Iskaral Pust

11 PL games remaining now, and 7 of those are at home. We still have Newcastle midweek to complete this torrid period 5 matches in 15 days. The players will be so fatigued but there should be a slight easing of the pace after that. Even one additional rest day between matches can help.

Good win. That was like what RM did to us in the CL final: dominant without possession. And we didn’t even need super saves from our GK. A third goal would’ve made it more comfortable, and we were closer than City to scoring in the second half. Szoboszlai especially had carved open City so thoroughly that he didn’t need to push the offside envelope. He could have delayed that run by 2-3 seconds and still comfortably set up the goal for Jones. Lots of good performances out there, and Endo was quietly excellent as a sub. TAA and Robertson were the weak points but we didn’t concede anything dangerous.

Good first half. This rope-a-dope is working and we should have had a third goal if TAA found Jones or Diaz with that cross. He had time to see them and they were wide open. I know TAA is struggling against Doku but he is at least showing him down the line and allowing Konate to block most of the crosses. Liverpool are using the mid block well and trying not to expend too much energy in chasing. Diaz has worked really hard off the ball but been so wasteful with the ball. Szoboszlai, Salah, MacAllister, VVD and Konate have all been excellent so far. Tough decision ahead whether to continue inviting pressure like this. KDB is dropping very wide to find space but then limiting his potential impact to do so.

Thank you West Ham. I had zero expectations of them getting anything from this fixture. Regardless of what Arsenal do, Liverpool need to regain their form and their focus and get back to winning games. They especially need to rediscover their defensive poise and finish their chances. We’re dropping points in games where we have a clear advantage in xG. That’s frustrating but not as worrying as the opposite.

A big relief there for Ireland to see that out and win against a truly rejuvenated Wales. And that’s the triple crown confirmed. In the big picture it was great to see Wales rediscover some shape and spirit. They played ferociously. It would have been better for Ireland’s championship ambitions to meet the dismal version of Wales that was collapsing in every game, but it’s better for the 6N overall if Wales emerge from that funk and play competitively again. Obviously the big factor was Ringrose getting a red card. Wales scored both of their tries during that 20 minute period. Ireland had been very on top before that and the crowd had been quiet. Another big factor was selection changes for Ireland from a mix of injuries and some experiments. Doris was a big miss at 8, especially when Conan left with an injury quite early in the second half. Keenan is always a miss at 15 but Osborne did pretty well apart from costing us an easy try and commanding lead when he messed up the final pass to Ringrose, although Osborne deserves some credit for the tackle that helped to very narrowly spoil Wales’ attempt for a third try. I’m still unconvinced by Mack Hansen. He’s a good rugby player with good hands and great head but once again he failed to finish a routine try for a winger. He was easily held up 1v1. He just doesn’t have the pace or power to finish 1v1 in the corner. Look how well the Welsh winger finished his try by contrast, or how Lowe can bully any defender 1v1. Calvin Nash should get more chances at 14. Prendergast was a mixed bag. He coolly slotted the penalties when needed and he kicked a peach of a 50-22. But he also missed two central penalties (which Ramos would kick without blinking), he turned over possession in a dangerous area that led to Wales second try and his kick out on the full led to Wales almost scoring a third try. He’s also a non-factor as the first receiver/distributor. It’s good that he’s learning and getting experience and he may have a very high ceiling but he’s well below international standard at 10 at the moment. Ntamack, Finn Russell and Marcus Smith all have much bigger impact on making their team play well. Ireland will need to regroup to face France. After missing the BP today, and after gifting England a losing BP with an unfocused final five minutes, I think they’ll need a grand slam to win the 6N. So be it. For Wales, the big question is whether they can build on this performance, especially when they don’t have the home fans urging them on. Edit to add: I did not understand the refereeing of the scrum. Ireland conceded at least four penalties very early in the scrum (not collapsing or turning or standing up). No replays were shown to explain why. It gave Wales a massive advantage to relieve pressure while Ireland were territorially dominant.

The second leg of the Ro16 and semifinal will be at Anfield (if we get that far), but second leg of QF will be away. It’s not like the NFL where the top seed retains home field advantage in each round before the final. If we were to meet RM/Arsenal in the QF instead of SF then it wouldn’t look like an advantage at all. There just isn’t a lot of structural reward for maxing out the league phase. If PSG beat us and go on to reach the SF, they’ll have their second leg at home. So they inherit that advantage from us despite finishing 15th in the league phase. The new CL format will rely on: avoid the bottom 8 in the league phase, then time your injuries and form to peak in the second half of the season. It’s really not that different from before. Teams who don’t have as much distraction from domestic cups or competitive title chases will have an advantage.

Not a surprise at all but we just saw how there is no advantage from pushing hard in the CL league phase. Villa finished 8th but they have an easier knockout path than Liverpool (Brugge easier than PSG, then have second leg at home in QF — only have a disadvantage in SF second leg away). PSG finished 15th, had an easy playoff round (10-0 on aggregate) and now have the same path as Liverpool. The PL calendar makes it valuable to avoid the playoff round, but not much advantage to chasing a higher position vs resting players. Even below 8th spot, City were just unlucky to draw RM in the playoff round — it was more probable to draw an easy opponent.

A harsh draw for ‘Pool. PSG, Villa and then RM or Arsenal in the semifinals would be our path. The only positive is that the final, if we can make it, would probably not involve a defensive opponent. But we cannot count any chickens until we improve our form. PSG’s wingers will be a big threat against our FBs.

It’s that Cassandra period of the season, when all of the foretold problems play out and you just have to watch it unfold. The MF is excellent but has too little rotation available, so they’ll get tired eventually. And we don’t have a defensive screen DM if opponents actually come at us. Outside of Salah and Gakpo, none of our forwards are remotely reliable. Our FBs are weak points in defense. The one I didn’t foretell: Slot doesn’t trust the bench players, so he’ll rotate even less. I’ll still take it as a positive that we’re top of the table already with so many weak points that could be improved upon in the summer. And Slot doesn’t seem blind to the problems, except the need to rotate the MF. I think he has underestimated the PL intensity. (Villa had new players from January in their line-up to freshen their team) Title chases are long and stressful. Momentum is swinging away from us for sure but there’s a long way to go.

The wheels have come off lately. Scoring two goals per game should be enough to win but we’re conceding more. And then we missed plenty of good chances too, especially Jota and Nunez. When the games are coming this fast and MF looks exhausted, I don’t think it’ll be easy to change this trajectory before it does a lot of damage.

Not finishing our chances, and then flailing about defensively. I’m not sure if it’s fatigue or nerves but we’ve lost that efficiency at both ends. This experimental shape isn’t working so far. Let’s see if Slot can tweak it. And hopefully Gakpo will be back soon.

Strange line-up for Liverpool with both Jones and Szoboszlai included alongside Jota and Salah, while Diaz, Nunez and Chiesa are on the bench. Gakpo still injured. We’ll see who plays LW and whether there’s a shift in shape. Our FBs are the weak points against Villa’s counterattacking wingers, so I’m a bit surprised that TAA and Robertson both start.

So the draw on Friday could pair Liverpool with Benfica or PSG. I’m not afraid of PSG but Benfica would be the kinder draw. And now Atalanta aren’t lurking as a potential tough opponent down the way.

Bayern finally got a goal in injury time. Celtic came very close. Benfica vs Monaco has swung back and forth.

Brugge are doing surprisingly well. The BeNe (but not Lux) teams are having a strong CL campaign.

Bradley, Endo and Quansah all did well as subs (Nunez not so much) so some credit to Slot for making those decisions, and credit to the bench players for stepping up and making an impact. It’s a pity Gomez will be missing again. Hopefully Gakpo recovers quickly from his clattering by Everton (for which no foul was given), and Jones should return next after suspension. The big problem is that we have so little depth for MF. Endo did well as a late sub and extra body in MF but wouldn’t be trusted to replace Grav or Mac as a starter for any PL match. Zubimendi or similar was needed to add midfield depth with quality even with Grav’s excellent emergence.

Really poor second half. We were nervously holding on. The MF looked gassed and Jones was unavailable as a sub due to his stupid suspension. That’s two poor performances in a row (I won’t count the FA cup loss as three since that was a different set of players). With an intense run of games ahead, this team needs to figure it out quickly. This is the exact wrong time to lose form. I don’t want to pile on any players but there’s plenty of scope to improve the team and squad depth this summer.

Nice to have a lead that should be safe. Although we have some rocky performances in defense today, and neither Diaz nor Salah did much outside of taking their goals. We just need to make winning routine again and control the game. This MF drives the team. I think the referee is showing some bias toward Liverpool here, which is a crawling attempt to even out what they know was a shameful performance by Oliver midweek. The whole attitude of PGMOL is to always cover for incompetence rather than ever fix it.

We’ve had three games refereed by Oliver this season, and none of them have been wins for us. Considering our win rate this year, that falls far outside any bounds of randomness.

I couldn’t watch live but Liverpool fans are complaining that Oliver had his thumb on the scales throughout. Infuriating to drop two points deep into injury time, just like the Newcastle match. Just not sharp enough at defending set pieces today.

Liverpool have rarely won at Goodison in the past 10-12 years and Everton are on an upswing under Moyes. Tough game tonight, as the derby always is, and too chaotic to predict. A win and no injuries would be fantastic, but let’s see what happens.

That’s tough on Havertz and Arsenal. It’s much worse than I expected for a “muscle issue” during a training camp, as it was reported yesterday.

Oh, City. I’d rather have them still in the competition as potential opponents than Madrid, but they let that slip away. I hope Pep still gives it the full go in the second leg (and tests players in the PL game against Liverpool beforehand).

I thought there was a news report today that Saka had rejoined some team training sessions at their Dubai winter camp? I agree though that I would not rush him back and risk a recurrence. That’s not just from a Liverpool point of view, that’s about not fucking up the guy’s career at a young age. Nice for Arsenal to get a sunshine break in Dubai while Liverpool are still slogging through matches. We have 5 PL games in the next 15 days. This just became a crunch period for the PL race before the flow of games gets disjointed again for CL and a stupid international break (when, of course, our players will all go play two full matches at the far end of the world, while our rivals keep their players home with “knocks”).

Good performance by Ireland and they seem to be rebuilding some cohesion game by game after a poor autumn. Hopefully they can continue against Wales next with their new manager bounce. Prendergast was better (although I wouldn’t have given him PotM), especially as he calmly sidestepped rush defenders a few times before he kicked. His slow wind-up to kick is a liability unless he does this. His lack of any power as a carrier or tackler also means that Ireland effectively defend with 14 all match and lack an additional threat with a central sniping run. That’s just down to his age and he could be a more powerful figure within five years. I thought Ireland’s forwards won this match, adapting to the messy rucks (was this SH refereeing?) and generally carrying and tackling very well until space was created for centers and wings. It was frustrating again to have tries thwarted within 5m, especially two held up. Ireland need to look at that and recognize when to go wide if the forwards are getting blocked. Lowe is very effective 1:1. Also disappointing to concede another late try in garbage time. We’re switching off slightly once a BP win is in the bag, but Healy also looked suspect again as a sub — it’s probably time for a younger player in that LH sub role (without taking anything away from Healy’s immense career). We’re just lucky Porter has been physically able to play so many minutes for so long. Scotland are tough to read. They looked sharp and confident in the autumn but had a mini-scare against Italy and were pretty far off Ireland’s level aside from ten minutes either side of halftime. Their goal-line defense was spirited and kept them in the game, but it felt like Ireland could control proceedings until they went to sleep for the final few minutes. (The match stats are surprisingly less in Ireland’s favor than it felt watching the match)