Blog by
dedlfc (David Douglas)
Liverpool
0 Stoke City 1: (Arnautovic 45 mins)
Pre-match
thoughts :
Liverpool can punch their ticket for a Anfield South final with a win or a
draw over Stoke City tonight. It's no exaggeration to say that this is the
biggest match of the season so far (but hopefully not the biggest match at the
end of the season). Jon "Scouse Cafu" Flanagan comes in for an
injured Nathaniel Clyne. Let's hope the local hero remembers how to shut down
his flank, because Stoke will be looking to lump in crosses to former Liverpool
big man Peter Crouch. Klopp has a huge smile on his face while the Kop sings
"You'll Never Walk Alone." Give 'em hell boys!
A couple
of early (and ill-fated) attempts to play quick counter-attacking long passes.
It seems to be a strategy to test a Shawcross-less backline, or just some nervy
early misplaced passes from the midfield. Very odd for a Liverpool side to
willingly concede possession and try to hit on the counter.
Flanagan
passes his first test against Arnautovic, dispossessing the attacker before
getting fouled.
Very
touching moment at the 12th minute, as Anfield honors Owen McVeigh, the boy who
recently passed away after a battle with cancer, with a banner, applause, and a
rendition of "You'll Never Walk Alone."
Emre Can attempts
to unleash an ill-advised shot from outside the box, but fails and instead he
carries the ball about 60 yards and out of play for a goal kick. Passing is
also an option to you can select! Emre.
Moreno
commits another stupid foul in a dangerous-ish area (and they're all dangerous
for Liverpool at this point).
HUGE
chance for Stoke. Walters is set through on a long ball and beats both Toure
and Sakho. Thankfully he failed to test Mignolet and put the shot wide of
target. Worringly Toure looks so off the pace if we are not careful we will be
conceding more regularly in this game. Also of concern is the gap between
Moreno who continues to bomb forward and Sakho which is has a high possibility
of being exposed.
Both
sides have settled into the match, and it has become a bit of a boring second
leg so far. There has been a lot of sloppiness on both sides, and not a lot of
flow.
Can, who
seems intent on stamping his mark on this game somehow, nearly finds the mark
with a screamer from about 25 yards which just goes wide.
Goal.
Stop me if you've heard this one before: Liverpool's opponent scores on their
first shot on target. Bojan plays in a cross to Arnautovic who is wide open in
front of goal, a yard offside, and calmly finishes it. Sure, he should have
been flagged for offside, but the defending was also criminally poor with again
Moreno and Toure to blame. 1-0 to Stoke, 1-1 on aggregate. This score
is the only one that could bring about penalties.
Halftime: That goal to finish the half was
a real punch in the gut. However, Stoke had the three best chances of the half,
so you can't say a lead by the visitors is wholly undeserved. For us, it was a lacklustre
first half at home which is becoming a usual occurence, with zero shots on
target. It looked like we readily conceded possession to start the half, hoping
to hit them on the counter, but the strategy clearly failed. Every time
Liverpool had space to run into, the final pass was always left wanting.
I don't
know what's more embarrassing: our set play defending, or our set play
attacking? Six of one, half-a-dozen of the other. Goals for the opposition and
none for Liverpool.
Big
penalty shout for Liverpool as Walters clatters Milner to the ground at the
edge of the box. With that and the offside, Liverpool can feel rightly
aggrieved if Stoke squeak through to the final.
Much more
tempo to start the second half. Suddenly Liverpool have decided they want to
get that winning goal. Might have been nice if they had decided this before
conceding, but a good response nonetheless.
Sakho
blocked a shot, which at this juncture, means he has more saves today than
Mignolet has in what? The last three games?
Benteke
on for Henderson. I'm not actually opposed to this. Firmino hasn't had the best
of games, and Henderson has been pretty sloppy in midfield. And theoretically
he should help on set pieces. Again, only in theory.
One
positive: it looks like Lallana and Firmino are growing a pretty good on-field
understanding. They've had a couple of moments that have been just a few
inches away from a breakthrough tonight. Flanagan puts in the most promising
cross of the night, but Liverpool's attackers are just a step slow, and Butland
collects the well-played but ultimately harmless ball.
Oh man,
the ball unexpectedly falls to Flanno right in front of goal, but the local
fullback can't get a shot away. He is the standout performer for us tonight: very
solid defensively, and adding just enough going forward as well.
Unleash
the Welsh Pirlo! Allen comes on for Toure. Papa Lucas moves to centre back.
A clear
handball in the box goes uncalled. If we go through, it'll be despite the
referees' best efforts. Fulltime and we got what we deserved an extra 30
minutes of football in such a busy period post-Christmas and New Year.
Full
time: Extra
football...yay. A much better second half from us, though ultimately fruitless.
To his credit, we looked much better after the introduction of Christian
Benteke,
Extra time: Nice hold up play early in extra
time by Benteke lays a chance on for Firmino who hits low and is comfortably
saved by the impressive Butland (future LFC number one maybe?) embarrassingly
at home that is our first shot on target and that is in extra time !!!
(And to
be fair, we've only given up one shot on target, but we know how that usually
works out).
The
defence tries their best to pull van Ginkel down in the box, but he stays on
his feet and shoots off the near post and out of play. Otherwise, a pretty
uneventful first 15 of extra time.
Ibe comes
on for Flanagan. Great first start for Flanno, hopefully much more to come the
rest of the season.
More last-ditch
defending from us. Stoke haven't had a lot of chances, but the chances they've
had have been dangerous. And what's that? An honest to goodness save from
Mignolet! He'll need to make a couple in the penalty shootout if Liverpool are
to advance tonight.
Ibe blows
our best chance of the evening with a shot about 20 rows deep into the Kop.
Other than Ibe, all the players are visibly tired and neither team can string
together too many passes in a row.
Stoke get
away with another handball at the edge of the box. Nothing further to report
before the game goes to penalties.
After Extra
Time: So, can
Mignolet beat Butland in the shootout? Also, this was Stoke's first win at
Anfield since 1959. Good timing.
Penalty Shootout
I assume
that Stoke have won the toss for the ends to take the penalties as the penalty
shootout takes place at the Anfield Road end with the Stoke away fans roaring
to the left of the goal.
Walters
steps up and belts the first penalty home to the left of Mignolet 0-1
Lallana
first up for us goes straight and high giving Butland no chance 1-1
Next up
is ex LFC player Crouch who hits low to Mignolet’s right which he saves!!!
Can with
the chance to give us a vital advantage then hits the post!!! Still 1-1 after 2
penalties each
Whelan
then stutters and then puts it to the right giving Mignolet no chance 1-2 good
penalty!
Big
Benteke then produces an even more exaggerated stutter but coolly slots home to
the right. 2-2
Afellay
goes high to Mignolet’s right, he gets a hand to it but not strong enough 2-3
Firmino
then sends Butland the wrong way for 3-3
Shaqiri
hits low to Mignolet’s right to make it 3-4 to Stoke – the pressure is now on
Milner knowing if he misses Stoke will go through.
Milner
steps up and………calmly puts it away – cool as a cucumber!!! 4-4 now it is down
to sudden death!!! Who will blink first???
Van
Ginkel sticks the next penalty into the corner 4-5
Will
Lucas be able to handle the vital penalty?? No doubt about it as he smashes
home then roars at the Stoke fans 5-5
A
decent penalty from Muniesa but Mignolet dives right into the left corner and
tips it round the post. Joe Allen to win it for Liverpool??
The
in-form Joe Allen steps up and puts us through 6-5 to our first Wembley final
since 2012 and our 12th appearance in the final which we have won 8
times.
Man of
the Match – Jon Flanagan
What a
welcome return for our full back didn’t put a foot wrong and kept going upto
extra time which is some effort for his first full outing for 20 months. Nearly
capped it off with a goal but it just wasn’t to be the Roy of the Rovers
fairytale ending.
Special
mentions
Sakho –
led the troops at the back for most of the game by himself as his defensive
partner Kolo Toure was so badly off the pace – we may as well just have played
with one centre back as Sakho covered both positions throughout and headed away
most attacks despite the pressure put on by Stoke especially from our old boy
Peter Crouch – at least two vital last ditch blocks saved us from getting shots
on goal. He is still not on his A game but he needs a better centre half to
play alongside as Toure as not able to complement his game or provide cover
when Sakho is under pressure.
Mignolet –
Made the vital saves to get us through to the final.
Joe Allen
– scored the all-important winning penalty and again just gets on with the job and
is now providing vital contributions to our season.
Liverpool
(4-2-3-1): Mignolet, Flanagan (Ibe - 105), Toure(Allen 85), Sakho, Moreno,
Lucas, Can: Henderson (Benteke 59), Lallana, Milner, Firmino
Subs not
used: Ward (GK), Lovren, Ibe, Smith, Teixeira
Stoke
City (4-2-3-1): Butland, Johnson, Muniesa, Wollschied, Pieters, Whelan, Affelay,
Walters, Bojan (Adam 71) (Van Ginkel 98), Arnautovic (Shaqiri 77), Crouch
Subs not
used: Haugaard (GK), Bardsley, Joselu, Wilson
Attendance: 43,091
Referee: Jon
Moss
After
Pens: There
wasn't much between the two sides tonight, other than a couple of favorable
decisions on both ends of the pitch. We didn't quite deserve to win, but they
didn't necessarily deserve to lose either. Somehow after all that, Wee Joe gets
the winner after 7 penalties a piece!
We were
again poor but we are off to Wembley and now we are there lets now go and
bloody win the thing !!!
Manager’s thoughts
Klopp
said an obscured view rather than superstition was to blame as Joe Allen
stepped up to strike the winning penalty over Stoke City. The German coach even
asking for clarification on how many saves Simon Mignolet made.
“Was it
two? Great,” said Klopp. “Usually I want to see them but people in the front
row said they could not see because I am so tall. So I sat the front seat and
could not see it. I had an ACL injury so I was not going to sit on the pitch.
It felt good to be watching the crowd instead. I didn’t see one shot so I will
have to watch them all.
On the
prospect of an all-Merseyside final, Klopp told reporters, "I heard about
it being the biggest thing but only if you beat them."
"I
have no chance and I cannot have any influence. We will watch the game tomorrow
and Man City being a goal down it is possible.
"We
take what it is. For sure it is the north of England final and if everything
comes together in a good way it is a derby at Wembley.
"That
will be great for the whole city. This city will have deserved it because it is
a great place for football and how Blues and Reds live together in a normal
life is how football should be.
I just
totally love our manager – really hope we can win the trophy just to see him
celebrate savour the victory at Wembley !!!
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