Last updated Thursday, 4 November 2010 at 6:55 pm
Newspaper reports
The Guardian, Kevin McCarra: “Chelsea were quietly formidable in securing their place in the last 16 of the Champions League. This display was awash with know-how and calmness. These are people with perspective who can record a victory without tapping supplies of energies that are hoarded for other competitions.”
Daily Telegraph, Henry Winter: “Carlo Ancelotti’s side were unconvincing before the break but turned on the style in the second half. Anelka’s finish was terrific, the ball threaded through the eye of a very small needle, while Drogba’s penalty brooked no argument. Ivanovic’s goals were a welcome bonus, a typically powerful header and then a neat shot.”
The Independent, Mark Fleming: “Ancelotti has barely put a foot wrong in his 17 months in charge at the Bridge, the one glitch being Chelsea’s elimination to Internazionale in the first stage of the Champions League knock-out stages in March, when Chelsea lost both legs of the tie and were made to look powerless. In their attempt to make good this year, Chelsea are intent on making as few mistakes as possible in the competition, to control “the details”, as Ancelotti described his intention in the build-up to this match.”
Official Chelsea FC Website: “One point from two remaining games will win the group after goals from Nicolas Anelka, Didier Drogba and two from Branislav Ivanovic ensured qualification for the knockout stages. The result never looked in doubt although it took until the second half to break the deadlock. Anelka’s fifth goal of this Champions League campaign was well worth waiting for given its quality; Drogba’s was from the penalty spot and was his first goal for a month, and then Ivanovic added his two to give the defender three goals in two games.”
The goals
49′ Anelka
62′ Drogba (pen)
66′ Ivanovic
86′ Bazhenov
90′ Ivanovic
“All the players played a good game, we had more difficulty in the first half but second half played better and Anelka was the key to open the game, he scored a fantastic goal. It was the most important goal this evening.
“We started well, we had good control of the game, good combinations in front but we didn’t score, and at the end of the first half we missed passes and lost our confidence. Obviously we want to start well, play quick, as well as possible for 90 minutes.
“Our aim is to do this, sometimes during the game we are not able always to do the same play.
“The last 15 minutes of the first half, we lost control of the game because we missed a lot of passes. I asked them to come back [after half-time] to play easily, to come back to controlling the game.
“There is a long way again, it’s important to start well and arrive in the first place of this group, but the final decision of the Champions league is in February and March. We have to be ready, now is a good moment and we hope to avoid injury, keep the team fit for February and March.”
UPDATE: See comments by BlueBayou and limetreebower for eye-witness reports.
Related links
Ok, seems some tongues have been had by some cats.
A very good perfromance with some great turns from Nico and Branners, but honourable mentions to Zhirkhov, Ashley, Paolo, Obi and you Ramires as well…..oh….. in fact I didn’t see a sub-standard performance out there at all. Into the ‘Round of 16 then and unless a disaster looms it’ll be as the Group champions thus avoiding a rather tasty looking Real Madrid (who showed typical Mourinho-esque powers of perseverance at the San Siro) and some of the other big guns.
But what’s this is see going on around me….the ‘media’ still raving on about Gareth Bale and Spurs? Barely a mention of Arsenal’s defeat, a slightly bigger metnion of our win and achievement…..but hey, it’s all Bale and Spurs still folks. Aaah the recognition of consistent excellence is rarely bedecked in appreciation.
And as for the £50m tag for Bale…really? I mean…..really? 2 shining games after a season of occasional sparkle? If I were Spurs I think I’d be twitching at the prospect of £50m for him…I mean if you’re willing to pay that then you’d be willing to pay £60m wouldn’t you?
I managed to stay awake to watch ITV’s highlights programme. In the few minutes of action I saw we looked, um, awesome. Apart from the save right at the end, did Spartak threaten Cech’s goal at all?
With each passing season I think to myself that our strikers are too old only for them to prove me wrong. Anelka is getting better by the day while Drogs, who is probably operating at about 80%, was at the heart of all the decisive moments last night.
And then there’s Pippo Inzaghi – 37 and still scoring Champions League goals for fun. Anelka and Drogba have several seasons left in them yet.
As for Real, Jose’s got one hell of a team there. Wembley in May anyone? That would be something else.
Did chuckle when I saw mention of Inzaghi on the BBC text feed last night; when he scored, it read something along the lines of “Inzaghi, who looked a shade offside…” No, really?
Comes to something when I saw an article about us supposedly being in for Kaka in January and had to think for a moment before I realised he was at Real (and still injured, apparently).
No Nick, not Real Madrid, they need to be knocked out in the last 16, otherwise (and I’m doing a Fiftee here) they will turn us over. Still, give me the Premiership anytime, always will be first on my Xmas list.
I got back from the game in time to watch ITV’s highlights and think their usual “blink and you miss it” edit job on the first half did us a favour as it was another slow start from us [ first shot on target took 22 minutes and was just a scuffed Drogba effort]. Second half was a very enjoyable controlled performance though I thought the Drog still seems not quite on his game since his return from injury.
And no, Spartak had lots of possession but were mostly reduced to wild long-range efforts with Cech only called on a few times to do his stuff.
ITV also chopped Sturridge’s ridiculous miss from about 2 yards near the end from a beautiful Kakuta cross that outdid some of Kalou’s past failures. Anyone got that on video, would be worth a YouTube clip?
Aye, good performance (eventually). Anelka and Ivan the stand-outs for me too. Think we just need a point to top the group which we should manage without too much drama. Big names given a rest, kids still appearing (for a little longer too); Kakuta looked less overwhelmed that he has done of late, Josh economical and very sensible with the ball – shows how much easier it is to introduce the youngsters when things are going well.
The Bale hoo-ha is quite funny; being mentioned in the same breath as Messi, Xavi et all now, it seems. Which is obviously bonkers. Did look terrific up against Maicon though, which is no mean feat. Should be read in the context that Mad Rafa’s Inter is hardly Jose’s Inter, but still…
Typically barmy media – he’s certainly a good player and seems to have a decent attitude; his shoulder-shrugging bafflement in the face of fawning interviewers is to his credit – just looks and sounds a little more natural than the Owen style media-trained robots we’re used to.
Can Spurs keep him? Interesting question – for me, they’re a great manager and 2-3 players away from almost being a worry. If the powers that be up at the Lane can convince him of that, with the added bonus of a decent run in Europe (keep VdV and Bale fit for the season, bit of luck and ‘Arry’s knack for a cup competition), then who knows?
I despise seeing Le Cock being spoken of so highly. The fool only tapped in a simple ball.
Don’t it occur to any that his tendency to delay releasing the ball is what has reduced Frank into some useless lump.
Congratulations; you have officially rendered any further voting in the “Cunt of the Decade” poll utterly pointless.
Oh oh.. vote for me. 😉
I have moderator powers now, but that was so stupidly funny from our spaced out, addled brained friend (in this case a euphemism for cunt) I decided to leave it in.
And Lord kaiser – a pre-warning next time please as my raucous laughter has exposed the others in the office to the fact that I read something very funny, very probably on a site I possibly shouldn’t be reading during office hours and i’d hate to have to hold you responsible for me getting disciplined m’lud!
The only positive to emerge from Frank’s injury is that his absence has flushed out Moffat. Whereas previously he was able to pose as a loyal fan with a strong, though unexplained dislike for Lamps, he is now completely exposed as a troll.My guess is that he is some form of artificial intelligence experiment aimed at convincing the weblogsphere that they are dealing with a real person. The unit is programmed to generate random, inchoate phrases relating to football and Frank Lampard coupled with intermittent, candid yet unsettling references to sexual relationships so as to pose as a “typical” male football fan. For technical or budgetary reasons the initial focus was purely on Lampard, chosen because for many seasons he played a high percentage of games and regular comment generation could be guaranteed. In more recent times Moffat’s appearances have been limited while software upgrades including other team members details were prepared and the additional complexities of multi-player comment overcome.So for the sake of science and the advancement of artificial intelligence his comments should continue to appear.
Ah! artificial intelligence, it will never replace real stupidity.
A sort of early version of HAL then?
It’s odd because I have the feeling that Mad Rafa is also an early form of AI Android, with programming algorithms designed by Microsoft – this would explain the increasingly frequent incoherent babblings being disguised as enigmatic and philosphical ‘bon mots’. As Mad Rafa gets older, the memory fragmentation increases and the search for inter-related information takes longer and throws out more obtuse results. I fear that the components of the Android may have been put together sometime in the 1970’s by rover employees, hence the lack of ‘CTRL/ALT/DEL’ function and what we will see is a gradual decline in the robots ability to absorb information, an increasingly hostile approach to simple requests until it ends up sitting in a darkened room, whirring repeatedly to itself ‘I am a priest who can’t see the white liquid amongst all the sugar’….however it must be left untouched so that Microsoft/Alfa Romeo engineers (recruited since the sad decline of BL) can build the next version (project name Basket Case).
I wonder if there is a Grand Unified Theory of UC (copyright Der_Kaiser) being formed here?
Cough! http://communitiesonline.homestead.com/dealingwithtrolls.html
It was the night of the astonishing miss
Alex kneed one over the bar from a yard
BBD has already referred to the Sturridge effort
Ramires only had to plant a great pull back from 10 yards
Kalou – 2 or 3 good opportunities went begging
I missed the riverboat and had to cattletruck on the District Line.
But we won, no one played badly, their goal was off side.
Mikel was perhaps a little more wayward than in recentgames. I thought Zhirkov did well again, but he is weaker in the air than a lot of the team. Ramires is settling in and had one lovely silky run where he ghosted past a couple of defenders.
It was a solid performance and can only help build the squad ethos for what is a team in transition.
It wasn’t a bad crowd considering the transport issues. A big turnout for Spartak. I assume some were UK based. Very ill judged solo pitch invasion, you need to look at yer studs son.
The first half was a bit low key but as CA said we were very sloppy towards the end. The second half was much better.
I hadn’t really noticed that their manager was Karpin until last night, having missed the first match. He was quite a player in his day.
If I’d known you needed a match report Nick I would have offered as I don’t get to many live games. I’m going to Fulham next week but assume things will be back to normal by then.
Player Ratings by Tube Stations in Honour of Those Who Made It Through
Chech – St Pauls – looks likely to survive a blitz these days
Paulo – Sloane Square – sedate but classy
Branners – Westminster – where power resides
Alex – Oakwood – solid
Ashley – Gillespie Road –You take yer Arsenal and find the gem underneath
Mikel – Monument
Ramires – Snaresbrook – the jury’s out but we expect a positive verdict
Zhirkov – Neasden – could go onto Kingsbury or fall back to Dollis Hill
Nico – Temple – we come to worship
Drogs – Barking – woof woof
Kalou –Cannon Street – and a bloody loose one at that
Kakuta – East Acton
Sturridge – North Acton
McEachran – West Acton
They should all form a central line in the coming years.
Just about exactly what you want before a trip to Anfield, other than that it would be nice to have had Frank on the pitch rather than the studio. Anelka was brilliant, as was Ivanovic and Mikel, and good stuff from the kids who really just need to learn to stick the ball in the onion bag. Sturridge doesn’t have ‘natural goalscorer’ written on him, does he?
You could now field a very impressive Chelsea team with an average age of around 24, with the only problem area being up front, where for all Sturridge, Kalou, Borini and Kakuta’s talent something seems to be amiss.
The Bale stuff is insane. I still cannot get over Patrick Barclay’s tweet that ‘Bale is the second best player in the world after Xavi’. This is an experienced, serious sports journalist at the national paper of record, and he’s acting like a lovestruck 15-year-old who only watches the Big Four on the telly. Pathetic and embarrassing. No idea if anybody has called him on this, but honestly…
Thanks for the eye-witness reports, BBD and BB.Looks like Carlo still hasn’t got them playing for 90 minutes (yet) but a much-improved performance on those we have recently seen, against a very good side who desperately needed to win last night.Ivan and Nic carried on where they left off last Saturday – joint Men of the Match? Unlike you, BB, I thought Kalou did ok. A lot livelier than Flo has been recently. OK he missed a good chance but combined really well with Nic for the first goal.Slightly worried about our midfield. John Obi had another so-so game, Lamps won’t be back for Saturday, so let’s hope the Bison improves after his enforced rest next Sunday. But Ramires caught my eye last night – best I have seen him play so far.Great to see us 3-0 up on 75 minutes and, therefore, able to bring on McEachran, Kakuta and Sturridge.KTBFFH!
Just saw a headline that Kalou has sent a warning to Liverpool.
It’s currently in Norwich, is expected at Stoke by 8pm before getting to Bangor, North Wales shortly before midnight. After spending most Friday of getting to Aberdeen and then Glasgow it will land in Tranmere Sunday afternoon, where it will fall over.
It’s about time the old boy was resurrected. I’m not quite doing a Prince here, but the chelseatony thing was getting on my tits – its OK for twitter, but on here I think it’s a little more ‘me’ to be Grocerjack again. Of course, any articles will be under the reral thing, but surely every writer (in the loosest sense of the word) needs a pseudonym?
I’ve been having similar thoughts Tony, shouldn’t take me long to come up with something uninspired and predicatable.
I’ll be back, and no I won’t be called Arnie.
I’d mention that I was also slightly less impressed by Nic, except than it might leave me liable to the suspicion of agreeing with You Know Who above.
Really the first half was pretty abysmal. It was obvious enough that we were playing well within ourselves, and that they were about as likely to score as Ann Widdecombe, but even so it was painful to watch. No one (apart from the defensive spine and — oddly — Kalou) came out of it with any credit at all, and when the team’s as sluggish as that Nic always looks (perhaps unfairly so) like one of the main culprits: play stalls when it reaches him and he spends far too long turning inside and back and ending up playing a square ball in front of an eight-man defence. Whereas Kalou was zipping up and down and generally playing surprisingly directly.
At half time an East Stand neighbour and I were agreeing that a Spartak goal would be better than another 15 minutes of the same. As it happened, of course, Kalou played Nic in with a lovely ball and the Nic scored from a position you really wouldn’t expect many people to score from, and after that it always looked likely to be easy.
Three main impressions:
1) seeing young Josh limbering up on the sidelines and then watching Obi’s number come up on the sub board. No, thinks I, surely Stick Insect McEachran isn’t going to play in the defensive midfield position …? But off Obi trots and on little Josh goes, right into the space vacated by the colossus. Thanks goodness no De Jongs or Vieiras in Russian football. The boy gave yet another fine performance, too. He’s so utterly confident on the ball — surprisingly similar in fact to Wilshere up in the northern wastes, they both have that unfussy quality.
2) How utterly, utterly aghast Branners looked when their goal went in. This was a real treat. Clearly the home record means a great deal; in fact they all quite obviously can’t bear conceding, even at 3-0 up with ten minutes to go. He didn’t just look annoyed, or bitter: he looked like his mistake had personally let down the whole team. No wonder the fellow has turned into such a star. Remember when we were all excited when he got 45 minutes here and there?
3) The away fans. Pace Sir Purplenose, the group stages of the CL are fairly pointless (of course he thinks the Cl is better than the World Cup, he’s Scottish; if I was Scottish I’d want to pretend international football didn’t exist either, no offence to BBD or any other north Britons). One of the few pleasures is hearing the different European approaches to “singing”, from that weird thing the Germans do where they seem to be going at random from note to note like plainchant, to the excitable shouting of the Greek/Turkish/Cypriot style. Never, ever have I heard a more utterly unmusical crowd than Spartak. Close your eyes and you pictured a mass of vodka-addled disease-ridden maniacal soldiers out of Tolstoy, drunkenly roaring across some steppe in mid-January, about to pitch headfirst into roadside ditches and die of typhus.
Bale-wise: he was terrific, to be fair, but honestly, you wonder about Mad Rafa (see above). If someone just scored a hat-trick by making a mockery of your right-back only *two weeks* ago, surely you don’t have to be José to think that maybe a slightly different approach might be advisable? Or, as the Mad One himself might put it, “when you have a chicken and a goat in your tractor, you do not put a bag of peanuts inder the steering wheel.”
Barclay’s attempt to weasel out of what he said (and then blame Twitter and leave it in a huff) in today’s Times is fairly priceless. [Not that I buy the Murdoch filth myself, I assure you.]
PS please please can someone less stupid than I explain how I log in on this version of the blog? “Login below”, it says, but once I overcome my pedantic gag-reflex at the verb “to login” and look below, I can’t find anything likely-looking, not even in the black bit at the very bottom.
Click on the DISQUS button next to the Twitter and OpenID buttons below “Optional: Login below”, LTB. A “Login or Register” window will pop up. Click the “Don’t have one? Register a new profile” link. Pick a username and password.
Going back for a moment to my piece about the Wolves game, I referred to werewolves and their association with shapeshifting.Clive, Tony, there’s a silver bullet for each of you.
I think Nic was as good as claimed….and this coming from someone, me, who is always surprised when he plays as well as I would like him to.
Bale: he was fantastic. I’d note, however, that the pundits here in the states put things in perspective by wondering if Maicon is getting over the hill and criticizing Rafa by saying Mourinho would have had a plan to deal with Bale after what happened at the end of the first match. You know, like the plan most EPL managers apparently have.
I thought GrocerJerk was long fed to the lions in ngorongoro. Does kenny emetulu live too?,
It’s like following Bobby Fischer’s ‘deep’ game against Spassky in Reykjavik in 1972 with all these cyberspace rantings.
Can someone please let me out of my misery and explain how the robot has been programmed to come up with utterances like:
‘long fed to the lions in ngorongoro’
and
‘does kenny emetulu live too?’
Ooooh, could you paraphrase what Barclay said? I ain’t paying to read his crap even when it makes him look daft.
According to some of the commentators on Zonal Marking, Maicon’s problem is he likes to drink/party. Of course, that only happens with English players so it must be nonsense.
I think the programming he’s had, is on a slightly lower level than this one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RG0ochx16Dg
Good grief CP…a programme I used to run home from school to watch!!!
And Moffat, good one yeah *cough*
Lost in Space was on the syllabus at the school I went to.
I think I got a C at O level
Thank you kindly, Nick.
Paraphrase of Barclay (disclaimer: I’m remembering this from lunchtime, reading the morose Albanian cafe owner”s Times — he also gets the Mail but I just can’t make myself touch it):
“I only meant that *yesterday* I thought he was the second-best player in the world. Tomorrow I might think it was someone else! And that’s what’s so wonderful about sports journalism, and by extension, me: it’s all about what you think at the moment. It’s so exciting and fabulous that I can think something completely different tomorrow! And because none of you get it, I’m leaving Twitter, so there.”
“Sports Writer of the Year”, I’m sure it says somewhere.
Ah, the immediacy of Twitter. Did he suggest who was at the top of his ‘best players in the world’ list today? Was Branners on it?
I think it might be Stevie Me on his hotlist tomorrow.
Very probably. I imagine that the press box at Anfield was like a gigantic circle jerk when the third went in.
Come on JD, this was another historic European night on Channel 5, oops sorry I mean Anfield
Rather sensible comments all around.
One thing to note about Kalou- he played in the center, and we scored a goal. He does all of his best work in the box and not on the wing.
I watched perhaps the first half of Milan-Real, and I can’t say I have any idea what any of you are talking about. Real just don’t look to be a good side yet. Undoubtedly I’d rather play Milan in a round of 16 game than Real- Milan just look a shambles. I don’t want to encounter Jose again, but I don’t see Real going far this year.
Gareth Bale has had a handful of nice games. Theo Walcott has had a handful of nice games. If the trend continues, good for him. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Last, I thought Sturridge looked good last night. He has that look of just being on the edge of a breakthrough. He’s playing more confidently, more quickly. His ball to Ramires after he evaded the double-team was one of the best plays of the night. If things click for him he could be quite a surprise.
So Branners has a +2 goal difference from the last two games.
Big Phil has one or two interesting things to say about his time with Chelsea.
http://www.fifa.com/worldfootball/clubfootball/news/newsid=1327522.html?cid=twitter_voiceofthesite#scolari+want+coach+brazil+2014
Good to see he’s not all bitter and twisted like Mad Rafa (who’s making as much sense lately as Moffat).
And where’s Guy Fawkes when he’s needed.
You can get odds of 95-1 on Ivan to score against Loserpool in the second half on Sunday. (Bet 365)
Think I will put a fiver on that, given that he has scored three in the last two and has previous up at their place.
Branners is 33/1 to score first on Sunday – in rich goalscoring form, likes netting at Anfield… got to be worth a cheeky tenner of anyone’s money?
JD – where are you getting those odds? Will definitely take that bet.
This was from Coral; http://sports.coral.co.uk/sport/en#/drilldown/event/84050/Liverpool-v-Chelsea
(hope that link works…)
10’s for anytime scorer too. Will have probably gone in the time I’ve been faffing around looking for my Coral account login though!
Cheers. Those are good odds. Malt whiskey all round if that one comes through : – )
@ Kaiser —
Barclay’s no. 1 was Xavi. Can’t really argue with that.
@ Gambling Dudes — is it possible Branners might not even start on Sunday? The centre backs will be JT and Alex barring injury; is Bosingwa out of consideration at the moment? I’d be careful with my tenner. (But then I’m a tightfisted and Puritanical bastard and don’t gamble anyway.)
I see Carlo’s named nine of his team already, including Branners. My brainfart, sorry.
Think we had the discussion about the odds on Ivan before Carlo announced the team so your caution was well placed.According to the official website the likely team is:Cech, Ivan, JT, Alex, Ashley, John Obi, Ramires (or Essien, if fit?), Zhirkov, Flo, Nic, Drogs.Carlo seems not to go in for mind games or secrecy. Is it arrogance, or just supreme confidence, that compels him to name the team two days in advance?
A commendable attitude to the risky business of crafty flutter, nonetheless…!
TV said JT was out for Saturday. “Resting.”
Sunday, whatever.
I quite like the approach myself. It just says to Woy – not fussed about your set-up, here’s my team, up to you to work out how best to counter it.
But there’s the problem for Woy, has he got the nous to set up his team to deal with anything?
The word on the poo blogs is, that he’s a small fish in a large pond.
When you are the 800lb gorilla, I think that is your prerogative. And honestly, when is the last time we changed our formation to counter what another team does?
Besides I think that the new Liverpool owners will realise soon enough, that Woy might not be the man to give them a return on their investment.
The burning question I have, what does a very attractive 30 year old women see in MULTI MILLIONAIRE John Henry? 😉
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/l/liverpool/9162510.stm
It’s ridiculous naming your team that early.
Everyone knows it’s better to wait until the last minute ,just ask Capell oh
And there in lies the main problem with Liverpool, Cunningplan.
They still believe they are a big fish……. The delusion at Anfield is quite bewildering….. Given madness is all around them, perhaps they should have kept Rafa….. I actually think that once he has finished his dismantling of Jose’s Inter, he will be back at Scouseland next year, cos it will be the only place left that will have him!
So, no Lamps again despite yet another “he’ll be fit this weekend” statement that isn’t true. Anyone else a little bit sceptical about his real injury and how long it’ll be? Could be were looking at the beginning of the end a lot sooner than we wanted.
And usual pessism rules – genuinely can’t see getting anything Sunday. It’ll be one of them games where we’re frustrated for periods, the usual suspects get annoyed and lose their rag and ultimately we come unstuck. I hope to be wrong, just like my 20 minutes in post against Wigan.
Yep, you and me sat in the corner of the Pessimists Club.
Something is nagging me about this game today, and it’s not a good nag.
Thought that we didn’t play our best, most fluent team work, as we’ve done in recently, but when everyone takes responsibility for their own performance, then having 11 individuals can also work, especially when we up the tempo as in the second half.
If this sounds a bit incoherent, it’s because I’ve just shared a few bottles of vino with some Brazilians who gave me a grilling as to what went wrong with big Phil – interesting to read that link btw. The article didn’t mention that he’s also reported to be the highest paid manager ever in Brazil (£200k pw. which is mega, mega bucks).
I tried to explain that Alex is one of the best defenders in the world and Brazil wouldn’t have collapsed against Holland if he’d played.
The point was that they, including Scolari, just don’t get the PL (or Alex).
Watched the UAreFA cup last night and after the Poles did a fine job on Manshitty, Napoli continued the theme against Poo, outplaying them, and exposing a really crap side for 45 mins. They presumably also partook of some vino during the interval, before returning to ‘coast’ for the second 45 mins.
You know the rest, and now we face a resurgent poo on Sunday, who believe they’re a real football team again with a real manager and an opportunity to ‘turn the corner’.
Thanksafucinlot, Napoli.
Just added a new feature, Quote of the Day. A new quote, um, every day. Force-refresh your browser’s cache to pick up the design changes.
Quote of the day?
‘Force-refresh your browser’s cache to pick up the design’
Reminds me of the mechanic who said I needed to ‘sprocket the flange on my swinging arm’
That didn’t make any sense either.
Spurs are serious title contenders and Gareth Bales is world-class
Perhaps they were all too busy reading the continuing windy guff like this in today’s papers to have time to devise a game plan that might beat Bolton:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-1327102/Tottenhams-Gareth-Bale-reveals-The-Prince-Wales.html
Fingers crosses that Gerrard is buying into this kind of nonsense from the same source:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/article-1327149/Des-Kelly-Relive-Liverpool-glory-years.html
Pass the sick bucket, please!
Come on guys I think you’re being harsh on Rottenham, they’re obviously prioritising the CL as they’ve beaten the current european champions.
Tottenham fans remind me of those US doomsday cults in the 1950s who would all go and sit on a mountain on the day the world was meant to come to an end. And then come back down the next day looking slightly shifty, saying it won’t be this year after all……
Meanwhile, ManU get their winner in 4 minutes of Fergie time against another of those teams that ‘aren’t a real test’
I’m on reporting duty for the trip to Anfield but the F1 in Brazil and shock at watching Bebe’s abysmal performance on Football First may delay things. I really am amazed at the stuff Fergie and Utd are putting out at the moment. I mean, have you ever seen a player as shit as Bebe? He’s an embarrassment of a footballer.
Beat the European champions and then get stuffed by Bolton.
I remember when that used to be us.
Think I’ve noticed Bales big problem. Apart from being Welsh that is. And simian.*
He can’t cross the ball in the air to save his life,all his best crosses are on the deck.
*No apologies to any Welshmen on The Blog. Or simians.
When I saw the Man Utd line-up ,three steering wheels but no driver ,I thought Wolves would get a result.
And they should’ve.
How to explain Bebe? Brown paper bags changed hands at motorway service stations.
And isn’t it about time someone did the humane thing and put Hargreaves out of his misery?
Were Hargreaves a horse, he’d have been shot and turned into dog food by now.
Not sure what to make of United this season; still unbeaten in the league, somehow, and redefining the adage about playing badly and winning – they look mostly awful, but find themselves in second. Not sure how that works, or whether indeed it really should force Sky to drop the ‘best league in the world’ tag for fear of action under trades description legislation.
Liverpool 1-5 Chelsea
A Drogba hat-trick ,another one from Branners ,and one from Kalou off the bench.
With a Gerrard last minute “consolation”.
You’re welcome.
Drogs on the bench? Crafty old Carlo with his cheeky mind games…
In the vain hope it has the ‘Fiftee post during Wigan match’ effect, we are truly abysmal at the moment. 38 minutes of making Woys Boys look like they should be league leaders.
No coherent pass to a team mate, awful set pieces that never ever beat the first man. Really really missing Lamps in midfield, Ramires undoing all his good work midweek by being Liverpools best player, some amazing passes to men in red. But still better than Kalou who really is a waste of space on days like today. About as creative as the most uncreative thing you can ever think of.
I’ve managed to clean the vomit off the carpet, induced several times listening to the commentators who have their noses so far up StevieG’s arse I’m surprised they’re still able to talk.
Strip any team, top 4 or otherwise, of their Drog, Essien and Frank equivalents at Anfield and there is only one likely outcome. Hiding to nothing territory, I’m afraid.
(yes, Drogba may be on but he sure as hell isn’t anything like 100%).
I tend to agree but that first half was woeful but in fairness it’s also been coming – an away draw at Villa and defeat here and at City doesnt auger well for tougher trips to OT, WHL and Emirates. Looks like Spudd aren’t the only ones with European hangovers.
When the team with the best away record is Newcastle, you know things are best described as ‘odd’. Still maintain that with key players available, we’d be some way clear this evening. Results away not great, performances (overall) not the best, but not that bad and some distance better than our rivals.
No two ways about it, second best by a country mile and then some.
Hopefully ‘one of those days’ but any team aspiring to win the league can’t afford many abject displays like that.
No idea what is going on with Lamps but were missing him more and more. Absolutely zero creativity form midfield today. And, surprisingly, we looked pretty feeble at the back as well. Up against a decent striker and we’re undone. Crying out for Drogba to find somewhere near the form Torres ruined us with.
I’m angry more than anything. Maybe some overreaction here and there but I don’t mind losing when playing well but that was just a huge embarassment.
I suppose we just have to take it on the chin, without stating the bleedin obvious, we’re not going to win every game this season.
But Wednesday it could all go back in our favour, just beat Fulham, and Citeh do a job on Utd, and the gap is back to five points again.
And to pick up on Mark’s bout of nausea with regard Stevie Me, what did he do to get the praise of being the best midfielder in the world from Sky? He didn’t score any goals, (or have a shot) he didn’t make any, perhaps they were still thinking of the Napoli game.
To the bloke who commented on how unmusical the visiting fans were: unfortunately, no tradition of singing in Russian football whatsoever. Only chanting. But we do have the best fans in Russia: the shows they put on are nothing short of spectacular. It’s just very different from England. A bit more… barbaric 🙂 Football still ain’t a calm family event, like it has become elsewhere. Mostly angry teenagers. But they do what they do really well, so fair play to them.
What can I say ,I’m no octupus.
Hate to question Carlo ,but what the fuck was he thinking? Not starting Drogba that is.