IT must be a strange lot being a professional footballer. Particularly at the high end. I’m always intrigued to know what they really mean and think when they sign for new teams and ubiquitously proclaim that they want “to win trophies and titles” in their...
WE should only be looking on the bright side. Four wins in five Christmas period games, 15 goals for, just five against. Mo Salah scoring, having fun, Virgil van Dijk signing for £75million. Then very suddenly it all gets a bit murky. From the togetherness in victory...
WE’RE back where we started with Philippe Coutinho then. Reports today suggest that the summer’s impasse over the player’s proposed move to Barcelona may be ending and that Liverpool FC’s top brass are softening their stance. Cited is that the rhetoric...
I THINK we’ve got to see this one as a bit of a free hit. These games, coming tumbling on top of each other as they do, can become lotteries. Liverpool have done well enough over this festive programme — wins over Bournemouth, Swansea and Leicester and the draw...
“TAKE a walk around my centre half, gentlemen, he’s a colossus.” Jürgen Klopp presenting Virgil van Dijk to the press pack on January 1, 2018. Well, not actually, Klopp, and not actually van Dijk. These were of course Bill Shankly’s introductory words when...
THIS Liverpool team — aiming for a 14th match unbeaten today — is very good you know. I’ve seen a fair few down the decades and feel qualified in my intuition. It’s funny that post-Arsenal all the focus has been on defensive collapse and the apparent...
IT’S the mid 1980s and Arsenal are playing Liverpool at home at Highbury. It’s a night game, midweek, and I think it’s finished as a draw. I think. We’ve been penned in at their Clock End. No cover from the rain. That ground adequately covered every stand except the...
IF I live to be 95 years old (gotta have ambition) then I’ve got about 2,300 weeks left. Never thought I’d hear myself say this but, I hope none of them are as long as this past one has been. A week ago The Reds were the six wins in eight games Reds. We were the...
I’M keeping myself ticking over between games. Just doing as little as I can in real life so that I’m sharp and fresh for these tests that are coming every three days. Jürgen Klopp’s not rotating me. I’m there for him, each and every time. The derby took it out of me,...
THE derby is an inconvenience right now. We’re having a party and the neighbours have knocked round to see what’s going on. Fuck off ya nosey meffs, no one invited you. Everton aren’t our business and we’re none of theirs. Social mores dictate we have to let them in...
