Search the Community

Take 8 mins out of your time to watch this Hull documentary. Very good film-making, and just think Anfield will be the same soon. The images bring it home. [YOUTUBE]8N7Qxh1mj0Q[/YOUTUBE]

its time for a real manager to come to LFCs rescue.

Over on the Members' Forum (in your dreams, peasants!) Red Nick has just admitted that he never comes around here anymore. Sounds like open season to me. (6) - Red Nick is a massive Peter Andre fan. - The mangina dance in Silence of the Lambs was based on Red Nick's daily pre-breakfast routine. - If you lick Red Nick, he tastes like the jelly stuff in the top of a cheap pork pie. - Red Nick once pushed 12 kumquats up his bunghole. He managed to recover 10 of them. - Red Nick is an Evertonian. Any more?

On the basis Torres stays its like taking Candy from a baby. A stronger team and squad than 2 years ago, no CL distraction, no teams to fear, chelsea seem to have gone backwards Its the best chance since 1990 to be champions There is only one thing that can stop us being champions.

Red Nick Insider sources can exclusively reveal that Fabio Capello will be anounced the next LFC manager after his private resignation to the FA this evening. Liverpool FC wasted no time once there captain broke the news to the club and imediately agreed a 4 year deal contract with the club. It an amazing turn of fortunes the favourite to be the next Liverpool manager Roy Hodgson is likely to be appointed the next England manager after spurning LFCs overtures. Just remember who bought you this worldwide exclusive and to be part of future world exclusives join our exclusive LFCREDNICK.com gold club great value at only 5.00 per month.

Yep thats me, well during the season i made a thread (unfortunately cant reboot it) called where would this team finish in the PL I cant remember it exactly but it was something like this. --------------------------Pepe------------------------ Carra---------------Sktrel------------Agger-------Aurellio---- ---------------------Lucas----------Plessis------------------ Benayoun-------------------Aqualani--------------Pacheo. ---------------------------Ngog----------------------------- Plus 60m to spend Sell Torres 70M Gerrard 30M Kuyt 10m Macherano 25m Babel 5m Reire 5M Johnson 15m You take 100m off the debt reduce the wage bill by 15m after signing new players and prepare for midtable medioctrity and keep reducing the debt until you find a buyer who will give you your profit. Anyway unless we find new owners this is quite a likely scernarion now.

He went from 80 points to 64 points some 17 points behind the champions after comming within 7 and had a chance on the last day to go to 67 and claim the CL place off chelsea who then might not have been bought by Abramovic. Rafa will probably take us back further than 10 points difference this season, however that doesnt tell the full story. LFC were in freefall and it was clear a lot of the players no longer wanted to play for the manager. However David Moores & Parry (one of the few things they ever did right) made it clear to the players that Houllier would be the manager the following season no matter what but if the players continued playing the way they were they might not be and surprise surprise our form improved. The downside of this is exactly the same happened the following season and we ended up on less points but because Newcastle had an even shitier year than us we got 4th and CL history was made under Rafa in 2005. This brings me on to the state we are currently in without a joint statement from HIcks and Gillett the players are going to continue to take the piss out of the manager and because the club is in dissarray I see no way for Rafa to ever get this back on course. You will never get the unifying statement in support of the manager because Gillett wants Rafa sacked and Hicks wants to keep Rafa. Also Hicks will never agree to the appointment of Klinnsman because it is a Gillett choice so actually getting them to agree to sack Rafa and agree on a new manager is fucking impossible To sumarise this post best WERE FUCKED

Now thats the truth

[YOUTUBE]1Xfi_CjKPrQ[/YOUTUBE] or [YOUTUBE]3gQuqkuhG5s[/YOUTUBE]

What a fucking pleyer I know its only a pre-season friendly but did anyone else notice that his passing today was better than Alonso's. Just hope he stays signs a new contract and Xabi Alonso fucks off. BTW Alonso never got involved one little bit when he came on but if I was Xabi in the same situation id take it easy. As for Mascher its pretty clear to me he's been working on his passing and if we can get his passing sustained we could have the new Graeme Souness.

Its the day the players and turned round to the manager and said we are going to win the league. You can continue to try and fix things that arent broke and make piss poor team selections but we wont allow you to derail our title challenge. We as a team will conquer all but FFS Rafa our life would be a lot easier if you didnt unintentionally try to may make our life harder by trying to be fix something that isnt broke. As I said a very special day for Liverpool FC players.

Dyed-in-the-red Robbie can kick on from here KEITH DUGGAN SIDELINE CUT: The Dubliner has had a long and colourful career but he is still young enough to reap even greater reward for his exceptional focus and persistence WHEN ROBBIE KEANE scans the Premiership table in the Liverpool Echo these days, he probably counts his blessings. With immaculate timing, he has gone from a club plummeting to the damp basement of the Premiership to one that looks poised for a return to old glories. A transfer from Spurs to Liverpool for €24.25 million to team up with one of the best strikers in the world is the stuff of childhood fantasy and as Keane has frequently remarked, standing in front of Anfield's Liver Bird symbol for post-match interviews, he had, as a kid back in Tallaght, dreamt of playing for Liverpool. On Wednesday night, when he scored against PSV Eindhoven, it was clear from the huge ovation emanating from the old ground that the Anfield crowd are eager for the Dubliner to succeed. His 11-game opening spell without a goal was hardly a catastrophic beginning to his Merseyside days but it was in danger of becoming a slightly awkward topic around the dressing-room. So Keane watched his flick until the ball was in the net and for a split second, as the great roar began, he looked stunned; then he headed off toward the end line to perform his formerly obligatory cartwheel and tumble. There it was then: Robbie Keane off and running in Kenny Dalglish's old number-seven shirt. At 28, Keane is ideally placed to leave a permanent mark on the annals of English football. Even in the short and lurid lifespan of the Premier League, countless overhyped professionals have passed under its bright lights, bouncing from club to club with their combinations of willing athleticism and unremarkable football skill. They shuffle into retirement with well-guarded investments and the Hello! lifestyle as compensation. But they leave also with the depressing knowledge that even though they were better at football than 99.9 per cent of the population, they were ultimately journeymen. The lucky ones might have an FA Cup or even a league medal as mementoes: many more will have to settle for action photographs of them squaring up to the incandescent figures like Denis Bergkamp or Alan Shearer or Roy Keane. But only a few get to make a lasting impression. For most of this decade, the general report on Keane was that he was a very good and honest striker who operated a shade below the marquee names like Michael Owen or Ruud van Nistelrooy - the boys the ex-pros on Match of the Day liked to purr over. Keane was never one to draw the most syrupy praise from the MOTD set: it was a rare evening they awarded him the ultimate Premiership accolade of being "top-drawer." But here is, at 28, playing for the most charismatic and - with the exception of the gloriously dysfunctional Newcastle United - strangest club in England. And it is hard to figure how Robbie is still in his 20s. The man seems to have been playing football forever. It is a full 10 years since he cracked home two goals on his debut for Wolverhampton Wanderers. He was just 18 then, chubby faced and cheeky and ready to take on the world. Six million notes - then a record for a teenager - brought him to Coventry and from there, of course, he was courted by Marcello Lippi and Inter Milan. And all of Ireland blushed with pride at that one because ever since Liam Brady went down a storm at Juve and Sampdoria, an Irish kid signing for one of the palaces of the Italian game has been a huge source of pride. Timing and circumstance meant it never quite worked out and back to the north he went, back to tradition and Leeds United. Then, as Don Revie's old club threatened to burn itself out of existence, Keane was sold to the Spurs. And all this time, he was showing up for Ireland, the years transforming him from the irrepressible kid to the senior professional. He quickly and methodically closed in and eclipsed the modest Irish goals record of 21 and regardless of his Premiership form, he turned up ready to play for Ireland. It might have gone differently for Keane. He might have burnt out. Goal scoring is such a temperamental business that too long on a cold bench or an ill-timed injury or a plain old dip in confidence might have led to a gradual retreat to lesser clubs. You only have to think of the career lives of two genuine Kop idols, Fowler and Owen, to be reminded longevity can prove elusive when it comes to strikers. The front men get the most explicit glory: they most often get to stand in the blaze of adulation. But every week without a goal brings increasing pressure to score. Keane endured his unsteady seasons and persevered; he bided his time and never lost the appetite for chasing down lost causes, more a terrier at heart than a princely leading man. But suddenly at Spurs it all clicked into place. The lessons of knocking around some of the most storied clubs in England and the craft he picked up from his sensational apprenticeship years at Wolverhampton through to his Saturdays playing on England's sacred grounds paid off. One hundred goals for Tottenham! Enough to ensure he will be fondly remembered by the Tottenham faithful. In the rapacious way of the Premiership, such was the vivid success of Keane's partnership with Dimitar Berbatov last season that ready cash was bound to smash it. Now, the Spurs front two have gone to the most evocative names in English football and the London club looks set for a long winter. And there is no time for sentimentality or regret. And so Keane has gone to Liverpool, the club he opted against signing for as a 15-year-old because he knew that much as he yearned to wear the red, Wolves was the smarter option for a callow Irish boy. Even before Wednesday, Ian Rush backed Keane to go "on a scoring run" once he found his rhythm and predicted his partnership with Torres gave Liverpool a real chance of winning the league for the first time since 1990. Since being bought by an odd and bickering American couple, Liverpool has been a deeply unsettled club. But while the team plays at Anfield and retains local heroes like Gerrard and Carragher, it retains more connections to its tradition than most modern sports clubs. When Rafa Benitez, the quietly stubborn coach whose interpretation of the game delights and confounds supporters in equal measure, spoke about Keane he praised him as "a good professional, with a good mentality, a player who has really settled down." And you can see that in the spare look on Keane's face, the hollowed cheeks of a serious and deeply ambitious footballer. He has made the transition from fearless teenager to a tough professional. It must have been a private highlight to have his name serenaded to the tune of an old Beatles classic on Wednesday. The best may be yet to come. Dyed-in-the-red Robbie can kick on from here - The Irish Times - Sat, Oct 04, 2008

We utterly dominated the game, and I think 2-0 flattered the bitters, but Cahill's sending-off was unjustified, in my opinion, and gives them a whining point. I'm sure reasonable Blues will say they'd never have won it anyway, and of course they wouldn't, but it's a shame that Riley, who I think had a very good game apart from that, had to blot his copybook with the Cahill decision. (Nando's goal should still have stood - so I count that as a hat-trick.)

With them Joint top and still very much in the title race and without them 10th and at least 6 points behind our major contenders for th title. For those who think were not a two man team the stats state otherwise.

Have i missed something? Why the fuck is he suddenly the new scapegoat in town? Every thread seems to have some dig at him. A few months ago most people loved the guy and thought he was a great bit of business. He may not be the quickest or as good a crosser as Finn used to be but he's hardly shite is he? Since he's been here he's been consistant and his versatility is an asset. Kept Ashley Young quiet yesterday and is part of a back 4 that hs conceeded one goal this season. I know a lot of people really rated Finnan but it's not Al's fault Rafa sees him as the best right back here. Give him a fucking break.

"I am not surprised [at United's yellow cards], the referee is there for this," said Scolari, the Chelsea manager. "If players do not respect him, it should be yellow and red cards. It doesn't matter who you are - Liverpool or Manchester United, whoever. It was strange that he [Riley] finished the game when he did but we need to accept his decision." Big Phil after the game, why did he mention us?!

LIVERPOOL 0 Stoke City 0 Report by Dave Usher at Anfield Scorer(s) – Half Time - 0-0 Venue - Anfield Date - Sat 20 September 2008 Star Man – Alvaro Arbeloa What a difference a week makes. From the euphoria and optimism of a stirring 2-1 win over the defending champions, to the depths of frustration following a sadly predictable 0-0 with one of the relegation favourites. That’s modern day Liverpool for you though, whenever we put ourselves in a position to challenge, we fuck it up. We’ve been doing it for years. It’s too early to say how costly this result will prove to be, but we can’t afford too many more like it. Taken in isolation, this isn’t a big deal. All the top sides will drop points to teams in the lower reaches, in fact they have already. Newcastle have been a joke this season, but they got a draw at Old Trafford. Spurs have been even worse, but drew with Chelsea, and Arsenal slipped up to Fulham. It happens, and even though it’s desperately disappointing I’d rather have dropped two points in this game than last week. Of course I’d prefer to have won both, and having done the ‘hard’ part last week I fully expected we’d be celebrating six points from these two fixtures. Four points from the two games isn’t the end of the world, but for the rest of the season it’s going to be difficult not to look back on these two points and say ‘if only we’d beaten Stoke at home’. It’s a terrible result, there’s no escaping that. But strangely I don’t feel too despondent about it. In fact, I felt a lot worse after the goalless draw we got at Villa Park. On paper a point away at Villa is much better than a point at home to Stoke. But we were really poor against Villa and didn’t even look as though we were trying to win the game. I thought we played quite well against Stoke and were a bit unlucky. We’ve played worse and won this season, four times in fact. We were poor away at Sunderland but won. We were poor at home to Boro and Liege but won, and we were poor for long periods of the Marseille game but won. In fact, the only time we have played well this season was last week against the mancs. So although we deserved to beat Stoke and produced some of our best football of the season, we can’t complain too much about fortune not being on our side given how much we had ridden our luck in previous games. Too often in the past we have seen games like this, where the opposition got everyone behind the ball and we couldn’t break them down. In fact, go back to this point last season and we were doing the very same thing against Birmingham. I even mentioned in the match preview how often we seem to drop points to newly promoted/about to be relegated sides. We shouldn’t be surprised by this result really, although I do think this game was a little different. Usually in this type of game, you can tell early on that it’s going to be a struggle. Too often we don’t move the ball around quickly enough and get bogged down trying to attack through the centre. Take that game against Birmingham last season as a classic example. We were very poor that day, and never looked like scoring. I never had that feeling against Stoke, I thought we generally did most things right but were let down by our finishing, long range shooting and our absolutely fucking awful set pieces. The rest of our play was top notch. Defensively we were untroubled, admittedly in part due to Stoke’s complete lack of ambition. In midfield we moved the ball around very well and switched the play from side to side looking for openings, and didn’t get too bogged down in the middle. The full backs got forward to give us extra options out wide, and on the whole I thought the performance was good. The main problem was that our strikers didn’t do their jobs, and Gerrard and Alonso didn’t have their shooting boots on. We created so many openings for shots from the edge of the box, but rarely managed to hit the target. Keane had two good chances from well worked moves, but each time he hit it straight at the keeper. Maybe he was trying to be too precise due to a lack of confidence? If he’d just gone for power he may have had more success, but then having swung and missed at two last week I can’t blame him for just ensuring he got good contact and directed it on target. Torres was just as guilty. He put a header wide, blasted one against the head of a defender and then put another high over the bar in the last minute. On another day, one of those would have gone in and we’d have notched up the three points. This is why I’m not too downhearted about the result, even if I am seriously frustrated about it. This time last year Rafa had left Torres out of that Birmingham game, and been roundly hammered for it. His argument was that even had Torres played there’s no guarantee we would have won. Whilst that is true up to a point – this game is proof of that – there is no question that Torres’ presence gives us a greater chance of victory, and on this occasion I don’t think there was much wrong with Rafa’s team selection. Personally I’d have started Babel instead of Kuyt, and given the way the game was going I’d probably have brought Yossi on sooner, but I think the team Rafa put on the field basically did everything he would have wanted from them – other than score. Actually, that’s not quite true. They did score, and I don’t think anyone inside Anfield knew why it had been ruled out. I certainly didn’t have a clue, and neither did anyone sat around me. There were only three possible reasons that I could see; 1) The free kick was indirect. 2) It was offside or 3) There was a foul in the box I thought it must have been the third option, simply because it couldn’t have been an indirect free-kick because Stoke restarted the game with a free-kick inside the box. I didn’t think it could have been offside as it clearly went straight in without anyone touching it, so I thought there must have been a foul. It was only after the game that I learned it had been ruled out for offside. Rafa claimed the ref made the decision, not the linesman. I didn’t see a flag go up, so it does seem that way. If there was no flag, then the ref is fucking bang out of order disallowing it. If there was a flag, then the linesman was wrong but shit happens. I don’t want to dwell on it too much anyway, as we still had 87 minutes to find a way through. Still, an early goal in these games makes all the difference, and had that stood I reckon we could have been looking at a repeat of the Derby County game last season. Ironically, that started with a goal from Alonso that was more or less identical to the one Gerrard saw ruled out. I really don’t like this ref anyway, he’s fucking awful. He was in charge of the games with Reading last season when Torres was getting the shit kicked out of him with no protection at all. But then again, as I said in the United report last week, Howard Webb is the best ref we have and even he’s shite. You have to expect that the officials are going to be bad these days, if they’re not it’s a bonus. It wasn’t just that disallowed goal that wound me up. His attitude towards Stoke’s time wasting was ridiculous. I don’t blame them for time wasting, it’s the sensible thing to do in their position. What angered me was that the referee actually did a better job of wasting time than they did. In the last couple of minutes there were three ludicrous examples of this. First, they tried to take a free-kick two yards away from where the offence took place. Instead of letting it go (the incident was in their half so it hardly mattered if they nicked a couple of yards), he made a big deal of stopping the play, running over and moving the ball back. Next, they had a free-kick on the edge of our box. We’re just wanting them to get on with it, but as they’re about to take it, over comes the ref and stops them. Why? So he could move the ball back about six fucking inches. Jesus wept. Finally, Fuller lashed out at Carragher in the corner. We get the free-kick, Carra tries to take it quickly but oh no, over comes Marriner, slow as you like, and books the Stoke forward. It wasn’t the fact he yellow carded him that pissed me off, it was the casual, nonchalant manner he did it. You know when you arrive at the train station and the train is already there, and you go to the ticket office to buy your ticket only for the guy to take fucking ages counting out your change. You’re thinking, for fucks sake hurry up my train is here you stupid dozy cunt. That’s Andre Marriner that is. Having said all that, he could have added on ten minutes and we probably wouldn’t have scored, as it was just one of those days. On another day, we’d have won handsomely. Torres and Keane would have put their chances away, or Gerrard and Alonso would have banged one in from the edge of the box. That was one of the most frustrating things for me, as we worked so many good shooting situations from 25 yards but aside from one brilliant strike from Alonso in the first half, Sorensen wasn’t really tested. Even worse than our long range shooting though were our corners. We are definitely the worst team in the league when it comes to corners. Our delivery isn’t the best, but it isn’t just down to that. We don’t seem to attack the ball very well and we hardly ever look like scoring from them. If we sorted that out it would go a long way towards helping us make a title challenge. Being able to get ‘cheap’ goals from set-pieces is a fantastic weapon to have. When Chelsea won the league twice in succession under Mourinho, a phenomenal amount of their goals came from set-pieces. Most of the mancs’ goals against us in the last ten years or so have come from set-pieces, but we hardly ever seem to get goals from corners. It’s seriously irritating. We had about twenty corners against Stoke and never threatened even once (apart from one that was cut back to Alonso on the edge of the box for a shot). Not good enough, and there’s no excuse as it’s something we could work on in training. Picking a star man was difficult, because although I thought most of the side played well, no-one really stood out. I’m going for Arbeloa, as I thought he had another good game and got forward well. Alonso and Gerrard played well too, and Carragher had another good game. We need to get the forwards firing quickly though, as generally we seem to be defending quite well but we are not scoring enough goals. Torres doesn’t look fit, and Keane desperately needs a goal. On the plus side, I like Riera and when he gets himself to full fitness he could be a real asset. I think it’s time to get Babel in the starting line up for a run of games now, just to see what he can do. Next week it’s the derby, and a win there will wipe out the sense of disappointment we’re all feeling now. We can’t get these two points back though, regardless of how many other games we win. I just hope we don’t live to regret this game come May. Team: Reina; Arbeloa, Skrtel, Carragher, Dossena; Kuyt, Gerrard, Alonso, Riera (Babel); Torres, Keane (Benayoun):

and Paul was right Cant remember the full details paul perhaps you could PM how much I owe and where it goes. Really thought Agger and Sktrel would be the first choice start of this season but you were right.

Him up in January, easily my MOM even if he was on the losing side cut us to ribbons time after time reminded me of ZZ in his pomp We Should most defo make an effort to Swap Alonso for him in Jan The Marseille number 7 is a LFC player if ever I saw one. Cheryrou what a player

Wonder how that went down with Rafa.