With a line-up led by the irrepressible duo of Steven Gerrard and Craig Bellamy Liverpool had the look of a team with attacking intent and with the Gerarrd pulling the strings to say that we bolted out of the traps would not have be an exaggeration. Liverpool should have taken the lead through Andy Carroll, who collecting Downing's through ball drove past Savic and shot straight at Joe Hart when composure was the order of the day. [Another Downing assist spurned].
Twice in a minute Liverpool tested Joe Hart. The first, a curling shot from the captain with very little back lift which Hart tipped away and from the resulting corner, Gerrard's floated over a pinpoint cross which Downing volleyed and Agger instinctively flicked towards the corner of the goal with Hart pulling of the save of the season. Liverpool finally took the lead from Gerrard's penalty after had been Agger mowed down in the area.
Jay Spearing until he went off and Jordan Henderson provided the legs to allow Steven Gerrard to control the game from the middle and play a more introverted role than his usual rampaging game. They easily controlled, beckoning City to break them down and keeping possession when we had it. Andy Carroll out muscled Lescott to header a Kelly cross wide and City had only one clear cut chance towards the end of the first half which Milner blazed over after Richards had powered past Johnson, who had quite an uncomfortable first half defensively.
Liverpool continued to play the game mind-set of a European tie which given the City line-up, bereft of Silva and YaYa Torre brought City back in the game and almost led to the them equalising with Richards header brilliant stopped by Reina almost on the hour mark. We began giving up position which was difference between our play in the latter half of the first period and first-half of the second and also Gerrard's influence was no longer at his height, partly because of City packing the midfield and the great man seemingly pacing himself to get through the game.
If anyone was in any doubts about Dalglish's intention, when Carragher replaced Bellamy (surprising with his ability to offer an outlet) on the 80 minute mark, Liverpool had Enrique, Skrtel, Agger, Kelly, Johnson and Carragher on the pitch to protect the lead. In saying that City were fairly placid with the lack of invention and it is why Kenny Dalglish is Liverpool manager and I am writing this blog!
King Dalglish (Mirror.co.uk)
If you had asked any Liverpool supporter if they would have taken a one-one draw before the game they'd have snapped your hand off and after all we have more to lose as Stevie said "Sometimes you have to do the ugly stuff". Role on Anfield in two weeks time.
Kop Post Man of The Match: Pepe Reina – showed in two instances why he is a truly world class goal keeper.
When Andy Carroll missed that glorious chance early on I immediately thought of deja-vu with Downing missing a similar chance in the league game eight days ago.
ReplyDeleteJoe Hart again seemed to have the number on our attackers until a mistake in the box by Savic who fouled Agger.
Our captain fantastic again showed the rest how to put the ball past Hart and that was that.
In the second half we created a 7-3-0 formation to hold what we had and for a change this worked!
So we now go to Anfield with a vital 1-0 win and hope to put this tie to bed in front of our fans.
Very good win.
If it was not for the penalty then wonder where the goals would have come from. We started of well pressuring the play on city, and Carroll should have put his chance away.
ReplyDeleteI thought Johnson in the first half did not play up to standard and gave the ball away to many times.
Kelly and Downing, made some good passes to Gerrard, for him top open play, Bellamy pouncing on loose balls, which City found hard to get around our midfield.
When Nasri came on City started to open up, but again we were pretty rock solid at the back, and our midfield made it hard for them to play around our back four.
I thought Pepe Reina played excellent covering many times our defensive mistakes, you could see he was screaming at them.
Second half it felt that we had 11 players behind the ball, City having 65% of the possession, we started to feel the pressure, with Adam, Johnson, giving away unnecessary free kicks
It was good to see Carragher does what he does best to provide some order and control at the back and keeping the defence locked down.
My MOTM - Pepe Reina, clean sheet, made saves which would have cost us a goal, and screaming and shouting at the back four for making defensive mistakes.
Alright everyone?
ReplyDeleteI just need to say that I was very disappointed with our tactics and performance in the 2nd half lastnight. It was anti-football and in the last half an hour we had 6 defenders onthe pitch and were firmy camped out in our own half. City improved after thebreak but that was only because we invited them onto us, Rafa would have beenproud of that formation and I thought those days were over. City were there forthe taking and with a little more guts on our point we could have had the tiesewn up last night. I know I should be pleased but I can’t feel proudabout that performance, showed them way to much respect.
Andy Carroll is bobbins and needs to be sold.
I agree with Barry that we should have tried to take advantage of Man City and tried to go in 2-0, then sit back a little. We looked like a schoolboy side for most of the 2nd half. Johnson, Kelly and Carragher, all seemed to have a go at playing something like centre midfield.
DeleteHaving said how much I detest the way we play, I think we got a good result.
The most boring football display of theseason goes to..........'Liverpool Football Club', Congratulations Liverpool'
ReplyDeleteWe seem to be making headlines for thewrong reason every game now days.....although at least we won, that was themain thing but boy I must've wasted 80% battery on my I-Phone while that gamewas on.
To be fair to Carroll, what chance has theman got of improving when you have absolute no service game in game out...hewas literally the only player last night that crossed the half way line in thesecond half, what can he do when the ball is pumped in the air to him. Heneeds bags of service and opportunities or he's just going to get worse as aplayer. I would hate to be a centre forward with mediocre players like Henderson, Adam, Downingand Spearing backing me up.
I thought Agger was Immense!!
I can agree more Barry. It was like watching conference side play premiership team or if like it was like Wimbledon of old defending their one goal lead against the might of Liverpool in FA Cup final if you are that old to know that. We won yes but it was painful to watch.
ReplyDeleteIt is an insult of the first order for Newcastle to ask us if there is any truth in the story to give them back Andy for £10m. That is very sad.
Just been told by an Aston Villa fan atwork “we might as well bring John Toshack back for Liverpool!!”he added “Carroll is so slow – can’t header, can’t run”this is the regular abuse I have to take about our 35m striker !!!
ReplyDeleteAbout the game – I am happy for thewin which we would all have taken before the night began – City werethere for the taking and I really hope we don’t regret our negativetactics when their main attacking creative player David Silva plays in thesecond leg at Anfield.
7-3-0 is not a formation I would everbelieve that our manager would use – it was definitely a return to thetactics of Ged Houllier and Rafa.
Win the 2nd leg and hopefullyall will be forgotten about this tactic.
dedlfc
Watching the last 20 minutes of the game got me wondering just how we got the pen in the first place. Of course I am yet to see the first half display!
ReplyDeleteIt was like the old days, get a goal and defend like Mad, 11 players behind the ball, its ugly, but its a win.
ReplyDeleteRedAlert
The first twenty minutes was top draw. Stevie was puling the strings like a guitar tuner and to be fair up until he got injured thought Spearing was having a strong game.
ReplyDeleteLord knows what's happened to Downing's confidence since the first few games of the season. The last time he did a decent cross he just about made it to the other side of the road! He looks woefully out of form - Viv Richards was the originator of the saying 'form is temporary, class is permanent' I just hope Downing doesn't belong to the former! Thought Skrtel ate up everything in the air and put in some last ditch tackles. Talking about tackles, long before Glen Johnson put in that ankle breaker, he was producing a particularly poor defensive display.
Pepe produced two top class pieces of goalkeeping to keep ahead. Without Kompany, Yaya and Silva the spine of their team was stripped bare and we could easily put the game to bed before half-time if we had kept our foot on the jugular, but I guess the pressure to win something and being so close to Wembley causes changes in tactics even 70 minutes from the end of the game!
I understand the desire to shore up a defence, but I thoughtwe looked much more comfortable in the first half when were actually playing football and had possession. The last half hour was very nervous.
DeleteI think we can argue that we did the playing on those two occassions we played City this season and did not get what we deserved, but we play ugly and City come unstuck and we got a win of some sort. I pray we do not try to put the bus or coach in the goal mouth in two weeks time.
ReplyDeleteWatched the match, thought we did well but was hoping we had scored more, feltlike Mourinho's Inter against Barcelona CL second leg at the Nou camp.
ReplyDeleteHopefully we can do the deed at Anfield in 2 weeks time.
Bala
If we get another early goal in the nextleg you can bet that we will go to this kind of formation
ReplyDeleteReina
Kelly Agger Carra Skrtl Enrique
Johnson Flannagan Gerrard Robinson
Donkey Boy
Barry - I think Doni will also play.
DeleteThink Doni should play up-front!!!!
Deletededlfc
Oh yeah, forgot about Doni, he'll come on for Stevie if he tires in the second half, best to leave some options on the bench
DeleteExcellent news - Stevie G has extended his contract again - the maximum we can get out of him the better - he is still our best player and I want him at our club until he can no longer do it at the top level - which I believe is another 3-4 years at least - he is that good!!!
ReplyDeletededlfc
His comments upon signing his contract says it all apart his abition and feelings for the club:
Delete"This is the club I love and is the club I have supported since I was a young boy," he said.
"I am living the dream as the captain of one of the biggest clubs in the world.
"I love coming to work every day and the experiences I have had since I was eight years of age and first signed for the club, I wouldn't change them for the world.
"To extend that and to hopefully have some more good times in a red shirt is what I want.
"There will be more highs and lows, there's no doubt about it as that's part and parcel of being a football player at a top club.
"The important thing is that you react well to the lows and experience more of the highs.
"I'm confident moving forward that the club is going in the right direction.
"We've got a fantastic team, we've got the right owners in place and the right team behind our team, so I'm really confident we'll have more good experiences in the future."
"It's a very proud day for myself and my family," the midfielder told liverpoolfc.tv.
"It comes on the back of a fantastic team performance last night when we got the result we were looking for.
"The contract extension coming the day after has been the icing on the cake so it has been a perfect 24 hours."
"It's really flattering for me that the club have offered me the chance to stay when I eventually hang my boots up," he said.
"Hopefully that will be in many years to come because I want to play for as long as I can.
"I'll know myself when it's time to hang my boots up and then hopefully I can stay involved with the club and set the right example for youngsters coming through."
Kenny Dalglish said:
"In this day and age there's not many people who go through their football career and represent just one club, especially people with quality like Steven," he said.
"If you're happy where you're playing, you're enjoying what you're doing and you enjoy the football club I don't see any reason to move, and it's fantastic for us that he hasn't."
Director of football Damien Comolli commented:
"The way he puts the team first and the club first over his interests is absolutely tremendous," said the Frenchman.
"He's a fantasy professional and it's just great to have someone like this at the club.
"He's a leader, he's charismatic, he's a top player and he's a team player.
"There's not much more you can ask for from an individual."
CONTRACT FOR LIFE! by far he is the best playter, World Class. I wish he gets his dream... for winning the Premiership for Liverpool FC.
ReplyDeleteRedAlert