On a night when the £35 million man Andy Carroll was paraded before a crowd buoyed by the expectation of seeing the new incumbent Luis Suarez, who was included on the bench alongside the returning Carragher, Jermaine Pennant and Salif Diao. Liverpool old boys returned to the club with as part strong Stoke side looking for a rare win at Anfield.
Liverpool started with fascinatingly, three centre-half’s in Agger, Kyrgiakos, and Skrtel to negate the Stoke City aerial threat and Johnson and Kelly deployed as wing-backs as the management are obviously aware of the lack of a quality wide man at the club. Dirk Kuyt has he has so often was picked to play as a lone striker. Dalglish has already added a fluidity to the play which was missing earlier in the season, which helped Liverpool to breakdown a stubborn and regimented Stoke City defence and midfield with our players interchanging and been asked to play a more total type of game.
Kyrgiakos almost broke the deadlock early when his header was blocked by Diao. What is noticeable about Liverpool was our determination not to get frustrated with a Stoke side pressing high up the pitch, but to keep the slick passing moves going. This led to excellent chances just before the break, with first Gerrard releasing the marauding Kelly who delivered a glorious cross on the run, ala Stevie Nicol, on to the head of Glen Johnson, whose header was spectacularly parried away by Begovic. The second a minute later, was set up by Gerrard whipping an inviting cross which Kuyt in acres of space should have buried.
Before the break, following a swift moving instigated by the impressive Lucas, Gerrard knock the ball down to Kuyt, who hooked a shot over from close range. Liverpool continued our dominance into the second-half and the patience shown was rewarded in fortuitous fashion when a Gerrard free-kick from fully yards ricochet towards Kyrgiakos, who brought the ball under control and into the path of onrushing Meireles who showing he is equally adept with his left foot, drove the ball home from 8 yards. He has now racked up three goals in his last four games.
Stoke started to enjoy a lot more possession with John Carew causing Reina to scurry across his goal with a shot that flashed past the upright. Dalglish acted immediately, replacing the tiring Aurelio with the new £22.7 million signing Suarez coming on to play alongside the omnipresent Kuyt. On 79 minutes, Suarez made one of this blog's followers Leon's dream come true, when bursting on to a Kuyt flick he rounded the keeper and although Wilkinson manage to get to the ball, he only managed to stab the ball in off the post with the crowd inside Anfield almost blowing the roof of the stadium. Reina, as is his wont, produced an extinctive save from Walters shot to get back his norm of keeping clean sheets.
The win was well deserved and with excellent performances all-round with Suarez in his cameo, showing flashes of a pure talent which could well light up the Premiership in tandem with Andy Carroll. It will be interesting to see if this formation will be the one of choice for the foreseeable future. Now for Chelsea…
KP
Heard the game on the crackling Radio
ReplyDeleteAll around good performance, Kenny has enthused players to play pass and move football which is working on the pitch.
It was excellent for Suarez to score and get his first goal on his first appearance; his defiantly worth the money.
However, I think most of the debate is about why we paid £35m for Carroll, he will have to put in a big performance on his first game!
Now let us prepare for Sunday!
Suarez looks like a fantastic acquisition to me and as we await the exciting prospect of the £35m Andy Carroll to play alongside him - we are going to have to try and adjust our formations to suit Suarez's style of play. I would love to see Pacheco and Suso given some play time as well because once you have committed so much money towards two attacking players the younger members of the squad begin to feel left out. It is now down to King Kenny to continue to give the younger players in the squad hope that they can make that final big step upto becoming first team regular players like he seems to be doing with Jonjo Shelvey and Martin Kelly. Give quality youth players like Pacheco and Suso a chance and it will enhance our team play and also show we have the depth in our squad to again challenge for honours.
ReplyDeleteWith Suarez and Carroll in, the move should hopefully be to bring in more quality with a left back and two wide men on any shopping list and a dominant centre-half. Agreed that the emergence of Kelly and Shelvey should be a shot in the arm to all the youngsters with years of stagnation with no movement through the ranks. It's easier to bring younger players into a winning team as Man United and Arsenal have and it's that consistency which we ought to be aiming for as matter of course.
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