coachpotato

Repped for the Sailor Jerry’s.

Their best eleven and our best eleven, currently, are very even. They too are capable of having “off” days/nights as we did against Leicester last night. They have an obvious financial advantage when it comes to buying and maintaining a large squad, which is one of the main reasons, over a season, where they should edge it over us, depending on how injuries and suspensions affect each squad. We can’t afford to have too many of either, they can because they just bring in another similar player and carry on. The only other difference that I perceive is they are more ruthless than we are, which could be construed as other teams rolling over more for them than us, but I don’t think it’s just that. There’s a coldness and aggressive streak to them such that they rarely take their foot off the gas at 3 or 4 goals up, they destroy teams, not just outplay them. It could be a reflection on their coach and his outlook, whereas our coach doesn’t give the impression of being cold and ruthless. All in all, it is a minor miracle that we have lived with them for several seasons now, where all the other teams in the PL haven’t. We’re still more feared in Europe I suspect, by the big hitters, than they are, but that might change when they win their first CL, and they will at some point, because ultimately, that is why vast amounts of money still get thrown at them. Hopefully they’ll have to wait a little while longer for it to happen. I also agree that the ESL hasn’t gone away and is more likely to happen the longer City and their likes turn domestic and international competitions into Scottish football.

Mings doing a respectable impersonation of a shop window dummy there, doubt if Lukaku has scored an easier headed goal.

Have to say that was the game I’ve most enjoyed seeing so far this season. Even at 0-2 & 1-3 I thought if we just cut out the silly mistakes we could salvage it, and so it proved. A couple of the youngsters were out of sorts, (nerves maybe?) and unfortunately were punished for mistakes, but I’m sure they’ll benefit from the experience of playing before a packed ground generating, what has to be said, a great atmosphere, stimulated in part by the Leicester scruffs crowing far too early and then getting their arses handed to them. The difference when the three experienced players came on was marked, and without Salah and Mane showed that maybe we won’t struggle as much as first thought when they go to the AFCON. Leicester we’re cynical in their time wasting and feigning injury, and I think it’s a pattern we’re beginning to see from teams who play us at the moment, tactics meant to frustrate and break rhythms, as they don’t have the players or tactics to do anything else. That’s where referees should bring their authority to bear and I felt the ref last night gave us a little bit of the benefit sometimes because of Leicester’s shithousery. A really good night for us and for football, the right result for the right team. Merry Christmas Reds.

I can remember the days of Jack Taylor when many English referees were regarded as the best in the world, and we seem to have fallen way below those standards in recent years. A few years ago I was involved in youth football and took a referees course because quite often there wouldn’t be enough refs to go around and you’d end up officiating yourself for half a game while the opposing coach would do the other half. It struck me then that refs were always on a hiding to nothing and I didn’t like criticising them because, having had the experience, I knew you were never right in some peoples eyes. When VAR came along, I thought that it would make the officials lot much easier as surely it would allow the correct decision to be arrived at in the end. I still think VAR as a concept is right, but all that has happened is that it has shown up how shite some of our officials are and how inept they are at reading games, not to mention that some of the appointments made and decisions arrived at have made them look corrupt. Jack Taylor will be spinning in his grave.

They certainly bring up their youngsters with one eye on the diving too. Dobbins first game and he was booked for simulation, just like the other kid should have been against us. DCL isn’t averse to toppling easily and the less said about Richarlison the better. But cheers Rafa for nicking a point.

Everton FC - “Getting it Right since 1878”

I don’t usually watch F1 as I think it is more the cars than the drivers these days, and it has tracks which don’t allow for racing skills to influence races. But today I was surprised five (?) cars were allowed through to leave Verstappen immediately behind Hamilton, and even more surprised that the eleven second lead Hamilton had before the safety car was deployed wasn’t re-established by the stewards before Verstappen was allowed to chase him. He’d worked hard for that lead and, in my opinion, should have had it back before the race restarted. Maybe that’s naive of me, but wouldn’t it be fairer to have it that way?

What’s that I hear wafting over Stanley Park………”null and void, null and void, nu…..”

That was a great game to get out of the way, and have 3 points at the end of. Gerrard did as much as he could with what he had available to him, only his 5th game don’t forget, and it’s always easier to try and frustrate us than go toe to toe, and he will have known that. How he will play with better quality players at his disposal will only be clear when he has them. Thankfully he didn’t pull off the draw that he wanted, but also, we were poor at times all over the pitch and struggled as we sometimes do when presented with this kind of challenge, and also with some really poor officiating, and it’s frustrating that we don’t put these kinds of teams to the sword as City tend to do. Something of a blip these last two games then, but two clean sheets and 6 points is title winning form.

I think he’s fucking boss. Proper footballer. Limited? Sure. Klopp knows his limitations and I bet he’d love to see him stay, but won’t stand in his way if he’s got the chance of more first team action elsewhere. Sadly.

Where are the traffic cones?? Won’t believe it’s happening until there are traffic cones a La BMD.

“Well there’s nowhere, absolutely nowhere, like the Old Lady on nights like this, is there?” Especially when little old Everton come from behind to beat one of the ESL “giants”! Football can smile once again. Jeez.

Their ire has blamed everyone and everything for 30+ years now, and for many, continually trying to qualify their failure has eventually landed at the feet of a board who have spent in excess of half a billion pounds to get them success. Many don’t want gradual improvement, like much of the world, it has to be now, today, although some of the more level headed (there are a few!) would accept that after what has gone before. When the board go, as they will unless, by chance, they land on the golden ticket, the more rabid ones will be left with the only thing they haven’t blamed in 30 years. I expect we all know many blues, most of who, football apart, are sound. My belief is that many of them are having the realisation dawn that actually it isn’t everyone else, it isn’t the powers that be, it isn’t even us. It’s themselves, and it’s a hard thing to swallow for them. Benitez will go, another will take over and it may work out, but let’s be honest, United have had the same approach since Ferguson left, but they have much more money to waste to get it right and they’re still looking.

Any BMD updates since Wednesday? No? Have the Board given up?

Wand of a left foot, got his fair share of goals, made loads of chances as well, brilliant move by Bob Paisley to move him to midfield and he and Terry Mac ran riot while Souness sat and dictated and Case filled in whenever. Brilliant, underestimated player. True legend of a club with so many legends, hope he rests in peace now. Thanks for all the memories Ray.

The Ballon D’or is a glorified piss up for all the UEFA free loaders and cronies, so it’s hardly surprising the results are flawed, if you’re not in the click you don’t stand a chance and, to be fair, Messi and Ronaldo have been standout players over the last 10 years, so no wonder they just keep giving it to either of them. Easy option.

At any level of the game, it has always been the case that you firstly have to meet the challenge from the opponent, then impose your superiority in terms of tactics and skill. There’s been many a good team overcome by an inferior side because they haven’t competed enough in the first place. Sadly, you can’t expect officials these to days keep it a level playing field by ensuring excessive challenges and general skullduggery get the response they deserve. We should beat them easily, they aren’t as good a team as we are, we all know that isn’t always the outcome, but we were due to give United a good hiding and did so, I only hope the same occurs on Wednesday night.

Remember that time he was commentating after one of our games and he played “The Party’s Over” after we got beat and we then proceeded to win all kinds for years afterwards. A real “You never win anything with kids” moment. He worked for Granada and I never really felt he was overly biased, although a few seemed to think he liked United and not us. Always thought he was decent as a commentator. Old school along the lines of Wolstenholme, Brian Moore, Coleman etc.. 91. RIP.

Doesn’t matter about how big Villa are in relation to the two Scottish clubs, Villa are playing in a much tougher and competitive league, it is that which will test Gerrard as a Coach more than anything else, whether it’s Villa or someone else.

Jordan Pickford?

Alisson is a big lad, it’s up to him to organise the other players at corners and free kicks, he’s effectively the captain in the box. For someone his size, he doesn’t seem to stamp his authority at dead ball situations, he should be flattening any fucker who gets in his way, and if you compare him to, say, Clemence who was quite slight in comparison when the game was much tougher, he really looks like a fanny at times. He makes good stops and is generally very good at 1 on 1 situations to be fair, but many teams best chances and tactics are relying on corners and free kicks against us so we need to be tougher all round when defending those situations.

I think yesterday’s defeat hasn’t really surprised anyone on here. It was like when we were top of the league last season around Christmas/New Year time, many sensed then we weren’t playing well, despite the fact we were still top. We just knew things weren’t right and that there were issues that needed addressing that should have been addressed during the summer, and that then didn’t get sorted during the January transfer window either. Hence we struggled and had to rely on a really late surge, and a goal from Alisson, to get us into the CL places. That sense of deja vu has been around for a little while, remembering we hammered Palace 7-0 before starting a weak run, then seeing us hammer United 5-0 and drop points against Brighton and now West Ham, it might be playing on Klopp’s mind too, which could explain his “prickly” reaction after the game yesterday. Whether we have the manager and players to reinforce, change or tweak tactics should be something we see after the break. I hope we do see that change as we’re conceding too many soft goals currently. But all the tactics in the world won’t counter individual and collective mistakes such as some of those seen recently, and those mistakes might be because the players involved are not getting enough rest, or simply that they are getting older, and aren’t capable of regaining that 5% drop in performance that will happen. If that’s only happening to one or two then it’s not critical, but any more than that and it could be.

We’re suffering from a lack of continuous improvement in the squad overall. With the players we have, we play the same way every week and half decent teams, well organised teams, are able to give us problems because they’ve been able to see how we are set up and counter that. Fair play, we’ve scored goals against teams too, because not all teams are able to maintain the discipline that is needed to keep us out, but whereas we blew away even decent teams a couple of seasons ago, we’re not able to do that now, unless you count United as a decent team of course. Changes in personnel are a part of maintaining success to keep things fresh and allow changes, they keep other teams guessing, it also allows you to alter your tactics and have variation. We haven’t had too many of those changes and, not to forget, we’ve had our share of injuries, which don’t help either. With the AFCON coming up, we’re going to be further weakened and I can see us dropping further points, however, I’m not convinced there’s a stand out team either from what I’ve seen so far, so it’s imperative we go again after the break and put together another 25 game run, today was poor, but that becomes a concern if there are similar performances in the future, we aren’t out of it, but we can’t afford to be as sloppy as we were today in too many more games.

They can’t blame anything, or anybody else, without acknowledging they have been their own worst enemies, and responsible for their own failure to become the big club they have convinced themselves they would have been had Heysel not happened. Conveniently ignoring that they would have actually had to go on and win the European Cup first, (which of course was a given in their minds) then maintain that kind of form against a Liverpool team that beat them to both League and Cup in the following season, after they had signed Lineker.