etho

City, Swansea, Chelsea away, United away. Three of those were two seasons ago

Massive win. Absolutely massive.

I fucking hate Lamela

Gini looks fucked to me

Fucking hell. Wow. Also surprised mane came off, he's worked so hard defensively

So embarrassing.but just gold. I'm surprised more people haven't said that bit about taking his number 20 made absolutely zero sense in the context of the sentence.

Balls. Keita out

Handball? Offside? Pen? Who the fuck knows any more. Absolute farce.

I think we might sign Messi in 2022. Wow, didn't realise how easy this posting absolute complete and utter unfounded based on zero logic bollocks was.

I was too young to watch the teams of the 80s and before, so I don't have that point of reference. But this team, in the modern era, with so much money and competition, with what it's doing this last 18 months, is better than I could possibly have imagined us being in my wildest dreams.

From the Athletic. I truly, truly love Jürgen Klopp. He makes me want to be a better person, without even meeting him. I hope he stays 20 years. To understand Jurgen Klopp the football manager is to appreciate the effect he has on people. Consider the story of a six-year-old boy suffering from leukemia invited to Melwood the morning after last month’s victory over Crystal Palace with his father, who left the facility frantically typing his recollections into his mobile phone just to ensure his son did not forget any details of the conversation he had with Liverpool’s manager. The players were beginning their recovery session when Klopp noticed the boy sitting on the wall waving at him, so he waved back. A little while later, Klopp came over and casually sat down and instigated a discussion by explaining what was happening in front of them. After a warm down, there was rehabilitation to prevent injuries and something called “pre-activating,” which the boy nodded at, like he was already in the know. Some light training followed. Pretty standard stuff but all along, Klopp quietly acted like he was giving away state secrets and it made the boy feel a thousand feet tall. He told Klopp that he plays first to 30 goals with his dad in the garden and he usually wins. His dad spoke to Klopp about his diagnosis, which means he’ll still be having treatment in 2022. Klopp reassured him that the staff at Alder Hey were amazing, that he was sure he was in excellent hands. The boy showed Klopp his scar and told him he’d come straight from hospital where he told the nurses they needed to hurry up because he wanted to see Liverpool train. Then the boy leaned over to Klopp and asked him whether he could tell him a joke. “How do you get an astronaut to sleep?” he said and before Klopp could respond, the answer came, “…you rocket!” Klopp would let off an enormous laugh but advised him to wait a little longer between the gag and the punchline. He likes to tell jokes himself, so the boy should take his advice. The conversation continued and right at the end the boy asked Klopp whether he could tell him his own secret. “Do you know why you always win?” According to the boy, it was because he makes a wish before every game. With that, Klopp gave him a big hug, whispering, “Keep some of those wishes for yourself…” Klopp the manager, Klopp the person. Not altogether that different. The father came away thinking he’d exceeded his expectations. “Whatever positive image you have of him in public, he’s 100 times that in private,” a source in Boston told The Athletic in the summer when Liverpool’s pre-season tour rolled into the city where the club’s ownership is based. There is another story, one which you may have read about before, though it is one with a direct link to sporting practice, which reminds where Liverpool have been and where they are now thanks to a manager who is planning to stick around for longer than many expected after he signed a two-year extension to his contract on Friday. That news was followed 24 hours later by a hard-fought 2-0 win over Watford, courtesy of two goals from Mohamed Salah. Watford’s visit to Anfield came almost exactly four years after Liverpool went to Vicarage Road and were bullied, losing 3-0. It was Liverpool’s Christmas get-together at Formby Hall golf club that night and many of the players involved expected it to be cancelled. Instead, Klopp distributed a message which decreed that everyone had to stay until at least 1am. “Whatever we do together, we do as well as we can and tonight that means we party,” a text read. With that, indeed, a four-match winless run at the beginning of Klopp’s reign came to an end with two hard-fought victories between Christmas and New Year, one of them over champions elect Leicester City. Klopp’s concerns about longevity as a manager relates to this voice and whether his messages will continue to hold the same meaning after several years at the same place. Listening to those who are able to speak on his behalf this week, it seems he has realised he has a unique opportunity at Liverpool to stay a little longer than he has elsewhere because of the career cycles of those he needs to convince most. Liverpool’s midfield in Saturday’s victory over Watford, for example, included two 29-year-olds in Jordan Henderson and Georginio Wijnaldum. Age is something Klopp is conscious of, an unavoidable feature of lifespans in any team. While one will be 32 and the other 31 by the time Klopp’s original contract would have ended in 2022, each member of the prized forward line will have either passed or will be pressing on 30. It is convenient that the lifespans of these players coincides, potentially, with their attention spans. It is different at Liverpool compared to Dortmund, where it was impossible for a team to grow old together because of the presence and appetite of Bayern Munich as well as other vultures from abroad. There is a future at Liverpool that did not exist in Dortmund, and certainly not Mainz. At Liverpool, the team is more likely to stay together for as long as he thinks it is benefiting the club. The challenge creating a new cycle on his own terms is something he’s never really experienced before and the talents of Curtis Jones, Harvey Elliott and Neco Williams excite him greatly. Klopp has more control at Liverpool than he did at Dortmund and more than he might have elsewhere. There can be few relationships in football as close as the one between Klopp and Mike Gordon, who hates creating headlines but could not avoid them last week after his airplane overshot the runway at John Lennon Airport in the early hours of Wednesday morning. He had been on Merseyside to oversee the final touches of a new deal for Klopp, someone he’d keep in charge forever if the circumstances were right. Gordon loves Klopp like a brother because he knows how much the German cares about the long-term welfare of the club he part-owns. When Klopp highlighted the importance of a new training ground barely a year into his Anfield tenure and was warned that funding for a new complex might impact on his own budget, Klopp response was: “Go for it.” It is possible that Liverpool will enter Christmas ten points above their nearest challenger with a game in hand. There has never been an opportunity like this to end the club’s 30-year wait for a title. Yet Klopp sees a bigger picture — an enticing longer-term pursuit. Should he overturn the weight of history, he sees it as part of his job that his successors find it easier to ensure a culture of success endures in a way that it probably hasn’t when you look at what has happened at Manchester United over the last six years. Klopp wants to create “a way of being”, said one source close to the manager, who admittedly did not know about the boy on the wall being invited back by Liverpool as a mascot for the Merseyside derby. Klopp recognised him in the tunnel that night and asked, “How are you doing?”

There are people who actually think Ederson is better. Mind boggling. Superb today

Ever see a player and think fuck me he's going to be playing for a big club soon, absolutely class player, hope we go for him? And then not only do you go and bloody buy him, you do it for the kind of money teams were paying 20 years ago? Love this. I think he's going to be absolutely brilliant. Sell Coutinho for 135 million, replace him for 7...! I actually think 5 or 6 of that Salzburg team will be moving on in the next couple of years, really really impressive

To be honest, that's actually very reassuring. Can't think of anywhere else I'd want absolutely shit loads of meticulous bureaucracy than from the people who make sure the planes are safe to fly

When we play really, really high quality teams that play toe to toe and press us (basically only man city), Lovren is noticeably a weakness on the ball for us as he's technically a level below