PSV 1-3 Liverpool- Post Match

[Crazy-Horse]

Thought exactly the same thing. He definitely plays better away from home, and for obvious reasons too. He needs support, not sniping and groaning.

Jockey had a great article on the BBC website a couple of days ago about the groans of home fans. He was actually talking about Eboue and the reaction he got from the Arsenal supporters, but it was quite appropriate to Lucas.

I won't post the whole article, but this bit particularly struck a chord

There has never been a player in the history of the game who has performed better with the boos of their own fans ringing in their ears and by all accounts Eboue was inconsolable in the dressing room after the game.

I can fall back on personal experience to tell you there is no worse feeling for any professional footballer than to have your own supporters on your back. If opposition fans get stuck into you that is good - it is done out of respect in most cases.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/7771014.stm

[vonk]

Just watched the game again and it's so much easier when you know that we've won. Almost enjoyable even!! Just a couple of points...

Even though PSV might be pretty **** you can only beat what you come up against. That said...

Lucas was brilliant. His passing was very neat. His free kick for the first was a thing of beauty.

Carra is a legend, he reads everything so well.

Keane does a hell of a lot of moaning. Really was fully committed second half and some lovely passes.

Babel looked very dangerous but some loose passes. Looked like he was up for it though.

Riera has a great first touch. If Dirk Kuyt had that he'd be the best footballer in the world!

Unlike some I don't need a convincing win against Hull. A win against Hull will be fine.

Goodnight.

[Nicey]

Well I for the most part enjoyed that game. First off the Officials were truly shocking. Other than that mostly positives from that game.

Great to see that we have the ability to field a reserve team in an important Champions Lg game !! and come out on top, was not too long ago we were fielding our strongest 11 in the Beer cup early rounds !! Shows how far the club has come.

Heard the commentator mention Babbs natural position is on the right channel.. was not aware of that ... well it showed if true he was noticeably better on the right flank .. made some good attacking runs cutting inside the defenders .. still to be convinced ...but a lot better from him in terms of effort as a whole.

Dosser for me was one of the stand out performances, looks like he is becoming more and more comfortable within the team. Tracked back a lot better last night and still the best crosser of the ball at the club by some distance .. Jesus he should couch our wingers. Looked a lot more assured and I still think he will be a monster of a player for us moving forward.

Poor Robbie .. did not get a sniff of a ball or a single decision first half. Was dropping back too deep and simply was not getting any kind of service at all let alone quality. 2nd half was a different story, playing in the pocket .. he bossed the game at one stage almost running the entire play single handly. A very very clever footballer who makes others look good due to his movement. Pulling players out of position, making clever runs and playing killer pass's. We obviously need to tweak his game and out system, to get the best out of him. I would have him in the hole behind torres or who ever we play but not up front as a lone striker as its obvious to everyone .. he is a hardwired play maker

Riera for me was total class .. a man amongst.. boys looks totally confident on the ball and makes things happen. One of the best signings in years and the best Left mid field player we have had for a very very long time. I have seen him score rockets like that before and last nigths goal was one for the highlight reels.. Total quality .. now if he could get the same kind of vicous bend on his crosses as dosser does he would be worldclass

Thought Ngog was off the boil for much of the game, his first touch was non existent mostly but you can see at 19 the lad has a lot of potential .. great composed finish

Darby looked solid as ever and a player who could possibly make the step up

Masher is getting back to his best which can only be good news ,,

Arbeloa has for me been our most consistent player this season, Fan ****ing Tastic .. always there in attack and always there in defence .. rarely lets anybody past him .. total and utter quailty .. He is up the standards set by our worldclass CB's

Carra .. was Carra
Lucas ... excellent game .. totally solid ... did not notice him as much as everyone else .. but at the same time did not put a foot wrong all game.

Whats not to like about that game .. a perfect night indeed...

Lets take this good positive result and performance into the weekend..

The team did good

[Shaggy]

Did anyone notice who replaced Carra as captain? Of the players on the pitch, I'd of thought it would have been Agger or Mascher, but I didnt see the armband on either of them.

It was Mascherano mate.

[Gingawaria]

Did anyone notice who replaced Carra as captain? Of the players on the pitch, I'd of thought it would have been Agger or Mascher, but I didnt see the armband on either of them.

Masch got it according to the commentary.

[Reece]

So no one else noticed Riera's unwillingness to use his right foot then

[Woobus]

Great performance in the second half, which we seem to be seeing a lot in away matches this year.
Keane was amazing in the second half, if Torres or Gerrard had of been playing I think they would have done a lot more damage than Ngog and Babel. Some of his passing and movement was top class, if he keeps up that kind of play him and Torres will be frightening.
Dossena is wonderful going forward and something we have really missed in previous seasons with his crossing. Made a few mistakes but he always had the fight and speed to get back and correct them himself.
Best game for Lucas always made himself a good option and passing was excellent. Got 2 assists, should have scored and it was great to see our free kicks actually being dangerous. Pumped into the danger areas of the box rather than hitting the wall or blasted over the bar.
Babel took his goal well but think he tries to hard as he knows he needs to prove himself. Best he has played lately and would like to see him back in the team at the weekend.
Ngog was pretty woeful until he got his goal, but he was very cool with his goal.
Its a wonder just how confidence can affect the players and would be nice to see Lucas come on at the weekend to Anfield cheering him.

[Scratch]

You havent added balance, not in the slightest. This post of yours makes me realise why people genuinely think you're a WUM.

The so-called 'positive' comments you make are actually thinly veiled criticisms and it's quite embarrassing really.

Rage?? A WUM? Never!! How dare you slander one of our most valued contributers to this site? It's people like you who drive posters from this site.

Although in the case of Rage, if you drive him i'll give you petrol money

[Assassin]

Cavalieri had a decent game. It is good to have a competent keeper sitting on the bench. I read earlier in the thread that a lot of shots were hit straight at him, some of them are due to his good position sense between the sticks

[Assassin]

no way Sally Gunnell

look at these 2 pictures - theres no difference!!!!

They has to be a Lucas song here....

Money or nothing tune, here is a possible starting line

We got tha Lucas

[PTP]

This will be similar to my post in the lucas thread – I was made up with last night, and anyone who is looking for negatives in the game is a miserable ******* – so granted we had already qualified from the group which took some pressure. But I really thought rafa got his team selection and subs spot on last night – it would have been so easy for him to have picked reina gerrard Alonso and even benayoun who has been slightly better than babel – but it was an ideal opportunity to say to the ‘underperfoming’ players – right here’s yer chance, pull yer head out of your arses and go and prove yourselves – and to be fair to them they did

Ok i don’t want to go to overboard, yes there were mistakes here and there and it wasn’t like watching brazil in the 70’s or Liverpool smashing forest 5-0 – but lets give credit were credit is due and take some positives here – firstly, rafa has been slated for some things year, even by me but i was made up for him last night, he gave some players a chance, they stepped up to it and he even picked three young local lads and gave a good bit of game time – well done rafa, great result, won the group and his choices paid off for him last night

Secondly – now Babel, Lucas, Dossena, N’gog, keane have been absolutely slaughtered by Liverpool fans this season – so it’s only fair that they get some praise when they play well

Babel – looked fired up and motivated, maybe he was a bit more confident in himself on the right hand side? But he got at players from the start, he looked strong and willing to run at the left back – it wasn’t vintage john barnes but it was a 100% better than some of his efforts in previous games

Lucas – even Ian St John gave him man of the match! Haha – looked composed on the ball, confident, tackled well, worked hard, made few mistakes and retained possession, plus a great whipped in free kick into the POMO area for babels goal

Dossena – again not a world beating performance but 10x better than previous games and looked a bit more settled and relaxed

N’gog – i thought he was poor in the first half and was expecting rafa to take him off, but to be fair to the lad he kept his head, worked hard and grew in confidence in the last half hour, become a bit stronger in keeping possession etc and the lad took his goal exceptionally well

Keane – worked his socks off, was trying a bit too hard to get a goal but it must have done him good to have played in a full game, a glorious ball for n’gog to score and another who looked a lot more relaxed and positive

[billy_mac]

Very pleased to have got first place, fear nobody in the next round. Mourinho and Inter would be nice!

PSV were awful, but you can only beat what is put in front of you.

Dossena hasn't got a clue positionally, and what is worse is that Jim Beglin hasn't a clue either and he was a left back! Every time the ball went down towards Dossena you'd expect him to be in position to mop it up, but he's never there. I didn't see any steady game in him last night. He made a lot of mistakes that would have been punished by a better opposition.

Robbie Keane would want to stop carrying on with the moaning and throwing the hands in the air, maybe he's putting his hands up for Dirk Kyut. He needs to put the head down and keep grafting. He played very well in the second half. His control and quick pass into Lucas was excellent and instinctive. He's no good dropping deep looking for the ball, was much more effective in the second half when he played a little further up.

Mascherano's passing was woeful last night, he should just do his job and give it simple. He hit one cross field ball early to Arbeloa and then he thought he was Jan Mobly. Again like Dossena we would have been punished by better opposition.

Lucas had his best match for us and Riera impressed last night after going off the boil for a while. It will do him no harm that Babel had a bit of swagger back last night as well to keep competition going in the squad.

Two away games in a week, two good wins, problem is we are home in the next match in a game which not only are we expected to win, we have to win to keep believe in the squad.

[rage]

Rage?? A WUM? Never!! How dare you slander one of our most valued contributers to this site? It's people like you who drive posters from this site.

Although in the case of Rage, if you drive him i'll give you petrol money

now now scratch you know you'd miss me if i left. as for craig calling me a WUM. Nearly amigo, I'm just wound up that we get so excited over putting away trash like psv.

happy we finished top, well pleased we're top of the league but honestly i don't think i'm the only one that's worried about our league form at the moment, especially at home.

[PTP]

now now scratch you know you'd miss me if i left. as for craig calling me a WUM. Nearly amigo, I'm just wound up that we get so excited over putting away trash like psv.

happy we finished top, well pleased we're top of the league but honestly i don't think i'm the only one that's worried about our league form at the moment, especially at home.

right firstly can evryone play nice today please

secondly - ok rage, lighten up fella just for 5 mins, i can tell you are a pessismist, even if we win the league you will prob still moan about something hahaha

but come on, regardless of whether we played against a ****e team or a team of world beaters, some of those lads (babel/lucas in particular) didn't look like they had a performance in them, finally last night, there was something positive from them - a few weeks ago they wouldn't have got in my sunday league team let alone string 10 passes together against a poor psv - so lets get behind them and support them instead of always looking to pick holes in people - the arguement i have already seen from a few people of "well psv are wank or well thats the bare minimum i'd expect from them" just doesn't hold up for me...............Now i ain't getting carried a way, there is still a huge way too go for these lads but at least last night they gave us something positive - I have been too quick to be negative and criticise myself but this is the new positive me and i am going to get you too see the good and get behind these players or else!

[rage]

right firstly can evryone play nice today please

secondly - ok rage, lighten up fella just for 5 mins, i can tell you are a pessismist, even if we win the league you will prob still moan about something hahaha

but come on, regardless of whether we played against a ****e team or a team of world beaters, some of those lads (babel/lucas in particular) didn't look like they had a performance in them, finally last night, there was something positive from them - a few weeks ago they wouldn't have got in my sunday league team let alone string 10 passes together against a poor psv - so lets get behind them and support them instead of always looking to pick holes in people - the arguement i have already seen from a few people of "well psv are wank or well thats the bare minimum i'd expect from them" just doesn't hold up for me...............Now i ain't getting carried a way, there is still a huge way too go for these lads but at least last night they gave us something positive - I have been too quick to be negative and criticise myself but this is the new positive me and i am going to get you too see the good and get behind these players or else!

fair enough. bring on the special one, it'll be fun to knock em out next