Liverpool FC Forum

[zarababe]

Clinical Torres kills off Everton

David Moyes keeps saying Everton are edging closer to the top four with each passing year but results keep insisting otherwise.

Liverpool won the 208th Merseyside derby more comfortably than the score might suggest, Fernando Torres's reliable finishing consigning Everton to a third successive home defeat in the league - they will enter October without picking up a single point at Goodison - and leaving Moyes still waiting to join Harry Catterick and Howard Kendall as the only Blue managers to win three times against the old enemy. The fact Rafa Benitez has already won six derbies in a shorter time shows the reality of Everton's position.

Results do not tell the whole story though and the feeling persists that Moyes has only himself to blame for not winning more games against big clubs. He left Louis Saha on the bench here at the start and sent out his team with five midfielders and Yakubu on his own up front, a strategy that looked more like an attempt to avoid defeat than secure victory, especially as the solo striker seemed unhappy in the role and wasted much of his limited service by flinging himself to the floor in search of free-kicks. Referee Mike Riley booked him for diving in the second half after he had beaten Martin Skrtel and got himself into a position where a shot at goal might have brought a better reward. All too predictably, Moyes decided to send Saha on when Everton went a goal down, but by the time the substitute took the field the home side had shipped another and the cause was lost.

Joe Royle used to say the ball was an optional extra for the first hour or so of a Merseyside derby and that the only chance of any football was when the fighting had stopped. Liverpool adopted exactly the sort of patient approach that was required, waiting until all the sound and fury had died down then picking Everton's pocket with two clinically taken goals in three minutes. The visitors hardly threatened Tim Howard's goal in the first half, yet once Torres struck Everton's confidence evaporated to the extent that Liverpool could have ended up winning by three or four. After failing to score since the opening day of the season Torres could have had a hat-trick, he had the ball in the net in the 68th minute as well but was recalled by a linesman.

'You really need to use your brain in these type of games' said Benitez. 'Of course passion is important in a derby, but you win with your brain and with your muscles as well.'

The day might have panned out differently for Everton had Tim Cahill accepted a close-range chance after 14 minutes. The Australian is normally deadly close to goal but could not adjust his feet quickly enough when a corner came straight through to him. The miss seemed to bother him and he completed an off-colour afternoon by collected a red card for catching Xabi Alonso after the ball had gone. It was not the most reckless of two-footed tackles, but Cahill did not do himself any favours by refusing to acknowledge Riley's whistle and by the time his manager had urged him to turn round it is possible the referee took a more severe view of his offence. By Merseyside derby standards of controversy this was pretty insipid stuff, particularly as it occurred when the result was beyond doubt.

A cutting edge as surgically precise as Torres allows them to do just that and Moyes must surely rethink the wisdom of aiming for goalless draws when up against such a lethal finisher. 'We wanted to be harder to beat than we have been,' Moyes said revealingly. 'But in the end Torres was clinical.' Indeed he was. He scored his first at the far post after Robbie Keane sent over a deep cross from the left, and an absurdly easy second minutes later when Phil Jagielka dispossessed Dirk Kuyt in the area and Everton stood around instead of clearing the loose ball.

Two goals, three minutes, game over. Everton were never going to come back, and all they managed before the end was a shot from Saha that missed and a chance for Yakubu that Marouane Fellaini, making a promising home debut in difficult circumstances, inadvertently deflected away from his team-mate.

By that stage the Liverpool fans in the Bullens Road stand were belting out 'You'll Never Walk Alone', while the home support attempted to drown them out with whistles. This is not a gulf that is being bridged. 'You could see the difference £100m can make,' Moyes said grimly. 'But whatever the cost I expect my teams to compete.'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2008/sep/28/everton.liverpool

[zarababe]

Fernando Torres regains form
Everton 0 Liverpool 2

LIVERPOOL have never won the Premier League but in those distant days when they used to monopolise the old First Division they had the happy knack of claiming maximum points when not playing particularly well. They have got the habit back, and it augurs well for their prospects of making a genuine challenge for the title for the first time since 1997. The latest Merseyside derby — the 208th — will not linger long in the memory, neither team having played anywhere near their best, but two goals in the space of three second-half minutes from Fernando Torres gave Liverpool a deserved victory which took them back to the top of the table at lunchtime yesterday.

Everton have now lost each of their first three home games in the league. Tim Cahill’s red card after 80 minutes, for a bad foul on Xabi Alonso, had no effect on the outcome, and manager David Moyes has more serious matters than that unsigned contract to concern him. It worries him that Everton have been beaten four times already this season, and that a defence once renowned for its resilience has now gone 12 matches without keeping a clean sheet. The Everton manager said: “This is the same group of players, in the main, that finished fifth last season, and our performances aren’t matching that. It is my job to try to find that form again.”

Liverpool manager Rafa Benitez was relieved that Torres, who rattled in 33 goals last season, is back in the groove, having previously failed to score since the opening-day victory over Sunderland. “His goals enable the team to play with confidence,” the Liverpool manager said. “Fernando thinks he can score even more than last season, but I’ll be happy if he gets 32.”

Derbies may be the biggest games in Everton’s calendar, but Liverpool have bigger fish to fry and are glad to get these local skirmishes out of the way without damage, either physical or arithmetical. It was not atypical when Cahill went through Alonso, whose minor ankle injury could have been a lot worse. Moyes felt the card should have been yellow, not red, but as the fragrant Mandy once said, he would, wouldn’t he?

Everton gave a debut to Marouane Fellaini, their £15m midfield recruit from Standard Liege, and the tall, 20-year-old Belgian made a sound if unspectacular start, passing the ball economically and performing his defensive duties diligently. To his relief, he will not come up against Alonso and Steven Gerrard every week.

There was also a home debut for Louis Saha, as a second-half substitute, but he also found it hard to make an impact. Of Fellaini, Moyes said: “I thought his early booking \ affected him, but for a 20-year-old boy coming into a team not playing at its best, I thought he did well. We should be helping him, rather than the other way around.”

Pepe Reina, in the Liverpool goal, was not called upon to make a single save, but it was Everton who should have taken the lead in the 15th minute when Mikel Arteta’s corner from the left was deflected to the far post, where Cahill, eight yards out, made a horrible hash of an inviting chance, miskicking wildly. Not long afterwards Fellaini had a shot cleared off the line by Jamie Carragher, whose heroics counted for nought when the referee indicated that Reina had been fouled into dropping the ball. That was the extent of it as far as Everton’s attacking threat was concerned.

Liverpool fashioned only one scoring opportunity in a prosaic first half, Phil Jagielka’s timely intervention balking Torres on the edge of the six-yard line. It was a different story, however, once the stalemate had been broken in the 59th minute — a feat accomplished when Robbie Keane did well to chase down a through-ball from Alonso and cut it back from the byline on the left for Torres to volley in from eight yards. Before Everton could steady themselves, it was 2-0 and game over, Torres shooting firmly past Tim Howard from 12 yards. The goal was hard on Jagielka, who had dispossessed Dirk Kuyt with a last-ditch tackle, only for the loose ball to run straight to Spain’s scorer extraordinaire. Torres had the ball in the net again, but the hat-trick strike was disallowed for an earlier foul by Kuyt on Joleon Lescott.

Gerrard might also have made it 3-0, from 25 yards, but was denied by Howard’s flying save, and Everton and their fans were glad to hear the final whistle. Ten minutes from the end, the small visiting contingent launched into some celebratory choruses of You’ll Never Walk Alone, and the disgruntled majority were too deflated to drown them out. Happy days for Liverpool, blue ones indeed for the other half of Merseyside.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol....124.ece

[tubby]

That Felliani looks like Screech from Saved By The Bell.

[zarababe]

Liverpool comeback shows they might just be the real deal

Late wins, comeback wins, lucky wins: Liverpool are ticking a lot of the boxes of the potential champion 

A win is a win is a win but, as Morrissey almost said, some wins are bigger than others. To see Liverpool's delirious celebration of Dirk Kuyt's winning goal at Eastlands today, after they had been 2-0 down at the end of a thoroughly miserable first half, was to see a side with an increasingly powerful belief that destiny is with them, and that it has decided their run without a league title will end at 19 years.

Liverpool did not play particularly well until Pablo Zabaleta was given a straight red for an appalling challenge on Xabi Alonso, after which they picked City apart at will, but that only adds to the worthiness of their victory. There is an inclination to talk of such victories as displaying the "mark of champions", when a team have played badly but willed or lucked their way to a win.

Yet what is just as important as the perception that a lucky victory is the preserve of the bona fide title contenders is the extent to which the confidence and sense of fate that can be drawn from such victories permeates through future contests. Liverpool will glean an immeasurable psychological boost from the manner of their win.

There are still issues with the team, not least at full-back, but this will only reinforce the growing belief on the Kop that this could be Liverpool's year. Late wins, comeback wins, lucky wins: Liverpool are ticking a lot of the boxes of the potential champion. The force is strong in these ones.

Every title-winner recalls one symbolic victory: recent examples include Manchester United' at Anfield in March 2007, Chelsea's show of bare-chested cheek after withstanding a physical battering at Blackburn in February 2005, and Thierry Henry's 4-2 win over Liverpool in April 2004. Usually, by their very nature, they come in the second half of the season. But if Liverpool win the league this year, this might be the one.

Comeback wins (Liverpool have already come from behind three times to win this season) and in particular late goals offer a window into a very healthy soul – remember how many Manchester United's treble winners scored – and this is the third time in seven league games that Liverpool have won with a goal in the final 10 minutes, two of them in injury time. Ryan Babel's winner against United also came late, with 13 minutes to go.

Liverpool are gathering force through each game and, as a consequence, gathering an even stronger force for the long-game of the the title race.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport....rleague

[zarababe]

Fernando Torres inspires Liverpool fightback
Manchester City 2 Liverpool 3
Oliver Kay

Sometimes, just sometimes, it is all about the game. A serious-looking injury, a red card and a backdrop of financial intrigue might often be enough to reduce the football to a side issue these days, but as the dust settled on an extraordinary afternoon at the City of Manchester Stadium yesterday, it felt fatuous to focus on anything other than an irresistible Liverpool comeback.

At half-time they were 2-0 down to a Manchester City team who seemed intent on claiming a big scalp to convince the rest of English football that they have more to commend them than the fabulous wealth of their new Arab owners. On another day this might have been the story of the collapse that followed, as City fell to a third defeat in four Barclays Premier League matches since the takeover five weeks ago, but Mark Hughes did not feel as if his team had collapsed or were even robbed. He felt more as if they had been run down by a red juggernaut.

It remains to be seen whether Liverpool have the class to become champions for the first time since 1990, but on this and recent evidence they seem to have the resolve. It required a monumental effort to recover from their two-goal half-time deficit, but from the moment Rafael Benítez’s team reappeared after the interval it seemed plausible. Fernando Torres, hitherto anonymous, plundered goals in the 55th and 73rd minutes and then, with both teams reduced to ten men after City had Pablo Zabaleta sent off for a wild challenge and Liverpool lost Martin Skrtel with a twisted knee, Dirk Kuyt pounced in stoppage time to complete a famous fightback.

Liverpool have previous for this, but their most celebrated comebacks of the Benítez era have come in cup competitions. Now, in his fifth season in charge, they appear to be applying the same spirit in the Premier League; of their seven matches this season, this was the third in which they have come from behind to secure victory in the closing stages.

“I’m really pleased with the result, though I’m disappointed for Martin with his injury,” Benítez said afterwards. “The positive thing was the reaction of the players after a bad first half. We made two mistakes for both goals, but the reaction and character we showed in the second half was key to winning the game. It is better for me if we don’t concede those goals, but if you can win, it shows that the players are ready to win every game. Physically we are in good condition, so credit to our fitness coach. We also have great belief and mentality.”

These are the type of attributes that Hughes is trying to instil in a City team high on flair but low on what he called “resoluteness”. It is a young team, with eight of the starting line-up aged between 20 and 24, and at times it shows. Zabaleta was guilty of recklessness in diving in dangerously on Xabi Alonso when he was sent off in the 67th minute, with his team 2-1 up, a naivety evident throughout the City team during the second half.

“We had spoken at half-time about the likely response of Liverpool,” Hughes said. “We needed to be ready for it and we weren’t.”

It had been going so well for City as they took the game to Liverpool. Shaun Wright-Phillips nicked the ball off the ponderous Fabio Aurélio in the nineteenth minute to set the ball rolling, sending in a cross that resulted in Álvaro Arbeloa presenting the ball to Stephen Ireland, who volleyed high into the net for his fourth goal of an impressive campaign. Three minutes before half-time it was 2-0 when Javier Garrido curled a wonderful free kick inside the near post, his first goal in 35 appearances for the club.

Liverpool were struggling, with Torres seemingly frustrated into submission by the persistent attentions of Richard Dunne and Micah Richards. But, as at Goodison Park eight days earlier, Torres came to life in the second half, reducing the arrears in the 55th minute when he bundled home a low cross from Arbeloa and then rose at the near post to head home Steven Gerrard’s corner.With Zabaleta off the pitch, the momentum was with Liverpool, particularly after the introduction of Robbie Keane, but it was the other two substitutes, Andrea Dossena and Yossi Benayoun, who combined to set up Torres, whose shot deflected into the path of Kuyt, six yards out.

The celebrations were of a type usually witnessed in late April, rather than early October, but the euphoria was understandable. After a fightback such as this, you are entitled to celebrate

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol....919.ece

[tubby]

S.hitrag 2 has this today.

RAFA LOOKS TO FLOG DOSSENA

01/11/2008

RAFA BENITEZ could be set to end Andrea Dossena’s Kop career — just six months after spending £7million on the left-back.

The Liverpool boss is troubled by the Italy international’s form.


Rafa knows he may have to sell before he can reinforce his title-chasing side in January.

And that could mean the end of Dossena, 27, and bit-part players like winger Jermaine Pennant, 25.

(personally I said right from the start he is no good and yesterday just confirmed it)

[tubby]

Also

Rafa eager to resolve future
Spanish boss wants to continue good work at Anfield

Liverpool manager Rafa Benitez is eager to avoid a repeat of the contract problems that forced him to quit Valencia.

Benitez won a second La Liga title and the Uefa Cup with Valencia in 2004 and had compiled a list of targets including the likes of emerging talents Cristiano Ronaldo and Didier Drogba.

But the Spanish boss walked out on the final year of his contract to take charge of Liverpool after broken promises over a new deal.

With 18 months now left on his Liverpool contract, Benitez does not want to walk away from another work in progress.

"I left Valencia because there were problems with my contract and other situations that meant I decided to leave," he told the Sunday Mirror.

"It wasn't my idea to leave because I had a list of names in place that would have improved the team. I believe Valencia would have gone on to win more trophies."

Benitez has led Liverpool to two Champions League finals, winning the top European crown in 2005, and this season the Reds look like genuine Premier League title contenders.

The 48-year-old feels Liverpool are on the verge of creating a dynasty at Anfield and he is eager to commit his long-term future to the club now that co-owners George Gillett and Tom Hicks claim to have healed their boardroom rift.

"I spoke with George Gillett in London last week but there was nothing about a new contract," Benitez added.

Focus
"That is OK because I want to concentrate. But if the owners ask to talk about a new contract that would be good also.

"If not, I will continue to do my job for as long as I can and then we will see. I really want to stay at Liverpool and hopefully in the future the squad will be even better.

"I would like to be here a long time so I am waiting. After improving the squad for the last five years I know we are very, very close to having a fantastic team and I want to be part of their future.

"I am also sure that this Liverpool team, with the staff I have also, will get better every year.

"The contract situation does not put me under more pressure to win either the title or the Champions League because in my mind I am just thinking about winning every game.

"I think we are close to having the team I want, but if I start thinking 'we have to win this trophy' it is possible to lose focus."

[Bam]

(personally I said right from the start he is no good and yesterday just confirmed it)

your my hero

[metalhead]

(personally I said right from the start he is no good and yesterday just confirmed it)

your my hero

 

[tubby]

(personally I said right from the start he is no good and yesterday just confirmed it)

your my hero

He hasnt showed once how good he is defensivly so far this season. He is okish coming forward but thats about it. Even Riise was better than him imo. We could have got Corluka for the same amount from Man City if we wanted but instead we got the guy who isnt even visible on footy manager in the normal game. 

[Ben1988]

(personally I said right from the start he is no good and yesterday just confirmed it)

your my hero

He hasnt showed once how good he is defensivly so far this season. He is okish coming forward but thats about it. Even Riise was better than him imo. We could have got Corluka for the same amount from Man City if we wanted but instead we got the guy who isnt even visible on footy manager in the normal game. 

great.... that proves it then he's then lol

on a more serious note... he quite poor and does need shipping out. another expensive mistake. Bring back Traore! 

[Roger Red Hat]

Bring back Traore! 

now thats a bit harsh, I'd rather just field 10 men thanks. 

[heimdall]

(personally I said right from the start he is no good and yesterday just confirmed it)

your my hero

He hasnt showed once how good he is defensivly so far this season. He is okish coming forward but thats about it. Even Riise was better than him imo. We could have got Corluka for the same amount from Man City if we wanted but instead we got the guy who isnt even visible on footy manager in the normal game. 

Well why don't we get Riise back then, I don't think he's having too much fun at Roma. I am actually being serious here, I even think we might make some money on it.
Riise in his best form with Riera ahead of him could be very tasty.

[Madmax]

(personally I said right from the start he is no good and yesterday just confirmed it)

your my hero

He hasnt showed once how good he is defensivly so far this season. He is okish coming forward but thats about it. Even Riise was better than him imo. We could have got Corluka for the same amount from Man City if we wanted but instead we got the guy who isnt even visible on footy manager in the normal game. 

Well why don't we get Riise back then, I don't think he's having too much fun at Roma. I am actually being serious here, I even think we might make some money on it.
Riise in his best form with Riera ahead of him could be very tasty.

tasty indeed..i dont know why we flogged him off in the first place..would have been brill though on the left riise and riera..

[GYBS]

Riise ?!? your jokin me right ? the guy reached his level with us two years ago and needed to move on . im so glad that row z are no longer in danger from him .