Well bit of a dirth of decent things to talk about at the moment so i've just been having a look over some of the stats i've noted down over a few years, and probably the improvement that stands out a mile off is our home form. Rafa really is turning Anfield back into a fortress, just looking back over the last 3 seasons, the games we've lost at home are:
04/05 -- Man U (PL), Chelsea (PL), Birmingham (PL), Grazer (CL) (5 Draws all comps)
05/06 -- Benfica (CL), Chelsea (PL), Sofia (CL) (5 Draws all comps)
06/07 -- Arsenal (FA), Arsenal (CC), Mancs (PL), Barcelon (CL) (4 Draws all comps)
Looking at 04/05, you can probably discount the Grazer match as we achieved what we needed from the match, but we did lose 3 at home, the B'ham wasn't acceptable, but you might say being beaten by the two teams above you could be expected, especially with Rafa settling into his first season.
Looking at 05/06, we can probably ignore the result vs Sofia for what it was worth, the Benfica match we definitely weren't at the races and it was a match we should have expected to win so no excuses there, and V Chelsea we deserved to be beaten but maybe not by the scoreline we did. So that's 2 notable defeats, only one in the PL.
Looking at 06/07, we didn't field our first team vs Arse in the CC (hopefully the depth of our squad will remedy that), the CL defeat didn't matter at the time, and v the mancs we should never have lost (hopefully our reinforcements will help us win that type of game. So the only real bad result was the Arsenal FA cup match when we weren't at the races but those things happen. You could say this season we had 2/3 notable defeats depending on how you look at it.
On the face of things our home form looks tremendous, okay so we know that isn't our problem, really it's the away days, but it's refreshing to think that we can fully expect to win just about every home game we play, i'll particularly be looking for our home performances v Chavs and Mancs, rather than worrying about the like's of B'ham etc. Hopefully our squad size and the types of signings we've made this summer will solve our main problems at home, maybe we could be in for an unbeaten home season this year.
04/05 -- Man U (PL), Chelsea (PL), Birmingham (PL), Grazer (CL) (5 Draws all comps)
05/06 -- Benfica (CL), Chelsea (PL), Sofia (CL) (5 Draws all comps)
06/07 -- Arsenal (FA), Arsenal (CC), Mancs (PL), Barcelon (CL) (4 Draws all comps)
Looking at 04/05, you can probably discount the Grazer match as we achieved what we needed from the match, but we did lose 3 at home, the B'ham wasn't acceptable, but you might say being beaten by the two teams above you could be expected, especially with Rafa settling into his first season.
Looking at 05/06, we can probably ignore the result vs Sofia for what it was worth, the Benfica match we definitely weren't at the races and it was a match we should have expected to win so no excuses there, and V Chelsea we deserved to be beaten but maybe not by the scoreline we did. So that's 2 notable defeats, only one in the PL.
Looking at 06/07, we didn't field our first team vs Arse in the CC (hopefully the depth of our squad will remedy that), the CL defeat didn't matter at the time, and v the mancs we should never have lost (hopefully our reinforcements will help us win that type of game. So the only real bad result was the Arsenal FA cup match when we weren't at the races but those things happen. You could say this season we had 2/3 notable defeats depending on how you look at it.
On the face of things our home form looks tremendous, okay so we know that isn't our problem, really it's the away days, but it's refreshing to think that we can fully expect to win just about every home game we play, i'll particularly be looking for our home performances v Chavs and Mancs, rather than worrying about the like's of B'ham etc. Hopefully our squad size and the types of signings we've made this summer will solve our main problems at home, maybe we could be in for an unbeaten home season this year.
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