately Suarez was in Stuart Barlow mode. One chance came when Neto passed the ball straight to him and gave him a free run on goal. Suarez had all the time in the world and opted to go around the keeper, only to over-run it and waste the most gilt edged of opportunities. Then he flicked one wide from close range after Sterling had rolled the ball across goal to him. That was three glorious chances in the first half, and he missed another after the break too. He can have these games from time to time, but this season they've been few and far between. The last one I remember was West Brom on the opening day, since then he's been on a tear. This was poor though, he wasted four great openings and as much as I love the guy this defeat is on him more than anyone else, I'm sure he'd admit that himself. He puts away any of those chances and we're singing a different tune, especially given the importance of away goals. He missed them all though, and despite us looking very comfortable we typically conceded out of nowhere and then had another bad little spell that saw us let in another cheap goal and go on to lose the game 2-0. It's infuriating, we just keep throwing games away and it's not showing any signs of getting better. We make too many individual errors when we're in control of games and that's why we aren't getting the results that the performances should be bringing. There's enough positive things to suggest we aren't that far away, but we just keep shooting ourselves in the foot time and time again. We should never have lost this game, let alone lost it by a two goal margin. But our problem is that we're soft, both physically and mentally. At times the physical side has cost us, but mostly it's the mental weakness that does us in. It was that mental fragility that cost us this time, as once we gave up one goal you could tell a mile off a second was on it's way. We needed to be able to just lock it down for a while and make sure we didn't concede a second, but we couldn't do it and that goal was inevitable as our heads had completely gone after conceding the first. Mistakes keep costing us, and both of these goals were self inflicted. I'm still amazed at how inept Johnson's marking was on the second goal, that simply can't happen. Throw in the four glorious chances wasted by Suarez and we've only got ourselves to blame for yet another bad result that was so easily avoidable. Zenit have some good players and it's obviously a tough place to go. The pitch was disgusting too, which makes it difficult for a side like us who insist on passing the ball around in dangerous areas. Losing here isn't a disgrace and should perhaps even be expected given our current level, but nevertheless the way we lost was completely unacceptable to me because it was so damn unnecessary. They were no better than us on the night, we matched them in terms of performance but once again performance and result did not tie in with eachother. At worst this should have been a one goal deficit with at least one away goal in the bag, so losing it 2-0 is pretty hard to stomach. We're conceding too many goals and we're far too easy to score against. That's what Rodgers needs to fix if we're to make any progress. I've no idea how he's going to do that, as a lot of the goals we're letting in are simply individual errors rather than anything tactical that he's doing. He can't stop Henderson from losing the ball meakly in a dangerous area and he can't make Johnson concentrate and not leave a man wide open on the far post for a tap in. Similarly, he can't handcuff Agger to the guy he's marking to prevent him getting a free header from a set piece and he can't stop Reina from charging out and giving Aguero and empty net to aim at. I find it difficult to blame him too much for what's happening, but nevertheless he is the manager and he therefore needs to find a way to get these players to concentrate for 90 minutes and to basically stop fucking up. When it's so many different players making the mistakes it's difficult. If it's not Reina it's Agger. If it's not Agger it's Skrtel. If it's not Skrtel it's Johnson and so on. You can't drop them all, we just don't have the quality to bring in. There has to be a reason why they're all making so many errors though, and that's what Rodgers needs to sort out. The mentality of the side is truly appalling, there aren't enough players who actually seem to like doing the dirty work. Making tackles, winning headers, tracking runners, throwing yourself in front of shots, I don't think we have enough players who embrace doing all those things, and it shows. I admire Brendan's footballing principles and I believe in what he's trying to do, but they'll only take you so far if you don't get the blend right. Silk without steel is no good, just ask Arsenal fans, there has to be a balance and we don't have enough physically imposing players or enough winners. We're so weak and fragile, so easily downhearted and so prone to stupid errors. Rodgers has brought in a top sports psychologist, so it's clearly something he's aware of yet it appears to be getting worse, not better. In terms of tactics, I don't have too many complaints although I'd like to see us not leave so many gaps between the defence and midfield. Zenit exposed that too often for my liking, especially early on. Allen just doesn't have the physical attributes to do that job, he's not equipped to deal with some of the physically imposing monsters he's come up against. Diaby at Arsenal, Hulk in this game…. Allen is not Mascherano, he can't compete physically with those kind of players and seeing him trying to stop the marauding Hulk was just painful, an absolute mismatch. Allen was ok with the ball, but defensively he didn't really help out much. The midfield as a whole didn't really function well all night, and I'm including the two wide players in that. Gerrard was ok, but nothing more than that, Downing wasn't especially good or bad but Henderson and Sterling were both woeful I thought. Henderson seemed to give the ball away cheaply pretty much every time he got it, he just got worse and worse as the game wore on. When he got caught in possession for their opening goal I didn't even blame him, I blamed Rodgers for not having hooked him much earlier as I'd been screaming for it since half time. Then there's Raheem Sterling. He doesn't run at people, he doesn't get crosses in, he doesn't shoot. I know he's just a kid but he's contributing nothing at all and he lost the right to being judged as 'just a kid' when he insisted on being paid like a first teamer. He got his contract, now he needs to show he's worth it and right now he's not even living up to the contract he was on before. The early season promise he showed seems a long, long time ago. He needs to remember what it was that got him here and start doing it again because he's been struggling for months and looks like a little boy lost. Either teams have figured him out or he's just completely devoid of confidence. Either way, it's alarming as he's much, much better than he's showing at the moment. What's the alternative though? He was only playing in this game because Sturridge and Coutinho are unavailable, Borini is rightly in Rodgers' doghouse (putting Italy u21s ahead of Liverpool) and because Shelvey didn't take his chance the other night. It's really unfortunate that we can't call on Sturridge for this competition, sadly Chelsea's shitness put paid to that and ensured he is cup tied, but that's the hand we've been dealt and we need to get on with it. Even without Sturridge we could have scored several, and that at least provides cause for some optimism for the second leg. We're up against it, and if Zenit score we're probably done for as we'd need to find the net four times to go through. It's not impossible though, and hopefully we can turn it around and do these shithouses next week. The reports that our fans were attacked both before and after the game didn't come as a surprise, in fact the only surprise would be if something was actually done about it. Star man was Carragher, flawless once again in an otherwise disappointing backline. One brilliant piece of defending to rob Hulk as he charged into the area and looked to have Carra in trouble was simply fantastic. Reina is the only other player who can say he did all he could, the two saves he made early on were top drawer and he had no chance with either goal. Johnson was mostly excellent and almost scored the goal of the season, but you'd have to say his part in their second goal completely undid all of that. We won't know just how bad this result is until next week though, there's still a chance to salvage it but we've made our task much more difficult than it needed to be. But then we never do things the easy way do we? I'm still taking us to go through, but I reckon we'll need to score four to do it as I doubt we'll keep a clean sheet. Team: Reina; Johnson, Skrtel, Carragher, Enrique; Allen, Gerrard, Henderson; Downing, Suarez, Sterling (Lucas):

Former LFC striker Neil Mellor and long time TLW contributor Paul Natton join 'Numbers' to discuss a couple of encouraging away displays and a not so encouraging home performance. Also up for discussion is the decision by Jamie Carragher to hang up his boots at the end of this season. Listen now either on the embedded player below, or by visiting our podcast page here. You can also subscribe through itunes and have any new podcast automatically delivered to your computer. Clicking the link above will download the latest episode straight into your itunes, and will subscribe you to any future episodes. Those of you wanting to listen on your phone, try this link as it should work on most smartphones. To listen in this window, simply click the play button in the box below. To listen in a new tab, click here. Podcast Powered By Podbean

LIVERPOOL 0 West Brom 2 Report by Dave Usher at Anfield Scorer(s) – Half Time - 0-0 Venue - Anfield Date - Mon 11 Feb 2013 Star Man – Stewart Downing So that light at the end of the tunnel turned out to be an oncoming train again then. You'd think I'd have learned to see it coming by now, how many times does it have to happen before I get wise to it? I'm like Wile E Coyote. Every time we put ourselves in a position to make some kind of a run, I get taken in by it only for them to go and fuck it up unnecessarily. It's soul destroying. The Aston Villa defeat should have taught us a harsh lesson, but clearly we learned nothing from it as we saw another complacent, sloppy performance that will undoubtedly prove costly at the end of the season. There's no question that when the season is over we're going to be looking at this game as well as the Villa one, and saying "that's how come we missed out on the top four". We may even be saying "That's how come we finished below Everton again", as the Blues were the big winners from this. They must be pissing themselves. Having picked up two draws from difficult away fixtures, we were in a position where two wins at home against West Brom and Swansea would have put us above our neighbours, who have a much more taxing run in than we do. But every time we get ourselves into this kind of position, we leave ourselves wide open to a kick in the bollocks. The most depressing thing was how utterly predictable it was from fairly early on in the game. I initially had this one pencilled in as a 3-0 or 4-1 kind of game. When it emerged that Sturridge wouldn't be playing I have to admit my confidence in us getting a comfortable result began to wane. I still thought we'd win, but I was expecting it to be a struggle and when it was scoreless at half time I knew we were in trouble. The result was harsh, obviously, but we can't say we were unlucky because we really do only have ourselves to blame for it. We dominated the game but we didn't play well and we spurned the gift of a late penalty kick that should have been our get out of jail free card. It's just completely unacceptable to lose this game, everyone has been beating West Brom lately and in its own way this is almost as bad as the Aston Villa defeat even though the Baggies are a stronger side than Villa. I don't know if the players thought it was going to be a walk over or not, but that's how it looked right from the opening minutes as far too many of them just didn't turn up on the night. There was a real complacency in our play and we were sloppy from start to finish. It wasn't terrible, we did create several chances and on another night we'd have got the win, but I never felt like we ever really got going at any point and it was all very disjointed. The absence of Sturridge clearly hurt us, but we can't use that as any kind of excuse as we should still have had more than enough to see off West Brom. Where his absence was particularly telling was when the ball was played into the danger area we often had no-one in there. One incident when Shelvey drilled a ball across the face of goal and almost forced an own goal from Reid was especially galling as we had no-one even remotely close to the six yard box. That's where Sturridge would have been, and the sooner he's back the better we'll be for it. I didn't especially like the call to bring Shelvey into the side, but the alternatives didn't inspire too much confidence either. Shelvey, Borini or Sterling? Much of a muchness really, but it says a lot for the lack of faith in Borini at the moment that Rodgers didn't just make a like for like change and start the Italian in the role Sturridge has been occupying. It also says a lot about Assaidi. Rodgers clearly doesn't want him and you have to wonder why he was bought, and more intriguingly who actually bought him? Don't managers usually try to give their signings an opportunity to play? Assaidi is either terrible in training or he just doesn't fit into what Rodgers is trying to do. Shelvey had a bit of a moan last week about being made a scapegoat after the Stoke game. I didn't think he had any right to moan, it's not as though Rodgers has left him out when he's been playing well. When he played well he was involved, when he was no longer playing well he wasn't involved. It's not rocket science, Jonjo. To be fair to Rodgers that's tended to be how he's operated all season, the team is picked on form and merit, so if you aren't in it then it's either because you aren't doing well enough or simply because someone else is doing better. I'd be interested to know who Jonjo thinks should be left out for him. Still, having gone public with his grievance, this was his chance to back that up by putting in a performance and it has to be said that he failed. Earlier in the season he was playing very well and he was worth a place in the side, I was really impressed with him and probably even went a little overboard in some of my praise. Regardless, he was playing well and now he isn't. It's really that simple. He has absolutely zero cause for complaint I'd say, especially given how Henderson and Downing have improved. His complaint about Stoke was that he wasn't the only one who was shit. A completely fair point, but he has more to prove than, say, Steven Gerrard, who was also poor that night. Shelvey wasn't the only one who didn't perform against West Brom either, in fact it's easier to name those that did; Carragher, Gerrard and Downing. Everyone else was below the standard you'd expect, with the possible exception of Henderson who was ok and at least had the excuse of being out of position on the left wing. I suppose Lucas wasn't bad either, but this is the kind of game when he's needed the least and a case could have been made for subbing him and moving Henderson central. The two full backs were woeful, that was our biggest problem given how important they are to how we play nowadays. Them having stinkers is always going to have a negative impact on the team's overall effectiveness and I thought they were comfortably our two worst players on the night (Agger's last ten minutes not withstanding). This was the worst Johnson has played all season, he was terrible and barely put a foot right all night. If he wasn't running straight into opponents he was letting the ball roll under his foot and out of play. He kept plugging away and he did give us a regular outlet ball, but his end product was just not there for once. On the other side Enrique was no better, he was like a bull in a china shop, getting his head down and running down blind alleys a lot of the time. He held on to the ball far too long and his crossing was shite too. In fact, Downing was the one player out wide who was doing anything. He was by far our best player in the first half and he was ok in the second too. He wasn't doing anything mind blowing, but unlike most of the others he at least played to the good level he's been showing in recent weeks. Gerrard is the only other of the midfield and forwards who even come close. In the first half Downing had a great shot saved and he also put in a couple of good crosses that could have been converted. One was well cleared by McAuley just off the head of Henderson and the other should have led to Agger scoring but he failed to make contact with it. Agger also had another headed chance that Foster tipped over the bar. It wasn't a good night for the Dane. Shelvey had a goal disallowed when he prodded in after Foster had failed to hold a shot by Johnson. The correct decision, but nothing Shelvey could have done as he'd made the initial run to get on the end of a cross that was blocked. Johnson immediately sent the loose ball goalwards and Shelvey couldn't get back onside. Unfortunate but the officials were right to rule it out. Generally we were very laboured in the first half and didn't create much despite having pretty much all of the ball. West Brom named five midfielders and just one attacker. And by five midfielders, I mean five actual midfielders, not wingers or forwards playing deeper, five out and out midfielders. They came to stifle and nick something either from a set-piece or counter attack, and that's exactly how it turned out. Steve Clarke couldn't have drew it up any better. The second half did see a slight improvement from us. We created a few clear opportunities but Foster was equal to everything we threw at him. He saved well with his feet to keep out Henderson's clever flick, and then repeated the feat when it looked like Gerrard was about to score. Rodgers sent on Borini and Sterling for Shelvey and Henderson and the Italian almost scored immediately when he collected Downing's clever lay off and sent a left foot shot towards the top corner. Foster made another decent save to keep that out. The saves he'd made to that point were generally ones you'd expect him to make, but what he produced to deny Gerrard was a bit special. The skipper collected a ball from Sterling outside the box, took a few strides forward and then unleashed a shot that looked to have wrongfooted Foster who was diving the other way. He stuck out a right arm in desperation and made a stunning stop though. Borini seemed certain to put the rebound in but went with his right foot instead of his left and put it wide. You have to convert those, and Borini really needs to start scoring soon. Thursday night would be a good time given we'll be without Sturridge again and maybe Suarez will be rested. After the save from Gerrard and Borini missing the follow up, it had "one of those nights" written all over it now, but then out of nothing we were handed a lifeline when the ref awarded a soft pen as Suarez went down after being bumped by Olsson. I thought it was a harsh decision at the time, and the replays back that up. There was a bit of a collision but Olsson didn't do a lot wrong really and for me that was never a pen. The Kop immediately broke into a loud chorus of "We're gonna have a party when Suarez gets a pen" whilst I stood there cursing them for tempting fate. "Wait til we fucking score it before you start celebrating, knobheads" I believe I muttered. It's bad mojo doing shit like that, it nearly always bites you in the arse and honestly, I just knew Gerrard was going to miss. Whatsmore, everyone I spoke to afterwards all said the same. Of course I always worry we're going to miss pens, that's a natural reaction I think and I'm certainly not alone in that. After the last couple of years we have every right to be worried as to whether we'll convert a spot kick as we've missed fucking loads of them. So whilst I admit to always being concerned, I can't say that I always expect us to miss. This was different though, it just had that feel about it. The way the game had gone, our history in terms of suffering let downs just when you think we're onto something, and Foster being in inspired form. I think most of us knew this wasn't going in (great save again to be fair to the keeper), in fact the only thing more inevitable than Gerrard missing the pen was Lukaku coming on and scoring. All through the second half I was watching him warm up and dreading him coming on. I think he's fucking ace and he's exactly the kind of player we have had massive problems with. West Brom's gameplan couldn't have turned out any better. Have Shane Long run our defenders into the ground for 70 minutes chasing aimless balls down the channels, hope that the game is still tight and then send on Lukaku to wreak havoc late on when the game gets stretched. The first shot they had in the entire game led to the opening goal. 80 minutes they'd gone without any kind of effort on goal. Mulumbu's 20 yard effort may or may not have been going in, but Pepe couldn't take any chances and he hurled himself to his left to make a fine fingertip save and turn the ball around the post. As they prepared to take the corner I found myself thinking "it'd be just typical of us to let one in here" and lo and behold, Agger lost his man and McAuley headed in off the crossbar. How many times has that happened to Agger now this season? Five? Six? I know it's quite a few. The air was sucked out of the stadium when that went in. There was stunned silence from the crowd and not even much of an attempt to rally the players. There was no belief that we'd be able to find an equaliser, either in the stands or on the pitch. You could see it in our futile attempts at creating something that the players didn't believe they could do it. To be honest we looked more likely to concede than score as we threw men forward and lost any shape we had. Coutinho was sent on for the unfortunate Downing, who didn't deserve to be hooked and probably should have been sent to left back as Enrique wasn't offering any threat. This scenario was perfect for Lukaku, if he's got space to work in he's a massive headache for anyone with his pace and power. He's showing skill to go with that now and we just couldn't cope with him. He ran the length of the field and shot just wide before he eventually wrapped up the win for the Baggies by skinning Agger and hitting a shot through Reina. Agger was beaten very easily, he just got completely done by a well disguised touch by Lukaku. I think everyone in the ground thought Lukaku was going inside onto his left foot but instead he fooled us all by quickly going the other way and Agger simply couldn't stop him. Great bit of skill it was. As that went in there was a mass exodus as thousands of disgusted fans made for the exits. I'd had enough at that point too, appalled that once again we'd found a way to fail to take advantage of an opportunity to make ground on those above us. Some defeats leave you disappointed, others frustrated, this one just left me very pissed off. My mood was unquestionably influenced by the fact I'd dragged myself out of my sick bed to watch this shit, and when that second goal went in I wished I'd not bothered. It was freezing, I had uncontrollable shakes and I just wanted the warmth of my bed. Instead I had to stand outside on Walton Breck Road trying to sell to fanzines to fans who if they were feeling anything like I was would rather be reading about anything else other than football at that point. I've also had to leave my sick bed to write this as the laptop is temporarily out of commission so I'm not feeling any less pissed off now to tell the truth. To come through the away games against Arsenal and City and be sitting in 7th place and in position to make a bit of a run, to now find ourselves back below Swansea and West Brom is pretty unforgivable. This team just can't be trusted, whenever it looks like there's cause for optimism they let us down. These are the kind of games you need to just find a way to win, but we don't have that in our locker. We have to play well to even have a chance to win, and if we don't perform then the best we can hope for is a draw as we're so fucking fragile mentally. It's fairly obvious that when we don't score early we're in trouble. In our last ten league games when the score has been 0-0 at half time, we've only won one and we've lost six of them. I'm not big on stats but that one is certainly telling. Results like this completely ruin everything. Even if we beat Swansea 5-0 at the weekend so what. It means fuck all because this needless defeat has set us back so much. The two creditable draws we've had mean fuck all now too. May as well have lost them both and beaten West Brom, as we'd have been a point better off. Instead we raise our game against the big boys and then think we just have to turn up and we'll web the likes of West Brom all over the place. When we get an early goal that is often the case, we've battered a few sides at home this season and no doubt we'll do it to others before the season is out. What will probably happen now is we'll win our next couple of games, and like the gullible fool I am I'll start looking up the table thinking "if we can win this game, and if they drop points there…." until sure enough, the road runner will paint a tunnel on the side of a cliff and then BANG! Another train will hit me for six, and it'll probably be wearing a Wigan or Southampton shirt. Team: Reina; Johnson, Carragher, Agger, Enrique; Lucas, Gerrard; Downing (Coutinho), Shelvey (Borini), Henderson (Sterling); Suarez:

Man City 2 LIVERPOOL 2 Report by Dave Usher Scorer(s) – Daniel Sturridge, Steven GerrardHalf Time - 0-1 Venue - The Emirates Stadium Date - Sun 3 Feb 2013 Star Man – Daniel Sturridge If you got points for playing well we'd probably be top of the league. Sadly you don't, you get points for winning games irrespective of how you look doing it, and that's an art we're a long way from mastering. The team that sits at the top of the table has collected six points despite having been outplayed by both Southampton and Fulham this week, whilst we've gone to Arsenal and Manchester City and played some great stuff but come away with just two draws. It's both encouraging and deflating at the same time, but at least it looks like we're heading in the right direction and some comfort can be taken from that. As we keep hearing, we haven't beaten any of the sides of above us this season, but that's more of an anomaly than a result of being inferior. We just need one win over a top side to get us over that hump, but between now and May we'll only have three more opportunities to do so, all of them at home. What that tells us is that our run in is a lot easier looking than those of most of our rivals. We've now played most of our more difficult looking fixtures and whilst we're a bit adrift of where we'd like to be, the remaining games offer us a great opportunity to make up some ground and see where that takes us. It's difficult not to get at least a little excited when you see us perform like this, especially given how good Sturridge was. He's brought so much to the side in such a short space of time, it's just a pity he hasn't been here since August as who knows where we'd be now. He put on a masterclass against City, he was by far the best player on the pitch and considering Gerrard was at his imperious best that says a lot about how impressive Sturridge was. I knew he was good, I didn't know he was THIS good though. City will be glad they don't have to face us again this season. That's twice we've played them off the park only to gift them an equaliser they didn't deserve. At Anfield earlier in the season it was Skrtel's error that cost us two points, whereas this time it was Reina. If we stopped shooting ourselves in the foot we'd be a very good side. Many of the wounds we've suffered this season have been self inflicted, it's incredibly frustrating. It's an obvious thing to say that we don't have that winning mentality, but in reality you only get that by winning. It won't happen overnight but if we keep playing like this and learn to cut out the blunders we will get there. It must be doing the manager's head in, as there's literally nothing he can do about individual errors. You can have the best game plan and tactical set up in the world, it can be working perfectly and you can be in complete control, but individual errors will always kill you. Whether it's a missed sitter or a suicidal backpass, those kind of errors will stop you winning games. If we can cut them out we'll be going places. We've had two incredibly difficult away fixtures in the space of four days this week. Avoiding defeat in both is nothing to be sniffed at, and yet it feels like we've had two defeats as we led in both games and should have seen them out. The Arsenal one is easier to accept because the Gunners threw everything at us and deserved to get back into the game. This one? It's a real kick in the balls as City offered very little and we were on top of this game from start to finish. Even after they got back to 2-2 we still looked the more likely winners. That's encouraging. The only negative was the result because performance wise this was brilliant. We did exactly what we wanted to do and City couldn't do anything to prevent us doing it. They hadn't conceded a goal in 2013 but we put two past them. We passed the ball around well, we were dangerous up front and we restricted them to very little at the other end. Reina made a save in the opening minute from Silva's dipping shot from distance, and then after that he had virtually nothing to do. Maybe that's why he did what he did late on, out of boredom. I thought it was interesting to see the difference in the tactical set up between this game and the one at the Emirates. The only change in the line up was a like for like swap at full back, with Enrique coming in for Wisdom, allowing Johnson to revert back to the right flank. The midfield and attack were the same in terms of personnel, but completely different in terms of how they lined up. This was more similar to what we did against Norwich the other week, although a lot of the time it looked a lot like 442 with Henderson playing on the left. The mentality was different too. At Arsenal we clearly went in with the idea of counter attacking. Against City, it was all about getting on the ball and taking the game to them. Suarez had played on the left at the Emirates as we needed to keep that rigid shape and have the extra man in the middle of the park to compete with Arsenal. Against City, he was central and playing much closer to Sturridge. I expected that. It's similar to boxing when they say 'styles make fights'. Arsenal is not a good match up for our style but City is a much better one for us. The games at Anfield against both teams taught us a lot. We learned that Arsenal can beat us at our own game, but we are capable of dominating against City. That was reflected in how we approached the away fixtures. I like that Rodgers is flexible in his approach and isn't afraid to try things and move players around. Yaya Toure said after the game at Anfield it was the most difficult match he'd played in since arriving in England. Fortunately for him (and us!) he was able to sit this one out as he was away on international duty along with his brother. City were without Kompany too, meaning they were without their best - and most physical - players. I looked at their starting line up and there's no way that was better than ours. A midfield of Gareth Barry and Javi Garcia (how shit is he by the way?) is not going to strike fear into anyone, whilst any striker worth his salt would fancy his chances against the pairing of Lescott and Nastisic, who'd never played together before apparently. This was a great chance for us to turn them over, and we did do in everything but final score. The passing and control of the game we had in the first half was good, but in the second it was even better. We created far more chances than them, we had more of the ball and we looked comfortably the better side. And yet we fell behind to the only real attack of note they had in the first half. That's our big problem now, teams don't have to work very hard to score against us. Our main flaw not so long ago was the lack of goals in our team and an over reliance on Suarez. We seem to have solved that now, Sturridge's arrival has gone a long way to fixing that whilst Gerrard's return to goalscoring form has obviously helped too. We're scoring plenty, unfortunately we're shipping too many at the other end. City's first was just too easy. Agger played them onside and then lost concentration for a second as he appealed for a flag that was never going to come. As a result he didn't get himself into a good enough position to stop Dzeko getting in behind him and the striker had a tap in. It was alarming just how easily Milner manager to get in behind us too. We saw it a lot the other night at Arsenal, a couple of passes around the edge of the box and then suddenly a runner is in behind us. Is it a flaw in our defending, or is it simply a case of good teams being capable of doing that? I'd say it's probably more the latter. It's unrealistic to go to places like Arsenal and City and stop them from doing anything. These are good teams, with top class players, they're always going to do SOMETHING in a game. There's an expression used in the NFL when the opposing team makes a good play. "They get paid too". In other words, these lads can play a bit as well you know. So whilst their first goal was disappointing from our point of view, over the course of ninety minutes they didn't do that kind of thing too often so I'd give credit to our players for that. I can just about live with their first goal, I can't live with the second as that was just completely inexcusable. It's really deflating when you're on top in a game and then concede with the first thing the other team does of any note. It happens too often with us, and when Dzeko put City in front I honestly didn't think we'd come back, I was just sulking thinking 'typical Liverpool'. It wasn't 'typical Liverpool' though, we've got more firepower since the addition of Sturridge, and just imagine how much better things will be if Coutinho could have a similar impact? Sturridge was unplayable against City. Maybe the added motivation of playing against his former side gave him that extra gear, but he was showing things in this game I haven't seen before. I always saw him as a quick, sharp forward who would score goals but wasn't much of a team player and wouldn't be too involved in the build up. I was fine with that too by the way, as long as he was scoring goals I could live with any other failings he had. Against City though he just blew that misconception of mine out of the water. His touch and hold up play was brilliant, his awareness of where his team-mates were was also impressive and he basically put on a clinic on how to play centre forward. Skill, strength, vision, pace, touch, finishing, work rate… you name it he showed it. And he did it with a bad wheel too, having picked up an injury in the first half that he said prevented him from sprinting flat out. Good job for City he couldn't go flat out, because even at 80% he had too much for them to handle. Nastisic got skinned by him down our left flank in the first half, Sturridge just got him turned and then accelerated past him down the line. That was impressive, but even more impressive was the awareness he showed to cut the ball back perfectly for Suarez who sadly miscued his shot. Exciting stuff though. His goal was class; a really sweet struck shot that gave Hart no chance. He refused to celebrate it even though City's fans had been booing him and calling him a 'greedy bastard'. Yes, that's right, fans of Manchester City were calling a player a greedy bastard, with no hint of irony whatsoever. In Sturridge's shoes I'd have been giving it the big 'un right in front of them for that, but to his credit he didn't. I remember he showed the same respect when he scored against Bolton when he was playing for Chelsea. With class and morals like that it's little wonder he didn't succeed in the cesspit that is Chelsea. Looks like he's found a home now though. City can complain all they like about what happened with Dzeko, but they had plenty of time to win the ball back and Dzeko being down didn't make any difference as he'd have been ahead of the ball anyway. Maybe it should have been a free-kick (although you could easily interpret that as Dzeko obstructing Agger's attempt to try and nip in to win the ball), but everyone in the stadium knew he wasn't injured and he just wanted to stop the game so he could halt our attack and give the ref shit over not giving him a free-kick. We always put the ball out when players are down and it pisses me off as most of the time you can tell there's nothing wrong with them. If it's a bad injury then by all means put the ball out, but generally if it's a bad injury you don't need to as the ref will stop the game. Anthony Taylor knew exactly what Dzeko was up to and apparently he told our players 'Play on! Play on!'. They did, and they were right to do so. City have no cause for complaint on that score, and that tit Mancini plumbed new depths by waffling on about how Agger could have been red carded. He's the biggest fraud in the Premier League he is. He made his name at Inter through default because the rest of the big boys had been caught cheating and Inter were basically the last man standing. He's done fuck all in Europe, and although City fans obviously love him because he ended their title drought, they won that title in spite of him, not because of him. 75% of Premier League managers could have won the title with that brilliant squad City had last season, and they wouldn't have needed until the last second of the last day to do it either. He's an over-rated, smug, sulky twat and his interviews make me want to slap him across the face with a big fish. His English is terrible, he makes no sense and he pouts and preens too much. They're the least watchable interviews of any manager in the league not named Ferguson, he's just a bad whopper and if City have any sense they'll bin him off in the summer. The fact City are basically handing another title to United may be adding to my hostility towards him, but still… I don't think I'm wrong. Anyway, we got back on level terms and then continued to dominate the game. City were rattled and their fans weren't happy, especially with the referee who was getting it with both barrels with every decision awarded against them. City looked lost, there was no fluidity to their play and no spark. Zabalata almost put the ball into his own net in comical circumstances when he didn't see Hart coming out and knocked the ball past him. It went wide of the post by about an inch. The second half saw us really turn the screw on them. It felt like we must have had 70% possession, we passed it around well and had City chasing shadows at times. The game couldn't have gone any better in terms of the pattern of play. We were clearly on top and it's encouraging to see us go away from home to a top side and play like this. Sturridge was clearly bothered by his thigh but it didn't stop him from causing them plenty of problems. The one blemish was a booking for a dive after he'd waltzed past Lescott. Difficult one this, as his back leg was caught by Lescott and we've seen penalties given for a lot less. It wasn't enough to justify him going down and he wasn't going to keep the ball in anyway. No real complaints about the booking, he may have just innocently lost his footing but by flinging his arms back like that he made it look theatrical and a yellow card was fair. Every time we went forward we looked dangerous, but Suarez didn't have his shooting boots on and missed the target with a couple of efforts he could have done better with. Gerrard's goal was richly deserved. A great strike, vintage Gerrard. Having got our noses in front the question now was what would we do? Would we sit back and hope to see it out? Or would we carry on playing the way we had been? We weren't in front long enough to be able to tell. Rodgers sent on Skrtel for Enrique, but I wouldn't say that was a defensive move or tactical switch. Enrique just looked like he'd ran out of gas. He'd played well for an hour or so, but then Milner began getting a bit too much joy on the flank and got a couple of crosses in as Enrique was no longer as tight to him as he had been. The change made sense, and Agger did very well when he switched to left back. Unfortunately we conceded just five minutes after going ahead, but I don't think it was a result of sitting back and inviting pressure, as we certainly didn't seem to be under any. In fact, we were inches away from making it 3-1 when Sturridge headed Gerrard's free-kick just past the post. Then within seconds of that City were level. Aguero chased a ball played in behind, but Skrtel was with him and had the situation under control. Either he'd beat Aguero to the ball and clear the danger, or Aguero would get there first and Skrtel would stay goal side of him and force him away from the danger area. Either way, Aguero was not getting a shot away, and even if he did he was out wide and it would have been virtually impossible to score. Sadly Reina had a massive brain fart and came charging out when there was really no need. It was an awful error of judgement, but he can consider himself unfortunate that he was punished so severely. It was great technique from Aguero to collect the ball and sweep it into the empty net from such an acute angle, but if he had that chance ten times how often would he convert it? Once? Twice? Three times at most. That's the way things are going for us at the moment though. It's gut wrenching to see what would have been a huge victory for us given away so cheaply, but in terms of the bigger picture the performance was more important then result, and even after that setback we bounced back and could have won it but for a great block by a defender from Gerrard's shot, and a fine save from Hart to keep out Sturridge. We're progressing and should have more points than we've got, but we're on an upward curve and need to keep it going. These draws at Arsenal and City will look a whole lot better if we beat all the teams we should be beating between now and May. The players will no doubt have taken great confidence from what they've done this week, and if they take this form into the home games we've got coming up against West Brom and Swansea then the table might suddenly be looking a little better afterwards, as those above us have some difficult games coming up. Fitness permitting, the side that played against City should be the one we stick with going forward unless people play themselves out of contention with poor form. Coutinho will presumably be eased into it off the bench, which is ideal as he finds his feet, but the good thing is there aren't any passengers at the moment and everyone is playing quite well. Team: Reina; Johnson, Carragher, Agger, Enrique (Skrtel); Downing, Lucas, Gerrard, Henderson; Suarez, Sturridge:

PAUL INCE 1997-99 by Dave Usher Date of Birth - 21/10/67 Nationality - English Position - Midfield Games - 81 Goals - 17 Club hons (Lpool) - Int Hons - 53 England Caps (17 goals) Other Clubs - West Ham United, Manchester United, Inter Milan, Middlesbrough, Wolverhampton Wanderers, Swindon Town, Macclesfield Town Ince was hailed as the 'final piece of the jigsaw' when Roy Evans signed him from Inter Milan for £4.5m in the summer of 1997. The Reds had gone close to winning the title the previous season, but were perceived as being a soft touch and in desperate need of a midfield 'enforcer'. Such was the impact Ince was expected to have he was even handed the captain's armband by Evans. Quite a statement. The former Manchester United star was a controversial, but seemingly logical choice for Liverpool at that time; a player who could provide drive, bite and goals from the middle of the park. He'd made his name as a promising youngster at West Ham, coming to prominence in a game against the Reds when he scored a spectacular volley. He left Upton Park under a cloud when he was pictured in a newspaper wearing a Manchester United shirt before the deal had gone through. To this day he's still unpopular with Hammers' fans. At United he was a huge success, forming formidable partnerships in midfield with first Bryan Robson and then Roy Keane, as United became the most dominant force in the land. Ince was a big part of that, but perhaps not as big a part as he would have people believe. The self styled 'Guv'nor' fell foul of the real Guv'nor at United, Alex Ferguson, and was sold to Inter Milan, where he enjoyed two successful seasons and became a popular figure with the Italian supporters. He was also a key man for England. Despite his on field success with Inter, Ince wanted to return home for family reasons and Liverpool presented him with the perfect opportunity to return to his North West home. His links to United meant he would have to hit the ground running if he was to win over the fans, especially as he was replacing Anfield legend John Barnes in the Reds' engine room. His debut season at Anfield was a relative success without him ever hitting the heights Roy Evans had hoped. He made 40 appearances in his first season, but the team faltered and in the summer of 1998-99 the club elected to bring in Gerard Houllier to work with Evans in a joint manager set up. Ince and Houllier never saw eye to eye, and when Evans departed Ince's days at the club were numbered. A strict disciplinarian, Houllier wanted to stamp his authority on a dressing room that had gotten out of hand and he saw the brash, cocky Ince as an obstacle in the way of that. The French boss also suspected Ince of leaking stories of dressing room unrest to the Sunday press and of attempting to undermine his authority amongst the rest of the playing staff, many of whom were young and impressionable. If Houllier had been in any doubt as to what to do with Ince once the season ended, those doubts were removed in a game at Old Trafford when the Reds threw away a 1-0 lead at Old Trafford in the FA Cup and lost to two late goals. Ince had left the field with an injury late on with the Reds hanging onto Michael Owen's early header and on the verge of a memorable victory. Ince departed, and United scored twice at the death to inflict a sickening defeat and Houllier decided there and then that Ince wasn't the kind of captain he wanted at the club. Rightly or wrongly, his view was that a captain should have only been leaving the field on a stretcher at that point in such a massive game. Ince's injury was not a particularly serious one and Houllier was apparently furious. That, coupled with the suspicions of Ince being the infamous 'Anfield Mole' meant there was no future under Houllier for the England star. The summer came, Dietmar Hamann was signed from Newcastle and Ince was sold to Middlesbrough. He would soon let rip at Houllier and assistant Phil Thompson via the press, a move which further damaged his reputation in the eyes of a Liverpool fanbase that had never really been able to fully take to him anyway. More info on Paul Ince: ++ / LFChistory.net -- Past Present Future

Arsenal 2 LIVERPOOL 2 Report by Dave Usher Scorer(s) – Luis Suarez, Jordan HendersonHalf Time - 0-1 Venue - The Emirates Stadium Date - Wed 30 Jan 2013 Star Man – Jamie Carragher It felt like I aged 10 years watching this. It was really hard going and incredibly stressful viewing. I ran the full gamut of emotions; Joy at going 1-0 up, euphoria at 2-0, worry at 2-1, despair when it went 2-2 that was immediately followed by panic as I was convinced we would go on to lose the game. By the time the full time whistle went I don't know what I was feeling. A mixture of relief and frustration I suppose. For large parts of the game we looked looked good, but for a long spell after we went 2-0 up we got absolutely pummelled and were chasing shadows. Arsenal went up a few gears and we struggled to live with them, but was that a case of us not doing what we had been doing or Arsenal just suddenly turning it on? For all their flaws, Arsenal are capable of producing breathtaking football and they can take anyone apart on their day. They've done it to better teams than us, and only Manchester United (59) and Chelsea (49) have scored more goals than Arsenal (48 ). Did we drop too deep, or did they push us back? Probably a bit of both, but if we'd have held onto that 2-0 without conceding for another ten minutes we'd have probably seen this one out. That Giroud goal came at a great time for them and it was somewhat inevitable that a second would follow as they tore into us. I'm surprised they didn't get a third if I'm honest, and they had chances to get it. Their second goal was great football, a typical Arsenal goal if you like. I can live with that, but to concede that first cheap one from a free-kick is galling. It feels like we threw two points away because we couldn't defend a set piece, and that's where the frustration comes in even if ultimately a draw at Arsenal isn't bad. At 2-0 up you should be able to see out the game, but on the plus side you have to look at the fact we were good enough to put ourselves into a situation where we were 2-0 up at the Emirates. We were excellent in the first half, buoyed by the early goal we defended well and played effectively on the counter attack. It was a significant change from the way we normally play, we didn't go there and try to dominate the ball and pass them off the park, it was more of a deliberate contain and break quickly approach. I'd assume that's due to Rodgers believing that there's no point at trying to beat them at their own game, as frankly they're better at it than we are. Arsenal is a bad match up for us style-wise, as they do what we're trying to do but they've been doing it for longer and the reality is that right now they're better at doing it than us. They showed that at Anfield earlier in the season. We dominated City and United at our place (even if we didn't win) but we got our arses handed to us by Arsenal. I think that played a part in how Rodgers set up the side for this game, as this was not how we normally play. It worked a treat for an hour, the pace of Sturridge in behind caused them problems and the likes of Henderson and Suarez in particular were getting up to support him well and we looked dangerous any time we attacked. My concern prior to the game had been whether we'd be able to get our full backs forward based on how Arsenal set up with Walcott and Podolski wide. You could make a case for playing three at the back to deal with that, as that would still allow the wing backs to join the attack. The one time we tried that at Chelsea though it didn't work too well and it wasn't a surprise to see us line up in the usual 433. Johnson is one of our best attacking players and to have him penned back in his own half would have reduced our attacking threat considerably (as happened in the second half when we got penned in), so it was great to see him in the box and involved in the opening goal. It was a little fortunate in that Suarez mis-hit his pass and it should have been cut out by Sagna, but he slipped and it allowed Johnson in. He cross also should have been cut out but it somehow ended up at the feet of Sturridge, but by the time he set himself for his shot the keeper was on him and made a good save. Henderson picked up the loose ball and fed Suarez, and once again fortune favoured us as his shot was deflected past the keeper. A perfect start, and it set up what would prove to be a hell of a game for the neutrals. Chances came at both ends, Reina made a great save to deny Walcott minutes after we'd gone in front. That was huge as you need to keep hold of a lead as long as possible, giving a goal away straight away is a real body blow as we've discovered more than once this season. Reina also made a good save to turn another effort by Walcott around the post, but we had good chances ourselves. Suarez produced one of the passes of the season to send Sturridge through but his first time shot went wide. It was a difficult ball to hit first time but I can see why he felt he needed to take it so early as had he taken a touch he'd have then had to beat Vermailen who would have got back goalside. Suarez then could have squared to Sturridge for a tap in but instead tried to nutmeg Mertesacker and ended up winning a corner. In Luis' defence, whilst Sturridge was unmarked there didn't appear to be any angle to get the ball to him as the defender was in the way. From that corner Agger had a header cleared off the line. Henderson's running from deep was causing Arsenal a lot of problems. Their midfield was made up of three ball playing, attack minded players and none seemed to want to track the runs of Henderson. He saw a lot of the ball and got himself into some great positions, but too often his final ball was lacking or he made the wrong decision. If he improves on that, he'll be a real asset to us as the rest of his game is coming along nicely and his energy really brings something to the team. He had one great chance to score in the first half when he ran in behind to collect Downing's pass and the keeper came charging out of his goal. Hendo got there first, the keeper was in no mans land and although he had Suarez and Sturridge in the box he elected to shoot but put the ball a couple of feet over the bar. He was right to shoot though, both Arsenal defenders had stayed on the edge of the box marking our strikers and left the goal completely unguarded. Mertesacker eventually realised and left Suarez to try and get back, but if Jordan's shot had been on target (which it should have been) it was a certain goal. We were good value for our lead at the break, but it wasn't exactly comfortable as Arsenal had created some dangerous openings. The second half began in similar fashion, we were keeping them at arm's length but you could never feel completely safe as Arsenal always posed a threat with Cazorla and Wilshere pulling the strings and Walcott and Podolski darting in and around the box. They're dire at the back though, and given they also had no protection from such an attack minded midfield we were always going to get chances. We possibly should have had a penalty when Vermailen handled as he tracked Sturridge's run into the box. It hit his left arm first, which was ball to hand and never a penalty, but then he followed it up by virtually punching the ball away with his right hand. Not deliberate, as you'd have to be an idiot to be deliberately handling in that situation, but it was fairly clumsy and he was lucky to get away with it. Sturridge should also have done better when the loose ball fell to him and he meekly shot wide. Arsenal had a penalty claim when Podolski tumbled under the attentions of Wisdom, but that would have been an incredibly soft decision as Wisdom just got himself between Podolski and the ball. It was end to end stuff though and we certainly carried a threat going forward, in large part to how vulnerable Arsenal are at the back. Henderson's goal was terrific from his point of view, but Arsenal's defending was shocking. As he collected the ball and assessed his options, there didn't look much on at all. Then he beat Mertesacker from a standing start and burst into the box. Santos came across to cover but Hendo just shrugged him off. Bad defending, but the full back was obviously wary about the danger of conceding a penalty and couldn't be too physical. The keeper saved the first effort but the rebound fell kindly to Henderson who tapped in and then gleefully set off on a celebration run around the field. Victory was now well within our sights, the home crowd were proper pissed off and our gameplan had worked perfectly. It would have been a huge three points as it would have put us level on points with Arsenal and just five points off third placed Spurs. And had we held to the lead a little longer, who knows? In fact, had we not scored the second, who knows? That sounds a little mental, so I'll clarify that. At 1-0 our concentration had been superb, but maybe getting that extra little cushion meant we relaxed a little bit? Would we have conceded that goal had we been protecting a one goal lead rather than a two goal one? We'll never know, obviously, but it's possible that the two goal cushion meant we had that little bit more breathing room and we dropped our intensity every so slightly. The free-kick we conceded from was dubious, there didn't appear to be any contact by Lucas on Walcott but I can see why a foul was given as Walcott lost his balance trying to elude a challenge that did not win the ball. Whereas Giroud and Wilshere had both been guilty of blatant dives, (one which was seen by the ref and one which he thought was a foul), regardless of whether this was a free-kick or not I don't think Walcott did anything wrong and I've got no complaints about the decision either. Our defending was poor, Agger got caught slightly under the ball and Giroud had a free header. A cheap goal to concede and we've been exposed from this kind of situation a little too often for my liking this season. After that we couldn't get out of our own half and Arsenal were brilliant. The goal lifted them and it often seemed like they had more men on the pitch. They seemed to be able to find pockets of space in and around our penalty with ease even though we had ten men back there and we were under siege. They've got some fine attacking players and when it clicks they can be irresistible. Whilst it's tempting to point the finger at our own players for dropping too deep and not keeping possession well enough, it's worth bearing in mind that Arsenal are capable of doing this to anyone and it's unrealistic to expect us to go there and have it all our own way. The second goal was inevitable, it was always going to come given how dominant they now were. We could have dealt with it a bit better perhaps, as Walcott probably shouldn't have been able to find the space he did in our penalty area. I also thought Reina should have done better, not necessarily that he should have saved it but I'd have at least liked to see him get somewhere near it. It's never good when a keeper is rooted to the spot and doesn't move, and whilst Walcott hit the shot well it's not like it was a surprise and he was several yards away. As I say, I don't expect him to save it but I at least expect him to make an attempt. He didn't make an attempt because rather than being on his toes ready to spring into action, his feet were planted and he couldn't move. It was like watching me in goal, any shot that isn't straight at me goes in whilst I stand still and watch helplessly as it flies past me before I can react. But then I'm a 39 year old, overweight, slow, amateur forward, not a top class goalkeeper in the prime of my career. I don't want to get on Reina's case too much though as overall he played well and he's been looking a bit more like his old self the past couple of months. The goal wasn't his fault by any means, I'd just like to have seen him in a position to try and make a save as it just doesn't look good when you see a keeper stood still like that. A relatively minor gripe though. At 2-2 I'd have taken a point there and then as it wasn't looking good for us at all now. The decision to take Sturridge off was an obvious one. We needed Enrique on to shore up the left hand side, and Suarez was never going to be the one to come off as that would be madness. So Sturridge off, Suarez up top and Enrique giving Johnson some protection and also an outlet ball made perfect sense. It should have happened a bit sooner than it did, but Rodgers said afterwards he'd wanted to make the change earlier; "I was trying to get Jose Enrique on down the left because Luis had ran out of steam a little bit. He has a great capacity to work but that was his first time playing in that role. But Jose couldn't get his boots on and all that sort of stuff, and within five minutes it was two each." How long does it take Enrique to get his boots on? And what is 'all that sort of stuff' referring too? Fake tan and teeth whitener if his twitter is anything to go by. Maybe he was having his eyebrows plucked? Anyway, he eventually got on and we improved straight away. And any time we managed to mount an attack, there was Enrique in the six yard box looking to get on the end of something. Right at the end when Suarez hit a shot that the keeper could only parry, Enrique was in a great position for a tap in if the ball had fell to him. He's got a real knack for it, but playing left back makes it tough for him to get in there as much as he'd like. It's a pity we don't have two Enriques, as they'd be a great tandem on that left flank. To think, a few months ago I wasn't happy we even had one of him! I think overall I feel pretty good about the performance and the result. A win would have been great of course, and having put ourselves in such a position it is annoying we couldn't see it out. Ultimately though, Arsenal played well and given that they've finished above us in something like 9 of the last 10 years and are still above us now, it's difficult to be too downhearted. With Spurs and Chelsea also drawing (hilariously in Chelsea's case), we're still within touching distance of 4th and even 3rd place. Everton were the only winners on the night, and we're six points back from them now. We may well be too far back from all of those teams to be able to catch any of them, only time will tell on that. But once we get Sunday's trip to City out of the way our run in is a lot easier than most of those other sides and making up ground is certainly not impossible. So with that in mind this is a point gained for me rather than two points lost, it was massively important we didn't get beat as the gap between us and Arsenal would have been six points. As it is, we're just one win and one Arsenal loss away from being on equal points with them. That stupid, unnecessary defeat at home to Villa is really hurting us isn't it? We've dropped other points of course, and a linesman robbed us of two at the Pit let's not forget, but that Villa one really sticks in the throat as it should never have happened. It may seem unrealistic to be talking of the top four, but to those who say we're a million miles away from it I'd say this. A win over Villa and the linesman not screwing us over at Goodison and just look at where we'd be? Right on the coat tails. It just needs us to be able to put a run together in this second half of the season, which hopefully we can do because most of our really difficult games are out of the way now. In fact, our next game is by far the most difficult looking fixture we have left, after that it's not bad at all as the only top half sides we face will be at Anfield. Star man is a tough one as I thought there were a lot of good performances. In fact the only player I thought struggled a little was Lucas, who still looks understandably a bit off the pace after his injuries. Rodgers may even think about bringing in Allen for Sunday, as Joe was outstanding in that role against City earlier in the season at Anfield. We really need Lucas back to his best ASAP though as him on top form allows everyone else to play better. Agger had a great game aside from his part in their first goal, whilst I thought overall Johnson did a fantastic job on Walcott and comes out of it with a lot of credit. There was one moment when he switched off and allowed Walcott to nip in front of him and win a header that almost proved costly, but aside from that he was terrific. Wisdom was solid and Henderson played a huge part by scoring one, creating another and covering every blade of grass. Twice. Gerrard did a great job defensively, especially in the first half. The work he did in front of the defence and also occasionally covering in behind them was fantastic, and whilst he didn't see as much of the ball as he usually would due to us playing a lot on the counter attack, he played a real captain's role. Credit to Suarez too, he put in a real shift for the team and still managed to be a real danger, but I'm going with Carragher as man of the match. A lot of fans wouldn't have picked him to play in this game, there was a poll on the forum asking whether it should be Carra or Skrtel and Skrtel came out on top. I voted Carragher and I'd pick him again against City this weekend too (although I'd also be tempted to play Skrtel in a back three). Regardless of his age and the premature writing off of his worth to the team by some, judged purely on form this season he's worth a place in the side and he proved it at the Emirates. He's 35 now and won't be around forever, so performances like this should be savoured as this is a true Liverpool legend we are watching and he's coming to the end of the road. He may just have a little more fuel in the tank that people thought though, and hopefully he'll still be here beyond this season as his leadership, character and presence around the club as well as on the field is invaluable. The way the game has gone now we'll probably never see another duo like Carragher and Gerrard come through and make the kind of massive contributions to the club that those two have done. It's rare to see one player do what they have done for their home town club, let alone two, so I'm going to enjoy performances like this whilst I can, as the likes of Carra and Stevie are going to take a hell of a lot of replacing. Team: Reina; Wisdom, Carragher, Agger, Johnson; Lucas, Gerrard, Henderson; Downing, Sturridge (Enrique), Suarez:

TLW writers Paul Natton and Stu Montagu join your host 'Numbers' to break down an eventful 5 or 6 weeks since the last show. Impressive wins, appalling losses and a couple of new signings, it's all covered in a slightly longer than usual show. Listen now either on the embedded player below, or by visiting our podcast page here. You can also subscribe through itunes and have any new podcast automatically delivered to your computer. Clicking the link above will download the latest episode straight into your itunes, and will subscribe you to any future episodes. Those of you wanting to listen on your phone, try this link as it should work on most smartphones. To listen in this window, simply click the play button in the box below. To listen in a new tab, click here. Podcast Powered By Podbean

DON HUTCHISON 1990-94 by Dave Usher Date of Birth - 09/05/71 Nationality - Scottish Position - Midfield Games - 60 Goals - 10 Club hons (Lpool) - Int Hons - 25 Scotland Caps (6 goals) Other Clubs - Hartlepool United, West Ham United, Sheffield United, Everton, Sunderland, West Ham United (twice), Millwall, Coventry City, Luton Town Don Hutchison's time at Liverpool was very much a case of 'what might have been'. Signed by Kenny Dalglish as a raw teenager from Hartlepool United, the young Geordie was handed his debut by Graeme Souness in March 1992 when he replaced Ian Rush for the final ten minutes of a 4-0 win against Notts County. The following season Don was one of a number of young players to break into the first team as Souness rebuilt the side amidst a massive injury crisis. Hutchison, Redknapp, Fowler, McManaman, Jones, Harkness and James gave the Reds a youthful look and unsurprisingly results were mixed. Hutchison showed promise and eye for goal. His first goal for the club came against Chesterfield in an infamous 4-4 draw at Anfield. He would score 10 goals in total for the club, but for all his promise on the field he had a self destructive side off it, finding himself on the front of the Sunday papers as often as he made the back. When Roy Evans replaced Souness, his patience with Hutchison eventually snapped after a City Centre incident in which he was photographed with a Budweiser label covering 'Little Don'. He was shipped off to West Ham before moving on to Sheffield United. Eventually he ended up back on Merseyside with Everton and he enjoyed a good spell for the Blues. So impressive were his performances in an Everton shirt he caught the eye of Gerard Houllier, who had taken over from Evans at Anfield. Houllier was interested in bringing Hutchison back to Anfield but the deal never happened and the player moved back up to his native North East to join Sunderland. A year later he was back at West Ham, where he remained for four seasons before spells at Millwall, Coventry and finally Luton Town. Had he been able to keep himself out of the Sunday papers and behave himself off the field, Hutchison may well have enjoyed a much longer stay at Liverpool. He had a decent career, but it could and should have been much better. More info on Don Hutchison: ++ / LFChistory.net -- Past Present Future

GLEN HYSEN 1989-92 by Dave Usher Date of Birth - 30/10/59 Nationality - Swedish Position - Defender Games - 93 Goals - 3 Club hons (Lpool) - League Championship 1989/90 Int Hons - 68 Sweden Caps (7 goals) Other Clubs - Warta, IFK Göteborg (twice), PSV Eindhoven, Fiorentina, GAIS, Skogens The Swedish international defender with the film star looks arrived on Merseyside to much fanfare, having been prized out from under the nose of Manchester United by Reds' boss Kenny Dalglish. Hysen had been regarded as one of Europe's top defenders for a number of years and had been chased by Alex Ferguson for some time. United thought they had him in the bag, but Dalglish stepped in at the last minute and the Swedish skipper jumped at the opportunity to come to Anfield. A UEFA Cup winner with IFK Gothenborg in 1982, Hysen left to join PSV Eindhoven in 1983 before returning to IFK a couple of years later. In 1987 he moved to Italy to link up with former boss Sven Goran Eriksen at Fiorentina, and it was in Serie A where his reputation soared. With growing concerns over the fitness of Alan Hansen, Dalglish needed a top centre half and made his move for Hysen in the summer of 1989. Dominant in the air and classy on the ground, Hysen slotted into the Liverpool way of playing perfectly. He made his debut in the Charity Shield against Arsenal and turned in a man of the match performance before going on to enjoy a successful first season with the Reds as the league title returned to Anfield. The following season saw a drop off in the form of Hysen, although he still clocked up 40 appearances. Age was beginning to slowly creep on him and when Graeme Souness replaced Dalglish the writing was on the wall for the popular Swede. He started just five games in 1991-92 before returning to his homeland to join GAIS. More info on Glen Hysen: ++ / LFChistory.net -- Past Present Future

Oldham Athletic 3 LIVERPOOL 2 Report by Dave Usher Scorer(s) – Luis Suarez, Joe AllenHalf Time - 2-1 Venue - Boundary Park Date - Sun 27 Jan 2013 Star Man – Steven Gerrard Embarrassing and shameful. We didn't heed the warnings were we given in the Mansfield game and we paid the price for it. A combination of complacency and cowardice saw us go out of the cup in pitiful style, beaten by a League One side that had only picked up one point from it's last EIGHT league games. This wasn't even a half decent side that knocked us out, Oldham are fucking shite, but they fully deserved to beat us. Point the finger at the team selection all you like, but it's not like Rodgers sent the reserves out there. Maybe he should have, they couldn't have done any worse (they're actually unbeaten season). He played all three of his front line strikers, we had two centre midfielders that cost a combined £30m and we had two full international centre halves out there, one of whom is vastly experienced. With the benefit of hindsight I'm sure Rodgers would pick a different line up if he could do it over again, but that team should have easily been able to beat a side that is struggling badly two divisions below us. It's to their collective and individual shame that they didn't. Gerrard, Lucas, Johnson and Agger were always going to be left out, it's been the policy all season as all have had injury problems and are being managed carefully, with the priority being getting them on the pitch for Premier League games. With a trip to Arsenal just three days after this game, leaving them out was the smart thing to do as far as I'm concerned. It was Oldham for fucks sake, a team who'd lost seven out of eight. Leaving those players out was not arrogance, it was common sense. Carragher was also left out, which suggests he is being held back for Arsenal too. There's certainly a case to be made that Carra would have been more useful to us in this game than Skrtel or Coates, whilst the Arsenal game would seem to suit Skrtel better as the Gunners rely more on pace than brawn, but if Rodgers had decided that Carragher was playing at the Emirates then leaving him out of this one was the right thing to do. Besides, he picked his two biggest and supposedly most physically imposing centre backs to deal with Oldham's long ball tactics. Sadly they weren't up for the fight and got their arses handed to them. The loss wasn't just down to the centre backs though, as from back to front we were woeful. Jones was culpable for the first two goals, the full backs were terrible, the centre backs were completely bullied by that big grock Matt Smith, the midfielders never got any kind of control of the game until Gerrard came on, Suarez was crap aside from the goal, Sturridge was even worse and both Sterling and Borini were way, way, way beyond crap. Not one of the starting eleven merited anything higher than a six out of ten, and most of them were well below that. Disgusting stuff. Rodgers singled out the younger players for criticism afterwards, which I don't agree with as the entire team stunk, not just the inexperienced lads. "I was disappointed with the young players today. We're trying to give them experience and let them see what it's like to play for Liverpool. It's not just about playing for Liverpool, you've got to be able to be competitive and be a part of a group that is going to challenge for trophies. I thought how we reacted to that and how they performed, knowing that that's what we're looking for, was disappointing." Who is he referring to by that, as eight of the team could be described as 'young' but only a couple (Robinson and Coates, and maybe Borini) would seem to fit into that description. "See what it's like to play for Liverpool". Well Sterling and Wisdom have been playing fairly regularly, as have people like Henderson and Allen, so that would appear to rule them out. You'd have to assume he wasn't talking about Sturridge either, so I find that assessment odd. Yeah, Robinson was terrible, so was Coates, but in relation to their respective abilities could you honestly say they were worse than Skrtel and Suarez? It smacks of something a little deeper to me, like he's sending out a message to some of the younger players. There have been a few little whispers here and there that he isn't happy with the attitude of some of them, so maybe this was a warning shot. It certainly seems a bit odd to single them out when everyone performed so badly, and I suspect there's something going on there. The senior players were just as culpable as the younger ones for me. The only one I feel that assessment may be a little harsh on is Henderson, I didn't think he was THAT bad but he didn't really do enough to escape being labelled with the rest of them either. We've shown on numerous times this season we're a soft touch, we don't deal with the physical stuff very well at all and if teams get plenty of balls into the box they can have a lot of joy against us. Oldham probably watched the DVD of what Mansfield did to us and will have been licking their lips about facing us. Matt Smith has scored four goals this season, half of them against us. He's an average League One clogger who generally gets little joy out of League One defenders as the only thing he has is height and physical presence, which even League One defenders can deal with. Coates should be able to handle that, so should Skrtel. They couldn't though, and you can add Smith to the ever lengthening list of physical strikers that have caused us - and specifically Skrtel - problems this season. All week Oldham will have been working on getting crosses into the box with the aim of putting us under pressure, and it took just two minutes for it to pay off. Jones should have come for the cross, the lad was only about four yards out when he headed it in. Having said that, just what the fuck was Coates doing? Six foot six, and that's the best aerial 'challenge' he can muster? You're in the side for your height son, fucking use it. Oldham clearly felt they could rough us up a bit and get amongst us, and some of the challenges they were throwing in should have been dealt with a lot more severely than they were by the dreadful Lee Probert. One studs up challenge on Jones was disgraceful, but we need to be able to stand up to this kind of thing without wilting. Oldham aren't going to stand off and try and beat us in a game of tiki taka, not with that snarling little gobshite Paul Dickov as their manager. He was a dirty little shit as a player and his team looked like a reflection of that. It's no excuse though, we should be able to deal with it and to be honest it wasn't even that bad as the rough stuff disappeared after a lively opening twenty minutes or so. Suarez was playing very deep in the first half, almost as the third midfielder. I didn't like it, he was too far away from the Oldham penalty area when he was collecting the ball, but it was from one of those runs from deep that he got us on level terms. He carried it a long way, tried to play it to Sturridge and ended up playing an unintentional one-two with a defender before finding the net. That should have been the end of Oldham's hopes of an upset, it was nice for them while it lasted but we were level now and would go on to win the game comfortably, right? Wrong. We allowed them to regain the lead when a howler from Jones ended with Smith tapping in at the back post for his second goal of the game. Sturridge had blatantly been fouled in the build up, but regardless of that we can't be giving away goals like that, even against League One sides. Half time couldn't come quick enough for us, as it would allow Rodgers the opportunity to give them a rocket as well as sort things out tactically, as frankly we looked a mess and players didn't seem to have a clue what they were supposed to be doing. The passing was poor, the shape was even worse and both collectively and individually it was terrible. Yet within minutes of the restart it got even worse, as a hopeful ball to the back post was met by Wabara who's excellent header went in off the underside of the bar. No blame for Jones this time, but plenty for Robinson, who didn't even make a challenge and allowed Wabara a free header. This is just basic stuff, but we were getting found wanting on basics all day, both in defence and attack. We had a few chances here and there, the best of which was disappointingly put over the bar by the woeful Borini, but generally any time we got near the goal an Oldham body got in the way to make a block or the shot went off target. Gerrard coming on certainly improved things, and Downing offered far more than both Sterling and Borini had, even though he didn't actually do much either. Shelvey did more in the brief time he was on than Sterling had done all game. Raheem is currently a shadow of the kid who looked so good in the opening weeks of the season. Allen's deflected shot gave us hope, and had Gerrard's piledriver been a couple of inches lower we'd have gotten a replay we didn't really deserve. Oldham had chances to make it even more humiliating for us, the best of which fell to Simpson who shot wide after being given a ridiculous amount of space by the dreadful Coates. The big Uruguayan never looked comfortable all afternoon, but what's Rodgers supposed to do? Does Coates look rusty because he hardly ever plays? Or is he not playing because he doesn't deserve to? A game against a League One side that was always going to look to hit long balls should be the perfect game to throw Coates into, and yet he was abysmal. If you can't play him against the likes of Mansfield and Oldham then what use is he? Send him on loan where he can play every week and then let's see if he's actually any good or not, because we're not going to learn anything like this. Still, at least he has the excuse of not having had much playing time, what's Skrtel's excuse? It looked to me like the players just went out there thinking they only had to turn up to win. They weren't prepared for a battle and it showed. Maybe they aren't equipped for it either, and that is more of a worry than them not being prepared. It wasn't just one area of the side that let us down, it was every aspect of it. Goalkeeper, defence, midfield and forwards were all complete gash. It was pretty shameful, and nothing summed up the day more than Jack Robinson blasting a shot high and wide and then telling Suarez to 'fuck off' after Luis pulled him up on it. You haven't earned the right to do that yet, Jack. Frustration all round. This is a team we destroyed last season too, although that was at Anfield of course. Had this game been at Anfield I'm sure we'd have seen a similar outcome to last year, but just as we did at Mansfield a couple of weeks ago we ended up playing the game on their terms. Either the players we have need to grow some balls, or we need to bring in a couple of big physical lads who won't be pushed around, as this was not a one off sadly. Skrtel and Coates SHOULD be big and strong enough to deal with this kind of thing, but clearly they aren't and we are lightweight in midfield too, although that was less of a problem in this game as Oldham didn't play through the midfield. It's been an issue in other games though. Rodgers obviously felt he could make a few changes and get away with it as he had selected four attackers. If anyone looked at the side before kick off and thought we were going to get beat then fair play to you. I looked at it and thought it was stronger than I expected it to be and that we'd win comfortably, as Suarez and Sturridge would surely be too much for a League One side to handle. Unfortunately it would appear that most of the team felt the same way and there was a lack of urgency and desire on display until it was too late. That just leaves the Europa as our one remaining hope of a trophy, and I'd be hugely surprised if we saw some of these players feature in those games. It's important we get something from the game at Arsenal now too, otherwise resting the likes of Gerrard, Lucas, Johnson etc will have been for nothing. A big response is needed from players and manager, as I would hope they are as embarrassed and angry about this defeat as the fans are. Team: Jones; Wisdom (Downing), Skrtel, Coates, Robinson; Henderson, Allen; Sterling (Shelvey), Suarez, Borini (Gerrard); Sturridge:

Brendan Rodgers recently spoke about being concerned at a lack of leadership and a vocal presence in the side after the 2-1 loss at Old Trafford. He responded by recalling Jamie Carragher to the starting line up at the expense of Martin Skrtel for the Norwich game and the side kept a clean sheet in a 5-0 success. With big games coming up at Arsenal and Manchester City, should Rodgers retain the experience and leadership of Carragher, or revert to his regular first choice pairing of Skrtel and Agger? Three TLW contributors, Paul Natton, Alex Woo and 'Liverpool Lad' have their say... It'll hardly be a surprise to anyone who's ever read anything by me that I'd go for Carra in this scenario. After Kenny, he's my favourite ever Red and I also think he's the most under-rated player we've ever had. It's right that, with his 35th birthday imminent, he's no longer regarded as the automatic first choice for Liverpool. However, unlike many who share that view, it's not because I think he's no longer up to the task; rather, I advocate using him sparingly in order to facilitate some much needed succession planning at centre half and also because I believe we need to have him fit and ready for these big matches. For the two seasons preceding this one, Martin Skrtel has been bettered at centre half in England only by Vincent Kompany, in my view. However, it's been quite obvious that he's had a significant decline in form under Brendan Rodgers. From the confusion against City, to his part in the shambles at Old Trafford via his utter humiliation at the hands of Christian Benteke, the player's season has been worryingly poor and form alone therefore demands Carra's inclusion at his expense. However, of far greater import in my opinion is the view recently espoused by the manager - and emphatically shared by me - about the need for his character and leadership in the team. When Brendan Rodgers talked about game intelligence and the need for experienced players to manage on the pitch, who better fits that profile than Carra? People will bemoan his lack of pace against Arsenal while ignoring the fact that he's never been fast, but I prefer to recognise his class, intelligence and character in the context of picking him over Skrtel for this eminently winnable match. For me, Carra has to play; the lack of credible alternatives demands it. Moreover though, he should also get a 12 month contract as soon as possible. And not because of any sentimental reasons either, but simply because this very young team desperately needs his significant influence bringing to bear upon it with greater regularity in competitive situations. Paul Natton ************************************************** I’ll take any excuse I can get to talk about how much I love Jamie Carragher. The man is such an underrated player and has been a brilliant ambassador for the club and city. He’s still got plenty to offer the team and I hope this isn’t his final season at Liverpool. From his fantastic attitude to his organisational skills, having someone as experienced as him in such a young squad is vital; if there is any criticism I have of our current first choice centre-back pairing it’s that they’re not particularly vocal. That said, there’s a reason Carra is no longer first choice: Martin Skrtel and Daniel Agger have, for the most part, been an excellent centre-back pairing. Few would deny that Skrtel is not having the best of seasons, but I certainly don’t think he has been a liability, and I think the last thing we need to do is start chopping and changing on the back of a few iffy away results, especially. The problem has been a continual questionable midfield selection and lack of physicality throughout the side more than anything. A lot of the problems our defence has faced this season stem from a lack of protection from the midfield; too often have opposition players been given a free run at the defence. It’s no surprise that we’ve looked far more solid since the return of Lucas, and before the unfortunate injury to José Enrique the back four was playing extremely well as a unit. For the past two seasons Skrtel has been a model of consistency and one of the top centre-backs in the league, so I think he has earned the right to play his way back to top form. I’d have started Carra against Oldham, as a scrappy away cup tie with a young defence is the exact sort of game we needed him in, and his exclusion was certainly a shock to most fans. However, Arsenal away is the type of game I’d definitely pick Skrtel over Carra for. Had the fixture been at Anfield then I’d be comfortable with Carra starting, but I think Skrtel’s mobility gives him the edge against Walcott, Cazorla et al. Alex Woo ************************************************** Over the previous 18 months Agger and Skrtel have become the mainstay of the Liverpool defence with Carragher now our third choice centre half, spending more and more time on the bench. The only reason this question has arisen is that there have been some error prone displays this season from Skrtel. This seems a choice between young and old, between the influence and nous of Jamie Carragher in a game against a lively Arsenal side where his lack of pace could be exposed, against Martin Skrtel who hasn’t been living up to his own high standards. Much has been made of Carragher’s declining pace, not that he has ever been blisteringly quick, but he has always had the awareness and intelligence to compensate for this. When Carragher was Skrtel’s age he was playing some of the best football of his career, due to his own ability and determination, and partly due to personnel that complimented his style of defending perfectly, such as defensive and deep lying midfielders like Alonso, Hamann and Mascherano. I believe the choice between Carragher and Skrtel shouldn’t be framed as narrowly as the aging professional versus his younger counterpart going through a patchy spell, but with consideration for the personnel they will have around them should they start against Arsenal. Games such as Arsenal at home, Aston Villa, Manchester United and to an extent West Brom have shown us to have a soft centre, with the fluidity of the midfield working well with the ball but not always as well without and not offering the protection they should. With a midfield still adapting to Rodgers’ philosophy, surely the defence can be afforded the same luxury. Whilst there are signs of improvement with in this area it is by no means the finished article. With this in mind and three games in a week, I would like to have seen Carragher playing at Oldham with his experience invaluable for the younger players, and for us to stick with Martin Skrtel for the Arsenal game. Then against City at the weekend, Rodgers should opt for the three at the back to stifle them as he tried at Stamford Bridge this season. Liverpool Lad

STEVE HARKNESS 1989-99 by Dave Usher Date of Birth - 27/08/71 Nationality - English Position - Defender Games - 139 Goals - 3 Club Hons (Lpool) - Int Hons - England Youth Other Clubs - Carlisle United, Huddersfield Town (loan), Southend United (loan), Benfica, Blackburn Rovers, Sheffield Wednesday, Chester City Cumbrian defender Harkness was snapped up by Kenny Dalglish for £75,000 from hometown club Carlisle United in 1989. Dalglish had been impressed with the youngster's performance against the Reds in an FA Youth Cup tie where he had caught the eye playing as a striker. He began his career in the reserves in midfield but was quickly converted to full back. He had to wait two years before being handed a first team debut in August 1991 by Graeme Souness who had recently replaced Dalglish. Harkness was way down the pecking order for the left back spot, having to go up against the likes of David Burrows, Steve Staunton, Julian Dicks and Stig Inge Bjornebye. Frustration got the better of him and he asked Roy Evans for a transfer in the 1994-95 season. A loan spell at Southend followed, but he stuck around and eventually he got his break at the end of that season when an injury crisis opened the door for him. He did well enough to earn a new contract and was a regular in the side the following season, playing mostly as a wing back in Evans' 3-5-2 formation. He was beginning to establish himself as a first team player when a rash challenge from COventry winger John Salako shattered Harkness's leg and sidelined him for almost a year. He battled back and forced his way back into Evans' plans, this time slotting into the side on the left of the back three. The arrival of Gerard Houllier signalled the end for 'Harky', the French boss wasted little time in showing him the door when he became sole manager after an ill fated joint manager experiment with Roy Evans. The player who had joined the club for £75k almost a decade earlier left for ten times that amount to join former boss Souness at Benfica. He didn't last long in Portugal however, Souness was sacked a month after Harkness arrived and the defender fell out with the club president as a result, returning to England to join Blackburn Rovers, where he would soon be re-united with Souness who took over at Ewood Park seven months later. Six months later Harkness was on the move again, spending two years at Sheffield Wednesday before linking up with former team-mate Mark Wright at Chester City. Injuries were beginning to catch up with him however and in July 2002 he hung up his boots at the age of 31. More info on Steve Harkness: ++ / LFChistory.net -- Past Present Future

RAY HOUGHTON 1987-92 by Dave Rankin Date of Birth - 09/01/62 Nationality - Irish Position - Midfield Games - 202 Goals - 38 Club Hons (Lpool) - LGE CHAMPIONSHIP 87/88, 89/90, FA CUP 88/89, 91/92 Int Hons - 73 Ireland caps, 6 goals Other Clubs - West Ham, Fulham, Oxford United, Aston Villa, Crystal Palace, Reading, Stevenage Borough Think of the Glaswegian who played for the Republic of Ireland, scoring vital goals against England in Euro '88 and Italy in USA '94 and the name of Ray Houghton should immediately spring to mind. However it should also be noted that he had quite a few moments in the Red shirt of Liverpool. Kenny had brought in Aldo from Oxford towards the end of the 86-87 season as a replacement for a Turin bound Rushie, and co-incidence would have it that Oxford - who would that season be relegated - were the first home opposition of the 87-88 campaign and had a certain Ray Houghton in their ranks. Despite our 2-0 win, the King must have liked what he saw as Houghton played a blinder and about 7 games later a deal was done which saw Houghton's name on a Liverpool teamsheet - the plastic pitch treatment was the venue for his debut in a 1-0 win over Luton. He then jumped off of the bench at Plough Lane to go past a posse of Wombles to score his first goal for the Reds. He was next in the wars at White Hart Lane feeling the full force of Steve Hodge's elbow - for which he was dismissed - leaving a repaired Ray to do the damage as we won 2-0. Houghton was in direct competition with Craig Johnston for the right hand side berth, but the popular Aussie warmed the subs bench while Ray was contributing to a piece of Liverpool history as we remained unbeaten at the start of the season. We met Everton in the 5th round of the FA Cup at Goodison that season, putting one over on them, with the brilliant combination of Barnes and Beardsley really becoming something to admire. Everton found out to their cost as a throw from Ablett fed Barnes who fought off his marker and played a neat one-two with Beardo and a trademark left wing cross found Houghton who beat Paul Power to the ball head home. His first headed goal in a Liverpool shirt was one we would all remember. He was also in the side for the now legendary 5-0 demolition of Nottingham Forest at Anfield, on a day when not even the Brazilians could have matched us for class. Ray scored the first when some incisive passing from Barnesy carved out the opening for Houghton to slip in behind the Forest defence to beat Steve Sutton. Forest and Everton were the only teams to beat us in the league that season as Ray claimed his first title winners' medal, but the anti-climatic FA Cup Final against Wimbledon robbed him of the double as they took the cup back to the surrounds of south-west London. Unlike the FA Cup, the Dons were unable to get their mucky mits on the charity shield as Aldo's double saw to that. Fresh from his exertions in Germany with the Ireland squad in Euro'88, Ray began the season playing the numbers game, with Rushy back from Juve, his shirt number was constantly fluctuating. With Rushie struggling to find his form, more often than not Houghton sported the number 9 shirt on his back. An ever present throughout the 88-89 season, Houghton ran Steve Nicol pretty close as Liverpool's player of the season and chipped in with 7 goals including a brace that doomed West Ham - a team that released him as a youngster - in a 5-1 win at Anfield. Similar to Gary Mac at Coventry, Ray refused to celebrate his goals, perhaps a little embarrassed? A goal in the derby in 88 also helped his popularity among Reds' fans. Houghton won an FA Cup medal that season making up for the disappointment of the previous year. His performances in the league (both pre and post Hillsborough) fully merited another Championship medal, but the heartache of the notorious Arsenal game put paid to that as the title made its way to Highbury. Injuries restricted the busy midfielders appearances for the first team during our last championship winning season, his first appearance came as a sub as we were hammered 4-1 by Southampton at the Dell. His only goal of the campaign came at Stamford Bridge in a 5-2 win, chipping the ball over Dave Beasant to increase our lead at the top. He featured at OT as a Barnes double gave the Reds a 2-1 win, however the London jinx was to strike for the third successive year as Palace gained revenge for their 9-0 mauling at Anfield as they won a thrilling FA Cup semi-final 4-3 AET yet again preventing the Reds notching up a second double. Dalglish's ruthless selection policy meant that Houghton didn't play much of a part in the title run in but nevertheless he had a second league championship medal. Ray was back in favour and raring to go for the start of the 90-91 season and scored twice in the opening game against Sheffield Utd in a 3-1 win. The Reds opened the campaign magnificently taking maximum points from the first 8 games. Houghton also weighed in with some crucial goals, the only goal in a 1-0 win at Sunderland and slotting past Shilton against Derby after a majestic Beardo pass gave him half of Anfield to himself. This was the returning of a favour from Beardsley as Houghton's quickly taken free kick gave him the opportunity to complete his hat-trick against Man Utd a few games previous. However the Mancs had forgotten all about that defeat as we travelled to Old Trafford for a Rumbelows cup-tie in October, a bad night all around as we were beaten 3-1 with a deflected Houghton goal serving as a mere consolation. 
 In a regular occurrence which would annoy the hell out of Reds fans, he and Beardo were both dropped by Kenny for the next game at White Hart Lane and Ray was out of the team at the time of Dalglish's resignation, but with the change in management he found himself back in the thick of things, but our inconsistent form meant that the Championship was slipping away. He played his part in relegating Derby County scoring the seventh goal in the massacre and in the memorable 5-4 at Elland Road in April 1991. Houghton netted as we cruised to a 4-0 half time lead, but were forced to hang on thanks to a hat-trick from Lee Chapman. He held onto his place as Souness began his managerial reign, but defeats against Chelsea and Forest meant that Ray was unable to add to his growing medal collection. Adding to his goal collection was Houghton's main aim heading into the 91-92 season as he had reached double figures in all competitions in all of his previous seasons at Anfield. Had the goals been Rugby posts Ray would have surely trebled his tally such was the amount of times he belted the ball into the crowd! With Steve McManaman breaking through into the first team and playing on the right flank, Ray switched to centre midfield and with Ronnie Whelan out injured for most of the campaign Houghton to proved to be a more than adequate replacement. He kept his place in the staring XI, due to an injury crisis. With the chopping and changing of the side, the results spoke for themselves. Newly promoted Oldham stunned the Kop by taking the lead, but as debutant Dean Saunders failed to make a breakthrough a digger cross found Houghton's head as he powered home to bring the reds back on level terms, the reds went on to win 2-1. Ray also repeated his feat of three years previously as he found the net against the Shite in a 3-1 win, collecting a Burrows pass and beating Southall at the near post, putting a blue Beardsley completely in the shade. European football made a welcome return to Anfield for the 91-92 season, Lahti were the opponents as Deano helped himself to four and Houghton to TWO headed goals. With the likes of Barnes, Rush, Whelan and Wright spending much of the campaign on the sidelines, some of the younger lads - Stevie Mac, Marsh and Tanner - were looking to Ray for guidance and he duly provided with what Clive Tyldesley described as "a very, very special goal" as he chipped the keeper from outside the area against Port Vale as we ran out 4-1 winners in a league cup replay. Away wins had become a rarity in the league under Souey, but at Spurs the Reds came from a goal behind to win 2-1 with Deano getting the equaliser and Houghton netting his eighth of the campaign to condemn Tottenham to yet another home defeat. Ray was again a hero at Goodison as his clearance off the line prevented the blues gaining a winner, this was typical of his performances and coupled with the amount of goals he was knocking in from midfield he'd become a PFA player of the year candidate. He netted his final league goal for the Reds in a fine 2-0 win over Arsenal at Anfield, collecting a Nicol throughball and chipping over Seaman in an inconsistent season where the team seldom turned on the style. He got his final goal for the Reds against Ipswich in a thrilling FA Cup tie at Anfield - a left foot shot just scraping over the line which was even more of a rarity than his headed goals! He also helped postpone the Mancs' title party (for another season at least) as Mark Walters slotted home after Ray's shot had come down off the bar. He would also pick up his 2nd FA Cup winners medal (or losers medal's which were originally handed out to us!) in a slightly low key final against the Mackems. After appearing in the team photo for the 92-93 season, it came as quite a surprise when Souey offloaded him to Villa, after his stellar display's throughout the previous season in finishing runner up to Saunders as the clubs top scorer - a part of his game which had greatly improved as well as his role as a midfielder getting forward to support the strikers, making late runs into the box and finishing off good moves. He'd often bottle out of the 50-50s but he was always full of running and on occasions tried too hard, but he scored some crucial goals, which is something expected of a player of his type and indeed there were quite a few to reflect on throughout his Anfield career. He masterminded a couple of victories over us whist in Villa colours as they achieved runners up spot in the first season of the Premier League. In 97-97 he was unsuccessful in attempting to keep Crystal Palace in the Premiership and spent the rest of his playing career with Reading. He returned to Anfield as a coach with Palace as we defeated them in the Worthington Cup semi in 2001 and is now a regular pundit on both TV and radio. More info on Ray Houghton: ++ / LFChistory.net -- Past Present Future

MIKE HOOPER 1985-93 by Dave Usher Date of Birth - 10/02/64 Nationality - English Position - Goalkeeper Games - 73 Goals - 0 Club Hons (Lpool) - Other Clubs - Mangotsfield United, Bristol City, Wrexham, Leicester City (loan), Newcastle United, Sunderland (loan) Bristol born Mike Hooper was not your typical footballer. An English literature graduate from Swansea University, he listed bird watching amongst his favourite past times. Birds of the feathered variety that is. Mike was signed by Kenny Dalglish after impressing in the fourth division with Wrexham. Bruce Grobbelaar had been an ever present for four years and Hooper was brought in merely to be an understudy. However, an injury to Grobbelaar in the Charity Shield against Everton in 1986 opened the door for Hooper and provided him an opportunity to show what he could do. He made eight appearances in Grobbelaar's absence and didn't let anyone down, earning the affectionate nickname of "Hooperman" from the Kop. When Grobbelaar was struck down with meningitis in September 1988, Hooper came in to replace him and did so well he kept his place for a while even when Bruce was ready to return. He made 25 consecutive appearances before mistakes began to creep in and Grobbelaar was re-instated to the side. Graeme Souness took over from Dalglish in 1990 and the next few years saw a period of great instability at the goalkeeping position. David James arrived for big money and with a big reputation, but neither he nor Grobbelaar were able to nail down the number one spot on a permanent basis and Hooper remained in the mix too, getting a run in the side between November and January in the 1992/3 campaign. A steady but unspectacular performer, Hooper was never really good enough to be a bona fide number one at Liverpool, but he still managed to amass a surprisingly high 73 appearances in the eight years he was at the club. A miserable spell followed at Newcastle where he had a bad run of form and proved an unpopular figure with the Geordie crowd, especially when he was caught on camera laughing on the subs bench after Newcastle had conceded a goal. Never your conventional footballer, even in retirement Mike continued that theme as he became a doorman at a North East nightclub. More info on Mike Hooper: ++ / LFChistory.net -- Past Present Future

VEGARD HEGGEM 1998-2003 by Dave Usher Date of Birth - 13/07/75 Nationality - Norwegian Position - Full back Games - 65 Goals - 3 Int Hons - 20 Norway caps, 1 goal Other Clubs - Rennebu, Orkdal, Rosenborg Vegard Heggem joined the Reds in the summer of 1998 for £3.5m from Norwegian side Rosenborg. He has the distinction of being the only player signed under the joint managership of Gerard Houllier and Roy Evans, he was one of the very few things the pair agreed on! Heggem had caught the eye of the Liverpool scouts whilst impressing for Rosenborg in the Champions League, he even scored a memorable winner in the San Siro against AC Milan. Blessed with great pace and dribbling ability, Heggem was more of a winger than defender and he immediately captured the imagination of the fans. He was not your typical Norwegian full back that's for sure, Liverpool fans had been used to the more stoic style of Stig Inge Bjornebye and Bjorn Tore Kvarme, whereas Heggem was more like a Brazilian full back and instantly became a fans favourite. His debut season at the club went well on a personal level despite the team as a collective struggling. The short lived joint manager experiment was abandoned after proving unworkable, and the Reds finished 7th as Gerard Houllier took up the reigns on his own. Vegard was one of the few successes of a disappointing campaign, appearing 35 times and finding the net twice, his first goal coming at Middlesborough on Boxing Day 1998 when he finished off a mazy run with an impudent finish with the outside of his right foot. A six week injury absence that season gave a hint of what was to come, as injuries plagued the rest of his time at Anfield and eventually forced him to hang up his boots early. He started just 11 games in 1999-00, also appearing as a substitute on 14 occasions. A superb solo goal against Bradford was to prove a rare highlight as hamstring trouble halted his progress. The following year was even worse, he featured only four times and missed out on the historic cup treble. Injuries had taken it's toll and despite playing regularly for the reserves in 2001-02 he never looked the same player, and the following summer he was struck down by an Achilles tendon injury that he could not come back from. He left the club in the summer of 2003 when his contract expired, and now runs a successful salmon fishing lodge in Norway. You can find Vegard on twitter @vedgy More info on Vegard Heggem: ++ / LFChistory.net -- Past Present Future

JIM FURNELL 1961-64 by Chris Wood Date of Birth - 23/11/37 Nationality - English Position - Goalkeeper Games - 28 Goals - 0 Club Hons (Lpool) - 2nd Div Championship 1961/62 Intnl Hons - Other Clubs - Burnley, Arsenal, Rotherham United, Plymouth Argyle Goalkeeper Jim Furnell was signed from Burnley in February 1962 and almost immediately took over between the posts from Bert Slater. Furnell played in the last 13 of the 42 League fixtures of 1961-62, Slater having played in the previous 29. Oddly enough, he then played in the first 13 League matches of the following season, before he was deposed by the young Tommy Lawrence, who played in the last 29 League games of that season. Jim's final two appearances for Liverpool came early in the 1963-64 season, before he moved on to Highbury to join Arsenal - and he later served both Rotherham and Plymouth with distinction, making exactly 400 League appearances for the three clubs he represented after leaving Liverpool. More info on Phil Ferns: ++ / LFChistory.net -- Past Present Future

LIVERPOOL 5 Norwich 0 Report by Dave Usher at Anfield Scorer(s) – Jordan Henderson, Luis Suarez, Daniel Sturridge, Steven Gerrard, Raheem SterlingHalf Time - 2-0 Venue - Anfield Date - Sat 19 Jan 2013 Star Man – Steven Gerrard Norwich must be sick of the sight of us. Whilst scoring goals has been a problem for us for some time, we've notched up 13 goals in our last three encounters with the Canaries. Suarez has seven of them, but it's not just the goals that have made him Norwich's chief tormentor, it's the manner of them, and the rest of the stuff he's inflicted upon them. Nutmegs, backheels, flicks, dribbles… when Luis sees the yellow and green he turns into a player that is the equal of anybody on the planet. Steven Gerrard revealed afterwards that one of the Norwich players remarked to him in desperation; "How are we supposed to stop him?". The answer is you can't, not when he's in this kind of zone. And not when he's given the kind of support from his team-mates he got in this game. The arrival of Sturridge seems to have given us another gear, he's slotted in perfectly and immediately looks on the same wavelength as Suarez and Gerrard. It's not just the goals either, his all round play has caught the eye and he's got the kind of swagger about him that top players have. It's actually hilarious to think that for two years Chelsea selected Torres over him. Sturridge will score goals for us, there's no doubt about it, the only question I had relating to his arrival was what would it mean in terms of the role of Suarez and the shape of the team. In terms of the former, it's early days of course but it may actually bring out even more from Luis as he's not having to shoulder the burden alone and can now just go where he wants looking to get on the ball without us being left with no-one up top. As for the latter, I'm none the wiser as I couldn't actually tell you what system/formation we played against Norwich. It was so fluid and players were popping up everywhere, I couldn't tell if it was 433, 4411, 4231 or something else. At times it seemed Henderson was playing on the left of a midfield four, then it looked like he was tucked in on the left of a three with Gerrard on the right of it. Suarez was popping up all over the place, at times he was further forward of Sturridge, other times he was tucked in behind and he'd also drift out wide. Rodgers made a comment a week or so ago about how formations aren't particularly important when you have the ball, it's more about when you don't have it. This game was a good example of that, Norwich didn't know where the danger was coming from. The opening goal came from a source they would have least expected. When Suarez's mazy dribble was brought to a halt on the edge of the box, Henderson struck a blistering half volley on the turn into the top corner. Right out of the Gerrard scrapbook that was. It was nice to see 'Hendo' making such an impression, he's been steadily improving all season and he's certainly edged ahead of Allen and Shelvey for that third midfield spot for the moment. It's up to them to step up and show what they can do now, they'll probably get that opportunity in the FA Cup next week. Our second goal was a cracker too. Lucas played a crisp ball into the feet of Sturridge who had come short for the pass. Suarez made a run in behind and Sturridge cleverly dummied to send Suarez clean through. It was the kind of chance Luis has often failed to take in the past, but the aplomb with which he converted this one showed just how confident he is at the moment. The sight of the yellow and green shirts behind that goal probably helped too! It's funny really, the Norwich fans were booing him and giving him shit, but why would you do that? Did they not learn their lesson from the previous two encounters? They were giving him verbals last season after the Evra thing, and he shoved those taunts back down their throats with arguably the best hat-trick ever witnessed on these shores. A few months ago they were at it again, and once more they were put to the sword with an outstanding hat-trick. The highlight of that was when Luis missed a sitter and was still being ridiculed around 20 seconds later when he robbed a defender, nutmegged him and then bent an outrageous shot with the outside of his boot into the far corner to completely stun the home crowd. That might be favourite moment of the season so far actually, it was fantastic. So you'd think after all that, Norwich fans would elect to keep quiet, not poke the bear and hope he goes easy on them. Well you'd think wrong, they continued to boo and chant, and Luis continued to punish them. One back heel turn right in front of them was ridiculous, you have to feel sorry for any defender that has to try and deal with that. Gerrard has said that Suarez is the best player he's ever played with. He also said that even our defenders hate facing him in training because he's so good, and so relentless. He never lets up. Norwich know that better than anyone, but to their credit they didn't resort to fouling him and there seemed a healthy respect there. I noticed in the second half when Luis almost made a complete mug out of Tettey with another ludicrous turn on the touchline that the midfielder just about managed to stop, the pair exchanged a little hand slap as they took their place in the box for the corner. Another defender (Bennett I think) also had a bit of a joke about it and the game was played in good spirits. Probably because that twat Leon Barnett wasn't playing. The one exception was Michael Turner, who upset Luis with a robust aerial challenge that left Suarez rubbing his head for several minutes. The foul was actually committed by Luis, but he came off worse and was not happy about it. He was glaring at Turner and the pair were still arguing about it five minutes later. You could tell Suarez was desperate to get him one on one so he could meg him, but he didn't get the opportunity. By that stage Norwich were well beaten, goals from Sturridge and Gerrard had ended the game as a contest well before Bennett deflected substitute Sterling's shot past the keeper to make it 5-0. I'm not sure whether Sterling will be credited with the goal, he should be considering that Shelvey was awarded one at West Ham that he didn't even touch. But Gerrard had one taken off him against Norwich earlier in the season when an on target shot went in off a defender. There's no consistency, so Raheem can only hope for the best. I loved Sturridge's goal. It was only a tap in, but there was a lot to admire about it. He made three different runs, and whilst the ball didn't arrive for the first two he got his reward in the end. How many times this season have we seen crosses fizzed across the six yard box only for us to have no-one in the box? Two of the three goals Sturridge has scored have been tap ins, but they're strikers goals and the kind we have been missing for too long. Credit to Downing too, that was an exquisite ball he volleyed in with his right foot. We've won eight of eleven now, that's the reason I wasn't so downbeat after last week. Losing at Old Trafford is to be expected, any time we avoid that is a bonus. We need to be beating the lesser sides consistently, especially at home, that's what will define our season and that's what we've started doing. 3-0 against Wigan and Sunderland, 4-0 against Fulham and now 5-0 against Norwich. We beat Southampton 1-0 but it could and should have been far more than that. The one blemish in that run of games was Villa, but honestly if we were to play them next weekend I'd expect us to put at least five past them, possibly more. There were no negatives to come from this (I'd have liked Borini to have got a goal to boost his confidence but you can't have everything I suppose), everyone played well and I'd also give great credit to Rodgers too for his team selection. I'd been saying all week that I thought Carragher deserved to play ahead of Skrtel, but I wasn't expecting it to happen. Whilst Carra has accepted that he's behind Agger and Skrtel, I don't think Skrtel has been playing well enough to keep him out. He was made to look a mug by Danny Welcrap for God's sake, that's not acceptable, especially coming so soon after struggling against Benteke, Jones and Cole. I was happy to see that change made as it was clearly the right call. It rewards Carra for his professionalism and good form he's shown when given the opportunity, and it's a shot across the bows of Skrtel who has not lived up to last season's form and needs to do better. Carragher brings leadership the defence and a vocal presence the side is lacking without him. I expect to see him used a lot more in the second half of the season than he was in the first, although I doubt he'll be playing every game, especially once the midweek European games come around again. It was the right call bringing Henderson in too, Jordan could consider himself unfortunate not to have got the start at Old Trafford last week, but one thing about Rodgers is that he doesn't play favourites and he generally picks people based on form. Allen didn't do enough to justify his place, so Henderson came in and took the chance with both hands. Gerrard was the best player on the pitch by a mile I thought. Just a top, top performance from him and his form has been very impressive of late. Johnson was outstanding again too, especially in the second half when it seemed like every attack we had went through him. He set up camp in the Norwich half and didn't have to do any defending such was our dominance. Lucas looked sharper than he has for a while too, snapping into tackles and passing the ball crisply. For the first time all season the top seven places are now occupied by what most would consider to be the best seven sides in the league. We're not in bad shape considering all the problems we had early on through a lack of firepower and adapting to the new manager's ideas. For us to improve on the 7th spot we presently occupy we'll need to start getting results against some of the other sides in that top seven, as whilst it's encouraging seeing us finally comfortably beating the sides we should be beating comfortably, we won't go any higher without taking points off the likes of Arsenal, Everton and Spurs. That's the next step for us. Team: Jones; Wisdom, Carragher, Agger, Johnson; Lucas, Gerrard, Henderson (Sterling); Downing, Sturridge (Bornini), Suarez:

Brendan Rodgers recently took the decision to terminate the year long loan of Real Madrid midfielder Nuri Sahin, who subsequently went back to his former club Borussia Dortmund until the end of the season. The German born Turkish international arrived with a big reputation and scored three goals in 12 appearances for the Reds, but never managed to hold down a regular place in the side. Have we wasted a talent or was he just not suited to the English game? Three TLW writers - Julian Richards, Dave Usher and Dan Thomas give their take on it.... This is going on the internet? Better be careful what I say then, anything Dortmund-related on the internet is treated with extreme reverence on there. Don’t get me wrong, I think they’re a terrific club and have a good team with a beautiful stadium. But they’re treated as golden gods in European football by some so when Liverpool beat off Arsenal with a stick to get Nuri Sahin, well certain sections of the internet exploded in a joy not seen since the second Death Star was destroyed. I’ll come clean, I’m being rather snarky but I just don’t have the time to dedicate to European football anymore. I’ve only seen Dortmund in the European club competitions and I don’t see much Spanish football anymore. So I haven’t seen enough of the Sahin we were supposed to be getting, I only saw the Sahin that played for us, and he didn’t impress me in the slightest. I thought he carried the air of a player who was doing us a favour being here. Maybe that’s just my perception but the nature of the chase to get him and the fact that it was a loan deal just gave me that impression. Still, I was more than willing to be impressed and everyone loves a heralded signing even if you’ve not seen much of them. Sahin got his first start against Arsenal but looked off the pace, no problem there as everyone looked awful that game. He was left out at Sunderland where O’Neill’s more ‘robust’ type of football would’ve caused him an issue and was brought back for the Europa game against Young Boys. This was his best run of games where he scored goals against West Brom and Norwich but even through this run he was left out in favour of Shelvey against the Mancs. It became apparent that Rodgers didn’t favour him over others and from what I saw, I agreed with him. Sahin’s best role was apparently a deep lying playmaker and he made noises that he wasn’t playing in his best position. When I saw him though he too often appeared off the pace of other Premier League teams and he would literally seem to go missing in games. Deep lying? He didn’t appear to know how to get out of that deep hole, even when he was further up the pitch. Sahin might on paper be a better player than some others in our squad but he didn’t seem to be able to cope with what was required of him. As 2012 wore on he disappeared further from view and I’m totally in agreement with Rodgers sending him away. He was on big wages and wasn’t playing, he was a drain on our very modest resources and this was one we were able to cut the cord on very easily. I also think his return to familiar ground at Dortmund is quite telling. Rodgers saw him day to day and if he thought he couldn’t be trusted in league games then it’s his call. Likewise if he thinks he’s no longer an asset to the squad then he should pull the trigger on getting shot of him. Sahin didn’t impress me and I’d have done exactly what Rodgers did. That might not be popular with Dortmund aficionados on the internet but it was the right call for us at this point in our development as a club. Julian Richards * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Nuri Sahin is meant to be really good from what I hear. He was player of the year in Germany and let's face it, Real Madrid as a rule don't tend to sign bad players do they? So whilst I've never seen him play other than in the dozen games he had whilst he was here, I'm happy to concede that he must be a pretty talented lad. Having said that, being talented in itself doesn't make him suited to English football, or to Brendan Rodgers' style of play for that matter. In theory he should have been, he's a ball player who should have thrived in a passing team like ours. He turned down Arsenal to come here, a decision he probably regrets now in hindsight. Sahin describes himself as a 'deep lying playmaker'. To me that screams out 'Xabi Alonso', and every team could use one of those, right? He was no Xabi Alonso though, he was slower than Xabi for a start, and that probably puts him in a group of around 1% of professional footballers. He was lightweight too, which when combined with a lack of pace isn't good if you're playing one of the holding roles. You can get away with it depending on who you partner him with, for instance if Sahin had a Sissoko or Mascherano next to him doing the dirty work, maybe his shortcomings could have been covered up. He never had that though, he didn't even have Lucas who was injured just as he arrived. He had Joe Allen, who himself shares some of the same deficiencies in his game (not quite as slow but just as lightweight). With Sahin and Allen in the midfield, we tended to get completely over-ran. The Arsenal game was the start of it, but he was thrown in at the deep end there and was lacking in fitness. Some slack needed to be awarded and was, it was completely understandable he struggled in that first game. Two goals in a cup win at the Hawthorns followed by another in the rout of Norwich three days later suggested he was adapting and finding some fitness, but that was as good as it got for him. He was often deployed further forward, probably as Rodgers didn't trust him to play deep with Allen. He was generally anonymous and was often subbed. Perhaps the return of Lucas would have made things easier for Sahin, but despite what he'd done before he arrived here, in a red shirt he'd shown little to suggest he was more worthy of a place in the midfield than Henderson and Shelvey. Maybe in time he would have shown his undoubted ability, but time was not something we could give him as come May he'd be heading back to Spain. If we'd paid a lot of money for him and had him tied down to a long term contract, we'd have been forced to try and make it work and I'm sure he'd have featured more. That wasn't the case, we couldn't indulge him and let him play his way into form at the expense of the team, and if he wasn't going to play then he was earning far too much to be sat on the bench or in the stands, as he had been of late. In short, it was worth taking a chance bringing him here but sending him back was the prudent thing to do given his high wages. Good luck to him, I hope he rediscovers his best form as he seems like a nice lad. Dave Usher * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Not even room for doubt in my mind, I think that with the exception of a handful of games earlier in the season, Nuri Sahin has been a huge disappointment. He's clearly a very talented player and many people whose opinion I respect were delighted when we signed him. However, he just hasn't cut it. The pace of this league passes him by. He's been like a rabbit in the headlights in this league, not having a spare second on the ball to get his head up and see what's doing. He's not used to people like Lee Cattermole kicking lumps out of him the moment he's passed the ball. And he never looked like he was going to get used to it either, which is why he went from starting to being dumped on the bench pretty quickly. There's been an argument that Rodgers hasn't used him in his right position, but the truth is that he has had a chance both further up the pitch and that bit deeper and did nothing of any note in either position. He started off well but as the pitches got heavier as winter set in, I think Sahin looked like a very ordinary player. Apparently he has lost a yard of pace since his injury which was evidently pretty serious. That checks out because to me he clearly has the tools to look like a top rate player, but just isn't in this league because he's so slow. He even looked pedestrian in Europa League games. Not only slow of body but of mind. He never looked at ease, not one bit. I have no problem with him and I wish him well but he hasn't made any sort of impact whatsoever, which is the reason I'm not fussed about him moving on in the slightest. What does concern me however is the fact that we're a central midfielder down. Of course, Sahin wasn't playing but if we needed to bring him in, we could. We still have options but not many. We have supposedly been paying the Turk's £90k a week wages. I have no problems with Sahin going so long as FSG use the money saved on a football player and not a baseball player. We may well have paid Joe Cole a lump sum to disappear but with him and Sahin off the bill that represents a saving of £200k a week. Ignoring Sturridge's wage of course, but he's one of the "young and talented" players that fits the American brief. So long as we reinvest those wages, I won't miss Sahin one bit as he wasn't playing. Good luck to him and I hope he recovers his form at Dortmund, but he's not cut for this league. And well done Brendan Rodgers for having the grapefruits to admit it wasn't working and for moving him on. Dan Thomas

NURI SAHIN 2012-13 by Dave Usher Date of Birth - 05/09/88 Nationality - Turkish Position - Midfield Games - 12 Goals - 3 Club Hons (Lpool) - Intnl Hons - Turkey caps Other Clubs - Borussia Dortmund, Feyenoord (loan), Real Madrid, Borussia Dortmund (loan) German born Turkish international midfielder Nuri Sahin arrived at Anfield on a year long loan deal from Real Madrid in the summer of 2012. The Reds had beaten Arsenal to the player's signature and it was seen as something of a coup. Sahin had made his name as a youngster at Borussia Dortmund, helping them to their first Bundesliga title in nine years in 2011 when he was also named the league's best player. Real Madrid swooped to sign him up on a six year contract, but his first year in Spain was a struggle due to a combination of injuries and being unable to dislodge the likes of Alonso and Khedira from Jose Mourinho's midfield. The arrival of Luca Modric from Spurs pushed Sahin even further down the food chain at the Bernebeu and Madrid were keen to loan him out to help him regain form and fitness. Arsenal thought they had a deal tied up for him but at the last minute he opted for the Reds. His first appearance ironically came against the Gunners, but it wasn't a good experience for him as he struggled with the pace of the game and Arsenal ran out comfortable winners. He'd been thrown in at the deep end and was clearly not ready for that kind of intense game, but he started showing glimpses of what he could do with three goals in the space of four days in late September. He scored twice in a League Cup win at the Hawthorns, and added another in a 5-2 rout of Norwich at Carrow Road. He'd shown a knack of arriving late in the box, which was a trait that had been lacking in our midfield for some time. It was looking good for Nuri at this stage, but that was as good as it got for him as he was never able to nail down a regular place and often found games passing him by when he started. He complained of not being used in his correct position, which is as a deep plying playmaker. There is some merit to that, but from Rodgers' point of view how could he select him in that role when our midfield became weak and easy to slice through when he was deployed there? Sahin's pedigree and quality was never in question, but his suitablity to the English game and to Rodgers' system certain were. His last appearance for the club came in a Europa League clash in Udinese, when he was forced off with a broken nose after just 12 minutes. That sidelined him for a couple of weeks and he was never able to re-establish himself in the side and when the trasnfer window opened in January, his loan was cut short by mutual consent and Madrid sent him back to Dortmund where would see more playing time than had he remained at Anfield.

Manchester United 2 LIVERPOOL 1 Report by Dave Usher Scorer(s) – Daniel SturridgeHalf Time - 1-0 Venue - Old Trafford Date - Sun 13 Jan 2013 Star Man – Steven Gerrard Sadly all too predictable. Go there, shit our pants, look like we're going to get battered, score a goal from nothing and end up with a respectable scoreline and a tale of 'if only'. The bottom line is that we went to the home of the league leaders, a side that were 21 points ahead of us going into the game, and we got outplayed for an hour before rallying and finishing the game strongly. The scoreline was a fair one though, unlike the game at Anfield earlier this season United were good value for this win. Much is being made of Rodgers' team selection and 'negative' approach. One thing I'd say Brendan Rodgers cannot be accused of is being negative. You can say he's too gung-ho and that leaves us exposed to counter attacks, and that's an argument that may hold some merit. Too negative though? Sorry, not having that. We played the same formation we usually do, with the full backs bombing on like we've done for pretty much most of the season. We went 3-0 up inside 25 minutes at QPR a few weeks ago with more or less the same line up. Were we defensive that day too? No, we were just up against a side that we were much better than. Manchester United are not QPR, and although we tried to just play our normal game it didn't happen, as it tends not to whenever we go there. So for me the line up wasn't defensive and he wasn't overly cautious at all. What happened was the players did what they almost always seem to do at Old Trafford and have been doing almost every year since Houllier masterminded three 1-0 wins in four years (the other result was a 4-0 defeat when Sami was sent off early). That is they collectively shit themselves in the face of superior opposition. Were people really expecting us to go there, dominate them and win? Seriously, is that what people thought? I ask this because of the huge amount of wailing and gnashing of teeth I've seen since the game. Anyone would think we'd lost at Reading or QPR the way some have reacted. Yes we were outplayed in the first half and were lucky to go in at only 1-0 down. But guess what, they've only lost at home once all season, they're seven points clear at the top of the table and better sides than us have tried and failed to beat them. This was basically our usual Old Trafford performance, it happens almost every year regardless of who the manger is and who the players are. It's like we have some sort of mental block when we go there. It's not there when we play them at Anfield, but when we go to their place? It's usually the same old story. Remember Rafa's first game there? We were horrendous, we went 2-0 down and had barely had a shot until out of nowhere John O'Shea scored an own goal. We nearly ended up getting a draw but Cisse missed a sitter. Same thing happened last year, we went 2-0 down then scored a scrappy goal out of nothing and could have nicked a point as we applied late pressure and made it a lot closer than it should have been. Even under Hodgson we went 2-0 down and were in trouble, then out of nowhere we won a penalty and suddenly started playing. We got back to 2-2 only to then lose 3-2. Since Houllier left we've gone to Old Trafford nine times and lost eight of them. In 80 league games at Old Trafford we've won just 15, even when we were great we struggled to win there. Yet Rodgers is getting hammered by some after this? In terms of the games we've lost at Old Trafford, this was actually one of the 'better' ones as by the end it was United that were hanging on wanting the final whistle to go as we were in the ascendancy. It doesn't make what went on in the first half any more acceptable, but at least we were left with some kind of straw to clutch afterwards. The way we played after Sturridge's goal was encouraging and gives us something to cling to. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we should just shrug our shoulders and say 'ah well, we always lose here so never mind'. I was as appalled by the first half showing as anyone, I thought it was cowardly. Not from Rodgers, but from the players who in the words of their manager were too 'tentative'. The word I was using at half time was 'timid', which is more or less the same. I completely agree with his take on what went wrong, it was plain for all to see that some players just didn't have what it takes to perform on that stage. The misplaced passes, the not showing for the ball, too many not wanting to take any kind of responsibility, it was the polar opposite of what Rodgers wants from his players. He said afterwards there's two things you need to perform in games like this. Courage and belief. From what I hear he stressed the exact same things to the team in their pre-match briefing the night before the game. Courage and belief in your ability. You have to be brave enough to want the ball and confident enough to play. We had neither in the first half, and had neither in the second until Gerrard conjured up that goal for Sturridge out of nothing. After that? Belief and courage in spades, but it wasn't there until we scored, and it's the same almost every time we play there. Time and again we gave the ball away cheaply, and Suarez was completely isolated and usually had three or four defenders to beat any time he did get the ball. For me that wasn't down to tactics, it was down to basically having to play with nine men because Sterling and Downing offered nothing in support of Luis. It didn't help that Lucas and Allen were struggling too, and Gerrard wasn't great in the first half either although he didn't plumb the depths some of his team-mates did. Sterling's game was basically, get the ball, cut inside, lose it. And repeat until subbed. I don't remember him going at Rafael on the outside even once, yet the Brazilian can be got at that way and it's a weakness we should have been looking to exploit. The game seemed like it was too big for Raheem, he froze in the headlights. Still, he's 18, he has an excuse. Several of his team-mates also suffered the same fate and they have no such excuse. Downing did what Downing always does in games of this magnitude. Nothing. At least he did nothing whilst the team were under the cosh and struggling. When we got on top in the second half he wasn't bad, he suddenly seemed to want the ball more and took more responsibility. Par for the course with him. Honestly, this was exactly the kind of display I expected from him. I had no expectations of Downing, but I hoped that Sterling might put on a bit of a show, as nothing has really fazed him so far in his fledgling career. He found it incredibly difficult though, but he's still on a learning curve and it's perhaps to be expected. There's no tougher place to go as a Liverpool player than Old Trafford, and there seems to be a mental issue that effects the majority of our players when we go there. You need big characters if you're going to get something there, and we don't have enough of them. What I'd give for a Mascherano or even a Sissoko in midfield right now. In games like this, those kind of players are a huge help to a team. Instead we had Lucas understandably still trying to recapture his best form after injury and an out of form Joe Allen. The Welshman struggled badly in the first half, he was terrible, capped off by one terrible pass straight to a United player that almost led to a goal for Welbeck and needed a terrific block by Agger to prevent it. To Allen's credit though he never hides and always wants the ball even when things are going badly. He improved a lot after the break too, I thought he actually had a good second half until he was brought off for Henderson late on. The selection of Allen over Henderson is the only contentious thing about the starting line up for me. I'd have gone with Henderson because he closes down space and will run all day. On a big pitch like Old Trafford against a side like United, you need that. Even so, I've seen some claiming that we didn't win this game because Allen started over Henderson. This is Jordan Henderson we're talking about, right? Not Graeme Souness, Steve McMahon or Jan Molby? He's done well lately, he's probably a better option than Allen at this moment in time but let's not get carried away, he's still Jordan Henderson, and I mean that in the nicest possible way. A lot of people will point to Sturridge not starting as being contentious. To be honest, I never thought for a minute he would be starting so when I saw the team I wasn't disappointed. Perhaps others were expecting him to play and that's why they were upset he wasn't. Based on things Rodgers has said since Sturridge arrived, and the fact he only played 55 minutes at Mansfield last week, I never thought there was a serious chance of him starting. He's been out injured a long time and has only recently returned to full training. Had the United game been next week, I reckon he'd have made the starting XI but it was just too soon for him to handle a full 90 minutes. Of course the option was there to start him for an hour and then take him off when he got tired. Rodgers could have done that, and who knows, he could have scored a hat-trick and left the field with us 3-0 up. It's possible, but unlikely, even though I'd accept that the way to beat United is to attack them (defence has been their weak point this season, but they hadn't been able to call on their first choice defensive pairing of Vidic and Ferdinand until recently). It's also possible he'd have failed to score and had to leave the field with us trailing, at which point Rodgers would then have been battered for taking off a goalscorer when we were trailing. Rodgers will have weighed up the pro's and cons, and decided he'd rather have the option of bringing Sturridge off the bench. We'll never know what would have happened had he started with him, but we've gone to Old Trafford with better strikers than Sturridge in the side and lost, so again, I'd say it's a little simplistic to say not starting him cost us the game. That said, clearly we looked a much better side with him in it, and that bodes well for the future. It's a pity this game a little too early for him as few teams are going to want to face Suarez and Sturridge in tandem, that;s for sure. He was terrific when he came on, he gave us a real threat in behind with his pace and movement and it allowed Suarez to go looking for the ball without leaving us without a threat up front. They linked up well together on several occasions and whilst the performance in the last half hour of this game wasn't enough to earn us a point, it did provide plenty of encouraging signs for the remainder of the season. Whereas some players looked like the occasion was too big for them, Sturridge seemed to treat it like any other game. 'Courage to play' and 'belief in his ability' are not in short supply with Sturridge. Until his arrival at half time the only attempt I can remember us having was a snapshot from Suarez that went miles over. After Sturridge came on we had numerous openings, and he was involved in most of them. We trailed at half time to Van Persie's goal, but we were fortunate it wasn't much worse. Van Persie could have had a hat-trick, he shot over when well placed and also had a back heel smuggled away by a combination of Skrtel and Reina after Rafael had gotten the better of Johnson and crossed for the Dutchman. Pepe got absolutely clattered by Kagawa as he blocked the follow up, and looked like he may have to go off initially. It happened right before half time though, which gave us time to make sure he was ok to continue. In addition to the Van Persie chances, Cleverley volleyed inches wide and Welbeck blasted over after skinning Skrtel. A lot of our problems came from giving the ball away cheaply, the rest of them came from not being aggressive enough in trying to win it back. For their first goal both Allen and Downing could have won the ball but didn't make a tackle. Wisdom was left isolated and by the time he left his position to close down Evra he had no chance of stopping the cross. Van Persie's movement deceived Agger and bought him a yard of space and the next thing we knew the ball was in the net. For me the goal was a result of being too passive and not being aggressive enough in trying to win the ball back. It was too easy for them to pass it around in the first half, but we got much tighter after the break and indeed scored as a direct result of winning the ball back early. By that time we had already fallen further behind, as slack marking from a free-kick allowed the smallest twat on the field a free header on the back post that hit Vidic in the face on it's way past a helpless Reina. Without knowing who was supposed to be marking whom, it looked like Johnson was the one to blame, which summed up his day. I seem to remember a few stinkers from him on this pitch actually. Replays showed that Vidic was offside, but complaining about that would smack of being a little bit desperate. I'm more annoyed at the way the free-kick was conceded and then how it was defended. Skrtel's defending in letting Welbeck get behind him was shocking, schoolboy stuff. I don't think he actually fouled Welbeck deliberately, the pair just sort of collided but Welbeck had gotten the wrong side of the defender and there was no-one getting across to cover. I half expected a red card to follow and it was a relief that it was only a yellow. As for the goal, technically Vidic was marginally offside, and I mean marginally as we're talking inches here. The linesman wasn't right in line which makes it even more difficult for him to judge, but I'd be amazed if he even knew the ball had hit Vidic. It all happened so fast it just looked like it had gone straight in from Evra's header. You'd have to be the world's greatest ever lino to see that as an offside on first viewing, so I've got no complaints about that at all. In fact, I've got no complaints whatsoever about the officiating all game. Howard Webb was excellent, you could even argue he was lenient towards us a couple of times as he could justifiably have sent off both Skrtel and Johnson had he so chose. They would have been harsh dismissals, but they were calls he could legitimately have made without too much criticism. So unlike the game at Anfield earlier in the season, the referee played no part in the outcome of this match. At 2-0 I was just hoping we didn't get embarrassed further. A comeback couldn't have been further from my thoughts at that point. We'd had a chance to equalise when it was just 1-0, but Wisdom sliced it horribly wide after making a superb run to get on the end of a perfect ball from Suarez. They scored not long after that and I'd more or less given up hope. Then Gerrard burst into life, robbing Carrick and then taking a pass from Sterling and hitting a low shot that De Gea could only parry into the path of Sturridge who had a tap in. A striker following in a shot to get an easy goal? Haven't had that since Kuyt left. Good stuff from Sturridge, who gave United's defence a torrid time after that. He created a shooting chance for Borini too by intercepting a pass as we pressed them near their own box. Borini took a touch and then hit a half volley about a foot wide. Sturridge was involved in everything, he shot wide after beating Ferdinand to make space for himself, had another one that he put into the side netting from a tight angle and then there was the best chance of all that he put over the bar. Should have buried that one, and if he had then maybe we'd have got a point. Based on chances created in the second half, we probably should have come away with a draw. It was a little like the Chelsea game in that regard I suppose. Whilst it's never nice losing to these twats, our season won't be defined on what we do against them, or City, or Chelsea etc. We need to be beating the teams we should be beating and whatever we pick up against the top three or four is a bonus. Like it or not, that's where we are right now. We need to learn to walk again before we can run, and that means beating Norwich next week and then hoping we don't lose at City, although the chances are we will. We've won seven of the last ten, which is encouraging. We've not yet beaten a side in the top half, which is alarming. We've now got Sturridge in and Borini fit again, so the issue we've had all season of not having enough forwards should now be resolved. The three looked good together in the closing stages of this game and hopefully in the coming weeks we'll see more of them as a front three. Then we'll have a better idea of where we are at as a team. Star man is really difficult as no-one particularly stood out that much. I'm going for Gerrard, simply because he took the fight to them in the second half and it was his drive and desire that got us back in the game when he created the goal. Suarez did well in the second half when we actually got some players around him who weren't scared to play. Sturridge is worth a mention too, as is young Wisdom who despite having a few edgy moments and sloppy passes (mostly in the first half), really got to grips with it after the break and can be pleased with how he came through the game. Final word has to go to the fans. Despite extreme provocation, the travelling Reds didn't give them what they wanted and rose above all the sick shite coming from the Manc hordes. When you're listening to 'The S*n was right, you're murderers' 'Always the victim, it's never your fault' 'Without killing anyone we won it three times' and 'There's only one Maggie Thatcher' for ninety minutes, and are then taunted with 'Where's your famous Munich song' it must be tempting to stoop to their level, and it's to their credit that they didn't. Something really needs to be done about this shit though, it's not a minority, it's tens of thousands of people. It came across loud and clear on the TV, and why are the media not making an issue of this? Why should our fans have to listen to this shit from thousands of people every time we play them? As a club United have tried to get their fans to knock this shit off, but it's been ignored and this was as bad as it's ever been. What's the answer? Banning their fans from Anfield next year would be one option. It wouldn't solve the problem but it would bring it into the public eye. Failing that, maybe some sort of complaint could be lodged by the club. Of course the Mancs would start throwing shit of their own at us, bringing up some incidents of wrongdoing by our fans, but given how they chant this stuff in EVERY game they play, and not just when they play us they really don't have a leg to stand on. There's simply no comparison. I don't have the perfect solution to it, I just know I'm sick of us having to listen to this every time we play them, or indeed any time those cunts are on telly. We sure as hell shouldn't have to listen to it in our own ground, so next year let's not let the fuckers in. Team: Reina; Wisdom, Skrtel, Agger, Johnson; Lucas (Sturridge), Allen (Henderson), Gerrard; Downing, Suarez, Sterling (Borini):

Mansfield Town 1 LIVERPOOL 2 Report by Dave Usher at One Call Stadium Scorer(s) – Daniel Sturridge, Luis SuarezHalf Time - 0-1 Venue - One Call Stadium Date - Sun 6 Jan 2013 Star Man – Jamie Carragher At least we got through. That's about the only positive thing I can say about this as it was pretty dire. There are a number of reasons for it, none which can be used as an excuse as frankly there can be no excuse for having to hold on desperately to avoid being held to a draw by a side that aren't even in the Football League. Combine a difficult pitch with a complacent attitude and a wastefulness in front of goal and you're going to have a problem against anybody. Not that I thought any of theirs were penalties, but another referee on another day could have given at least one of them (all were ball to hand an unintentional, but since when has that mattered to some refs?). Mansfield had no luck at all, which was fortunate for us I suppose. We only have ourselves to blame for how this game ended up almost getting away from us. Mansfield did not approach the game the way you'd expect, they were tentative and seemed overawed to begin with. We had loads of time on the ball and the possession must have been at least 90% in our favour in the early exchanges. Sturridge looked electric and took just seven minutes to open his account, running onto Shelvey's pass and stroking a first time shot past the keeper. Top marks for the finish, low marks for the dance. I'm not a fan of post goal dancing (unless it's Crouch doing the robot), but if Sturridge can guarantee double figures every year he can do whatever he likes, from 'Gangnam Style' to the 'Okey Cokey', I really don't care as long as he continues putting the ball in the onion bag. He could have had three in the first half, he should definitely have had two. One chance he missed when he should have scored, another chance was really well saved by the keeper when he tipped it wide at full stretch. Sturridge was a real livewire and his movement was excellent. Shelvey seemed to strike up an instant rapport with him and the two combined well on several occasions. All due to respect to Jonjo though, it's how Gerrard and Suarez link with him that will determine how well the rest of the season goes. It was extremely comfortable in the opening half an hour. Mansfield didn't press the ball, they seemed content to just sit back and hope to keep us out. For a long time I don't remember them managing to put more than three passes together at any point, and initially even when they got throw ins in our half they didn't hurl it into the box as had been expected. That would change in the second half, when we were subjected to a Rory Delap style bombardment by the wonderfully named Exodus Geohaghon. Towards the end of the half they had a couple of good moments that came from us losing the ball and them hitting us quickly with pace. Nothing too threatening, but it was enough to get the crowd back into it. It had gone really quiet after the way we'd started the game, but by taking our foot of the gas and allowing them to hang around, we were inviting trouble and that's what we got immediately after the break. They started the second half on fire. They pressed us, got balls in the box and had us completely penned in. There was a spell in which it seemed like Jones made about ten interventions in two minutes, it was incredible. We had no grip of the midfield and were relying on Jones and the two centre backs to keep them at bay. Rodgers wasted little time in getting Suarez and Henderson on. Suso going off was a given, he'd not got into the game and was the most glaringly obvious candidate to be replaced. I was hoping Sturridge would stay on so that he and Suarez could get some playing time together before Old Trafford next week, but given his lack of games of late the sensible choice was to get him off. Suarez made an immediate impression, as did Henderson who's strong running helped us get out of our own box and down the field. Downing too helped in this regard, making a few surging runs from inside his own half to the Mansfield box. That helped relieve the pressure we'd been under, and also led to the second goal that ultimately settled the tie. Downing ran at the full back and cut inside onto his left foot, with many expecting the shot he rolled the ball instead into the path of Suarez who collected the ball and prodded it goalwards. The keeper blocked, the ball bounced up onto the hand of Suarez and as he followed it into the goal he smashed the ball into the net in a clear act of frustration. I was sat behind the goal and had a great view of it all. Like everyone else, including Suarez, I assumed the handball had been seen and it would be a free-kick to Mansfield. I was just hoping that the ref wasn't going to book him for what was clearly an accidental offence that he could have done nothing about. As clear case of ball to hand as you'll see, he even tried to pull his hand away but the ball had already struck him as he attempted it. Suarez then realised the goal had been given, so went into his customary goal celebration of first kissing his finger (for his wife) and then the tattoo on his wrist (for his daughter). The Mansfield fans were furious, as you'd expect, and they began chanting 'cheat', presumably at Suarez although it could just as easily have been at the ref too. It wasn't long before they broke out the 'Luis Suarez, you know what you are' chant, but I can't hold that against them as we'd have been pissed off too had that happened to us. The Mansfield fans were great, as were the club. We couldn't have been made to feel more welcome, there was the 96 empty seats gesture, a banner on their stand supporting the Justice campaign and they even played YNWA just before kick off (as well as 'He Ain't Heavy'). Their match programme even had a double sided poster featuring Liverpool legends on one side and Mansfield legends on the other. The Mansfield legends included Liam Lawrence, best known for being a bit part player at Stoke. There's a huge gulf in size and stature between the two clubs, for them to have given us such a game is to their great credit. The goal they scored was deserved based on their second half showing. From their point of view they'll say they dominated us and penned us in. That's true, but we have to look at how that can happen. Against the top sides it's just one of those things, they've got great players they are going to have spells in the game where you just have to ride out the storm. Against a non-league side it shouldn't happen, no matter how much they perform above themselves. We were sloppy, the pitch began to cut up and because we had let them hang around they grew in confidence and belief. Suddenly it became a cup tie, when if we'd done our job properly in the first half the second would have been a formality. The goal was somewhat inevitable, if a side gets as many crosses into the box as we allowed Mansfield too, in all likelihood something will eventually fall to them. When balls that many balls are being pumped into your packed penalty area, it doesn't matter if you're up against Barcelona or the Dog & Duck, you're running the risk of conceding. The goal ensured it would be an uncomfortable ending to the game, but one or two hairy moments aside it wasn't that nervy. Whilst this was hardly the ideal way to prepare for next week's trip to Manchester, it counts for little. In terms of how I view the side and where we are at, this game doesn't affect things either way. It's the FA Cup, strange things can happen and sometimes little teams upset big ones. Thankfully that didn't happen, we didn't play well but we survived to fight another day, and most of the side that played in this game won't be lining up against the Mancs next weekend anyway. All the talk afterwards was of Suarez and THAT goal. That might not be a bad thing in some ways as it deflects away from the fact we just about scraped past a Conference side. Still, it's not nice seeing Luis villified again, especially as he did nothing that virtually every other footballer on the planet would have done. I'm not talking about using his hand to score a goal, as only an absolute moron could look at that and say it was a deliberate act. I'm talking about this notion that he should have 'owned up' to it. Has that ever happened? A player scores with the aid of his hand and then goes and tells the referee not to give the goal? I'm sure it must have happened, but you're talking about a one in a million event. It's ridiculous that Luis is getting any criticism at all, but aside from one irresponsible gobshite ESPN commentator (who has since been reprimanded by his bosses), a few knobhead journalists and of course fans who hate Luis anyway, the reaction within football has generally been a case of 'what's the big deal?'. Plenty of people within the game have spoken up for Luis, from Andy Gray to Ian Wright, with Gordon Strachan giving a particularly stirring defence of him on ITV. The comments that carried the most weight were probably those of Paul Cox, the Mansfield manager who's post match interview was as refreshing as anything I've seen in some time. I wouldn't have blamed him if he had gone on front of the cameras in the heat of the moment and let rip, it would have been understandable given the circumstances. It's rare to see that kind of class and dignity in football these days. Being at the game I wasn't aware it at the time, but ESPN did everything they could to stoke up the controversy, Jon Champion was an absolute disgrace to his profession and hopefully he's had a proper bollocking from his superiors. I didn't particularly care for the line of questioning from Ray Stubbs to Paul Cox either, but the Mansfield boss didn't go down the path Stubbs was attempting to lead him. I haven't read any papers, I assume it's a mixture of gobshitery, agenda driven moralising sprinkled in with a fair bit of common sense. Hopefully those idiots who've attacked Suarez for 'kissing his hand to taunt the Mansfield fans' are now back in their boxes, having been informed that he does that after every goal he scores. And then there's those who say he should have admitted he handled and not claimed the goal. I assume they would have been quite happy to take his word that he was onside against Everton and awarded him the goal, or that he was assaulted by Leon Barnett at Norwich and awarded him a penalty? In fact, I know, why don't we just let Luis make all the decisions on incidents he's involved in, starting next week at Old Trafford. That'll be fun. Of course that's ridiculous, but no more ridiculous than this notion that he was wrong to claim the goal. Where was this indignation when Everton's defenders didn't go and tell the linesman that Luis was onside? Or when Mongo cleared that shot from a yard behind the line against the Ukraine? Or on every other incident where a referee has made an error that a player is aware of? The only regret I have about this whole thing was that it was poor old Mansfield that suffered, as they didn't deserve that kind of injustice go against them. I just wish it had happened next week at Old Trafford. Fat chance of us getting a favourable refreeing decision there like. Still, you never know, maybe Luis has something else lined up for them. Team: Jones; Wisdom (Flanagan), Coates, Carragher, Robinson; Lucas, Allen, Shelvey; Suso (Henderson), Sturridge (Suarez), Downing:

LIVERPOOL 3 Sunderland 0 Report by Dave Usher at Anfield Scorer(s) – Raheem Sterling, Luis Suarez (2)Half Time - 2-0 Venue - Anfield Date - Wed 2 Jan 2013 Star Man – Luis Suarez You can't understate the part luck plays in the outcome of football matches. Regardless of how each team plays, games are decided on such small details; a missed chance here, a slice of fortune there. I thought we were fantastic in this game, it was a joy to watch some of the football we produced, and the work ethic and intensity when we didn't have the ball was equally impressive. And yet as well as this turned out, there are a lot of parallels in the first half of this game to that of the Aston Villa game, which turned out to be the biggest disappointment of the season so far. As I said, small details. Villa had three chances in that first half and scored twice. Sunderland had three chances and scored none. We had loads of opportunities in both games, we put two away against Sunderland but drew a blank against Villa until eventually getting a late goal when we trailed 3-0. I'm taking nothing away from how we played against Sunderland, l'm excited about many of the things we saw, I'm just saying that sometimes there are such fine margins between winning and losing. We walk that line far too often because of our deficiencies in the final third, but that wasn't an issue in this game as we converted three of the many opportunities we carved out for ourselves. Quite how we only managed to score once in a completely dominant second half is a mystery, but it was largely irrelevant thanks to the two first half strikes that ended Sunderland's resistance. Sunderland had more about them than Fulham had shown a few weeks ago, considering how well we performed Sunderland actually deserve some credit for what they did in the first half. With better finishing they could actually have made a game of this, despite being completely outplayed pretty much from start to finish (I thought the opening ten minutes or so were relatively even but after that we were in full control of the game). Steven Fletcher was bright and busy and full of running in the first half. By the end of the game he looked a completely broken man, having got nothing out of Agger and Skrtel and having had little or no support from his beleaguered team-mates, who spent the entire second half chasing the ball to the point that when they got it back they were too tired to do anything with it. When Brendan Rodgers spoke of his intent to turn Anfield into a place where opponents hate playing, this is the kind of performance he was referring to. "Death by football" he calls it. We've seen it in flashes, but not consistently. I'd probably say the first 45 minutes against Udinese is the best display of it we've seen so far (although the City and United games were also impressive given the standard of opponent), but in terms of a 90 minute display of dominance and high tempo football, this might be the best we've seen. You're not going to completely dominate the top sides in the league and win by three or four goals. It might happen once in a while, but generally speaking it's going to be pretty tough to do. Against the lesser sides though, it's an attainable target. The Mancs under Ferguson have based all of their title successes on doing just that, whereas not being able to beat the sides we should beat has been a massive problem for us for many years. It's still an issue now of course, the Villa defeat is proof of that, but Norwich, Wigan, Fulham, QPR and now Sunderland have now all been seen off handily. Hopefully a sign of progress, but until we add consistency it will count for little. I doubt Sunderland will have a tougher game than this all season, especially what they endured in the second half. And they sure as hell won't come up against a better player than Suarez. He ran them ragged all night, the only surprise was he didn't come away with a hat-trick. The whole team performed well, but it was Suarez who provided the thrust and cutting edge that proved decisive. Without that, the good work of the others counts for little. He scored twice, made another and also laid on other opportunities that were not taken. The assist for Sterling's goal was incredible, he was running away from goal, the ball was going away from goal, but he's just a supremely gifted footballer and he somehow adjusted his body to hook the ball perfectly into the path of Sterling. Most players wouldn't have even contemplated it, let alone been able to pull it off. Sterling showed a cool head to lob the ball over Mignolet and the pair then celebrated jubilantly together. That's another thing I love about Suarez, there's no hint of ego about him and you never get the impression he thinks he's above any of his team-mates, even though he clearly is as he's one of the world's top players. He plays like a superstar but he doesn't act like one, he seems just as happy celebrating team-mates goals as he does his own. It was just the start we needed, but it was almost ruined just three minutes later when a good passing move from Sunderland ended with Fletcher playing in McLean who shot wide. He should have scored, it was a terrible miss and a big let off for us. Like I said, fine margins. If Benteke's shot the other week goes the other side of the post…. You can't legislate for these things, what you have to do is have enough firepower to be able to overcome setbacks when they happen, and to capitalise on the let offs when they come along. Against Sunderland we showed that. Far too often previously we haven't. Daniel Sturridge should help in that regard. The second goal was all about Suarez once again. Gerrard did well to win a loose ball and play Suarez in with a well weighted first time pass. Luis took it on his chest and tried to go by Cuellar on the outside. Cuellar fouled him, the linesman flagged but then the defender fell over and Dowd waved play on. He'd been about to put the whistle to his mouth but credit to him for waiting to see what happened before stopping play. It's funny when you watch the replay because Gerrard sees the flag go up and spits his dummy, turning away in disgust whilst Suarez sets off towards goal! You'd think Stevie has been in the game long enough to play to the whistle. Sterling and Henderson both got up in support of Luis, and even though he scored I'd say Suarez should have squared to Henderson really. His shot found the net but he was a little fortunate, it wasn't a great finish it just squirmed through Mignolet's legs. Henderson would have had every right to tear a strip off Luis if he hadn't scored, but he did score, so Jordan will have just bitten his tongue this time. Sunderland then had another great opportunity and we had Reina to thank for keeping them out. Gardner's free-kick was blocked by the wall but collected by Adam Johnson, who's ball was met by Fletcher at the back post. Pepe made a smart save to keep Fletcher's effort out, but it looked like the loose ball would be turned in by a Sunderland player until Reina reacted quickly to clear the danger. That and a routine stop from Larsson (who should have done better with a presentable opportunity) were just about the only things of note he had to do, but he did them well, and in addition to that his distribution and quick thinking started numerous counter attacks. A good night for Pepe. Some of the football we played was an absolute delight, whether it was through patient build up play or swift counters. There was one fantastic break that almost resulted in a goal for either of Downing or Henderson. Sterling won the ball by his own corner flag and played a ball up the line to Suarez. He spun his man and then set off down the right wing before playing a ball inside to Henderson. Usually a player would take a touch here and then assess his options, but Henderson had already had a look and knew Downing was racing up in support on the left and he just played a lovely little first time ball into his path. Downing took it to the edge of the box and then drilled a shot that looked to be going towards the far corner before it nicked off a defender and went about a foot wide, just eluding the outstretched boot of Henderson who had charged into the box. Superb stuff and it had the crowd purring. It had been a good first half, but despite how well we'd played it was a little concerning that Sunderland had managed to have three good opportunities. The second half was completely one way traffic, we were confident when we were in possession and hungry to win it back when we were not. Sunderland couldn't cope, any time they had the ball it seemed like we forced them into an error within a few seconds and we had it back again. Sterling should have had a second goal shortly after the break. Gerrard picked out Suarez who played a lovely first time ball round the corner into path of Sterling. There was a lack of composure this time, he hesitated as Mignolet came out and ended up disappointingly squaring the ball instead of shooting. Actually it may have been an attempted shot, either way it was poor. Overall Sterling had a decent game though, and this is the kind of thing he'll get better with as he gains more experience. The arrival of Sturridge and the impending return to fitness of Borini may mean fewer starts for Raheem, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. A rest won't do him any harm, and he'll have to up his game to force his way back into the side. Suarez made it 3-0 when he collected a stunning pass from Gerrard, controlled it on his chest and smuggled it past Mignolet. The pass from Gerrard was like an excecet missile, but he had his range all night and sprayed some fantastic passes around. Credit to Downing too, his run across the back four took a centre half away and opened up the gap that Gerrard exploited so perfectly. Without Downing's run though, that goal doesn't happen. He played well again, and fully deserves his place in the side at the moment. Sterling was replaced by Allen midway through the second half, with the Welshman going into the advanced midfield role that Henderson had filled to good effect. Henderson went to the right, before he himself made way for Suso. Carragher got a late run out too, coming on for Skrtel for the final 20 minutes or so. In doing so, he overtook the great Billy Liddell to go into 2nd place on the club's all time league appearance record. A great achievement from a Liverpool legend, he won't catch Ian Callaghan for top spot, but I doubt anybody ever will and in this case, first is first, but second is still pretty fucking impressive. Well done Carra, lad. Suarez almost got the hat-trick when Allen picked him out with a fine ball. Great first touch from Luis, but Mignolet did well to save the shot. Allen enjoyed himself when he came on. He nearly scored from a Downing cutback but Rose made a great block. He then hit the side netting after brilliant wing play by Johnson and when he finally did find the net it was ruled out as Downing was half a yard offside. A pity, as he could have done with that goal as a confidence boost. Still, it was interesting to see how comfortable he looked in that role with free reign to make runs into the box. He was one of the many positives to come out of this game, but Henderson also did a good job in that role. The midfield is basically Lucas and Gerrard plus one, and we have three players battling it out to be that 'plus one'. It looks like Sahin is out of the picture, rumours are linking him with a move away this month, which wouldn't be a massive shock. For a brief time he looked like he was hitting some form but it didn't last and he's fallen way down the pecking order. Pity, the lad clearly has ability but he needs to games to reach his best level, and we aren't here to just help him get fit for Real Madrid, we've got games to win. This was one of those rare games where everybody performed to a high level. There were no passengers or weak links, the whole team were on top of their game and the subs also contributed. Suarez gets the star man but Gerrard ran him close with a virtuoso display in the middle of the park. Much has been said and written about the skipper's form this season, but based on numbers alone he's having a hell of a year. He leads the rest of our midfielders in pretty much every important category, and leads the entire league in assists apparently. The eye test tells a slightly different story, there have been some games where he's just not been at it but there's also an element of him being judged by far higher standards than others are. He's judged against the incredible standards he's set for himself over many years. Even an average Steven Gerrard is still vastly superior to the majority of midfielders in this league (the below average one we've occasionally seen, such as at Stoke the other day, not so much), but on those days when he's on top of his game, like this one, there's no-one to touch him. Glen Johnson was top class again too, it doesn't matter whether he's on the right or the left, he's just a fucking menace and teams are having huge problems keeping him in check this season. Suarez apart, he's been our best player. The absence of Enrique hurts us though, not so much defensively as Wisdom is solid and dependable, but going forward young Andre isn't at the level of Johnson or Enrique yet. With some really big games coming up the timing of Enrique's injury couldn't have been worse, but nevertheless we go into those games in good spirits. Too often we've had a run of easy looking fixtures where we've looked ahead and totted up how many points we should amass from them, only to be disappointed when we drop points to someone shite. This time there are not exactly high expectations for the upcoming away fixtures, so hopefully the reverse will prove true. Maybe we'll surprise ourselves? The worry is that every time we've looked like we were making progress, we've dropped a bollock. With back to back 3-0 wins under our belt we look like we're on the right track, but next up in the league is the most difficult fixture of our season. It's a tough game for them too though, the last thing they'll want is for an in form Suarez to run wild on them in their own back yard. It won't be a game for the faint hearted, that's for sure. Team: Reina; Wisdom, Skrtel (Carragher), Agger, Johnson; Lucas, Gerrard, Henderson (Suso); Sterling (Allen), Suarez, Downing: