by Neil Atkinson | Oct 14, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
I’D have taken it. Before a ball was kicked I would have taken it. Both the manner of it and the eventual result. I’m not going to be mad about the fact that your Manchester United seemingly offered it. That is their business, not mine, and they will be...
by Neil Atkinson | Oct 1, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
THERE are days when it just gnaws and gnaws and then suddenly kills. There have been existential masterpieces which cannot match the sheer profound sense of desolation that last 10 minutes had for Liverpool and the worldwide diaspora of supporters. Feeling both young...
by Neil Atkinson | Sep 26, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
WIN or die, the banner read before kick off. Win or die. Liverpool, endlessly contrary, chose neither. They come away from Moscow the better side but not the winning side; they come away from Moscow a side that has failed to win but one unlikely to die in the...
by Neil Atkinson | Sep 23, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
THAT. The Lads. They are The Lads. Getting to be The Lads. It’s something that happens to a football team, something that happens to any decent enterprise, ignore the gendered language or anything else you like, you’ve knocked round here long enough and...
by Neil Atkinson | Sep 19, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
IT suddenly all looked so hard. When it had looked easy. At least relatively easy. Too often this is a Liverpool side on top until they aren’t. And too often a Liverpool side failing to make hay when the sun shines. The sun shone on Liverpool against Leicester....
by Neil Atkinson | Sep 16, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
THAT made me punch concrete and I might have broken my seat and my head throb and my Saturday night be mostly me chewing the inside of my mouth and maybe twitch. Anyway. Let’s at least try and have a chat. Football matches are two sets of 11 men and while the...
by Neil Atkinson | Sep 14, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
STOP it, Liverpool. Just stop it. I have had enough of the nonsense around Liverpool lacking ruthlessness at both ends of the pitch; had enough of the nonsense inviting ruthlessness from opponents who deserve credit for hanging in but too often little else. Stop it....
by Neil Atkinson | Aug 27, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
THE first big league occasion of the season. The first big win. Talking in general terms? Not quite. Last season last year’s champions beat last season’s runners-up but this feels like a north west kind of a season, a north west kind of a campaign. I could...
by Neil Atkinson | Aug 23, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
BRING. Bring on. Bring on your. Bring on your Internazionale. Liverpool are not immovable, never entirely not irresistible but good lord were they very good indeed at times this evening. The key times were these: 0 – 22. During that time they took the whole tie...
by Neil Atkinson | Aug 19, 2017 | Footie, Match Review
LIVERPOOL’S victory against Crystal Palace felt like a run-of-the-mill win but threw up this question: Is it run of the mill if it actually doesn’t happen very often? It felt like we as supporters had actually forgotten what this sort of thing was like...
