Carabao Cup quarter-final and Liverpool at home. When
the draw was being made and it was all Premier League clubs, I was hoping for
Brentford or Crystal Palace, so on paper at least, we had a chance but of
course we get bloody Liverpool. There is light at the end of the tunnel however
because Arne Slot has promised to rotate a bunch of players, but Chelsea did
that against us recently and still won 5-1 so let’s not get too hopeful.
The main interest around this game of course is that Simon Rusk is in caretaker
charge following the departure of Russell Martin after the abhorrent shit show
that was our 5-0 defeat by Tottenham. What sort of team would we see? What sort
of style of play would we see? On the face of it Russell was a popular manager
with the players so reactions will be interesting. One thing for sure is that
if we are as half arsed on the pitch as we were in the first half against
Tottenham, then we are in for a long evening.
Team news and it looks like Rusk has gone into this thinking that he may as
well put out the strongest team he can if he’s only here for one week, with the
only real absentee being KWP who apparently has a knock. Don’t know where he
got that considering he didn’t put a single tackle in on Sunday. Adam Armstrong
is suspended because he has booked been booked twice in previous rounds of this
illustrious cup competition so Cameron Archer starts up front. Slot has been
true to his word and massively rotated there is only really Trent, Mac Allister
Gakpo and Núñez from their normal Premier League side. Other than that, it’s
reserves like Kelleher, Quansah, Gomez and a few young players.
Away we go and there is a marked difference straight away because there is no
playing out from the back. McCarthy is hitting the ball long towards Aribo who
has kind of pulled out to the left, if there is no short ball on. It’s all a bit wayward and inaccurate, not helped
by the fact that it is blowing a gale and absolutely pissing down. Liverpool
are understandably very disjointed as well and both teams are struggling to put
any sort of possession together. We reach 10 minutes and Liverpool began to get
some control over the ball and it’s remarkable how passive we look. The players
are back in position, but there is no press to speak of.
We are defending deep and manage to create a chance more by luck than judgement
as THB smashes a clearance forward and it bypasses seven Liverpool players and
go straight to Fernandes in the middle of the pitch who knocks it off to Dibling
on the right, who really should make more of this than the tame effort he
produces that goes straight to Kelleher.
Darwin Nunez has already been copping stick from the Northam End and “shit Andy
Carroll” has rung out several times already but then he gets a bit fortunate as
Trent’s driven through ball is sliced by Bednarek and comes down perfectly for
Nunez. McCarthy has a good starting position but for no apparent reason he
decides to retreat back into his six yard box and then slips on his arse and
Nunez isn’t going to miss that even though his finishing is shaky at the best
of times. 1-0 and lots of, cupping of the ear to the Northam. Twat, but we’d
have all done the same.
Liverpool then stroll up the left-hand side through Mac Allister and Gakpo, with us getting nowhere near them and Endo links up with Gakpo to give the ball to Elliot on the edge of the box and with no Saints midfielder or defender player getting anywhere near, he just rolls it into the bottom corner with the aid of a slight deflection off of Manning. Fucking garbage.
There is no reaction and it’s nearly three as we stand off again and allow Liverpool to pass the ball to the edge of penalty area and Trent feeds the ball into Mac Allister, whose low shot is very well saved by McCarthy. We are so slow and lethargic and gutless.
Halftime and basically that has been a passive load of shit. Apparently the players all had a day off after Spurs so it’s nice to see them all refreshed. Wankers - exactly the same fucking thing as against Spurs. Useless. The midfield has been pathetic. I can’t help but be massively disappointed in Flynn Downes. I really hoped when we signed him that he would be a different maker in the midfield this season and would drive the standards of everybody else but he seems to have sunk down to the levels of the likes of Joe Aribo who just seems to accept, when we play the better teams, that he’s not quick enough to do anything in the game so he just strolls about. He kind of maintains his position but he’s basically a training cone. His engagement with opposition players is non-existent. Training cone stuff as they passed it around him. Downes hasn’t been much better The pair of them are playing today against two Liverpool kids who are both about 19 so we really should’ve been bullying the fuck out of them but there was nothing in that first half.
We come out for the second half and there is immediately a bit more aggression about the team. Liverpool have taken off Mac Allister and Trent which helps also. Bednarek steps into midfield to pick a ball up and finds Fernandes in the centre circle. He attempts to sweep the ball right but it hits Endo in the face and bounces through to Archer in the left-hand channel and he goes directly for goal, getting to the edge of the box, switching it onto his right foot and smashing it past Kelleher and into the far top corner of the net. Brilliant finish and game on. It doesn’t matter a shit that the assist was slightly fortunate. We will take it.
A limping Bree is replaced with Sugawara which provides us with more attacking impetus and his first action from the right is to put in a wonderful cross which Archer meets at the near post but he can’t get enough on it to divert it past Kelleher who makes a good sprawling reaction save. Saints get the ball back out to Sugawara, who burns past Tsimikas before hanging another cross up in the air which Fernandes controls and smashes goalwards but it’s blocked for a corner. We have impetus for the first time all season but before we can take the corner, we have to wait for the obligatory defender to get off the deck. It’s been a feature of their play that every time there’s any action in Liverpool’s penalty area, one of their defenders goes down and stays there.
Saints are throwing players forward now and consequently leaving gaps and Liverpool exploit one with substitute Jota bringing it forward before finding Chiesa on the right and his cross shot is past McCarthy but cleared off the line by THB for a corner, which we deal with.
Double substitution time by Simon Rusk and it could be called the January 2023 Transfer Window Nightmare Substitution and on come both Tall Paul and Sulemana for Archer and Flynn Downes. This leaves us with the defensive wall of steel of Aribo and Fernandes in the centre of midfield and the boys who have done so little since they arrived two years ago, are given another opportunity and it nearly works as Manning puts Sulemana away down the left and he hammers over a first time left foot cross and it’s Tall Paul with the side foot and this is the moment, this is what we’ve been waiting for….. and he slips on his arse. Fucking hell.
The final dice roll sees Aribo and Bednarek come off for Lallana and Ben Brereton Dustbin and he too has his chance as Fernandes puts in a cross from the right and the (How the Fuck is he a) Chilean International, meets it with a header at the back post but it kind of plops off his head straight to the goalkeeper…. And he was offside anyway.
Chiesa has not scored to Liverpool yet and he will never have a better chance than what comes next as his first effort is brilliantly cleared off the line of THB and when the rebound comes back to him he blasts the next shot and Sugawara gets his head in the way, more by luck than judgement and it flies off another corner. The commitment to defend is good to see.
Six extra minutes and the first four of those pass with nothing happening, so it’s time for some anti-Russell Martin football as McCarthy launches it into the sky and Fernandes gets in front of Quansah and is clean through. The Liverpool defender leans all over him and pulls him down and that’s got to be a red card, but no, Simon Hooper waves his arms around and exaggerated fashion and talk of fucking bottling it. Of course, there is no VAR when you need it and that’s the end of that.
The proverbial game of two halves comes to an end with Liverpool, of course, going through to the semi-final. As far as Saints were concerned, the first half was pretty much as bad as it gets but in the second half, no doubt having had a bit of a rocket at half-time was much better in every aspect we put pressure on, we ran a lot more and we created a load of chances. It was so refreshing to see us actually trying to put pressure on and get a bit of momentum going to get back into the game, rather than passing it around and hoping and not having any shots. We got a goal back and we piled it on as best we could, looking for an equaliser. We put crosses in the box instead of turning out again and nearly forced a penalty shoot out because of it.
The main talking point of the game is the referee absolutely bottling giving us a free kick on the edge of the box which would’ve led to Liverpool having to play the last minutes with ten men. Up the other end, that’s a red card all day. The referee said that he didn’t see Quansah’s arm over Fernandes’ shoulder, which sounds like absolute bollocks to me. It is absolutely a clear foul. Also, because of the way we were playing because we were putting pressure on and creating chances, there would’ve been a feeling inside the ground that we could’ve actually equalised, unlike earlier this season when there has been no such feeling. Remember Bournemouth away? Got back to 3-1 with 40 minutes to go and then didn't have another shot.
I would be interested to know where the change of tactics came from. Did it come from Simon Rusk alone or did he talk to the players to see what they wanted to do, because it was very different. There was hardly any short goal kicks or passing it back to the goalkeeper once we had possession of the ball. Not every ball went long but we at least mixed it up, as you have to do.
Any positive you say about this game has to be put into the context of the fact that we were playing Liverpool’s reserve team and by the end they were bringing on Academy kids who have barely kicked a ball in first team football before. Regardless of that though, this game was really about us and our attitude and how we approached it and in the first half there was just too much standing off. In the second half however, we set about it and were much more positive. Fans will forgive a lot if you are having a go, even if you’re beaten by a better side in the end.
Setting up with a five-man defence really means that the wingbacks have to get forward and join in with the midfield or the midfield will get completely outnumbered. Manning on the left was joining in whenever he could, but James Bree was not and that pulled the central midfield of Downes and Aribo all over the place in the first half. Neither of them looked particularly up for the challenge either and that first half was a massive disappointment.
With the midfield not providing much in terms of protection, the defence were overworked in the first half and in the main stood up well. All three of THB, Bednarek and Wood had very good moments defensively, possibly because they were relieved of the burden of playing suicide ball around the six-yard line. You expect some sort of consistency out of THB and Bednarek, but Nathan Wood again had a good game and if there’s any justice in the world with a new manager coming in, will definitely be ahead of Jack Stephens in the pecking order.
Alex McCarthy was captain for the day but unfortunately dropped a bit of a bollock with the first goal. He had a good starting position and then for reasons unknown, decided to backpedal into his own penalty area as Nunez came forward. That was the moment where we conceded the goal because Nunez is much more like to fuck it up if put under pressure. The slip in a penalty area wasn’t the biggest factor in the goal being conceded. Ironically, it was the same part of the penalty area where Tall Paul went over in the second half when he had an open goal to put the ball into. Ironic that three blokes in trainers can do a crossbar challenge at half time and none of them slip over.
The second half was dare I say it, exciting. There was a large element of fortune about the way the ball reached Cameron Archer but that was a brilliant finish and it was so refreshing to see us really push on after we got the goal back. forcing Kelleher to be busy to preserve Liverpool’s advantage. How many times this season has the opposition keeper not had dirty kit after 90 minutes? A lot was impetus came with the introduction of Yuki Sugawara in the second half who played high on the right hand side, added energy, got crosses in and showed all the things that he is good at. Miraculously, even Kamaldeen Sulemana showed signs of life as we tried to rescue the game and then there was Tall Paul - shame he slipped on his arse. We all know that Paul is not the greatest but he causes absolute chaos wherever he is, so we could certainly do worse than find a role for him for the rest of the season.
Onward to Fulham on Sunday and I suspect it will be a packed a few days before then, as the manager search intensifies, or maybe not and maybe it will be Simon Rusk in charge at the weekend. Either way, at least there was a bit of hope from that second half today and up the fucking Saints.
opinions on Ivan Juric glen?
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