That’s poor, even by your standards.
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Lovely win today against a very tricky Villa side. Those inswinging corners from Digne were tough to deal with, but we had two rocks in the middle at the back, and Kelleher did really well and made some good saves too.
Nunez had a good game, Salah got his goal and an assist, and Diaz was lively. Robbo looked better for the enforced break - he is at the stage of his career now where he is our best left back, but he will need some rest along the way to show it. It’s a position to upgrade, but there’s still life in Robbo at least for the season ahead.
Gravenberch did well and it is a joy to see him on the half turn, breaking the press and then surging through them. Jones lingered on the ball a few times for my liking, and got caught in possession. He wasn’t bad, but he has been better.
Five points clear of Man City is great, but there is a very long way to go, and that could easily be overcome if they hit their stride as we have seen many times before. There is a legitimate question as to whether they will, as they look like a team that has a few older players and if teams will have a go at them, especially without Rodri, they might get some joy. They may well buy their way out of it, but with all the charges over them it is hard to know if it will be business as usual. Good players who still choose to go there will surely want an exit clause if need be. And there is also uncertainty over Guardiola. Hopefully it all falls apart around them.
Arsenal are struggling at the moment too, and they have a tough game against Chelsea tomorrow. They are 10 points behind and will need something against a decent Chelsea side to close the gap. They aren’t out of it yet, but it could be a very steep climb after tomorrow if things don’t go well for them.
Take a bow Arne Slot and you mighty reds. We would have accepted a transitional season, and a top four finish with signs of a pattern of play emerging to give us hope, but he has hit the ground running and all of a sudden we are title favorites - though to my mind that’s still a bit early.
I can’t wait to see what the rest of the season has in store. Hopefully the international break is kind to us and we don’t see any injuries. Then when the action resumes there are some intriguing contests right away.
Can’t wait.
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FIFY
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Coote wasn’t giving much today, to either side.
Oddly difficult to choose MoM votes today. Feels like just about everyone was at least 7/10
Kelleher - not many saves, but some big ones to keep the lid on. He is showing the critical ‘big club keeper’ trait of being able to be sharp when called on suddenly after 20 minutes of spectator status.
Gravenberch - feels like voting for a metronome at this point…but he keeps the beat.
Nunez - scored a goal, worked hard. It was going to be him or Salah, but the go ahead goal was key and he flashed some instinctive finishing.
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Agree with Kelleher. Can’t have Darwin, given those two glaring misses. And Ryan was AWOL for much of the second half.
Ibou was outstanding today, and fully deserves to be in the top three.
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Ref (and mostly us) is lucky he wasn’t put in a position to make any game changing decisions. How the fuck he called off the foul on Salah before the first goal I’ll never know.
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It’s a great position to be in, but we’re only a couple of injuries away from scrapping for top four. If we lost either centre back, Mo, or a couple of our starting midfielders, we’d be in trouble.
I’m not saying don’t enjoy it, but always be aware that things can quickly change.
Bradley did well, but we missed Trent’s ability to switch play and come up with passes for the strikers to run on to.
Kelleher, Ibou and Mo for me.
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Nunez seems like he just needs a little bit of adjustment and he will explode. Salah wasn’t what he can be. In a way, they are both below their potential but Darwin is more frustrating because he should be on the rising slope.
Agree with Konate, he was the other one in the mix for me, very much who I was thinking about when I said it was tough to choose.
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How long have we all been saying that?
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Literally?
Yeah I like that Slot is giving him (another) chance but he still doesn’t have enough composure in front of goal. Can’t see how this is going to change at this point.
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Which is a real shame, because you can’t fault the guy’s passion, work rate and commitment.
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Yeah, that’s why the Kop loves him.
It’s just that when he’s through on goal it’s more of a surprise when he scores than misses.
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He needs to score more goals but his work rate & team play are incredible. Just hope he gets to scoring too.
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Nunez is a different player when he isn’t presented with a must-score chance. His technique had been flawless in the past weeks when he wasn’t getting chances. Once he got in front of Martinez however, his first touch for his goal wasn’t the best; his shot in the following 1v1 was a tad too strong. And he probably could have done better with Robertson’s cross early in the second half. That’s not to say that he wasn’t good. He was very good, but he still needs to learn how to keep his composure in front of the goal.
Apart from that, our backline and Kelleher were peerless. It was really nice seeing Robertson back to his indefatigable best and that TAAesque pass that set Salah loose by Van Dijk was a sight to behold. Jones and Gravenberch were excellent and Salah at 32 is probably the best player in the PL and among the best in the world.
One a final note, Coote did not play advantage. He was waiving Bailey’s challenge away. He is lucky that Nunez picked up the ball and scored because otherwise 60,000 Scousers would have stormed the pitch and gone after him.
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Could have been at least 4 if Darwin didn’t have his “ffs Darwin” boots on.
Either way who cares
3 points
Clean sheet
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How can it be DOGSO if Darwin collects the ball, rounds the keeper and scores? Had Darwin not got the ball, then I would agree, but by us scoring it nullifies the DOGSO
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Points-wise maybe not, but you have to question where their heads would be after that.
They also had a good luck at Villa penalty appeals, one of which was debatable but for Watkins taking an absolutely outrageous dive upon feeling contact, the shirt pull from Bradley, which was nothing, and the coming together with Torres and Konate, which should have been embarrassing for the Villa lad.
They didn’t even reference the one on Nunez in the first couple of minutes, despite it being more of a pen than the other three combined.
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That’s all good and well, but Cootes didn’t even see it as a foul.
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