Anfield legend John Barnes has slammed Manchester City's poor performance against his old club earlier tonight, arguing that Liverpool were 'well worth the victory'.
Summarising the game for LFC TV, Barnes observed:
"Man City had nothing to offer at all until Nasri came on and they changed the dynamic of it, but the way Liverpool started from the first minutes, they took the game to Man City
"They [Liverpool] did it all in the first half, and they were well worth the lead at half time, and I didn't feel they'd get beaten.
"For some reason, I thought it was going to be a draw, but Liverpool were well worth the victory.
Barnes also revealed that he believes Liverpool will go on to win the tie:
"I think Liverpool needed a result there tonight in order to go through. If they'd got beaten tonight, I don't think they would have gone through.
"Over two legs, I always fancy Liverpool".
The second half was a bit of a tactical shambles at times; Glen Johnson didn't seem to know where he was meant to be playing, and Liverpool became more and more negative, playing what Alan Hansen described as a 'flat back nine' (!)
It was a superb defensive performance, but inviting pressure on like that against a team renowned for attacking prowess can surely never be a good tactic.
Overall, I agree with Barnes - the game is pretty much in the bag, and unless there's some kind of catastrophe at Anfield in the second leg, Wembley awaits.
Jaimie Kanwar
Summarising the game for LFC TV, Barnes observed:
"Man City had nothing to offer at all until Nasri came on and they changed the dynamic of it, but the way Liverpool started from the first minutes, they took the game to Man City
"They [Liverpool] did it all in the first half, and they were well worth the lead at half time, and I didn't feel they'd get beaten.
"For some reason, I thought it was going to be a draw, but Liverpool were well worth the victory.
Barnes also revealed that he believes Liverpool will go on to win the tie:
"I think Liverpool needed a result there tonight in order to go through. If they'd got beaten tonight, I don't think they would have gone through.
"Over two legs, I always fancy Liverpool".
The second half was a bit of a tactical shambles at times; Glen Johnson didn't seem to know where he was meant to be playing, and Liverpool became more and more negative, playing what Alan Hansen described as a 'flat back nine' (!)
It was a superb defensive performance, but inviting pressure on like that against a team renowned for attacking prowess can surely never be a good tactic.
Overall, I agree with Barnes - the game is pretty much in the bag, and unless there's some kind of catastrophe at Anfield in the second leg, Wembley awaits.
Jaimie Kanwar
The tie is in no way in the bag, that's very naive to say that. City are more than capable of coming to anfield and beating us. With Silva back in the team city will be a different proposition and if we approach the game in a negative way and try and defend our one goal lead we could still lose the tie.
ReplyDeleteIt is not a naive thing to say at all, it's based on persuasive evidence:
ReplyDelete* Liverpool have lost only one game at Anfield out of the last 23.
* We haven't lost at home to City for 8 years
* Liverpool have an away goal advantage
Yes, City are capable of winning, but history suggests this will not happen.
Agree with every word
ReplyDeleteso j k you really are a red supporter
ReplyDeleteGuys , you may be right , you maybe wrong , but i believe this return tie Anfield will be the turn around for our season's home game woes .
ReplyDeleteif we beat them in that return tie @ home , tha't will be like an adrenaline boost for the rest of the season considering our home wins have been so few to come by .
anyway's cheers coz all of them worked hard today .
what i can't still accept is that everytime i see A.Carroll play , he seems to have extra weight tied to his legs ?????
Away goals dont really count in the League Cup, Jamie.
ReplyDeleteHaving evidence is brilliant.
ReplyDeleteGoing away and doing research and finding out information is so rewarding.
It's amazing the stuff you can discover when you use the internet.
Of course away goals count. Plus our home ground advantage will be the difference. For the rest of the season we will only get better at home. Besides us needing more goals, better home performances is the only other thing that stands out as what we need to work on from the first half of the season. With Gerrard back now our whole team will lift when we need to the most and win games whilst on the front foot at Anfield, which has been our problem. Our Away performances have been great!!
ReplyDeleteI also agree that a win against City next at home will be a catalyst for a serious run at Anfield over the next few months.
In the run up to the 3 games with City, I did say a win, a draw and a
ReplyDeleteloss were in order but not in that order. We've had the win, we've had
the loss. I think it's going to be 1-1 for the return leg, but that'd
still be a good result!
second half was shambolic.if roy hodgson had decided to go with tactics like that and hold out for a one nil win he'd be castigated.bellamy should have played through the middle for the last hour and carroll should have been off.extremely negative from kenny.i know we got the result but it was the expense of actually playing football.we're better than that.
ReplyDeleteTiti_Camara i agree to an extent but Its about goals at this stage and once we were one nil up after dominating early Kenny would have been thinking about the week before. In the League game we should have scored early and didnt only for Man city to thrash us 3 zip. so you cant blame Kenny for saving our goal however it was very negative. Perhaps a little bit too negative for liverpool! YNWA
ReplyDeletefor the players we had on the field it was shameful.
ReplyDeleteagger,enrique,gerrard all told to camp out in their own half.if aguero's header had been a few inches lower we'd have ended up drawing.
i know it's hindsight and we got the win and hopefully go through but it was depressing to watch and reminded at times of the worse parts of rafas negativity.
It was a ok defensive performance from us, that was made look better than it was because of City's attacking display. Come on, we got away with the tactical cock-up Dalglish made in the second half. We were ok but City were very poor, by their standards this season.
ReplyDeleteAnyhoo, considering our record at Anfield, we should be able to see out the second leg. But we must provide a attacking outlet to ease the pressure on the defence, because yesterday, in the second half, there was barely anything
Times a-changing
ReplyDeleteAlthough I mostly agree with what you say I don't think we can use the historical fact that we haven't lost to City at home for 8years, why I say that is because they are 10 times the team they were in those previous years now. But as a Red supporter this kind of two-legged tie reminds me of the Champions League days where I will always fancy us, against any side!
ReplyDeleteCity played the best they could. Yaya Toure and/or David Silva are key to decent City performances.
ReplyDeleteI hope Liverpool don't stonewall for the 0-0 at Anfield. It will be asking for trouble
ReplyDelete