Black Cat Crossed Our Path

 I don't like playing Sunderland away. I have already mentioned this and it will probably come up again next season aswell, it's just a fixture I'm not keen on. Yet again we lose there to a lucky and bizarre (though this time perfectly legitimate) goal, a tame long range shot hitting he post, bouncing against Reina's head back onto the post and into the path of a player who misses so many of his chances he might aswell be playing upfront for us!

 I've didn't watch the game live and certainly didn't fancy the highlights so I'm not really in a position to talk about who played well and what went wrong so instead I'll look at other aspects of the defeat. Certain matches this season like the Fulham away match and Arsenal at home last weekend have seen us defeated by late goals, this is painful but in a way understandable as when a side concedes so late there is little time for an equaliser to be found. But yesterday we conceded early enough to provoke a reaction and the fact we didn't really come close to scoring despite having well over half an hour knowing we needed a goal is disapointing and says as much about our mentality as it does about our ability.  We have seen the team go through spells over the last decade or so when we have almost needed to go a goal behind to kick start our performances but that doesn't seem to be the case at the moment. We had a season under Rafa where we were the comeback kings winning a large number of our games despite going behind, the need to score meant we had to push forward and lose any inhibitions which in turn created some fantastic results. A place in the top four is almost certainly beyond us now for the season so we need another reason to turn up and put in decent performances. For me that reason is the fact that the players wear a Liverpool Football Club shirt every week and have huge amounts of money deposited into their banks every month. Liverpool is a club that belongs at the top end of the table but finishing behind Arsenal, Chelsea, Man City, Man Utd and even Spurs is understandable in the short term, finishing below Newcastle, Sunderland and Everton is not.

 Tuesday night's game is bigger now as a result of our current league position. It doesn't matter that it's Everton visiting Anfield, it could be anybody, but when a team is only two points behind you a win is massive as it opens up a decent sized gap, especially with the end of the season in sight. Our supporters and our manager will not settle for anything less than 110% in the derby and if certain players repeat recent efforts on the pitch when the blues come visiting their cards will be marked. Anybody who can't motivate themselves for a match such as this has no business at our club. I'll preview the derby in a little more depth on Monday but one glance at the league table tells you all you need to know about how important a win is, never mind the fact we have only won one of our last eight league games and need to find some momentum as soon as possible.