NEWS STORY
WHY YOU SHOULDN'T GET TOO DOWN
Paul Rogers 17 January 2005
Judging by the faces of the Liverpool supporters walking out of Anfield just after twenty past two on Saturday afternoon, you'd have been forgiven for thinking someone had died. Anfield Road was so quiet you could have heard a pin drop.
Rewind the clock back to a few hours before and the scene couldn't have been more different. Supporters strolling up Utting Avenue and Arkles Lane before the game were buzzing with a newfound optimism brought on by our most exciting signing since Stan Collymore turned down Everton in the summer of 1995.
"Get your money on Moro," was all that could be heard as grown men rushed into the bookies on Oakfield Road. "He's scored on every single one of his professional debuts." Never mind 5/1 for the former Real Madrid man to be the game's first scorer, you could get odds of 7/4 that he'd find the net at any point during the game.
Those odds looked a steal when the team sheets arrived with the names of Rio Ferdinand, Alan Smith and Ryan Giggs all missing. Despite the old adage that when you expect most from Liverpool, they let you down, it was hard to find a home supporter walking into Anfield that didn't think we only had to turn up to collect the three points.
How wrong everyone was.
There's no point beating around the bush; Liverpool simply didn't perform on Saturday. Though probably better organised, Manchester United were not much better. Alex Ferguson's claim that of the top three teams who've come to Anfield this season, Manchester United put in the best performance was someway wide of the mark. Arsenal scored a fantastic goal against us in December and Chelsea, though lucky with penalty decisions, at least went for the win in the second half. United by contrast came with the intention of spoiling the game - twenty eight fouls conceded, five bookings and one sending off was testament to that. In fact, never mind Chelsea and Arsenal, Watford performed better than United at Anfield and still lost.
With the exception of Roy Keane's blistering first-half strike, which crashed back into play off the woodwork, neither team really deserved to score a goal. Somehow Liverpool managed to notch up 12 attempts on goal without every really worrying Roy Carroll,while United's only shot on target miraculously managed to slip under Jerzy Dudek's hand. Rafael Benitez was not about to publicly slaughter Dudek in front of the television cameras after the game but everyone knew he was fuming inside. It's hard enough to beat Manchester United without your goalkeeper conceding a soft goal for the fifth time against United in three seasons.
"If a goalkeeper makes a mistake but the team still wins by two or three goals, we wouldn't be talking about it," claimed Benitez. "But in a game like this the mistakes are more important."
With an important game on Tuesday night against Burnley, Benitez was right not to pour further scorn on the only experienced goalkeeper he has to call on but the tired expression on his face said more about his feelings that his words ever could.
As we've found out this season, Benitez is not one for making excuses. He never mentioned the two penalty appeals that once again went begging - Phil Neville's arm deflecting John Arne Riise's cross and Gabriel Heinze chopping down Morientes in the area. He never mentioned the fact that we were without Djibril Cisse, Harry Kewell, Xabi Alonso, Steve Finnan, Vladimir Smicer, Chris Kirkland and Josemi. He didn't mention that of the four players who'd never played in this fixture before at Anfield (Luis Garcia, Mauricio Pellegrino, Fernando Morientes and Antonio Nunez), two of them were making their Premiership debuts after not starting a full match all season.
These things can't fail to have an influence on a match of this stature. Of the new signings, Morientes never gave up despite clearly lacking match fitness and managed to carve out three efforts on goal while Pellegrino hardly put a foot wrong. With time, both players will no doubt enjoy better days in the red shirt of Liverpool.
The despondent feeling amongst fans leaving the ground on Saturday was totally understandable. Losing to Manchester United hurts at the best of times and it hurts even more when the result was caused by an inexcusable error.
But, and it's a big but, there are plenty of reasons to remain positive about the Rafaloution. Already this season, we've enjoyed more days actually watching Liverpool than we probably did during the whole of the previous two campaigns. Despite our terrible run of bad injuries, we've held our own against every single team we've faced in the Premiership. We've not been outclassed by Chelsea, Arsenal or Manchester United once this season and despite dropping points, none of them has beaten us by more than one goal.
What we lack is consistency but with a new manager, new attacking tactics and players not only new to the club but also new to England, that was always going to be the case this season.
Improving your consistency comes with time and it's a problem a lot easier to solve than trying to bridge a gulf in class that existed between ourselves and the top three last season. There's still a lot to play for this season and, despite Saturday's defeat, there's even more to be optimistic about.
Manchester United might be the last team in the world you want to lose to but things need to be put into perspective. The t-shirts worn by the players before the game to raise money for the 150,000 plus people who lost their lives in the tsunami three weeks ago should do that. We lost a match. No one died
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