Supremolad

Agree that this 2 week break comes at a good time especially for players who wont be involved in important games for the national teams. I think we the fans also need this two week break. These past few weeks have been mentally exhausting to watch. Many fans are already feeling emotionally drained, so imagine how those players are feeling. I am reluctant to criticise the team for not playing "too well" over the past few weeks. They have played well enough most times imho. There have been a few tough opponents in the run of games from February. We were hardly going to smash all of them 6 nil like we did Leeds.

"I haven’t seen an angle that leads me to believe it was onside." This angle should help. Looks quite onside here.

Frank obviously took the defeat quite well.

Actually I just listened to the podcast there. Gareth said "several" weeks not seven. Several can be as few as 3 weeks. I agree with you that it is hopefully a ruse to get him out of the international break.

They said so? Were they speculating or stating it as fact? All the reports I am seeing dont mention 7 weeks at all.

Great pod. Regarding the Trent v Reece James debate, I dont think Trent is actually defensively inferior now. In fact, there were stats knocking around last year which showed Trent was better than him at defensive metrics like tackles and interceptions. Tbf, I dont have the stats for this season so I'm open to being shot down based on those. I do think we shouldnt ignore the fact that James plays as a wingback with the security of a center back behind him due to Chelsea's 3 at the back system. This ensures he doesnt have to do as much defending compared to Trent who has to cover a lot more area in his fullback role. Overall, I think Trent is the better player defensively and offensively. Especially with the noticeable improvement in his defending over the past year.

We need more end product from Diaz, it is fair to say. 1 goal in 6 starts isnt great. However, I also love his work ethic and defensive contributions. I think it was with the Antonio chance which Keita intercepted, you can see Diaz sprinting at full speed from the centre circle to get back into the box to help out. Just a typical example of his all round game.

What you said about Alisson isnt controversial at all, regarding his dallying on the ball. He has been doing it for ages. Quite often, he waits just an extra couple seconds too long before releasing his pass. His kicking of the ball is good but it can be erratic We have conceded big chances and goals to opponents because of it. Kelleher is better with the ball at his feet. Not by a mile but by enough to not give us heart attacks!!

Yep. Would like him to beat his man on the outside occasionally. It would make him more unpredictable. He is an exciting talent and a threat. But we do need to see some more end product between now and end of the season. 1 goal in 6 starts isn't earth shattering. Although to be fair, he has been unlucky with a few attempts.

Turns out Jones and Keita make the squad today. Only absentees to injury are Firmino and Thiago who are likely to be back next week. So fret not, happy times are still here.

Great stuff, Dave. Got more than a few proper chuckles out of me. Good shout about Southampton and good that they also got City in the FA cup because they would cause Pep some more headaches in that one.

Great report, Dave. Really enjoyed the article but let's clear up the Mane titty lip narrative. True, he was disappointed to be taken off but him standing aside during the celebrations was because of his religious beliefs about alcohol. Being a devout Sunni muslim, he tries to avoid any contact with it. There is a video of him chatting to Minamino before the champagne started getting sprayed. And even though Minamino respectfully agreed not to spray any, other people around did. That's why Mane eventually had to stand aside. There are a few pictures of him afterwards smiling and holding the trophy after that. He is fine.

They dont always have Manc officials and Mike Dean does referee our games. Still did so some weeks ago at Anfield when we played Newcastle. I know we are pissed off at the handball incident but let's not resort to outright lies.

Michael Oliver tends to be generous to us. Not that he favours us every game but we get quite a few penalties and 50/50s off him in comparison to other refs. He also gave us 2 penalties in the Leeds game at Anfield last season in addition to some other penalties over the years. The derby at Goodison last year is the one big stain on his copy book. Although, he did admit afterwards he got the Van Dijk incident wrong. VAR should have been helping him out on that one. David Coote, the fucking cunt. For the game on Wednesday, going by the current rules he has to give that penalty for handball. Defender's arm was away from his body and the cross wasn't from very close range. The 2nd penalty Oliver awarded was soft as fuck though. Mane was already going down after messing up his attempt to dribble round the keeper.

That clip of Guardiola spouting absolute bollocks is incredible. First time seeing it and it was as bad as the preview Dave gave it. He even had the audacity to whinge about being knocked out "unfairly" from the CL. A competition they shouldn't even have been playing in the first place due to their shady shit. What a cunt.

We had problems in that first half. Henderson was the very least of them. Extremely harsh to say he had been appalling before Thiago came on.

Cant be praising our squad depth and then be worried when Klopp uses that depth to rest a couple key players while playing against one of the worst teams in the league at home. Surely people aren't shitting the bed because Trent isnt playing against Norwich today. We would still create enough chances for our front three and those three would even create chances for themselves. We are winning this.

Dont think he is. Only Jota and Bobby are out officially. But giving Trent a day off today should limit the chance of him being injured over the next few games. Needed a break at some point and I would think today is the best time to rest him.

Top, top "Jonathan Pearce is a fucking cunt" analysis, Dave. I really despise his sanctimonious, self important, shit views when he is commentating on MOTD.

I see some are putting forward the theory that Klopp's instructions might be holding Curtis back. However, a few weeks ago Klopp said to the media that he had actually had a chat with Curtis. Told him it was time to step up a level, more or less. So I certainly believe Klopp isn't the one telling Curtis to hold onto the ball too long before eventually playing it safe or losing it. I still believe we would see more from the lad but at the moment, it'll be tough for him to get in ahead of some of our other players in midfield.

Joined a couple years ago and shortly after got hooked by Dave's unique match reports and his other content. Became a subscriber. Thought it was an absolute bargain for the amount of TLW content archived over the years which became accessible. Then I noted Dave's unfathomable love for Adama Traore. I was going to pack it all in but thankfully he stripped Traore of "his boy" status. So here am I, still contributing to the millions in Dave's bank account and happy to do so. I rarely use the MF though. I find the FF more entertaining. And although I like the TLW podcasts, I make sure I read the match reports on here before listening to the pods. Because the pods drop first, listening to the episodes is like having a spoiler-filled version of the match report which gets uploaded later.

Still won't stop commentators and pundits banging on about how silly it is that Liverpool have a high defensive line.

Look how excited Virgil is. "He's back, the main man". That's why I always say our top players would absolutely be thrilled to have Mo sign a new contract. They wont be thinking, "this fucker is on 350k a week now". They'll just be made up that he is still at the club.

This is not the best analysis to use. BBC are showing stats from penalty shootouts in World cups. That is a small sample size. I reckon there have been far fewer than 100 penalty shootouts in World Cup history. Most likely not even up to 50. The best research on penalty shootouts is the one I posted earlier from InStat. They studied thousands of shootouts. A bigger sample size, which shows that the 5th kick is harder to score than the 1st one. Hence if you had to choose between 1st and 5th, it makes more sense to have your best kicker on the 5th.