Only 4 things to say about Liverpool 1 Arsenal 1 & the other games.
Crap wall.
Anfield is like Las Vegas.
Stevie G played his best game in about five years.
And Man United look like the hottest team in the world.
That was one of the worst walls I’ve ever seen. It had the wrong players in it. The wall was Hleb-Adebayor-Eboue-Flamini-Fabregas. It should have been full of brave defenders.
After 7 minutes, Arsenal were facing a free-kick by a six foot two inch gladiator with big feet and his shot from an indirect free-kick was never going to go up and over the wall and down again from 19 yards.
It was always going to be blasted through the wall. So the wall should have been Sagna-Toure-Gallas-Flamini-Clichy. The charger should have been Clichy. The wall should not have broken in the middle. You charge from the end of the wall, not the middle.
Liverpool fidgeted round the free-kick to see who the charger was and then Kuyt obstructed Fabregas’s charge and Flamini moved away from Eboue and left a four foot wide hole in the wall and Gerrard blasted it straight through that hole. How inept and amateurish! There should not be a hole. Somebody had to take the hit. That is their job. That is what they are paid £40,000+ a week for. If the shot hits somebody and deflects and goes in, fair enough.
It’s the biggest league on the planet. Arsenal is a £200 million operation and Arsene told us 12 days ago at the AGM that a billion people watch the biggest Premiership games worldwide. He is a polymath who can build a training ground and build a team and build a stadium and build a global network of 26 scouts but he can’t build something as mundane as a wall to defend a free-kick. It’s a shame. But nobody is good at everything, even a genius.
Seeing Gerrard slam the ball through that hole annoyed me intensely because I knew Liverpool could not score in open play. If that Liverpool eleven played against Arsenal for the next five years, they could not score in open play.
Unfortunately, that is Rafa. Champions League semi-final against Chelsea, same thing, sucker goal early on, free-kick, Daniel Agger, bang! The only goal of the game. And Mourinho said Liverpool could never have scored in open play.
On this occasion I did not follow my own guidelines, so often repeated on ANR (Football’s an entertainment, so don’t get bent out of shape by a result ).
After 2 minutes, Alsonso lost the ball to Adebayor, who zipped past Hyypia, Carragher brought him down and no foul was given and the commentator said the impact with Adebayor had injured the defender. In fact, Carragher was on the deck and lifted his head slightly to see where the ball had gone and, as Riise raced back to cover, his left knee caught Carra on the back of the head. He was accidentally whacked by his own left back.
Later on, in 79, Carra pulled back Fabregas by his shirt in the box, just as he pulled over Joleon Lescott of Everton is last week’s derby, which Liverpool were lucky to win 2-1.
Arsenal going to Anfield is like a British boxer fighting in Las Vegas. You have to knock him out to get a draw.
To be fair, Liverpool played well in the first 15 minutes. But after that they just hit it long for the next half hour. They booted it up to Torres from 15 to 45 and that was imbecilic and self-defeating That was where they lost their chance. If Liverpool had played football in that period, even without scoring a second goal, they could have won because they are better-equipped to defend a lead than any other Premiership team .
But they just banged it up to Torres, who was clearly unfit and should not have been playing. So Liverpool gave the ball away every time in those 30 minutes and then had to chase around trying to get it back. That tired them out. That and having a day less recovery than Arsenal after coming home from Istanbul about 4 am on Thursday .
After losing to Marseilles and Besiktas, and winning so luckily against Everton, Rafa had to pick a belt-and-braces formation. So he went 4-3-3 with Alonso and Mascherano as twin anchormen. Those two played, at times, three yards in front of the centrebacks, so there was no space for Arsenal’s usual interplay around the D.
Second half, as Liverpool faded, and injuries disrupted them severely, Arsenal dominated and Eboue hit the post (54) and Fabregas equalised (80) and Fabregas hit the post again (86) and it finished 1-1. Although Arsenal had 66% possession it was generally said to be “a fair result.”
Obviously, the equalising goal was fantastic.
Sub Gilberto found Bendtner, who played a pass to Hleb and ran left side for the return, Hleb held the ball for an eternity of seconds when 95% of players would have played it wide to Bendtner. But Hleb just waited and then lifted a brilliant prod forward into the run of Fabregas, who hit it first time between Reina and the near post.
“We’ll win it now !” I shouted.
“Shut up, Dad, please ! Shut up!” said Caroline, who was home for the weekend. Jan was in the kitchen, Michael in the peak district of Derbyshire.
There were 10 minutes left, plus injury time, and I was sure Arsenal would score again. But they didn’t.
Sir Alex preferred to go to Anfield rather than watch it on TV like the rest of us. My guess is that he wanted to see the Arsenal back five. My other guess is that he would not have been impressed by Rosicky, Flamini or Adebayor
With Scholes having a knee operation on Thursday which will keep him out for three months, Fergie might just play the same side that thrashed Middlesbrough 4-1.
That team employed two electric wingers and two very chunky, strong strikers, despite the fact that he brought Owen Hargreaves back after injury.
When Sir Alex signed Nani and Anderson I reckoned he had spend £25 million on inexperience. That seemed risky.
But Anderson looks a better player than he ever was at Porto.
Half-Pirlo, half-Gattuso, Anderson can mix it but also ping it left-footed across the field or forward. He is tenacious and super-energetic, sometimes pressing defenders in the last third. As they passed the ball way from him, Anderson raced from player to player, trying to tackle. His energy is prodigious. He has adapted quickly. I think it’s called “raising your game.”
Sir Alex recently gave 33-year old Ryan Giggs another year, so Giggs does not have to play every game this season to beat Bobby Charlton’s appearance record of 759 games. By extending Giggs’s contract, he makes life easier for himself in terms of his team selection this season. and Giggs feels more secure.
Would United line up like that at the Emirates?
Remember, if it’s a 1-1 draw, Arsenal will stay top.
This was Fergie’s team, including the subs he used :
Manchester United (4-4-2): Van der Sar; Brown, Ferdinand (Pique, 73), Vidic, O’Shea; Ronaldo, Hargreaves (Fletcher, 66), Anderson (Giggs, 78), Nani; Rooney, Tevez.
In the Herald-Trib, Rob Hughes has written an eloquent piece about billionaires and Avram Grant and Juande Ramos.