Beat the shite and win the league, well on today’s showing we might struggle. One Phil Coutinho shot aside, we didn’t look like we could break the massed rank of blue-shirted bellends to get a potentially huge three points.
Anyway, the ratings –
Loris Karius: 6
Very little to do given the lack of threat, clawed a low cross away, probably won’t need to wash his jersey.
Nathaniel Clyne: 6
Solid, didn’t look troubled, tried to make the extra man on the overlap but when you’ve got five buses to evade in the box, what can you do?
Joel Matip: 6
Dealt well with what he had to do, broke forward a few times well. Looks to have settled quickly and dealt with whatever limited pressure was put on him.
Dejan Lovren: 6
One great clearing header in the first half, aside from that had very little to do.
James Milner: 6
Mix it, make it and don’t get beat – which he didn’t. Struggled to influence further forward as of late, though.
Jordan Henderson: 5
Struggled to find gaps in a hyper-congested midfield, felt like he needed an extra gear with United there for the taking.
Emre Can: 5
See above, albeit a bit more sloppy, but again, like playing in an attack v defence drill and looked a little rusty.
Philippe Coutinho: 6
Massed rank in front of him, but didn’t look sharp enough when he had the time and space. Came nearest to breaking the deadlock but aside from that, quiet.
Could have done with watching videos of Everton circa 1994.
Roberto Firmino: 6
Bits and pieces, just bits and pieces. Needed either him or his compatriot to shine and none did.
Sadio Mane: 5
Strangled for space, didn’t get going, passing and link up poor when he did have the chance to impose.
Daniel Sturridge: 5
Given a big chance against a team he’s performed well against in the past and struggled to make an impact.
SUBS
Adam Lallana: 6 (60)
Lively as ever, would have started if fit, but can’t be expected to take on 62 men on his own.
Divock Origi: (85)
N/A
Alberto Moreno: (85)
N/A
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Feel like you’ve sat on the fence with these comments Andy. Not saying scores are wrong though
I am a lot more positive than you Andy. I felt that after the first 20 we utterly dominated them. I have rarely felt so relaxed about not conceding and I felt like a goal was coming for long periods. Ultimately it didn’t and clearly we were not quite at our level but against 10 mourinho men behind the ball it was always going to be tough.
I would have given everyone bar Karius, mane and Studge an extra point.
Mane was very poor (off day) as was Studge (bigger problem – I know most will disagree but I’ll say it again; I really don’t think he is suited to this team/style and I don’t think klopp rates him anywhere nearly as high as many fans do).
Agree with you Tom. Unless Studge reinvents himself as a Bobby Firminho type player (which is very unlikey) or is happy to be used as an impact sub in future (just as unlikely) then I think Studge will not be with us this time next year…sad but likely.
Hope Karius is given time to settle. The kid Ward on loan at Huddersfield is said to be keen on returning as soon as his loan is over so both Migs and Karius will need to be on their toes.
Apparently 800 million people around the world got to watch the José world famous, record breaking expensive bus parking tour. Rumour has it that Tony Pulis and Fat Sam are being lined up as replacements when the Old Trafford ‘faithful’ get fed up of this charlatan and want to upgrade……..
Agree with both Tom and Lee in Sturridge. Having supported Sturridge to recover form during injured years and to hit the 2013/14 form sooner rather than later, it seems he will not be good for Klopp ‘s game. At the moment, I rate Bobby as first choice and Ings and Origi ahead of sturridge. Sadly it’s time to ship him out instead of letting this high maintenance asset deplete on the bench.
Disagree about Mane. Thought he played as well as he could have, despite being double teamed every time he got the ball anywhere near the box. When he was called upon to try to hold up the ball on those god-awful long balls forward, he did well, by either flicking on, or holding up. Sure, he wasn’t mustard, but he wasn’t exactly rubbish either. Thought Can was the worst of the bunch, seeing as how the majority of his passes went astray. He also barged into numerous players, without being clever enough to hide his intentions. Sturride was absolute shite, I would have yanked him early on when he refused to chase a ball to the end line(that he could have caught up to) In a perfect world, Ings would have been on the bench and would have loved to come on right then and there and take any opportunity that presented itself, unlike selfish Sturro. Ings deserves a feature on his current form, and I dont think this game would have been too big for him either.
Thought Clyne was very average and nearly let Zlatan have a simple headed goal. Mane disappointed me; he holds on to the ball too long running when he has clear chances to pass it.
We didn’t play well but it was just one game and Mourinho is a master of killing games.
Thought Clyne was average and nearly let Zlatan have a simple headed goal. Mane disappointed me; he holds on to the ball too long running when he has clear chances to pass it.
We didn’t play well but it was just one game and Mourinho is a master of killing games.
I’d say the centre halves deserve a 7 but can’t quibble too much. United are now a Mourinho team. That makes me happy. Why? Because we’re a Klopp team.
Emre Can didn’t have his best game, but he’s still better than Pogba: 9m>93m.
About right. The international break and a Monday night probably helped lose momentum but its hard against most outfits down all the leagues who park the bus and give a shit about the result.
Playing a Jose side who are in general on the backfoot is like playing cricket with every fielder on the boundary.
I’m happy to look at this one a different day to how I usually would.
I am actually happy with how he managed ourselves defensively against what was essentially a bunch of cowards with one thing in mind. That was the most gutless side Utd have sent to us in decades. Pogba and Ibrahimovic got nothing against Lovren and Matip, culminating in Zlatan’s pathtletic petulance late on. There is no doubt in my mind this is a game we lose in previous years. We weren’t good any means but no team can be every week. We didn’t look vulnerable at any point even though I was utterly convinced we would contrive to give them something.
The balance of our attack totally shifted when Lallana came on. He allowed Coutinho and Firmino to push into the front line and we started getting in behind, causing them a few desperate moments. Would have liked to have seen it from the start but obviously that couldn’t be.
All in all you take it. When you are faced with gutless opponents who just will not come out, there is nothing wrong with taking a draw, especially with our track record in similar games. If Utd are happy with what they produced tonight then all power to them. I’m just glad he ain’t our manager.
Completely agree with all this. Exactly my response to the game; and without wanting to sound like a know-it-all, I predicted 0-0 to my dad beforehand, and said I’d take it.
Defo woulda lost that in recent times. Shame we couldn’t win, but not losing was very important, kept a clean sheet, move on to next game. Especially if we manage to win our next league game, this draw carries even more value…
If we’d managed to find our game a bit quicker and get in one or two more promising positions for someone like Phil to do something special, we coulda knicked it.
I’d give man utd more credit than you tho. They carried out their plan better than us and were extremely disciplined. No question it was an extremely negative approach tho…
I think the way I spoke about Utd was a bit of an overreaction. You are quite right in giving them credit. They had a job to do and they did it, albeit thanks to that odiously talented keeper of theirs.
What you say about finding our game quicker is also a good point. We were muck the first 20 minutes and gave them just what they needed i.e. surviving the initial onslaught.
Disappointed not to get the 3 points but I’d had a feeling this would be our first clean sheet of the season. Our slow start didnt help anyone but them. Nobody should be surprised by their approach, they’ll probably play like that away to every other side in the top 6.
That said, we’re still unbeaten against our so-called league rivals and we should forget about it now. I just hope people dont get too downhearted about it, we should remember if we were offered 2 points behind the league leaders after 8 matches, especially after the difficulty of our start, we’d have taken that all day. We’re still in a very healthy position.
We have played, Arsenal, Spurs, Leicester,Chelsea and Man u, 3 wins two draws; 2 points off top and United playing to spoil the game and park the bus because they are already 3 points adrift. We play bad they play well but their goalie keeps them in the game and we have 2 key players missing for the first time. At the start of the season many people picked United as champions and above us for a CL place, if we can beat West Brom then we march on and either United or Chelsea are going to be out of the title race after next Sunday.
I would like to see Studge and Divvy played as a two and have two seperate strike forces, Mane, Bobby and Phil tier them for 60 and then Studge and Divvy come on, or vice versa.
Klopp has done a lot in one year but their is so much more to come.
Such a nothing football game Fellaini was MoM just winning headers and getting his big horrible, hairy toe on things for seconds. Mourinho’s archertypal spoiler game without the slip.
Tbf to him Can was painfully but understanderably not match sharp. Obsessed with just playing infront of him and what he could see straightaway with everyone clustered over on the left rather than having a look to Clyne. Mane didn’t help coming dead central particularly in the first half either.
Sturridge just isn’t going to work for us, in my opinion.
Maybe we can use him against lower teams to try and break them, but even then, he still doesn’t fit in well enough.
It’s not about liking him or rating him, he just doesn’t fit. We’d be better off, a higher % of the time, with origi or ings in there, I reckon. Or of course, the normal “first choice” lineup.
The substitution made such a difference; lallana was busy, but it was more addition by subtraction. It was coz sturridge went off, and the balance immediately altered. Suddenly we were all closer together and linked together in 2s and 3s.
Sell him, we have the depth…
Daft opinion. What were you saying half time of the Europa final? It’s still him and Coutinho for the most talented player at the club until Mane or Firmino have shown it for longer.
It’s not like Benteke where he scores the world class goal against United September last season but everyone in the world other than Rodgers still knew he was never the long term Liverpool no. 9. There’s a place for Sturridge; he just had scraps to work off because we were playing Mourinho’s shit game and not our own. We’re launching it in the air first half expecting Sturridge to win headers and hold it against United when they’re playing like a back seven out of possession and loads of their team are giants.
He was subbed too early for me as well. Can was knackered looking at the board like he was expecting the hook for Lallana and some of the bits and pieces from gaps later on could’ve fell to Sturridge.
As Leon said, it’s not about liking or rating him, it’s whether he is right for the team. For me, unless Studge changes the way he plays (ie. presses better and makes more selfless runs off the ball), he needs a goal return of well above a goal every two games, otherwise we just don’t get enough in return for what we miss by him not being a good “fit” for this style.
I am not saying we give up on him, and agree that he has as much talent as anyone but phil, but i’d just prefer the team functioned well and i think that is less likely with him in the team.
Liverpool played like Liverpool the last 30 minutes. ManU parked the bus after halftime.
Coutinho worked hard for the entire match and was man of the match.
Sturridge lost the ball more than 5 times and did nothing – 3
On many occasions the team played the backwards when we should have played forwards (emre can, Henderson)
Creativity was needed we had coutinho, needed more creative players in
Karius almost lost the game
Mourinho was right Henderson and can stayed back – but I understand why, we don’t want to get hit in the counter and probably mourinho was mad
United (or was it Sturridge)slowed us down from the normal pace Liverpool plays until Lallana came in
Smalling dragging can jersey. Almost penalty
Adam Lallana made the entire team better
Old old story…no guile or intelligence to break down a well drilled defence.Klopp doesn’t fancy Sturridge and he is probably finished here .
IMO that is a very glass half empty view. Put another way, for all intents and purposes, exactly the same Mourinho team (in fact it was inter Milan), in the semi final of the champions league in 2010 went to the Nou Camp and played in exactly the same pragmatic way and came away with a 0-1 victory. My point being that even the best team in the world ever couldn’t break him/his team down, and they lost in trying.
We could have been better, we probably should have won, but in the grand scheme of things, i’ll take that and if anything i have come away even more confident that we have the resilience and backbone that many doubt.
They were beaten 1-0 I’m sure (Pique scored) but went through on aggregate anyway.
But I know what you’re saying, he stifled that game too and showed no ambition, didn’t have to in the end I suppose. Master of killing a game, I suppose the best thing to do, however negative it sounds, is to not give them a sniff either because coming back against his sides from behind to draw, never mind win, is a difficult task.
Whatever happened to Origi?! He was our best finisher last season before he picked up the foot injury toward the end of last season. Phil, Bobby, llalana and mane are core offensive force. Sturrige is clever player but doesn’t fit in what Klopp is implementing because Sturrige doesn’t f***want to run simple is that. Can is not quick enuf with his passes for the current style n shouldn’t start games but def Gr8t sub if Hendon or Gio aren’t available.
I must be the only one who thought Hendo was our mom. He covered so much ground doing a lot of water carrying for others. Him and Can just didn’t work as well together as him and Winji. Really pleased to see that he seems to have come through those foot problems though.
I did too.
I thought Can was the weak link, he constantly slowed the play down and he turned like a 40 foot lorry and just didn’t allow us to move through midfield like we normally do, I was surprised he didn’t get hooked at half time, I thought Jordan seen this and was fighting in a congested midfield for both of them, we should have bagged the three points but I sleep well knowing I don’t have to watch that shower of shite every week playing that excuse for football.. Up the Reds..
Don’t see how you can give the nervous and panicky Karius the same score as Coutinho in that game.
PhilC was better in 2nd half when not trying to play in Hendo’s position, great shot deserved the goal. The team functions much better when Hendos the central play maker also allowing Can to settle in a slightly more advanced role. As a pair they’re the future of our midfield with Phil just in front. Don’t know why Mane was gravitating to an already choked centre mid, more discipline and patience was required. Wouldn’t fancy being in Studges boots trying to make sense and setting his stall out to the chaos of the 1st half. Hendo, orchestral conductor needs to be dominant and set the tempo, fucking off his team mates when they conjest his territory.
Overall still got loads to learn, it was a lot like Burnley but better against better opposition requiring more guile patience and discipline. For me Hendo has been our standout player this season, he’s really kicked on but shit he needs to dominate and be braver.