Stoke City 1, Liverpool 0: Insert Ugly Joke Here

We are the Potters and we play how we want.

Liverpool played well but would never have scored if they'd played all night.  Forget trying to play 'fancy' football, concentrate on scoring.

I'm with red2death on this one...we did what we needed to do, but the end result just wasn't there.  On another day, we would have converted at least one of our chances to pull out a draw, and maybe more.  And of course, a different ref would have penalized Stoke for handball at least once, and might have sent Delap off for his cynical, ankle-breaking tackle on Suarez in the first half.

But whatever...it was an unpleasant loss, but those things happen in the Premier League.  Especially when playing Stoke at the Britannia after an international break.  Next week's game against Tottenham will be much better, if for no other reason than 'Appy 'Arry's team will come out of their own end occasionally.

One other thing about Stoke and then I'm done.  Their fans can credit them for having a "commitment to defending", and they can prattle on about their "team spirit" and "manliness", but at the end of the day, they're a bunch of thugs who play the clearest example of anti-football I've ever seen.  Contrary to Tony Pulis's obvious belief, the end does not always justify the means.  Cruyff said it best: "Victory is not enough, there also needs to be beautiful football".  I would much rather we play like Barca and lose than play like Stoke and win.

I absolutely hate hate hate hate hate it whenever a keeper has one of his unstoppable days against us and then returns to his shitty real form in the next few games against others.

That said, Hendo was poor with his finishing today and the miss by Suarez at the end summed the day up for us. It was truly an exasperating day and no matter how frustrating it was for us fans, it must be so much more frustrating for the players on the pitch because they knew they were the ones who could've made the difference!

End of the day, I don't think we should be going for anyone's head especially since they gave it their all and there's bound to be snipers who'd be going for Hendo's pricetag and etc.

Day's like that happen but it's time for the next game. Bring on Spurs!

I am so old I can remember when Liverpool supporters had some class. Suarez is a good player, the most talented guy on the pitch today. Good teams know how to integrate exceptionally talented players into their team - you haven't managed this yet.

After Suarez the best player on the pitch was a young man of 23 years, captain of his side, cool, strong, disciplined and honest. A marvelous player, one who'd improve your side no end. And integrated into a proper team. You have nobody remotely up to Ryan Shawcross's standards of discipline. strength and manliness.

You've got too many bluffers in your side - your captain is a peevish and indulged favourite child. A strong-minded referee would have booked him for his refusal to go off when told to to get his facial cut fixed - a grown-up would just have gone off and got on with it. Carragher did everything except stamp his feet. A grown man pouting is a ludicrous sight.

Looking at the rabble who finished the gamein all black I was wondering how many would have got a game under Shankly, Paisley, Fagan. Carragher? Johnson? Carroll? Carroll!

So...Shawcross is a fantastic übermensch, Stoke are all manly and team-spirit-tastic, we used to be classy and you don't rate Carra or Carroll...wow, insightful. Horseshit, of course, but y'know...thanks for calling. When you make a couple of salient points I'll be sure to bother responding

RedTrev:"Shawcross is a fantastic übermensch"Straw man RedTrev, sign of a weak argument.Shawcross is a superb player and a recognisably strong character. Your captain is a whiner, a bluffer, too indulged by fans and weak managers to be brought face-to-face with his inadequacies.Suarez is a very good player: yesterday I would say he did as much as anybody except Carragher to lose you the game.I saw Kenny play when we were both 18 - he on the pitch at Paradise and me in the Jungle. He was a wonderful player, rightly adored by the Celtic crowd, and he was a good manager too, fifteen years ago. But, he was always a nasty wee so-and-so when things don't go well, and I'd watch out for more idiocies when results in important matches go against him. He finished up at war with the press in Scotland last time he was running a club. And he'll have to do better managing the real good players, the world-beaters, than he has so far

What Kenny said after yesterday's game:"We don't have any complaint, for want of a better word, about Stoke City. They played very, very hard, they played well. They got their goal, they defended well and courageously at times, and maybe occasionally they got a bit of luck."We don't have anything but appreciation for the way that they played, the way they held on and went on to win the game. So I've only got complimentary things to say about Tony (Pulis) and Stoke.Idiocy, really? 

Like I said, I liked Kenny as a player, and then as a manager in the 1980s and 90s, but I don't have stars in my eyes. He isn't a pathological liar like Wenger, of course, but I have seen him lose his rag and nurture a grudge plenty of times over the last forty-odd years.

And, yes, it is idiocy to know what he knows, to watch a poor display by a lot of his famous players and then say stuff like this:

"The first four games have had contentious decisions in them and every one has gone against us.
"We would like to be respectful to referees but more important is having respect for my football club."

"If I feel the club is suffering in any shape or
form I will need to go the same route other people go and see if we can
gain some benefit from that."

How many pens not given to visitors at Anfield? How many dives by Stevie G? How many agricultural fouls by Carragher?

You sir, are obviously from the 'Och I hate that Fancy bloody Dan fitba' school of footballing criticism. Enjoy your win Mr McAuly, but please don't patronise me with your 'knowledge' of the game.

Well, that's me told?!? Alec, for a man of 60-odd you should have a little more respect for your peers. Insulting Kenny's character and managerial skills on here us just plain silly and at 37, I have enough sense not to get into a slagging match with a tourist/troll. Bye now.

I love historical fiction.  - Cheers, Alec

I'd hate to say this but Manchester United would have won even with such tactics that Stoke was putting on last night against us. I heard Bolton was trying to be physical against them last night (no, i didn't watch the game) ..and Manure scored 5 away! We just didn't have that extra quality needed in the midfield.  

Charlie Adams was extremely poor in my opinion.. Suarez being too petulant at times... maybe caused him to lack composure when he needed too... How I wish Meireles or Aquilani was in that midfield to bring some quality intricate passing... but we can't look at them anymore...

Need to buck up real bad next games. Man City is already up there heading the pack .... And Stoke is 4th at this point of time in the league!! haha

Oh ya, Carra is off paced. Maybe we should give our new Uruguan defender pitch time..

Liverpool must learn how to play against Anti Football ...we cannot use this as excuse cos other teams can still win even with such tactics... Referring was woeful ... but isn't that the same for every single football match??? 

Anyways, we need to lose of some point in the league, hopefully this is the only one !!! Hahahaha

And yeah... how could I forget Gerrard!! He needs to come back soon but Kenny needs to be gentle with him being all so fragile at times..

"I'd hate to say this but Manchester United would have won even with such tactics that Stoke was putting on last night against us".
Man U would not have had all the officials' decisions go against them!!! Especially not when Clatten-fucking-burg was the Ref!!!
"Charlie Adams was extremely poor in my opinion"
No he wasn't 'extremely' poor you extremist and his name is Adam not Adams!!!

Someone on the chelsea offside posted these highlights from our game and the others http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

This was perfection for Pulis.  Sneak a goal, then park the bus.  If a third of the teams did this in the EPL, it would kill football in England.

We did everything we needed to except finish.  

There was no space on the pitch today so we did ok for those conditions and created plenty.  But we have to beable to finish.

The comments about Adam and others not having a great game - didn't matter.  We created the chances.

I understand the preschool philosophy, "if you want to give someone a treat, you have to bring enough treats for everyone for it to be fair". And I also understand how it shooould apply to Stoke's situation, "If you play football a certain way, everyone in the league should be able to play this way for it to be fair". But that isn't the case. imagine twenty Stoke Cities in the Premier League. That wouldn't work, whatsoever. it would look something like a very organized MLS football. if there was a league of 20 Barcelonas, that would work. They possess, attack, and defend in equal amounts. 

With all that out of the way, I'm perfectly satisfied with having ONE Stoke City. We can spend one day a year fuming about how shitty they are at football and how they could potentially be the only football team to win the Rugby World Cup and the Carling Cup double. Having ONE Stoke City is pro-football. I just wish every team had a different strategy that made them unique. 

I think it matters in the broader context of the season, but yeah, if three chances had been taken, it'd be an afterthought.

Whatever, I'm just going to keep drinking.

I'm with you on that.

Just going to keep drinking. Can't stand this shit. We can't take one stinking chance???

Weeeeee suck. 

I'm sorry that I don't have much else to say, as I missed much of the match. I'm glad to see that we are mostly positive, that is great. But not being able to beat Stoke against the odds is worrying, even if we did theoretically "beat" them. I'm not backing this up with facts or anything, basically: "Man, we should've been able to win this, damn, hope this doesn't happen again..". and that is all. No reasons or crucified players. 

it's a little concerning that the king found a clearly gassed kuyt to be the better option in this game to a rested carroll... it indicates carroll's lost the bosses trust a little bit, i mean, this was supposed to be the type of physical contest he relishes, and u wud imagine he should be fired up to clear his name a little bit.  i was all about the lineup at the beginning, but dirk was cooked right from the start - and of course he would be!  he plays every minute of every dutch game, it should be an automatic rest game for him after the fifa breaks.  This is the second time this season kenny has done this, first with suarez, and while its not exactly a 'fool me once' type of situation, it does bear some monitoring, wat happens when stevie first comes back for example - is there a chance he might mishandle his first game(s) back as well?

You guys crack me up with the Stoke 'anti football comments....you really do! I thought Liverpool had a bit more about them than the plastic Arsenal fans but apparently not!!!
You can try again at the Brit next season boys.....

Tony Pulis, move along. We wear our caps backwards. because we are the shit, silver. 

Glenn, I guess you're a Potter? Listen mate, when you guys are squashing down the pitch, defending tigerishly, working the old set-piece-towel magic and generally parking the 52-seater against the mancs, chelski or anyone else, well shit,  I'm all for it and fair play to you. Just don't expect us to endure that type of football and an unjust defeat and praise Tony's boys for mugging us. If that sounds bitter, it's because am. If it sounds like I think we play better fooball and you guys are distinctly 'not barca', it's because I do. Enjoy the win fella, but it's a tad cheeky to come on here and pontificate about our reaction to it.

It appears the punctuation at the Brit is worse than the football.

The players who looked like solving the Riddle of the Pcked Stoke Box were Bellamy, Suarez, Enrique and Lucas.  Perhaps having Maxi on for these types of games would be a benefit, as it is the older, wiser and more patiently positive players who seem to thrive.  Wee Jay also strikes me as someone who would have been better out there today as well.

Still, compare what we saw today with what was on offer one year ago.  Today we kept possession (except for Carra's hoofing), we made numerous attacks and kept seeking a goal, we took shots and made chances.  Things are much, much better than they have been in the recent past.

Bellamy and Suarez looked very, very tasty together in flashes, and you could almost feel Enrique rubbing his hands with glee when Craig came on.  More of that, please, Kenny.

Three small points to add to Ed's Itorial and the commentary from us plebs:

I think missing Kelly/Glen really skewed our balance across the park. Cannot say enough how strong & composed Agger/Enrique look on the left side of the defense, they're such a good platform for playing out the back and dictating the game. 

Pepe might be one of the best 3 passers at Liverpool. Weird to say...but the more involved he is, the more dynamic we look. I can usually think of a handful of Reina counter-attacks, but today - due to the general clogged drain of shit eloquently discussed here - he had little to do, which sometimes is not the best thing. 

The general consensus says Carra, Adam, Henderson, Kuyt, and Suarez had below-par to poor days today. That, my friends, is why Gerrard remains key to LFC: He remains the only player capable (hopefully) of taking the game by the proverbial sack and giving Lady Luck the stiff one she needed today. 

Rustling up some tacos and a cold bucket of beer on a warm Saturday afternoon. Still, not too Xabi.

clogged drain of shit!!  Love it.  Stoke through and through.

Still a fan of the tagline. Justin-pecable.

Oh dear you lost !!! It happens get used to it losers. Sure your not an Arsenal fan in disguise?. Heard it all before. I hate bad losers never hear sir Alex moaning about how we play after they have BEATEN us wonder why? clue I suppose is in the word beaten !!!

Fergie popped off after losing to Bayern two years ago in the Champions League.  And he really lost it on Martin Atkinson last year after losing to Chelsea.  But Gary Neville and Roy Keane are class acts, I get your point.

In all fairness, you don't get beat often (unfortunately). And Fergie hates to lose, he just takes it out on the dressing room. 

But you just...how can you gloat about....why are you giving Matron Fergie a reacharound if...what are you trying to...? My brain hurts. Analysing ill-conceived triumphalist nonsense that cites defeat to the scum as a given does that to me. Please stop talking....

This is terrific--bragging about losing to United, fluffing Fergie, and cryptic ravings about the significance of the word "beaten" that we can't possibly wrap our minds around.

Today was not in vain friends.

Thanks for the usual balanced write-up Ed. Pretty much where I'm at too.

 All the stats will tell the truth, ie. we owned the ball, had 24 attempts and were facing a side so negative and lacking in guile that they completed just 125 passes out of a pathetic 195 atempts.

Similarly, their pen could have been avoided if Carra had gone down when Walters shoulder-charged him and on another day the TWO shouts we had for handball would have resulted in pens for us.

Just spare me from the inevitable gloom-mongers calling for Carragher's head, Kenny's sacking and Henderson's decapitation...

That was a horribly frustrating way to spend an afternoon in so many ways. There were a LOT of things that werent right. And the overall impression is one of having been mugged...which we were.
 
- Skrtel at right back is an understandable call but it meant less fluidity going forward than Jonno or Kelly offer. Last week vs Bolton he was inspired in the oppo half. Today...not so much.

- Carra was closed down quickly all day as were the majority of the midfielders who provide a simple out-ball  and so, inevitably, he resorted to his default setting of punting it long. This makes my eyes bleed and my ulcer grow and I wish he wouldn't do it. Please Jamie, for me....? Still our best defender, despite the naysayers.

- Agger and Enrique were competent and composed and the latter flourished in an attacking sense when Bellamy came on and started buzzing about effectively.

- Adam was way-off his best and nearly drove Suarez to self-harm with his hollywood balls. To be fair to the kid, he never hid and certainly doesn't lack the moral courage to get on the ball even when he's stinking out the joint. Charlie will have many good days, however.

- Mr. Reliable, Lucas, was oddly ineffective and saw a lot of passes intercepted early on. He did, however, grow into the game as Ed says.

- Poor old Henderson had a game to forget. Put clean through he squandered not only the initial gilt-edged chance but two successive ones before Adam missed the fourth of that chaotic spell. Aside from that his passing was sloppy and his contribution minimal. One step forward and two back for the kid but such is the nature of a 20 year old's development. Like Charlie, he has the heart and ability and better days will come.

- Where is the Dirky of last season? And why, in the name of jeeebas, must Bert Van Marwijk play the lad in every minute of every facile victory. Frankly Kuyt seemed to be on half-power. No lack of effort but a discernible lack of his usual top-notch impact.

- Downing was very busy, although I personally wish he'd stay left for 90 minutes. A solid performance and suffered from lack of attacking support on the right. Nearly, but not quite. Again, no shortage of endeavour and has obvious quality.

- And so to Suarez, the most irritated man in all of Stoke and environs. A bustling and bright display from Wee Luis who was instrumental in anything decent we did. Ironically, after bitching extravagantly at all his team-mates (especially Adam) for 93 minutes he then missed an excellent opportunity at the death to sicken Pulis's shower of cloggers.

- Carroll and more especially Bellamy added to our threat for the last 20 or so minutes but to be honest they could be still out there now and not score.

- Days like this happen but the thing that makes you want to hurl out of sheer frustration is when an anti-football gang of agrarian gents like Stoke actually score from one of their 2 shots on our goal. Yes, we must learn to break them down and they are entitled to set-up how they like and blah, blah, fucking blah. Tonight, I still feel like my wallet and my Missus got stolen by an ugly, clumsy thief...and I don't know how it happened.

we did break them down.  It was all ugly football, we did what we had to but just didn't finish.  That was the only thing missing, stoke didn't allow any other style of play.

Even when our passing was off, we still got the ball up there, Stoke were that bad.

Need clinical ruthless finishing.

Your last sentence is a gem! Spot on!

Gutted..anyway, we deserved a point at the least today. We created numerous chances,but just couldnt finish. Matches against Stoke are absolutely frustrating. Tactics like these will take them no higher than 7th or 8th probably... fucking Stoke..learn to play first. Adam was dissapointing, always kept at shooting.Lucas was awry but recovered soon. And that one on one with Hendo should have been finished. Anyways, nothing to feel disheartened. We'll bounce back, its still early in the season, looking forward to the Spurs match! In Kenny we believe! YNWA

we've never played well after an international.

Why the negativity?  I actually thought we played alright.  It was one of those days, nothing would go for us.  Players weren't fantastic, but they ran their guts out, and had a decent game.  

We created 24 chances to their 3, 73% vs 27% possession, and they ended up winning 1-0.  It happens.  Shit happens.  It's alright, we'll just have to move on.

Past the halfway mark we were quite dominant but they were hanging on.  At that point I felt that if we just step it up a notch it'd be too much for them to handle.  All credit to Liverpool, we did find that extra gear through Carroll and Bellamy.  Though in the end Stoke still survived, barely.  What are we to do, demand another 2 minutes so we can snatch a point or three?  We're not that club, you know.  

It sucks, but it's as positive a loss as losses get...
   

I keep saying again and again, same old story but in different season, MUN won AWAY 5 nil.. and we had been beaten by Stock away 0 - 1 , my heart is bleeding, I just can not see MUN keep wining and we loose ground on them....

why are you even looking up at the Mancs?

What matters is each game that we go in to and look to get those 3 points.

What everyone else does isn't really a matter of paramount importance unless they're consistently having 3 extra referees as part of their squad.

Tough to stomach. Hendo's big miss was complete shite, but Enrique's ball to spring him was f'ing fantastic (as was the run); that bit encapsulated the match. The missed handball call from opening minutes (or calls, though calling the late one in the second arguably could've been harsh). Adam definitely reverted to Blackpool-over-ambitious long-ball-Charlie when he started pressing: disappointing. It's five nil, Satan over Bolton as I write this. I want to kick the screen.

Succinct and spot on Ed.

Early handball was criminal, late one would have been harsh.  Great work by Enrique and Hendo to create that chance but Hendo showed his tender years on finishing.

Adam's work didn't matter, they had no interest in keeping the ball and we created plenty of chances.  Just didn't finish them.

Not many sides will get a result here, and let's not forget they only scored with a Carra + Ref combo. It would have been a different game if they didn't score first and couldn't park the bus fleet for most of the afternoon, and had to come out occasionally. 

We'll know how far we are off top tier sides once we see how the two Mancs fare. Top sides can carve open negative teams.

Still gutted though, I believed our new players would have given as some strength and guile against this lot.

Spurs away next week, that should be a better game. Chin up.

absolutely, the goal meant they closed up shop.
But they weren't that good, we opened them up just didn't take our chances.

We tried...

We got the tactics right.  Go for the jugular from the start and try to grab the first goal so they can't park the bus.  Unfortunately, it didn't work out.  I fancy we're not too far off Utd or City.  Probably just need to add a couple refs to our squad and we'll be able to match Fergie's lot.

I appreciate the positive outlook but would expect a bit more grilling of Adam. He was woeful for me today and I feared every time he touched the ball he would just give it away again. At this rate, I'd rather see Spearing and Lucas in the center of the park just playing simple one-twos. Keeping composure is a good term for it. I think Charlie was having flashbacks to his Blackpool days thinking he needed to bootstrap the team himself. I say we push him out to the left and make him fill a bit-part role until he realizes it's a team game and that we don't need him to hit balls down the red carpet all day long. 

Elsewhere on the pitch, Carragher looked off the pace, as you said. I would have rather seen him come off, slot Skrtel into the middle and Johnson out on the right. Give the armband to Pepe and everyone's happy, capiche?

In terms of attacking intent, I think we saw Kuyt suffering the pangs of 150+ minutes of football for the Netherlands and that really affected our ability to get behind the Stoke defense. Suarez played well but didn't take his chances. Downing for me was industrious but I'm still dying waiting for him to produce an end product. Henderson didn't have the best game for me either. He kept things pretty simple down the right flank, but I can't really blame him being that he had Skrtel taking the overlap, something any footballer would struggle to work with. However, I must say Skrtel was solid defensively today, and despite some obvious shirt pulling, he managed to keep Stoke quiet on set pieces.

When Craig and Carroll came on for Kuyt and Hendo, I was pretty happy. It seemed like the right move at the time and those were two players that were relatively ineffectual. However, taking off Skrtel and putting on Johnson did little for us. By that point in the game I think we had all but given up building any attack out of the RB position. I think Kenny would have done well to take off Adam and bring on another attacker like Maxi or Spearing to simplify our passing game in the midfield. Maxi, for me, fits really well in our current system as well because he feeds off the excellent movement of players like Suarez and Downing.

Craig showed some flashes of talent and certainly livened things up for us, but he was essentially forced to move into the center of the park in order to get any real time on the ball. I think I counted at one point Stoke had managed to set up 9 men (including the GK) inside the box in order to keep up us out. Fucking ridiculous. Effective. But ridiculous.

I'm a Barça supporter as well so I'm fairly used to seeing those kind of tactics, but bloody hell, they certainly kill a part of my soul.

2 wins, 1 draw, 1 loss. Take a deep breath.

Didn't want to spend too much time on the individuals, but I completely agree with you re: Adam. Like I mentioned, my stream was in and out, so I was a bit more tentative in making conclusions. Everything we hoped he wouldn't bring was what we got today. Not pretty.

And as usual, great stuff all around, cheers.

And you'll have to excuse me for forgetting to do so. But I always enjoy the material around these parts. So kudos to you and Noel for doing such a smashing job with the site. :D

My fault. I was a bit hot-headed when I wrote that. You were probably fortunate not to see as much as I. The pundits made a good point: despite his woeful game, he didn't shy away from the ball and made himself available for a pass. I suppose it can't be helped that he was simultaneously giving me a migraine.

Didn't really matter what Adam did, we still got all the possession and created real chances.

Problem was without the early goal, and then with stoke scoring, they just decide to stay in their own third.  No space, long grass, narrow pitch, turgid result.

You take your chances and then they can't park the bus, they have to open up and lfc would have murdered them with the space.

Fair points. We were a bit wasteful in front of goal. And then I see that Rooney's hit 8 in 4. Great.

Well said, Ed.  Stoke is shit - always have been and always will be.  And while it was an incredibly frustrating result, I found the match oddly entertaining.  Downing on the right was wonderful to watch, and there was no shortage of scoring chances.  They never quit, and that's certainly something.

Points lost, but still hope. 

Oh yeah...fuck Stoke.