Other Matches - 4-5th December, 2018

[Stan]

4 hours ago, Dan said:

Both teams will feel like it's two dropped. Fulham because they were leading late on against a side who were frankly dreadful on the day. Leicester because we've somehow taken a point when you feel like we weren't close to our best. So many off days. Iheanacho I'd happily never see start another game. The bloke is so far off being good enough to start in this league it is unreal, it's such a comedown from the relentless pressing, finishing, pace and desire of Vardy to go to Iheanacho who is frankly lazy and brainless. People trot out the age excuse for him but these are serious fundamental flaws in his game. I don't think he'll ever be good enough.

Team selection was baffling. Injuries piling up by the looks of it. Didn't expect to see Simpson start. It's a shame how badly Soyuncu sold himself for their goal, it's a truly terrible bit of defending but a shame because up until that point he'd had a really decent game, promising signs from him other than that but he's got to take that one on the chin.

We are in serious trouble if Vardy ever gets a long term injury. Spurs game is a write off if he isn't fit. 

Diabate getting a start was very surprising. I can only think Pereira and Gray were being saved for Saturday. He's so far off a Premier League level too. After a bit of involvement for 5 minutes he went dead quiet. 

 

[Mel81x+]

55 minutes ago, Harry said:

I only caught the last 30 minutes. Great to hear Keita was MOTM. that's definitely encouraging. Sometimes you do wonder whether it will still be milner hendo as gini by the end of the season...

Nah he wasn't MOTM for me that goes to Virgil. He bossed it last night.

[Harry]

11 minutes ago, Mel81x said:

Nah he wasn't MOTM for me that goes to Virgil. He bossed it last night.

A few match reports had him MOTM.

Definitely impressed with Virgil though.  such a commanding presence. Played a couple of great balls too and Loved the cutback to firmino for the second. Probably my current favorite player. 

[LFCMadLad]

Allison had a great game too, as did Milner. Agree though that MOTM goes to either Kieta or VVD who were both outstanding. 

VVD has to be our best signing in decades and is probably the best CB in the world right now. Absolute monster. 

Anyway, last night's win means that this is our best start to a season in our 126 year history. 

Well done lads and well done Klopp. 

[Storts]

1 hour ago, Marc said:

@Storts

Why was the attendance only 33k last night? I thought you’d have more season ticket holders than that.

We have 42k season ticket holders, but that's irrelevant now unfortunately.

Basically, the way they are doing it, is refunded 1/19 of the cost of a game at White Hart Lane (individual refunds each time) and then asking people to buy a ticket at Wembley at different costs. It's ridiculous and last night they put on cat B prices of £45 minimum so people just didn't bother.

The club have lost so much goodwill with the fans this season, we've been treated terribly and people are responding with their feet. Nobody wants to be at Wembley. It's a pain to get to and from. We were promised we were going home this season, and yet here we are coming up to the New Year and still at Wembley. A huge number of people have vowed not to go back to Wembley or to Spurs until the situation is resolved.

As usual levy's greed got the better of him though, there has been no gesture to the supporters, no attempt to reconcile the situation, and instead he's faced with situation's like last night where people just didn't want to go in midweek to Wembley. Fair play to them. Wish I wasn't such a loyal mug and could have stayed away as well.

[Mel81x+]

48 minutes ago, LFCMadLad said:

Allison had a great game too, as did Milner. Agree though that MOTM goes to either Kieta or VVD who were both outstanding. 

VVD has to be our best signing in decades and is probably the best CB in the world right now. Absolute monster. 

Anyway, last night's win means that this is our best start to a season in our 126 year history. 

Well done lads and well done Klopp. 

Wasn't it the best start to a season in the Premier League era? I'd imagine we were very good pre-PL as is quite evident with how we ran the league ragged back then.

I think a special mention for Burnley has to go to Hart as well. Could easily have slipped into a hard situation but he kept them firmly in it with some top quality saves. 

[LFCMadLad]

49 minutes ago, Mel81x said:

Wasn't it the best start to a season in the Premier League era? I'd imagine we were very good pre-PL as is quite evident with how we ran the league ragged back then.

I think a special mention for Burnley has to go to Hart as well. Could easily have slipped into a hard situation but he kept them firmly in it with some top quality saves. 

No mate, it's the best start in our entire history. 

[True Blue]

8 minutes ago, LFCMadLad said:

No mate, it's the best start in our entire history. 

Just good enough for second best still 

Nah seriously tough, if Liverpool keeps this up this season's title race will go down to the final game of the season

[LFCMadLad]

Just now, True Blue said:

Just good enough for second best still 

Nah seriously tough, if Liverpool keeps this up this season's title race will go down to the final game of the season

It's shit that we start like this but come up against a machine like City. Any other era and we would piss it 

[Cicero]

You think this Liverpool side is the 2nd greatest ever PL team? 

[Dan+]

5 hours ago, Stan said:

Diabate getting a start was very surprising. I can only think Pereira and Gray were being saved for Saturday. He's so far off a Premier League level too. After a bit of involvement for 5 minutes he went dead quiet. 

Yeah Diabate isn't good enough unfortunately. Liked what I saw from him early doors but he's not really good enough. I was surprised to see Ricardo get no minutes last night and I was calling for him to come on. Gray did actually play quite a part in the goal as well didn't he? I've not rewatched it but that's how I remember it. I do remember texting my mate who has us for BTTS literally 20 seconds before we scored saying "forget it, we're having an absolute howler", lo and behold...

It was a really, really poor performance I'm afraid, and yet I feel like if we'd had Vardy fit we'd have probably won it comfortably. Fulham are going to keep shipping goals even under a more organisational based manager, they will give anybody chances.

We're on a decent run of unbeaten games now but I can't help but feel we've drawn too many games we should've won in this run and we're going to look back on that when we take a few beatings this month. Amazingly last night if we'd won we'd have gone to 6th. The league table is even more baffling than last year.

[LFCMadLad]

1 hour ago, Cicero said:

You think this Liverpool side is the 2nd greatest ever PL team? 

Who said that? 

[Cicero]

9 minutes ago, LFCMadLad said:

Who said that? 

Any other era youd piss it?

[RandoEFC+]

3 hours ago, Cicero said:

You think this Liverpool side is the 2nd greatest ever PL team? 

Of course it is. They already won this season's title before any football had been played remember?

[LFCMadLad]

2 hours ago, Cicero said:

Any other era youd piss it?

I may have gone slightly overboard 

[Marc]

7 hours ago, Storts said:

We have 42k season ticket holders, but that's irrelevant now unfortunately.

Basically, the way they are doing it, is refunded 1/19 of the cost of a game at White Hart Lane (individual refunds each time) and then asking people to buy a ticket at Wembley at different costs. It's ridiculous and last night they put on cat B prices of £45 minimum so people just didn't bother.

The club have lost so much goodwill with the fans this season, we've been treated terribly and people are responding with their feet. Nobody wants to be at Wembley. It's a pain to get to and from. We were promised we were going home this season, and yet here we are coming up to the New Year and still at Wembley. A huge number of people have vowed not to go back to Wembley or to Spurs until the situation is resolved.

As usual levy's greed got the better of him though, there has been no gesture to the supporters, no attempt to reconcile the situation, and instead he's faced with situation's like last night where people just didn't want to go in midweek to Wembley. Fair play to them. Wish I wasn't such a loyal mug and could have stayed away as well.

Interesting. Refunds at 1/19 is fair I guess, but putting Spurs v Southampton on at £45 a ticket in a ground you shouldn't be playing in is madness and fans were probably right to vote with their feet.

I'm always split on supporters voting with their feet. You should support your team through thick and thin but supporters also shouldn't be taken advantage of and not turning up is the best way to show discontent. 

[Dave]

A Brighton fan has been arrested and charged for throwing a missile at Wilfried Zaha.

[CaaC (John)+]

Joe Gomez: Ben Mee defends tackle that broke Liverpool defender's leg

9 hours ago|Football

Burnley centre-back Ben Mee has defended the tackle that fractured the leg of Liverpool's Joe Gomez.

Defender Gomez could be out for six weeks after he was taken off on a stretcher 23 minutes into Liverpool's 3-1 win at Turf Moor last Wednesday.

"I don't think anything was wrong with my tackle personally," said Mee. "You can't take tackles out of the game."

Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp asked referee Stuart Attwell to stop Burnley being so physical during their match.

Asked whether his tackle on Gomez was dangerous, Mee said that "it's part of the game".

He added: "I've seen Liverpool make tackles and get the crowd up and things like that. For me, you can play fair, but you can also play hard as well.

"We're at the bottom of the table and we need to get out of it, so we're obviously going to work our socks off to win games. It was just unfortunate and I send my best wishes to him [Gomez]."

After last Wednesday's match, Klopp acknowledged that Mee's tackle was "the cleanest" committed by Burnley during the game, but was unhappy with the standard of their challenges overall.

"We all want to win football games, and there are different ways of doing it," said Klopp.

"I think the referee has to make sure that things like this don't happen constantly. It's not how it should be. Let's play football."

At a press conference last Thursday, before it was known that Gomez had broken his leg, Burnley boss Sean Dyche said it was a "fantastic tackle" by Mee.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/46502830