[Liverbird]

Step right up, Didi. It's your final chance to shine and convince Rafa that your retirement home is at Anfield, and not at some second-rate German football club.

Step right up, Florent. You were mildly disappointing against the Moneybag$ but we should not expect too much from your young shoulders, leading our attack. Yet, this is Naarwich, bankrolled by a celebrity "chef" and not a Russian oligach. They have Simon Charlton in defence, not William Gallas. They have Robert Green, arguably England's best goalkeeping prospect since Kirkland. They have Mr. Worthington, not the arrogant Moury.

Step right up, Riise. You were encouraging against Glen Johnson, but we all know that you are more like a Gronkjaer than a Kewell. All we ask for is to have a bit more precision with your crosses and let Florent do what we know he can do.

Step right up, Garcia. You have become a wonderful addition to our squad, but all we ask for is to have a bit more accuracy with your shots. I am not sure if they are big on rugby in Spain, but we are playing football here.

Step right up, Stevie. I know you are tired of seeing how desperate the situation is and not many people will blame you for thinking whether the lush greens of Stamford Bridge and the clinks of millions of Russian roubles will actually be better than a fledging and injury-ravaged squad . Yet, even if this may be your last season with us, all we ask for is to be at your best for this match.

Don't think it will be a goalless draw but an away win will be a great bonus.

For paw's prediction league, click here.

 

[ilgenio]

Pool are 1-0 up in the 58 min.

A long diagonal pass from Riise on the left found Luis Garcia near the edge of the penalty box. LG let the ball bounced once before chipping it exquisitely over Green into the net.

Super goal! :star: :thmbup:

 

[ilgenio]

2-0 to Pool in the 64th min.

A defensive clearance from Norwich richochet off Sinama Pongolle and the French youngster found himself through on goal. Green parried the shot from FSP and the rebound fell into the path of Riise, who made no mistake of hammering it into the empty net from 6 yards out.

 

[ilgenio]

81 min and still 2-0 to Pool.

A linesman apparently pulled his hamstring and is now substituted by the 4th official. That's not something you'll see often in matches :shades:

 

[ilgenio]

Lifeline for Norwich in the 88th min.

A long cross-field pass from Mattias Jonson found Ryan Jarvis just at the edge of Pool's D. The 18 year-old youngster controlled the ball well on his right foot, beat Traore with a quick change of pace and fired an unstoppable shot past Dudek into the top left corner for his first goal in EPL.

What a way to score a debut goal~ :star: :thmbup:

 

[ilgenio]

Full time

The Canaries 1 The Reds 2

Nervy moments for Pool in the dying minutes. Matthias Jonson played the last 30 seconds of the match in a shirt without name & number after being told to change his blood-stained shirt due to a cut he suffered on the head in the first half.

 

[MINDSCAPE]

It was a relief, we were not at our best, all possession but no cutting edge upfront. Clearly we have to move for a class striker. Mellor is just not good enough at the moment.

Dudek - Nothing much to do, goal not his fault - 6
Finnan - Steady Game - 6.5
Warnock - Raw but still showed a bit of what he can do - 6
Carragher - Immense defending -8
Hyypia - Immese Defending - 8

Diao - Bad first half, much better second half - 6 (5 in the first half - 7 in the 2nd half)
Gerrard - Not at his best but 110 percent effort as usual - 6.5
Nunez - Extremely sloppy, some nice touches though but even a half fit Smicer is better then him - 5
Riise - Clinical Finish, however when getting forward didn't have the best of time against Norwich's Excellent Helveg (Norwich MoM IMO). - 6

Mellor - Slow and not quick enough, he may need time to prove his value but time is running out for him to build on his Arsenal Goal - 5
Garcia - Hot and cold but scored a great lob. - 6.5

Pongolle - Set up the goal by forcing Green to save his shot to the Path of Riiise
Hamann - Cameo Role.
Traore - Terrible defending to set up Jarvas's goal.

 

[liverpool4ever]

We didn't thrash them, but we snatched the 3 points.
The festive period was quite good for us, of course excluding the Chelsea game when we deserved to get something out of it, 9 points out of a potential 12 is not bad at all, doesn't look like our best performance obviously but this game came after 3 games in such a narrow span of time, players might have been tired, but I'm happy we got the full points out of it & survived the last few minutes. Good as well to see Riise and LG score, hope they maintain their good form.

By the way after our win we've climbed 5th now (temporarily though)

 

[Gilli]

Nice summary Mindy, I pretty much agree with your ratings. Regarding Mellor, I always thought he's just a temporary solution, despite that cracking goal against Arsenal. He was already on his way out before our injuries so I don't see him becoming a poor men's Owen if you wanna call it that way. He'll probably leave sooner or later. Anyway about today, a very average performance, and a terrible game until for 58 minutes. But I'll take it, everyone said we played great against Chelsea yet we came out empty handed. So 3 points in a bad game when we have the most depleted squad in the league in our 4th game in less then a week is good enough. Fantastic goal by LG, and a very solid game at the back. Bring on the Mancs.

 

[gautam]

Good assessment Mindy. Agree with all of it. Couldn't see why Rafa started with Diao. He was a little shaky in the first half but did much better in the second. A much improved performance from LG. Was quite neat with the passing today, particularly in the second half, and in sharp constrast to the Chelsea game. And a brilliant finish to score our first goal. Riise did well to slot in the second which was a lot tougher than it looked. Nunez looks extremely short on confidence and Rafa will have to think of a solution to his situation fast. Very disappointed that we couldn't keep a clean sheet but am quite happy with three points away from home. Carragher and Hyypia had very good games. It's easy to be hard on Mellor but the service to him was absent throughout the first half. We lacked quality in supplying the final ball.

The game became more open during the second only after Norwich started chasing the three points. We would have had a tough time breaking down this team had they decided to shut up shop and go for the sole point.

Helveg was excellent for Norwich as was Jonson. And Fleming was good too till he gave away the second goal. Disappointed that we didn't see too much of Bentley's skills on the ball.

 

[liverpool4ever]

Saw the highlights, nobody mentioned Carra's handball
Good goal though by LG, Riise's strike as gautam said was harder than how it looked, but anyway good win & hopefully with more wins we'll get to the top 4 :excited:

Now let's beat Burnley in the FA Cup on Friday (?)

 

[Mutu]

I saw the game on prem+. It was an average performance with no one really shining apart from the defence. But coming straight from a defeat, the 3 points is all that matters.

Luis Garcia still hasn't regained his form post injury, despite his goal he didn't really excell apart from odd flashes. He's reminding me so much of last season where he was infuriatingly inconsistent. I'm certain however that he'll improve, but he needs to do it quickly with Liverpool struggling with injuries and in desperate need for some attacking flair.

With regards to Diao starting, I think that's just Benitez rotating the sqaud, trying to keep his squad as fresh as possible.

 

[karrmadamaii]

It was ball to hand regarding the Carra incident. He was too close for it to be ball to hand.

 

[Mutu]

Hand ball is hand ball. It makes no difference wether the ball hits the hand or if the hand moves towards the ball. When defending you should really keep you hands by your side.

Technically that was a penalty

 

[karrmadamaii]

Hand ball is hand ball. It makes no difference wether the ball hits the hand or if the hand moves towards the ball. When defending you should really keep you hands by your side.

Technically that was a penalty

SO, TECHNICALLY, we should have drawn against Chelsea. :rollani: :nono:

Its not a simple as that. So you saying if someone linesup in the wall, which is in a penalty box, and puts his hands over his crotch to protect his livelihood, and say, Roberto Carlos hits a rocket straight at his crotch and hit his hand, that's a penalty?

:eekani:

 

[zico]

So you saying if someone linesup in the wall, which is in a penalty box, and puts his hands over his crotch to protect his livelihood, and say, Roberto Carlos hits a rocket straight at his crotch and hit his hand, that's a penalty?

:eekani:

Are you stealing this from Stephen King's screenplay, Karrma? God forbid if that ever happens, but if it does happen then I'm afraid it would be much much worse than just a harmless PK.

 

[karrmadamaii]

Are you stealing this from Stephen King's screenplay, Karrma? God forbid if that ever happens, but if it does happen then I'm afraid it would be much much worse than just a harmless PK.

yeah it will be worse than jsut a harmless PK zico, its will be a straight red card for a blatant hand ball offense in the box :wth: :shades:

p

 

[Nesty]

anyone has highlights please

 

[Mutu]

SO, TECHNICALLY, we should have drawn against Chelsea. :rollani: :nono:

Its not a simple as that. So you saying if someone linesup in the wall, which is in a penalty box, and puts his hands over his crotch to protect his livelihood, and say, Roberto Carlos hits a rocket straight at his crotch and hit his hand, that's a penalty?

:eekani:

It was a definite penalty against Chelsea, I don't think there's any argument there.

With regards to you're Roberto Carlos situaution. Of course not, as if your hand wasn't there then the ball would hit your body. There has to be some degree of leniancy, if you keep you're arms by you're side, there's little you can do if the ball hits you're arm. But if your arms extend further out, and you get hit by the ball, I think it is handball. The incident today was unfair on Norwich, because were it not for Carragher's hand Norwich would have had a cross which would have put pressure of liverpool.

 

[SM Online]

Couldn't get to the game and didn't want to pay on sky plus for it so I haven't seen the game so I'm not going to comment except...

Well done lads