Steven Gerrard, Everton and Stoke

 So Steven Gerrard says Everton play like Stoke and it seems to offend both Stoke and Everton fans. Get over it, he’s not insulting anybody.

 Liverpool struggle against Stoke, a team who make life difficult for you by being very direct at times and have big, physical players not scared of putting themselves about. They use wingers and tall forwards to get high balls in from wide areas as well as from deep. It works, it’s effective and skilful teams don’t like playing against it. The Stoke manager has built a squad capable of standing toe to toe with anyone in the league on it’s day on a very limited budget.

 On Sunday Everton were often very direct, aiming long, high balls for Fellaini and Jelavic, sometimes getting the ball out wide to cross high for the same two targets. It’s a style that David Moyes has used to great effect, Everton have had a great 2012 in terms of league results. Their squad has been put together fairly cheaply so it has been easier for them to acquire mainly physical, hard working players rather than the more expensive skilful players with vision that the boys with the big money go for.

 Everton play in a similar way to Stoke, Stoke play in a similar way to Everton. It’s not a criticism, it’s a comparison of styles and both teams should be happy to be compared to the other as they have both been successful and have both reached an FA Cup final in recent times playing this way.  Gerrard wasn’t criticising, he was saying Everton are hard to play against, as are Stoke.

Things I Saw In The Derby

 The Derby yesterday was a proper Derby match, plenty of passion, plenty of controversy and a bit of banter – exactly how these games should be. I’m not going to write an exact match report but I will focus on the bits I found most interesting for one reason or another.

 It seems Everton have a mental block when it comes to beating Liverpool at the moment, even when they play well they just can’t seem to do it. If I wanted to provoke I could easily say they dived, cheated, ran to the ref demanding cards, threw things at our players, benefitted from a very late very wrong linesman’s call and yet they still couldn’t beat us. But that’s not really my style, I’d rather look at things in a slightly more analytical way.

 First goal, Suarez was obviously determined to score and when the ball deflected in off Baines he gleefully ran over to the Everton bench and dived in celebration. I’m not saying it was overly wise but I certainly don’t think there was anything wrong with it, Moyes had spoken at length about Suarez before the game and now Suarez had his reply, I don’t think Moyes can complain about the celebration and as far as I’m aware he didn’t so in this case fair play to both men, it’s banter between opponents on Derby day and football is all the better for it.

 Second goal, great free kick, great header, enough said.

 Osman’s goal, Jones did well to punch the ball in a crowded six yard box but I think punching it out to the edge of the penalty area pretty much central wasn’t good, though the finish through the crowd still wasn’t easy and was very well executed. I think had this goal not come so soon we would have settled into our lead and probably won the game but we didn’t concentrate properly and Everton took full advantage.

 The equaliser, just seemed like none of our defenders were in the right positions and the ball evaded them all. There was more than a touch of fortune in the goal, coming from a throw in that should have been Liverpool’s but was awarded the other way, but let’s be honest, over the course of ninety minutes there’s always going to be a corner or throw in awarded the wrong way at some point – that’s football, and we should have defended better.

 Raheem Sterling committing a foul after being booked. Tim Howard came racing out to the ref to ask for a second yellow card, which the ref didn’t produce. If the officials handed out yellow cards for fouls that innocuous most games, never mind Derby games, would finish 5-a-side. Howard didn’t cover himself with glory in trying to get the teenager sent off, and neither did Mirallas when asking the referee for an earlier yellow card. Sterling’s game tailed off after this and he played with a fear that he hadn’t shown previously, I think he was possibly more concerned with not being sent off than he was with concentrating on playing his normal game but the young man will learn from this and emerge mentally stronger for it.

 Phil Neville getting booked for diving. All the headlines pre match were centred around David Moyes saying if people like Suarez keep diving then supporters will stop going to the games. And then his captain dived. Again, fair play to Moyes for apparently having a go at Neville at half time, but you have to ask had a free kick been awarded and scored from, would the morally perfect Scot have instructed his team to stand aside and allow the reds an equaliser, or would he have celebrated like they’d won the league? I’ll leave you to pick your own answer. Another little aside from the dive, there have been comments recently saying it’s foreigners who have introduced diving to the game but it’s worth pointing out that Phil Neville helps coach the England under 21 squad so if he carries on like this we could have the next generation of England stars coming through thinking this is acceptable behaviour. Also his shocked reaction to being booked didn’t seem to be so much ‘are you seriously accusing me of diving?’ as it did ‘but this happens all the time ref, why are you punishing me?’.

 Brendan Rodgers’ half time changes. Joe Allen is an excellent holding midfielder, sharp in the tackle, full of energy and efficient with the ball when he has it. But he’s short. Everton played Fellaini behind Jelavic right in Allen’s area of the pitch and hit long balls in the air to him, which Allen just couldn’t compete for. Bringing on the extra centre back to allow Coates to come forward and challenge Fellaini was key to keeping the blues at bay for the second half. We don’t usually play with three centre backs but on this occasion the manager read the game well and adjusted his team accordingly, and while it didn’t win us the game I’m sure it prevented us from losing it.

 Fellaini kicking Joe Allen (twice) while he was on the floor. Allen fouled Fellaini, the ref gave the free kick, the two remained tangled and Fellaini kicked the Welshman twice, not with real power but it was a petulant action and on another day he could have been shown a red card. But he wasn’t and fair play to the ref for letting the game flow, it’s a Derby and there should always be room for a bit of niggle.

 Coins being thrown at Luis Suarez. This is the second season in a row things have been thrown at our players from the same end and it needs dealing with and not just accepting as part of a hostile Derby game. Suarez put the coin in his right boot and I’m sure if his final goal had been allowed to stand he would have pointed out that it was scored with the coin.

 Suarez fouling Distin and getting booked. This wasn’t a clever challenge and it looked painful, but it was never a leg breaker or anything like that, I actually thought it was a straight forward yellow card but the Everton manager saw it differently, and after a few replays I still think a red card would have been a bit extreme but it’s not a tackle I’d like to see put in on one of our players.

 The injury time ‘winner’. Great free kick, great header down, great finish. A few seconds later the Everton defenders half heartedly appeal for offside and the linesman is clearly too scared to allow the goal to stand so he raises his flag for offside, not wanting to be responsible for a controversial winner. Replays show Suarez wasn’t even close to being offside and the linesman has a perfect view. When Everton played at home to Newcastle they scored a perfectly good goal that was ruled out because the officials weren’t 100% convinced the ball had crossed the line, and oh, how they screamed for video technology that night. Those same voices were silent this Sunday evening……

 Post match interviews. Phil Neville apologised for diving, his excuse? “I’m not used to being in that part of the pitch”. If Suarez had said that after the Stoke game it would have made the headlines on the back pages of every paper and people would still be laughing about it now. Brendan Rodgers expressed his disappointment at the disallowing of the late goal and defended Suarez over his tackle on Distin, and didn’t go into any detail when asked about diving, though I’m sure he would have loved to really put the boot into Neville. Personally I think he should have also spoken about Fellaini kicking Allen but he didn’t. David Moyes said Suarez should have been sent off and the late goal wasn’t offside but shouldn’t have been a free kick anyway. No mention of if Suarez should have gone then so should his own big haired Belgian. No mention of Liverpool getting a dodgy free kick but Everton getting their equaliser via an incorrect refereeing call. And no mention of Everton supporters being driven away from the game by the actions of the club captain.

 All in all a great Derby game, probably fantastic for the neutrals, and to be honest I thoroughly enjoyed it myself.

 I feel I also must make mention of Everton’s playing style. They played long, direct high balls to Jelavic and Fellaini on many occasions, but they also got the ball out wide and tried to get crosses in. Ok, so the basis of their game seems to be having tall forwards who are good in the air, but the way they tried to get the ball to them varied regularly which makes them difficult to play against as you’re not sure how their next attack will develop. Mixing your play is vital in outwitting your opponents and many teams could learn from the Toffee’s approach yesterday.

 Bring on the return fixture at Anfield!!

My Solution To The International Boredom

 The weekend is nearly upon us and for football fans there’s nothing whatsoever to look forward to as it’s time for the international fixtures to take place. It feels like the season hasn’t really got going yet and we’re already on the third set of international matches which, in my opinion, completely ruins the momentum of the Premier League.

 Us supporters are deprived of seeing our team for a weekend, club managers will complain about losing their players again, big clubs will withdraw players from national duty with slight knocks and the national team managers will complain about the limited time they get to work with their squads. In this day and age of cosmopolitan football clubs have players from all over the world so it’s quite normal for your star player to have a ten hour flight out to his own country and then back again, often arriving home the day before his next Premier League fixture, giving his club manager a real headache.

 Aside from scrapping international football completely there’s only one solution I can think of. But first a quick question and answer session.

 What’s the best thing about international football? Easy – tournaments, seeing your country play regularly and improving as the team spends more time together.

 What’s the worst thing about the Premier League fixture list? Easy – the continual international breaks.

 What do national managers want? Easy – more time with their players.

 What do club managers want? Easy – their players not being taken away from them five or six times a season.

 My solution? Instead of repeated short international breaks have one long one each season.  Shut down the domestic leagues for a month and play a host of international games. If there are five other teams in your qualifying group then play them all Saturday Wednesday Saturday Wednesday Saturday and even have time to fit a friendly in before if you like. Then the following season stop the domestic league again and play the return fixtures, simple.

 The national team manager then gets a full month with his players to work on tactics, formations, player bonding and anything else he likes, resulting in a national side that plays better football and hopefully making the international fixtures more watchable. Supporters can actually see the qualifying groups taking shape and one result will feel like it has more bearing on the next rather than winning or losing a match and having to wait six weeks to see if it has any effect on whether you will make it to the next big tournament or not.

 Club managers will only lose their players once, giving them fewer interruptions when trying to mould a team from their expensively assembled squads. Look at Brendan Rodgers, trying to introduce a new philosophy and style of football requires continuity and consistency but he has been denied this as his players keep jetting off to play for their countries. And he’s not the only manager who suffers in this way, they all do.

 The toll taken on player’s fitness with the constant flying and alteration of sleep patterns will be reduced, instead of travelling 50,000 miles on a plane for international duty over the course of a season Luis Suarez would only be airborne for 10,000 miles. Surely this is a massive benefit and could even extend the careers of top players. Not to mention the environmental effects of fewer flights.

 And for those of us who simply find international football pointless, dull and boring we will know exactly when to book our two weeks abroad in the sun. Or what date to arrange your wedding for without fear of missing your local derby. It’s all good.

Even FIFA Say Suarez Is A Cheat - But What Is Cheating?

 Diving has now become such a hot topic even the vice president of FIFA Jim Boyce has got involved and had his say. He says diving is nothing less than cheating and has become a cancer within the game, and I don’t disagree with him. Diving and ‘simulation’ has been commonplace in the game for a good twenty years now with millions of examples of such behaviour across every league in world football. Strangely enough with all the diving that has happened (remember Rivaldo at the world cup, Klinsmann, Rooney, Gerrard, Young, Welbeck, Pires, Viera, Ronaldo, Pepe, Bale three days ago, the list could go on and on and on) Boyce only named one player – Luis Suarez.

 I’m not defending Suarez against diving allegations, at times he’s very clearly guilty, but I am saying the coverage he gets is not in proportion to that which other players receive for the same actions and it would be easy to see why he could develop a victim complex. It’s not hard to work out why Brendan Rodgers chose to defend his player when other managers haven’t had to despite their men conducting themselves in a similarly unsporting manner.

 Boyce says there should be retrospective action against divers and initially I agreed with him, but should that happen I wonder just where it could lead. There is plenty of cheating that happens within football that is not diving related and how can you punish one kind and ignore another?

 When a corner is taken if an attacker can’t run and head the ball into the net because his shirt is being held and the referee misses it is that cheating? It’s a deliberate attempt to gain an advantage over an opponent using methods that are not within the rules of the game. Does this mean we need to hand out bans to defenders every time this occurs? Let’s be honest, diving is wrong and we don’t like it, but defenders combat strikers using ways that are outside of the laws of the game more often than strikers use them against defenders.

 If two players go in for the ball and it bounces out of play off the shins of one man and he knows this, but still appeals for the throw in is he not attempting to con the referee into giving his team a decision they should not get? This is also cheating and trying to fool the match officials, should we ban players for this?

 Sticking with Suarez incidents as they are topical and fresh in the memory, when a defender fouls an attacker in the box and a penalty is not awarded, has he cheated? Against Norwich, Man Utd and Arsenal Suarez was denied the chance to shoot at goal because of a challenge from a defender that was not within the rules of the game, does this mean the defenders cheated and should be banned?

 Deliberate handball is cheating, it is seeking to gain an advantage doing something that is against the rules of football. Do we need to ban everyone who commits a deliberate handball offence?

 I, like most football fans, have been saying for as long as I can remember that diving is cheating and we don’t want it in the game, but can we really blame the players for doing it? As the law stands if a referee feels a player has dived it’s a yellow card offence so if a player chooses to try to con the official he knows the risk and decides it’s worth it. If a game is level with a few minutes to go and a player hasn’t been booked, and defenders have been handling him all game using methods not within the rules, then why shouldn’t he try to win the match for his team in whatever way he can?

 Then there is us fans. We all accept our own players diving, we may say we don’t like it but if we win a game 1-0 thanks to a dodgy penalty we take it all day long. Evertonians hate Suarez with a passion and regularly call him a diver but if you offered them a 1-0 derby win thanks to a penalty when one of their forwards has cheated they would take it. As would fans of any team.

 The rule makers need to come up with something that will deter players from diving, and retrospective suspensions based on video evidence is a good way to go, but if they’re going to do this then all forms of cheating need to be dealt with. And when it comes to reporting incidents a sense of proportion and perspective should be applied, but I doubt this will ever happen in my lifetime.

Brendan Rodgers, Luis Suarez, Tony Pulis And The Media

 Today I would like to praise Brendan Rodgers for his calm, considered and accurate reaction to the media reporting of some of the weekends controversial incidents. Tonu Pulis gave his verdict on Luis Suarez after the game on Sunday and I’m not saying I disagree with what he said, Suarez quite clearly took a dive and in an ideal world this sort of thing should be punished with a ban. But what Pulis didn’t do was condemn the overly aggressive tackles from his side (including a stamp that should have received a red card and a three game ban), and his short memory didn’t stretch back a couple of weeks to when Peter Crouch deliberately handballed in scoring a goal for Stoke against Man City. The difference? Crouch cheated and it affected the outcome of the game, Suarez attempted to cheat and failed, it didn’t affect the outcome of the game.

 Rodgers’ didn’t defend Suarez from the diving allegation as it would be a pointless defence, the evidence is there clearly on TV and it’s being shown on Sky Sports News enough times to make sure everybody sees it. I’ve felt in recent weeks that Suarez has cut down on his theatrics and his antics on Sunday disappointed me, I’m hoping this will be a watershed moment for him and he will move forward and learn from this, when controversy doesn’t follow him he is one of the best players in the league and a really exciting talent to watch. It wasn’t Suarez’ actions against Stoke that Rodgers chose to focus on, it was the subsequent media reporting.

 He clearly and calmly stated, without naming names, that another high profile player did the same thing on Sunday and it didn’t make the headlines. He also spoke about how players, again without mentioning names, caused or potentially caused opponents injuries and this also didn’t gain the same sort of media headlines as those generated by our Uruguayan. He’s not wrong. I saw an hour of Sky Sports News on Monday, between 1 and 2pm, and, thanks to the wonders of being able to rewind TV it took me less than two minutes to count up that during the hour they showed Suarez’ dive NINE times. I then had to go on to youtube to find footage of Gareth Bale’s dive against Aston Villa as that wasn’t shown even once. And that’s not even going into the front page coverage most of the Monday sports pull outs gave to Suarez, while not mentioning Bale. Ok, Suarez has previous, but so does Bale, he is a serial diver and condemning one man so heavily and not another shows a bias in reporting, whether the media will admit it or not.

 Diving is wrong and needs eradicating from the game, retrospective punishments would be the only way to go, leave it as a yellow card during the game as it is so hard for refs to get right due to the cunning nature of today’s footballer and watch the video afterwards and hand out bans. It’s not always possible to prove without doubt that a player has dived but the FA disciplinary panel work to the balance of probabilities (as we have become very familiar with) when reaching a conclusion so if a player claims he slipped they can simply say ‘we don’t believe you slipped’ and ban him. This is what the FA can do about it, now how about the media.

 It’s really simple for the media, just report it as it is, don’t sensationalise it, don’t pick on certain players, pick on everyone who does it. If you’re going to have a picture of Suarez on your back page for diving then put a picture of Gareth Bale next to it. And make sure you have images of Danny Welbeck, Ashley Young and Eden Hazard ready for the next time they commit this horrendous sin. And come down just as hard on people who falsely accuse players of cheating. At Norwich last week Suarez was pushed in the back, elbowed and then trodden on by a defender who knew full well he’d committed a foul, who then turned round and asked the ref to book Suarez for diving. Fans and pundits alike say it’s hard for refs to know if a foul has happened as players go to ground too easily, by the same token defenders reacting like that to committing a foul makes it equally as hard for refs to know what has occurred. If cheating is such a sin then accusing a fellow professional when you know they haven’t done anything wrong is just as far out of order and should be subjected to the same scrutiny and headlines.

Concentration And Consequence

 Another home game, another bucket load of positives, another game without winning……. Udinese were the latest visitors to Anfield to be given a lesson in football and then sent home with a present, as hosts we’re almost perfect at the moment which is great if you’re on Come Dine With Me, but we’re not, we’re in the results driven business of competitive top level football.

 Brendan Rodgers’ Liverpool is very much a work in progress and we shouldn’t forget this, he is introducing a new philosophy and a fresh style of play as well as integrating a number of promising youngsters into the first team set up and the work being put in now is geared up for long term success for the football club rather than instant results built with no foundations. As I see it the long term aim for the first XI is to play possession football, keep the ball away from the opposition and press them high up the pitch using fast and accurate passing combined with men moving into forward positions. This sounds like dream football and any supporter would be crazy not to want their team to play in this way, in fact Liverpool supporters almost demand their team to play this way, it’s what we crave and, given the level of support we’ve kept during our last twenty two title-less years, it’s what we deserve. My issue at the moment is this – against Udinese last night, against Man City, Sunderland and Man Utd we pretty much achieved this style of play. We dominated possession, passed the opposition to death, got men forward, wore them down and…………… didn’t win.

 The stats from last night’s Europa League game show we completed 691 passes to Udinese’s 173, and we had 71% possession to their paltry 29%. We were also far superior in the goal attempts figures but sadly the only statistics that count record us having two goals to our visitor’s three. It’s all very well trying to play perfect football but if you achieve it for ninety percent of the game and still don’t win then it needs seriously looking at.

 So far this season in the league we’ve played six matches, given away three penalties, received two red cards and conceded twelve goals. And probably completed over three thousand passes. What I’m getting at is just how much we’re being hurt by individual errors, they are costing us in every match we play and unless the manager can find out the reasons why and eradicate them we won’t be able to challenge for the positions higher up the league.

 Martin Skrtel was our player of the season last term and at times so far this time around he has looked commanding, but his errors have directly given away goals to West Brom, Man City and Norwich. Daniel Agger was caught out against West Brom and conceded a penalty in addition to collecting a red card. Pepe Reina totally fluffed a late long range shot against Hearts, almost resulting in us having to play an extra thirty minutes of football. Steven Gerrard gave the ball away deep in the Arsenal half and Podolski raced away, scored and we lost the game. Jose Enrique somehow managed to take the ball around his own goalkeeper against Young Boys presenting them with an open goal they duly finished off. In the same game Jamie Carragher was easily outmuscled for their third goal. Suso gave the ball away in the Man Utd half, Valencia raced away, won a penalty and we lost the game. In that game we were playing with only ten men after Jonjo Shelvey’s over the top of the ball challenge, the way we played with ten men makes you feel that without the dismissal we could well have taken all three points. Brad Jones comically dropped the ball at West Brom in the League Cup leaving us a goal behind after only three minutes. Last night it was Glen Johnson being caught in possession for the first goal and Sebastian Coates rising majestically to place his firm downward header beyond the reach of the ‘keeper (his own) that really turned the game. That’s pretty much all of our first choice and reserve defenders costing us goals, and it’s only the beginning of October.

 At no point this season have I felt a team has had us under so much pressure a goal against us was inevitable, we’ve had too much of the ball for that scenario to have arisen. But also at no point have I felt that we were fully in control of our defending, the possibility of us pressing the self destruct button has always been just around the corner and until that is removed and we regularly keep clean sheets there will always be nerves in our play, which will in turn lead to more mistakes.

 As I mentioned at the start there have been plenty of positives and I don’t want this article to seem like it’s doom and gloom. I have no doubts that we have the right man in charge and I think the emergence of some of our younger players, most notably Raheem Sterling and Jonjo Shelvey bodes very well for not just the long term future but also the rest of the current season. Shelvey has the potential to replace what we will lose when Steven Gerrard eventually retires and Sterling could provide the creative spark we’ve not really had since Steve McManaman left for Real Madrid. Also Luis Suarez has taken on the mantle of being our sole striker and vastly improved his goals to games ratio (with the help of a few Norwich defenders). We have been a goal threat more often than we were last season and you feel that it may not be too long before we give somebody a proper hiding when everything clicks together (we have a derby in a few weeks, would be a good time for it to happen…….).

 I’ve been impressed with how Brendan Rodgers has spoken about our performances after our victories and our defeats and he seems quite realistic in his assessments. He would do well to heed the warnings of last season though, we went through a patch of totally battering teams like Wigan, West Brom and Norwich but not winning the games. The management seemed to think that as the performances merited more than we were getting there was no need to change anything or to lay into the team and as a consequence the rotten sequence of results continued. I’m pleased that despite playing well last night Rodgers has chosen to publicly highlight the negatives as something to work on rather than point out the positives and say everything is ok.

 Lessons need to be learned and if defenders with better concentration are required then that is something that we can look at in January or next summer, but for now as a team I think we’re moving in the right direction, we just need to keep realistic and cut out the basic errors.

Who To Choose For An Italian Job

 Tonight sees Udinese visit Anfield in our second Europa League group game and it could be a pretty tricky fixture against an Italian side who have plenty of experience, despite having a start to their league campaign that has been pretty similar to ours, with only one win in their first six matches.

 It’s difficult to know what sort of side we should put out for the game, Brendan Rodgers has started making wholesale changes for our midweek games and our weekend form has certainly improved as a result, though our second string hasn’t yet come up against a team as strong as tonight’s opposition. The likes of Carragher, Coates, Shelvey, Downing and Henderson can come in and, while three of them are young, they’re not complete rookies and all have first team experience. The major decision is who to play alongside them, should it be youngsters like Suso, Jack Robinson, John Flanagan, Andre Wisdom and Samed Yesil, or should it be a sprinkling of first team regulars like Steven Gerrard, Luis Suarez, Joe Allen, Nuri Sahin and Glen Johnson? I think with the lack of travelling involved it would be a mistake to not at least have a bench full of established players, even if the boss decides to begin the game giving our youngsters a chance to impress.

 Prioritising the league is the right choice, we need to finish as high as we can and it would be gutting to be completely out of contention for a top four spot by November, but by the same token it would be wrong not to try to win the Europa League. It’s extremely unlikely we’ll win the Premier League this season which leaves us in the hunt for three trophies and we should give all we can to land all three of them. Our team under the new manager is a work in progress and will take time to gel, but nothing would help buy the whole process some extra time like landing silverware, especially in your first season at the club. I think we’ve already made a big step in our group by winning away at Young Boys and we should use the three home games to try to get the points we need to qualify. Four wins would surely see us qualify for the knockout phase of the competition and if home results go our way we can then afford to rest our key players for the away trips to Italy and Russia, where they will not only avoid ninety tough minutes but also the travelling that is involved. A positive result tonight will go a long way in taking the pressure off four our remaining group fixtures, a defeat will leave us with it all to do.