George Best (1946-2005)
This man may well have played for the enemy, but no doubt he did itincredibly well, earning the respect of literally anybody who knowsanything about football as one of the best players to have ever kicked aball. We’ve all seen the clips of George Best on television this week,beating 3 or 4 men 3 or 4 times each before rounding the keeper andslotting it home: his class was permanent in terms of football, and theshame is that he decided to devote his life to drink instead of continuingto develop his heroic status in the beautiful game. Those who didn’t likethis man as a person are easily understood, but there is a markeddifference between respecting somebody as a person and respecting him as afootballer and human being. Paying respect is about showing some class anddecorum by giving up perhaps just a minute of your time to remembersomebody; even if that somebody did several things that you did notmorally agree with.
And I do know that the majority of fans did show respect at the City ofManchester Stadium on Saturday during the minute’s silence – yet what Iwon’t forget is the jeering emanating from the away section – that is, oursection, the Liverpool section. After all of the atrocities and silencesthat our club has been through due to things which have happened to ourown fans, I thought that as a club, we were well beyond booing at a deadman’s last moments of respect. It was a disgrace and I hope never to seeor hear it ever again; those who were involved, and yes it did involveManchester city fans too, should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.
The Match – vs. Manchester City (a)
After the mauled moments of peace, a dim and understated game got underwayin front of a 47,000-strong crowd. Benitez set out his usual away-gamestall: defend in the first half and look for counter-attacks, then breakin the second half and launch numerous attacks at the opposition’s goal.At the opening, Crouch would be used to win balls for Cisse to run onto,whilst Gerrard was free to come inside from the right flank and attempt tocause trouble for the Man City defence at every opportunity. The resultwas a predictably tight affair, in which Darius Vassell’s misguided headerflew wide as a warning to a deep-sitting Liverpool back four.
But the defence, with Hyypia and Carragher operating at the heart ofthings, recognized the danger and became more compact, moving slightly upthe pitch to allow Steven Gerrard to whiz and whir around a slow Citymidfield with aplomb, if not with quite the effect that Rafa was goingfor. Overall, the link between attack and midfield usually provided by acentral Steven Gerrard or Luis Garcia was missing and it was fullynoticeable; Gerrard’s curling effort in the first half flew only just wideof the far post was our best effort, although it could be argued thatDjibril Cisse should have made more of a chance which fell his way thanksto the hard work of Peter Crouch.
The big man flicked on a long ball perfectly for Cisse, who promptly wentfor the most difficult way of scoring and made a familiar hash of it. Whena fling with his left foot – which, it is now confirmed, is purely onlyfor standing and running on – was easily the best option, the Frenchmantried a weak outside of the right foot nudge and the ball bouncedcomfortably into the arms of a relieved David James. Wonderful. The topscorer sometimes looks as if he can do not wrong; sometimes, like onSaturday, he does absolutely nothing right, and this continualinconsistency is emerging as a huge problem for the £14 million man.Although I do have to stand up for him; Djibril has scored so many morethan Crouch and Morientes combined that leaving him out of the team isalmost a risk.
Rafa’s ruthlessness shone through and when his frustration at Cisse’sineffectual efforts (or lack of it) came to the fore, he subbed theFrenchman from the field of play. This was just 6 minutes into a secondhalf which was promising to be every bit as dull as the first. Crouch wasalso have a fairly quiet match, although he contributed more than Cisse inkeeping the ball in areas high up the pitch and subsequently allowing foropportunities to be created; at the end of the day, this is why Rafabought the lad and the manager admitted as much this week.
Sending on Harry Kewell, rejuvenated after a spell out with injury and asuccessful return with his national side Australia, turned out to be amasterstroke. That missing link between the midfield and attack wassuddenly filled and Gerrard began to operate with slightly more freedomwhilst Man City dithered pointlessly over what to do about the danger ofKewell playing in the space between the central midfield of Hamann andSissoko and the offence of Crouch. To explain in a little more detail whatKewell did to the match, you have to look at the problem of Peter Crouchfor the centre backs. The two City centre midfielders couldn’t mark Kewellas they had their hands full with Gerrard, Sissoko and Hamann; the twocentre backs were trying to double up on Crouch (in other words, if oneloses an aerial challenge, the other, with no attacking partner to worryabout, could immediately be on the scene to pressure the front man) andtherefore didn’t want to come forward and take care of Kewell.
What resulted was 20 minutes of tactical doubt for Stuart Pearce and to behonest Kewell, as the opposition boss admitted after the match, was dealtwith far too late. The fragile panic caused in the Man City defence led toRiise and Gerrard being able to combine on the edge of the box, ending upwith the Norwegian able to blast in a trademark left-foot smash and wheelaway to celebrate with the traveling Reds. 1-0 up and Liverpool shut upshop as only they know how; Kewell dropped back a little and the midfieldfought for everything, whilst Jamie Carragher’s solid tackling andblocking perfectly complement the ever-solid Sami Hyypia (as usual).
By the end, City simply looked desperate and created barely anyopportunities for Reina to deal with; it has to be said that winning ataway grounds in this rather dull, boring way is undoubtedly part of Rafa’sPremiership idea. He has been trying it all season and recently, theattempts have come to fruition, with 4 straight Premiership victories forthe first time in recent memory. Sunderland away on Wednesday will be asimilar job – don’t expect fireworks, but do – as every Liverpool fanshould having seen the recent displays – believe that the team will playpretty well and get a result, no matter what.
Team Ratings: Reina 7, Finnan 7, Hyypia 7, Carragher 7, Warnock 8, Hamann7, Sissoko 7, Riise 7, Gerrard 8, Crouch 6, Cisse 5Subs: Kewell 8, Morientes 6, Garcia 6
All Things Red in Short…
Kop Idol apparently starts soon at Anfield, with several players set to besold in the New Year by Rafael Benitez. Djibril Cisse is fairly confidentthat he will not be one of those ‘eliminated’ from the competition havingscored 11 goals this season, but judging on his reaction to beingsubstituted on Saturday, I wouldn’t be so sure. It is clear that Rafadoesn’t like his temperament and work rate, whilst Cisse hates therotation system which he had always avoided at Auxerre. Will there befireworks come January?
Congratulations to the skipper on being voted the 3rd best player inEurope. Personally, I’d have him in second place above Lampard, but whathe has achieved is magnificent in the past year and even the years before.If Liverpool win the World Club Championship in December, Steven Gerrardwill have won every single possible prize at the club – bar thePremiership. Let’s hope that soon changes.
Pat on the back goes to Peter Crouch after another goalless week. Havingsaid that, the amount of support and praise for Crouch coming from theboss and the majority of the fans is phenomenal at the moment; I’m surethat first one will roll in soon and he can go on from there to net plentymore.