Some Liverpool fans have allowed the dust to settle and accepted Everton earned their draw and celebration. Some can’t quite let Michael Oliver go just yet.
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Walk on
It’s been… not interesting per se, but… let’s say diverting to see (many, not all to be fair) Liverpool fans wailing about the derby.
The sad and simple fact is that Michael Oliver didn’t have a great game, but that was in no way to only Everton’s advantage. Diaz, Ramsay and Mac Allister were all fortunate not to have been sent off (with Diaz extraordinarily lucky not even to have been booked), while the ‘extra’ time added on was for a head injury and because of time-wasting by Alisson. Loathe Oliver or despise him (and let’s be clear here: he has sent off six Everton players in 44 games, and Arsenal fans hate him: he was not doing either Everton or Arsenal any favours).
The simple reality Liverpool fans have to face is that they were worse than Everton for the entire second-half, having been equal to them in the first. Even your second goal was the result of a lucky rebound off Branthwaite, albeit after your only good move of the half.
I am very well-aware of how frustrating it is to lose points to a last-minute goal in the derby, and you have my sympathy. But you really need to focus – and this goes especially for Van Dijk, whose judgement and decisions throughout the game were at best third-rate – on why you weren’t there for most of the game.
And, you know, you’re going to win the league and there’s every likelihood you will beat Everton at Anfield, perhaps as your coronation.
But be sensible, please.
Cheers,
Rory
Lot of understandable emotion about the game. On the big decision – I did think it was a foul on Konate, but the kind of incorrect call that happens five times a game not a major error. And I’m happy that VAR didn’t get involved, I’d much prefer them to leave decisions as they stand than intervene in every last call.
Overall, great game, great last derby for Goodison, shame we couldn’t make the result stand up. A chastening week, but I think if you want football to still be great and emotional and exciting you have to accept that some of the big results and big moments go against you.
Be interested to see how the Havertz news affect Arsenal
Dan, Plastic LFC
MORE MERSEYSIDE DERBY FALL-OUT FROM F365
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👉 ‘A f***ing disgrace’ – Arne Slot’s 19-word blast of Michael Oliver that led to red card revealed
The dust has settled
I wrote in immediately after the game, a sarcastic little vignette about how Everton celebrating a 2.2 draw like a CL final win was embarrassing.
However, like most of the players and the fans, I got caught in the moment.
Ofc Everton celebrated like that, it’s a last minute equaliser in their beloved, soon-to-be-demolished, stadium against their most hated rivals, who had JUST been singing about winning the league in their back yard.
As such, I can’t even blame Doucoure for that celebration, ditto Jones for responding, in fact EVERY emotional response was valid (new age hippy jargon, apologies) however, the ref was appalling but he has been appaling against every team.
The sheer emotion, it’s why we ruddy love the game, and tell me, were you not entertained?
Also, totally agree with Tyldesley on Rio (Only 100 word vocab).
Good luck to you Everton, Goodison did you proud.
LFC fans, take heart, seven points clear is bloody lovely.
David (🎶 It was the heat of the moment🎶) Molby, Shrews
Incompetence
As I sit here trying to digest the big bowl of incompetence served up by Michael Oliver, I’m trying to rationalise why
He gave a free kick to Everton for the first goal when it was clearly a dive
He didn’t send Guye off for a second bookable offence
Didn’t give the nailed on penalty on Szobozlai
Didn’t give the nailed on foul on Salah in the 94th minute
Didn’t give the clear push on Konate for the 98th minute goal
And it’s the same reason he didn’t give the last minute penalty on MacAllister versus City last season:
Because f**k Liverpool. That’s why.
Derek LFC
Poor reffing, worse playing
Yes, Michael Oliver was awful. Particularly in his weak decision making. Unsurprisingly, Everton players quickly cottoned on to the fact that he would blow any time they went to ground and the crowd howled, and they adjusted their behaviour accordingly. For all the calls of a blood and thunder derby, the fouls given on Everton players were more akin to a Spanish ref in a game with Barca from 2014. If they got into a tight area they would just fall over and know they would be rewarded with a foul. But that definitely was not the reason that we drew the game.
We drew and deserved nothing more because we did not get to grip with A) them dropping off our defence when we had the ball and just sitting in and only closing our midfield, meaning all game we simply failed to play through them and B) their long ball tactics and success in retrieving second balls. They started with this style and for the first time this season Slot completely failed to alter his own tactics to change the flow of the game. Usually, if a team starts off well and has adopted something novel against us, Slot chops and changes relatively quickly and effectively to find a way to get back on top. This didn’t happen last night. Instead Everton grew more dominant in the second half and were it not for our reasonably fortuitous second goal, whereupon we finally had a period of semi-dominance (which was solely because when Everton went behind, they were forced to change their successful tactics and start closing us down higher up the pitch) it would have been more likely we lost rather than were close to holding on to an undeserved win.
Regarding Slot unsuccessfully wrestling back control of the game, I shrug my shoulders frankly. He can’t be expected to always best his managerial opponent, and it ultimately relies upon the players competently adjusting as well as his instructions. I do fear however, that this is another tenet of the sit deep, shut-up-shop style of play that we have previously struggled against. It’s clear Liverpool enjoy teams trying to press them. VVD is exceptional on the ball, with an impressive range of passing. Konate is fast improving and clearly revelling in the responsibility of keeping the ball against a press, and with Gravenberch as our no.6 we have possibly the most press resistant DM in the world (Though clearly still finding his feet with the defensive responsibilities.) Teams pressing high against us, creates space for our attacking midfielders and front 3 to exploit.
However, when teams sit deep the effectiveness of those pacey, dribbling attackers diminishes significantly. When facing the deep block Diaz as a number 9 is not particularly effective, probably because of his inexperience in the role, and Darwin playing there means any reasonable chances we do produce are likely to be skied into the stands. I hope Slot is pondering and plotting this issue as there are only going to be more teams adopting the approach going forward. I wonder whether Jota might be deployed as a 9 going forward. Obviously it requires him remaining injury free, but Slot started the season with him there and his accuracy in front of goal and ability to score from headers means he is probably the most effective striker when facing a deeply defensive team.
Anyway, nothing Michael Oliver or Liverpool did should take away from Everton and their gutsy, impressive performance. Moyes set them up perfectly, extracting maximum output from a team that has been struggling all season. Doucoure acted like a dick, but otherwise the Everton players played smart football whilst simultaneously riling us at every opportunity. The players and fans deserved at least a point and probably more. It was a fitting send off and Liverpool fan or not, you’d have to be anti-football to begrudge a last minute thunderbastard winner by Everton’s CB and captain in the last derby at Goodison…
Ed Ern
Goonering on
Well, well, well. How the turn tables…
“But rather than Arteta about it and Goonering on and on, we’ll take the point and the high road, and we’ll f*cking go again.”
Thanks, Eric. He’s from the LA that’s in California, in case there was any confusion. So, let’s all ignore how Slot got a red card for the way he Arteta’d about it, and how Eric wrote 6 paragraphs so that he could have his cake and eat it. Congratulations on taking the high road with a 7-point buffer at the top of the table. So brave. Hey, it’s okay. We all agree the refereeing in the PL is dogsh*t. Maybe skip the tribalism and piousness next time. Complaining is fine. Just own it.
Simon, Norf London Gooner
Head injuries
Something I’ve thought about for a while but especially after everton vs liverpool is that the way head injuries are treated in football is a clear area for improvement.
My current understanding is that the referee should stop play in any case of a head injury, although this certainly isn’t applied consistently. Michael Oliver (Not the golden standard, I know) didn’t stop play when the two everton players clearly clashed heads rather violently, to the point Salah even stopped to point it out, but earlier in the match he immediately stopped play after MacAllister caught Garner, who was holding his eye area despite MacAllister hitting his jaw, and not very hard.
I assume the thought process behind this is that for the more dangerous of the two incidents, Liverpool were on a fairly promising attack, so Oliver didn’t want to stop it, although I think head injuries should definitely take priority.
The obvious issue with always stopping play immediately is players faking it when their team looks like conceding, and the combat to this is ensuring anyone who goes down with a head injury stays off the pitch for at least two minutes for example, to discourage players faking it. The problem with this is it discourages actually injured players from receiving treatment. For example, say a centre back takes a knock to the head but they think it isn’t quite bad enough to sacrifice two minutes, they would risk further head injury, especially in tight games, as the rule to punish fakers actually discourages real victims. As said earlier, the priority must be to protect those with head injuries.
In the case of head injuries, why not just let the medics go on to the pitch during play??? If the play is moving away they won’t be in the way anyway, and if play isn’t moving away then you can stop the game as you really should if it’s going on around someone with a head injury. This already exists in other sports and I don’t see the downside, it solves the problem of stopping counter attacks for an injury that’s out of the way, stops players faking it to stop a counter and without preventing or discouraging actual victims from getting treatment, if anything they’ll get it quicker.
Would like to hear others thoughts on this, maybe there’s an obvious reason.
C, Greece.
All hail Sir Jim and his redundancies (the mail was originally titled ‘Thank f**k for redundancies’ – without the asterisks)
Again, idiotic mails talking about things they don’t know. Google is your friend guys, use it to check the basic stats.
So people think that United are firing 200 people and it’s a big deal. United have 1277 staff compared to 730 at Arsenal or 1100 at Liverpool. So Arsenal & Liverpool must be broke i guess? Or they are just run sensibly without donating money to random people who are redundant or not needed? Who knows.
We have one of the worst bloated squads and that same issue with the staffing. INEOS may be trash for all I know, but at least they have stopped the awful waste of money over the years by removing the deadwood, not wasting money on random talentless hacks and giving the fear of the lord into people who are taking their jobs for granted. For a team in 15th, we sure as hell have a lot of haters for not being the worst spenders anymore. Weird. I don’t see Arsenal giving out millions to Wenger or Liverpool to Keegan? But MUFC suck for not donating 2M a year to SAF. Neither are their staff paid as much as United, nor their players. But hey, rather be broke than have a billion and burn it to the ground like the last 10 years have been at United. We could have spent nothing and still be at the level we are. But we burnt through a billion plus with not much to show for it.
Glad to see at least some sensible business decisions by the new owners who are actually taking some decisions in life. This is a football club, not an NGO or a charity for people to get paid for life for just existing.
PS – On a side note, 30 years of United players, staff & managers were at the funeral of Kath Phipps, a long serving member of their staff. From Becks, Keane, SAF and more. Show me a club that does that for their staff. That’s who United are for their stop. But that doesn’t mean we give out money for free.
Cheers
Aman
Things that make me sad
1. Football seems to be becoming as joyless as the rest of life but there are the things that get my goat at the moment:1. VAR – it hasn’t fixed anything and makes the game slow.
2. Celebration Police – sick of fans being told how much and when they can celebrate. Life is miserable enough with politicians and grifters trying to divide us for their own financial end and it isn’t even good banter
3. Obsessive worship of Billionaires – they didn’t get where they are by helping the workers and the won’t stay there by helping us
Paul Rhodes
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