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Nearly every weekend game over the past month has been in that Sunday two o’clock slot. The PL could have scheduled the Leicester game for the Wednesday so we could play on Saturday, in order to have reasonable time to recuperate before travelling to Italy for a game in midweek in the Champions League. This is the PL though, famed for money-grabbing short-sightedness. And so we travel to Turf Moor, a ground in a part of the world where monsoon conditions are the norm. Anyway: Bravery. Ruthlessness. Efficiency. X-factor. Intelligence. Timing. I don’t ask for much. Last season’s fixture came towards the tail end of the season at a time when we were starting to put a run together to climb back into a top 4 spot, while others began to fall by the wayside one by one. It was expected to be a hard-fought affair but ended up being a bit of a walk in the park. Bobby put us ahead late in the first half when getting on the end of a low ball in from the left flank. Big Nat got his first goal for the club in the second half, reacting well to plant a header into the net. He’d been a big part of the team’s renaissance in the spring, with his no-nonsense defending giving the team a sure-footed platform that had been lacking over the winter months. Ox wrapped things up late on, picking the ball up on the left side of the area, taking his man on and firing a sharp effort in at the near post. We had an even better time of it up in deepest darkest Lancashire on Boxing Day 1969, thrashing the Clarets 5-1. Most players used to pile in on the Christmas dinner and had more than their fair share of booze. It’s probably why Boxing Day games are so well regarded, because you usually get a hugely entertaining full of the inexplicable because some players are so obviously out of it. With smaller squads in those days, managers used to pick the same team week-in week-out so quite a few regulars would make an arse of themselves over the festive period. It was a squad player, Ian Ross, who set us on our way, with Graham and Lawler adding to the lead before half time. Further goals from Peter Thompson and Callaghan rubbed further salt in Burnley’s wounds, with only a consolation goal from O’Neill for the home fans to cheer. This wasn’t a Liverpool side on the brink of something great, but rather the last hurrah of Shanks’ 1960s stalwarts. The boss would shake things up at the end of the season to build his second excellent team around younger, hungrier players. We had an early FA Cup exit and finished miles behind champions Everton in the league. Here’s a match report from The Guardian. The big box office draw after Christmas 1969 was Sydney Pollack’s They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? It was based on a novel that was released a few years earlier, and starred Jane Fonda. I’ve heard of the film but though it might be a western of some sort, but it’s actually a film about a dance competition. It’s set during the Great Depression of the 1920s, where people sought an escape via ‘dance marathons’, basically dancing ‘til you drop in an endurance contest in an attempt to gain some local, and maybe some national, fame. If you think I’m basically cribbing off Wikipedia, you’d be right! I’ve not seen this film but it was a critical and commercial success, and got nominated for a slew of Oscars - a record of nine, though not Best Picture. That was taken by the brilliant Midnight Cowboy. The manager might have Sadio available for this one, in addition to everyone else who has returned recently. He’s got a squad depth not always available to him this season, so he can afford to give a number of players an hour or so before bringing on someone else without weakening the team. Indeed the changes might even push the team on to do even better. Make the most of it, do all the right things, and grab the 3 points. We are more than capable.