With our team 2-0 down from the first leg, we needed the support of the crowd and the whole team to have a great game to turn the tie to our favour.
Zenit are currently on their mid season break and so therefore had to use several friendlies to get prepared for our games against them.
We started the brighter of the two teams with our sorcerer Suarez causing the Zenit defence constant problems but it was a costly lack of concentration by our most experienced defender in his 150th and ultimately last European game, with a poorly judged back pass which allowed Hulk clean through on goal to open the scoring after 20 minutes with the all important away goal.
With us now facing an uphill struggle, needing four goals to get through our fantastic crowd pushed the team on to try and turn this around, with us needing inspiration on the pitch the under fire Agger went on a great run and was fouled on the edge of the area, Suarez stepped up to take the free kick and proceeded to drive the ball through the poor Zenit wall into the back of the net for the equaliser.
The momentum had just begun to swing to us and the team drove on, a very nice move between Enrique, Henderson and the out of form Joe Allen culminated in Allen smashing the ball home from a save from the Zenit keeper Malafeev for a 2-1 lead for us at the half time break.
With our team now playing towards our Kop end, we kept driving for a third goal and preceded to get the goal through a wonderful free-kick from Suarez, with the Kop baying for our captain to step up to take the free kick, sorcerer Suarez curled the ball from about 30 yards past the despairing Zenit keeper Malafeev for a 3-1 lead with just over 30 mins left.
The Kop was now in rapturous form with the team now needing one more goal to get through, Rodgers made a decision to change the team at the exact moment we had scored our third goal, he took off Henderson and Allen for Shelvey and Assaidi.
Assaidi looked extremely lively down the left wing when he came on and was a constant threat, whereas Shelvey looked like a player trying too hard to impress the boss after falling out of favour in recent weeks.
Shelvey missed a glorious chance to prove his worth to the team when he hit the side netting from close range whilst Gerrard and Suarez both tested Malafeev, Suarez with yet another free-kick and Gerrard with an effort that bobbled before forcing the keeper to push the effort away with his fingertips.
It wasn't enough though for us, even the late addition of Raheem Sterling couldn't give us the deserved extra boost we needed and, despite winning 3-1 on the night, we sadly went out of the Europa League on goal difference.
Man of the match - Luis Suarez
Desperate to make up for his ultimately costly missed opportunities in the first leg, Suarez was determined throughout. Our sorcerer tried to turn a game around through his constant running and two brilliant free kicks nearly helped us get through but to no avail. We now have 11 league games to help ensure we at least have Euro league football secured for next season to offer Suarez because I fear if we are out of Europe completely next season, we will lose our sorcerer this summer to a side that can offer him the Champions League platform the world class performer deserves to showcase his skills in.
Positives
Lucas Leiva
Desperate to make up for his ultimately costly missed opportunities in the first leg, Suarez was determined throughout. Our sorcerer tried to turn a game around through his constant running and two brilliant free kicks nearly helped us get through but to no avail. We now have 11 league games to help ensure we at least have Euro league football secured for next season to offer Suarez because I fear if we are out of Europe completely next season, we will lose our sorcerer this summer to a side that can offer him the Champions League platform the world class performer deserves to showcase his skills in.
Positives
Lucas Leiva
Our steady Brazilian looked like he was struggling to get back to his best but showed the qualities we have missed in the side with some excellent interceptions, tackling and intelligent passing.
The Kop
The crowd tried everything they could to spur the team on to turn this tie around and again showed why they are famous the world over for their fantastic support.
Negatives
Carragher
What an sad way for one of our legends to bow out of European football with us, he has been absolutely colossal for us over so many European nights but it was his error which has ended our chances of winning any trophies. Fantastic LFC career - YNWA
Timing of the substitutions
With Rodgers still being wet behind the ears in European football, I feel he potentially lost this tie by (in hindsight) not delaying the subs until 20 minutes left, the third goal had gone in, the momentum was very much with us so giving Henderson and Allen, ten more minutes would not have done any harm and Zenit noticeably improved briefly straight after the third LFC goal as the subs had to get up to the speed of the rest of the team.
The Kop
The crowd tried everything they could to spur the team on to turn this tie around and again showed why they are famous the world over for their fantastic support.
Negatives
Carragher
What an sad way for one of our legends to bow out of European football with us, he has been absolutely colossal for us over so many European nights but it was his error which has ended our chances of winning any trophies. Fantastic LFC career - YNWA
Timing of the substitutions
With Rodgers still being wet behind the ears in European football, I feel he potentially lost this tie by (in hindsight) not delaying the subs until 20 minutes left, the third goal had gone in, the momentum was very much with us so giving Henderson and Allen, ten more minutes would not have done any harm and Zenit noticeably improved briefly straight after the third LFC goal as the subs had to get up to the speed of the rest of the team.
Liverpool: Reina, Johnson, Carragher, Agger, Jose Enrique, Lucas, Allen (Shelvey 59), Downing (Sterling 84), Gerrard, Henderson (Assaidi 59), Suarez.
Subs not used: Gulacsi, Coates, Suso, Wisdom.
Booked: Shelvey.
Goals: Suarez 28, 59, Allen 43.
Zenit St Petersburg: Malafeev, Aniukov, Luis Neto, Lombaerts (Criscito 46), Hubocan, Witsel, Denisov, Shirokov, Danny (Faitzulin 46), Hulk, Semak (Rodic 84).
Subs not used: Zhevnov, Bruno Alves, Bukharov, Kerzhakov.
Booked: Denisov.
Goals: Hulk 19.
Att: 43,026
Referee: Bjorn Kuipers (Holland)
As the title to the email stated yesterday we gave them the fright of their lives but sadly it was not quite enough as I have stated in the attached match report we now need to try everything we can to get as many wins as possible to at a minimum qualify for Europa League again next season or we can kiss goodbye to Suarez this summer.
ReplyDeleteVery proud of the boys last night !!!
David agree, not more that we could ask, for. They gave everything they could, but already we had a mountain to climb before the game.
DeleteWe could go into the game with detail, like we should have had at least a penalty for one of the handballs,
Carragher, back pass to unleash Hulk, and score, and I did not believe we needed to make any subs, bringing on JS was waste of space he looked lost.
It was not quite enough, and sadly we just ran out of time.
Well done to the boys.
As I said yesterday, this was a test for our lads. And to be fair, most of them stood up to the challenge, including Lucas. We dominated the game, and fought hard. I thought we were a bit unlucky not to get the penalty.
DeleteNow for Champions League qualification!
really gutted to have gone out as think we'd of had a decent chance of going all the way and when suarez second free-kick went in it looked like we'd definitely get a fourth and I was starting to envisage a trip to amsterdam in May.
DeleteThink the criticism of BR over substitutions is a bit harsh and easy in retrospect but actually thought assaidi did alright and hope he get a bit more playing time between now and then end of the season as think he could be a useful squad player. Think the change was probably more to do with having to play with abandon until we got the third and then having to be a bit more cautious as we only needed one.....
As feared conceding was the killer but performance should offer encouragement as Zenit are no mugs and to have put them under so much pressure and restricted them to a couple of chances when having to push forward is hopefully another sign of things moving, albeit slowly, in the right direction.
Think CL is going to be too much to ask but just hope we can finish season strongly to hopefully create a bit of momentum to go into next season and hopefully convince suarez to give us one more season to try and get back into CL
I think the real achievement for this season now will be keeping Suarez as a LFC player for the start of next season !!!!
DeleteSuarez is going nowhere.
DeleteFBJ
Hi Freddy,
DeleteI really hope you are right as he alongside Gerrard is our star player but will only stay without CL football so long – he is 26 years old and will want and deserves to play in the top competition – I would love to know he would stay just for the love of the club but the Torres fiasco taught me that world football stars words are only as good as how successful their club is.
We are currently not a team able to compete at the top table which is a fact even though it hurts to say that !!!
I hear you David.
DeleteBut in reality, most players don’t stay just for the love of a club. They stay if the commercials are right. Suarez has a sweet contract generating lots of $$, his young family are settled, he’s got lots of Spanish speaking team mates and most importantly he’s the top dawg around which the club is being built.
He’ll give the club one more season.
Freddy
His top class, for now he seems to be enjoying it, but for how long, apart from SG, his cut above the rest, and can be in a team which is in all competitions and winning end,
DeletePlayers he quality, start to get frustrated, and the lack of winning ability in our team, , he will start to feel this and it be time to move on.
True. But he’s only 26. He’ll give it another year. Then he’ll do a RVP and join Real Madrid or something.
DeleteTo be honest though, LFC really needs to move away from this strategy of being over-reliant on one or two player. It leaves the club over exposed and it’s very bad business indeed.
Hopefully Brendan will do something to bring some more quality (& get rid of the dross) so that the scoring load can be better distributed throughout the team.
Freddy
That’s exactly why he was brought to the club to change the reliance on one or two players but so far he has failed miserably as we over-rely on Suarez too much !!!!
DeleteBringing in Sturridge has helped a little but we need even more quality around the team so opposition defences do not know where the goals are coming from !!!
I think the signing of sturridge is already going some way to addressing that. Think he looks more than capable of becoming a reliable twenty goal a season man and hopefully he will help convince suarez that we can be much more competitive next season. Only concern on that front is that suarez seemed to be getting massively p*ssed off with him on sunday, when his old ball greedy traits started to reaapear!
DeleteI agree with your points David.
DeleteBut we need to be patient and give the gaffer a bit more time though. Rome wasn’t built in a day.
Freddy
Exactly and we've already scored more this season than last and look like scoring a few in most games we play...I think we are more in need of imporvement in defence and in terms of being less vulnerable when we lose possession. Hopefully a lucas returned to peak form will go some way to addressing that but think we need strengthening in both central defence and defensive midfield. We obviously still need fuirther depth in attack with borini looking very suspect but I think a front three of suarez, sturridge and coutinho will cause most teams a lot of problems....if suarez stays obviously, which i think he will
DeleteI’m all for giving the gaffer more time – Rome wasn’t built in a day and all that. However, there less chance of it being built within a generation if we maintain our current philosophy of just buying a player because they’re 5 foot 6, or because they’re technically (if given the time and space) a good player, under 22, and cost half the money in wages of established players.
DeleteFor me, we still haven’t set out a policy that is likely to get us back in the Champions League in the next two seasons. We’re too short of quality, physicality and without sufficient strikers (and I don’t mean Borini) at the club.
I have to say I am one of Reina’s biggest critics over the last few seasons because of the extremely high standard he set himself when he joined the club but I thought he pulled off a couple of great saves which showed what a great keeper he has been for us over the years.
DeleteJust want him getting back to being consistently good with the help of a reliable back 4 in front of him.
Livi,
DeleteYou summed it up for me – its not just about buying short players – its about buying quality players !!!!
World class saves in my opinion!
Deletehe saved a very good shot, low drive save, otherwise he be picking that one out of the net. At all cost our Defenders are also to blame! at some points we could not even get the ball out of our own half. Some of the passing was so poor that we kept of getting caught out. That needs to improve quickly.
Deletewell, we don't need that! we need to be playing as a team.
ReplyDeletesuarez was lucky yesterday, got away will trampling over the defender, stomach with his studs, nasty!!
That’s the nasty side of his game that gives him that edge – we will never be able to stop that creeping in his game but hopefully Rodgers will have had a quiet word with him to try and tone things down a bit.
Deleteyeah i thought that looked very intentional. Totally unnecessary! The man is just a loon on a football pitch. Saw a thing on lfc website a few months back where he, henderson and coates were competing in a skills contest, he was tried to cheat flat out and was absolutely raging when henderson won!!
DeleteI was speaking to Leon and we were both saying after the last goal that with so much time left it was disappointing to not have conjured up many more goal opportunities.
ReplyDeleteWe scored the three goals we needed, but Carragher felt the hot breath of Hulk on his neck and the rest is history... The second free kick was Roberto Carlos like,,, and as Leon said how we needed Sturridge to be there on hand to be tapping home the rebound following Suarez free-kick.
We need more depth, pure and simple and when we get additional bodies one hopes they'll be some match winners interspersed and wingers that can actually pick colleagues out with their crosses.
I know everyone was screaming at the tv in the last few seconds to punt the ball up there when we were messing about with the ball at the back, but I guess that's all part and parcel of being a Liverpool fan!
LOL at screaming at the tv – I was swearing at the tv !!!! LOL
DeleteYeah was a good effort – really thought there was at least one more goal to come, but sadly not.
DeleteWe were at the office watching the ‘in-game’ bets coming thru and there were still some punters sticking some decent sized bets on the Liverpool win right into the last few minutes.
Robert
Echo everyone's comments, played some great stuff at times, most one sided game I've seen for... er 4 days and still can't believe that we didn't go through. Great game, electric atmosphere and so nearly another glorious European night at Anfield.
DeleteAgree that maybe we didn't create enough clear chances, for all the dominance we didn't work the goalie too much. We need to address this urgently as it's been the story of the last couple of seasons and goes a long way to explaining why we're so far from the top yet can play teams of the park (and still lose, West Brom, Villa, Manure). Sturridge and hopefully another attacking midfielder will hopefully address this and teach Suso, Sterling, Assaidi and Shelvey how to be top players.
On them, i didn't think they made much impact. Sterling had no time to and Jonjo didn't have the nous to grab the game by the neck. Assaidi did well. Was the substitution timed right? we'll never know what impact Jordan and Joe Allen would have had. It's easy to say the momentum was with us but either of them may have tired and, say lost the ball giving their £45m striker a free shot on goal. oh no that happened earlier!
So gutted and there's no comfort in losing. And not impressed with Suarez's foot on the back, looked avoidable and If so, it's a red card. Nor the lack of a full house (Yes I too watched at home). But what goals and if we steamroller teams like that we're surely on the right track. Isn't that a cause worth seeing through? Maybe Carra will win the league on the coaching staff!
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I can spell but not when using my phone!
Boydy