Mario Balotelli [On the Road to Ballon d'or)

[Gibbo]

Chuffed for him, the massive fist pump said it all.

He works so much better with a partner due to his dropping down, this leaves at least someone in the area.

Showed flashes tonight, couple of great turns and a pretty decent finish for the goal. Worked his bollocks off too.

[Assassin]

Great performance by him. Works his socks of closing down and defending set pieces. Good for him to get a goal, it seemed to lift a weight of his shoulders. He must be feeling the love at Liverpool because he celebrated the goal

[Chris]

That was a beauty of a finish. Thought some of his hold up play was great aswell but we didnt have enough people around him to take advantage of it. Cant wait to see more of him and Sturridge together.

[Roboklopp]

Good to hear Brendog saying he told him to get int the box more.

[Fredo]

He needs to learn to lead the line better. When he plays on his own, he needs to be more aware of his position and players around him. If he does that, he'll exploit defences even more with his pace.

[Patricks_Berger]

There's no doubting his quality. Like with Suarez - we need to learn to play with & he needs to learn to play with us.

I think - after his Milan experience - tonight will do him a lot of good cos he got his goal but the team still did the work to come up with the winner C'MON

[Shaggy]

Great finish. I actually think he's been lacking a bit of confidence. This will help - I know anyone who scores a goal at any level is ****ing buzzing for the few minutes straight after but you could see after the goal, with more confidence, what a threat he can be.

[BigChief]

Yep, definitely a confidence thing. You can see he's really trying to stay focused on the football despite the crap he has to put up with (from Lallana/Coutinho and opposing players elbowing him in the head).

Why has Senderos not been retrospectively punished yet by the way?

[G]

I thought he shinned it and got lucky. Need to see it again. Don't care though he's off the mark

[Lee]

I thought he shinned it and got lucky. Need to see it again. Don't care though he's off the mark

Really? It was a lovely finish.

Deserved that tonight. He could've had two or three and hopefully now that first goal is out of the way he'll go on a bit of a run.

I can see him becoming a bit of a cult hero. The mad *******.

[danperkins]

Great finish. I actually think he's been lacking a bit of confidence. This will help - I know anyone who scores a goal at any level is ****ing buzzing for the few minutes straight after but you could see after the goal, with more confidence, what a threat he can be.

[Buzzo]

It looked easy, but it was a great finish. Totally agree, with a bit of confidence he'll score some goals. Was good that he didn't get the hook either, and got to play the full 90.

[G]

Really? It was a lovely finish.

Deserved that tonight. He could've had two or three and hopefully now that first goal is out of the way he'll go on a bit of a run.

I can see him becoming a bit of a cult hero. The mad *******.

Yeah but I only saw it in real time, haven't seen a slow mo yet.

[RedRum]

He is so skilful and pacy, it can be easy to forget how tall and strong he is. Has potential to be the complete centre forward if he can up his work rate (which in fairness was pretty good tonight).

[captainfog]

I know we used the Suarez money for the whole squad, but Mario is basically Suarez's replacement and because of that it's going to be very difficult at first to get used to the fact we've gone from someone who was all action, non stop charging about making things happen type player to one who drifts in and out of games without showing much emotion, but when he's involved is capable of brilliance. You couldn't get two more contrasting styles.

He's going to be frustrating as hell to watch, but as long as he gets goals I can live with that.