The end of the road?

Just when I thought this season couldn't get any worse, Wigan 1-0 Liverpool, proved me wrong. We were desperate. The team had a collective shocker. Kuyt, Insua, Torres had terrible games but Gerrard pissed me off more than the rest of them. It was a gutless display with Wigan the first to every ball and they looked the more committed team too. I would have withdrawn three of them at half time if I were in charge. Rafa didn't try to defend them post match. They let themselves, the fans, the shirt and club down with that display.

I was in work late on Thursday night so I didn't get to see the 1-0 defeat to Lille. The goal was a poor one to concede and I don't think Pepe will be happy with himself for not going for it. Again, we should have had a defender heading it clear. On current form, Kyrgiakos more than deserves his place in the team for his aerial dominance. We can turn this around in the second leg but if we continue to play like we are now, then it's unlikely.

Another Monday night game and another banana skin on the cards this week. I really can't see us winning this given the attitude that the players have been showing. Portsmouth should be dead and buried but yet their players are fighting for everything and getting some results. If our pack of wasters showed their attitude then we're be far better off in the league.

Which brings me onto the subject of the manager. I'm a big fan of Rafa and have been since before he came to the club. But it has to be said that he's made some bad mistakes this year. His gamble on Aquilani's fitness has backfired and left us creatively bereft in midfield. He's also been too cautious in playing the Italian since he's returned to fitness. But besides all of that, I still think he's the right man for the job and would give him another season. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like the players or the fans agree with me. They played like they couldn't care less on Monday. I think they've given up on this season and on the boss. If that's true and they won't respond to him anymore then he'll have to go, probably this summer. I fear we'll regret it in the long run and I shudder to think who the Americans will appoint in his stead, considering they've approached Klinsman before. It's a shit job given the owners, the debt, no transfer funds, no new stadium and a squad that needs serious investment. We've made a profit the last three transfer windows and while that's the case we won't remain competitive in the league. Anyone who thinks we'll attract a big European name like Mourinho, Hiddink or Capello is dreaming. Why would they sign up for this mess? With our current owners and investment scenario, we'll remain a poisoned chalice and any top manager will steer well clear of us. I'm surprised Rafa's put up with them for as long as he has. One of the few silver linings in this nightmare of a season is the prospect the bank forcing the Americans to sell up at a reasonable price this summer. Missing out on the top four places and the champions league money might force their hands. They are a cancer that slowly killing the club we love.

Pepe Reina has signed a new deal with the club which is a massive boost. He's the best keeper in England and one of the best in Europe.

This season has made it clear that we need some new blood in defence. If I were in Rafa's shoes I would break the bank for Kjaer of Palermo. He's Agger's international colleague and a Red by all accounts. He's done well in Italy and it sounds like he'd be interested in a move to L4. I fear he will go elsewhere as he'll be out of price range. That's no big surprise considering our transfer budget will be £0. If we had some cash we could spend it on Arda Turan who is a red and would love to join us. I would happily sell Babel and Riera if we could get him in to replace them.

Swindon youth Goalie Jamie Stephens is to spend a week on trial at the Academy. We've a number of young prospects between the sticks so I wonder how he'll fit into that set up if we sign him.

Aurelio injured himself again in last weeks match with Blackburn and will be out for 2-3 weeks. I like Fabio as a player and he seems a decent chap but I do question whether he will be offered a new contract this summer given how injury prone he is. Maybe he will stay on if he accepts a pay cut.

Unirea away and Rovers at home

A 3-1 win over Unirea saw Liverpool progress to the next round of the Europa league where we'll face Lille. The game was played on a terrible pitch and we were put up against it when Unirea scored early on. But we struck back with goals from Mascherano, Babel and Gerrard to give a fairly comfortable win in the end. It was good to see young Martin Kelly get another few minutes in Europe after him being out injured since the Lyon game.

Big Sam's Blackburn Rovers visited Anfield on Sunday and left with nothing. Which was nice. We took the three points thanks to a 2-1 win with goals from Gerrard and Torres. The win came no thanks to the ref who let them away with some nasty shit. I don't know how Nzonzi stayed on after getting Lucas in a headlock and throwing him to the ground. How great it a thing it is to see our Spanish Supremo strike terror into the hearts of men. He converted the winning goal after some great work from Maxi on the byline. The Argentine had a useful game with good movement and an amazing first touch. If he had a bit more pace, he'd be lethal. As it is, I think he can offer a lot from the flank with his delivery and I'm sure he had goals in him too.We don't play again until Monday when we visit the DW to play Wigan. This one should really be winnable. We're building up a bit of momentum again now and I'm hoping that El Nino will push us onwards in the final 10 games. Unfortunately, Skrtel broke his foot in Romania and is out for 8 weeks. We'll miss him as he's been in decent enough form recently but we should have Johnson back now and Kyrgiakos is finished his suspension.

The Liverpool Echo are suggesting that Pepe Reina has agreed a new deal which will be finalised soon. If true, this is great news. He's the best keeper in England by a long shot for me and I wouldn't sway him with anyone, with the possible exception of Iker Casillas. No doubt this deal will be used as an excuse why Rafa won't be given any cash this summer.

A player we've been linked to in the past, Afellay of PSV, has cropped up again this week. This link reckons we could be chasing him this summer. The source may not be the most trustworthy but he might be a cheap signing as he'll have a year left on his contract, which would fit in with our restricted budget.

QPR youngster Raheem Sterling has signed up at the Academy. He's 15 but has already been identified as one with great potential. If he lives up to it, this could prove to be quite a coup considering we captured him ahead of City, Utd and Arsenal. Here are 10 facts on him from the Mirror.

Ngog we trust?

I've been pretty busy in work recently so updates have been lacking. Here's a brief overview of the last two games.

Sunday's match with Arsenal was really disappointing. Although, I was really happy at half time. We had started really well and Masch was closing them down to great effect. El Nino was back in the saddle even though he didn't look anywhere near 100%. He was presented with a great chance early on which he fluffed but I felt a fit and firing Torres would have finished with ease. But Deadly Dirk struck to put us ahead with a cool finish from close range. We might have been 2-0 up if the ref had have given us a peno when Gerrard was taken down in the box. But after the break GloJo was unlucky to score an o.g. After that our heads dropped and Arshavin struck again. He must with he could play us every week. After that we fell apart. There was very little effort and only a few half chances for us to go level. The contrasts between the halves was stark.Fortunately, we got things back on track with a 2-1 win over Wigan on Wednesday. This was a much more solid display. We created quite a few chances after Ngog opened the scoring. He started in place of Torres who is having his injury managed and can't play two games per week.

Yossi, Agger and Gerrard all had good chances to increase our lead before Torres, on as sub, went round the keeper and scuffed it over the line. Not the prettiest he's scored but they all count. It did get a bit easier after that but we still had a nervous ending as N'Zogbia got one back for them in injury time. On a positive note, Insua looked much fresher, and seems to have benefitted from a rest. Ngog continues to score and now has 6 goals this season. He's developing every game and his movement and link up play are improving rapidly. Given the fragility of our Spanish striker, I expect young David to continue to play regularly for the rest of the season. A £1.5m bargain from Rafa, despite the bosses reputation for profligacy in the transfer market.

Today's match sees us take on Portsmouth in Fratton Park. This hasn't been a happy hunting ground for us in the past but that was more under 'Arry. They're not in great form but have Grant in charge now and he may make a difference from their early season form. GloJo and Babel are back in the squad for this one. Happy to have Glen back but Babel is a waste of space. I expect another tough and nervy match given our fragile confidence and form but it's one that we should win ultimately.

The Ruud Van Nistelroy rumours won't go away. There might actually be something in this. I think he'd be a great impact sub or striker to have on rotation.

Danny Pacheco has a bright future according to the boss. I think we all saw hints of that future with his cameo against Fiorentina. I can see him getting more game time now that Voronin is out in the cold. Another youngster who made an impression in the Champions League group was Jovetic. He's a player that Rafa tried to sign in the summer before budgetary constraints kicked in, according to Dominic King in the Echo. I think he'd be superb for us but I fear he's out of our price range now.

I'll leave you with a one liner I came up over last weekend.

What's the difference between Berbatov and Voronin?

About £31m.

Lucas laments at Latics late leveler

LUCAS! What was he thinking? I was mucho pissed off when he conceded the peno last night. It finished 1-1 because yet again, our inability to score a second goal gives the opposition hope and let's them throw everything at us in the last few minutes, know that a point is there for the taking. We must have no toes left after shooting ourselves in the foot so often.

Yossi did fantastically well to score from such a narrow angle after beating the keeper and had a good game all round. In fact, he could and should have had a second when he made mince meat of the defence but couldn't beat the goalie. I was glad to see him come into the team as Dirk has been at nothing in recent weeks.

Torres looked off form and never really got into the game. Despite that, he did manage to put a header onto the post and had a few shots and half chances in the first half. He did nothing in the second and looked knackered again at the end. It may be a while yet before he can contribute 90 mins. Gerrard had a half volley near the end and a free kick before half time that were close. Babel didn't do much but Lucas had a decent match until his moment of madness. There was no need for that penalty to be conceded as the Wigan player wasn't even going towards goal.
Chelsea on Sunday sounds pretty daunting given our inability to score and win a game now. They were wobbly themselves for a while but seemed to have steadied the ship with their last two or three matches. We'll need to see more from El Nino and our Captain than we saw last night. Big game for Javier too, but it's the kind of occasion that he loves and thrives in.

Sky are reporting today that Keane is a Spurs target and they've sounded LFC out over a possible return. I think that any deal could only be in the form of a loan. To be honest, I would be surprised if this happens now. Even though he doesn't fit into our best XI, I doubt Rafa would be willing to let anybody leave the squad at this stage without a suitable replacement. But the Keane experiment has been a failure and I think he should be shipped out in the summer. We could do with a quality match winner for our right hand flank to chip in with goals, threat pace and movement from the right hand side. Dirk has his qualities but doesn't have much in that regard.

More evidence of why Parry must go, courtesy of Anfield Online. We risk losing Agger for a pittance due to procrastination.

Both Gabriele Marcotti in the Times and a Man Utd blog called stretford-end.com examine the zonal marking system we employ and discover that the myth doesn't match the facts. Andy Gray and co could do with reading these articles. Here's an extract.Quite frankly, that Liverpool are poor at defending set pieces has become the biggest falsehood since it was claimed that Chesney Hawkes was the future of music.
The truth is that Liverpool only conceded from two corners all last season, both coming in Premiership games (Chelsea away and Everton at home). In total the Reds faced 137 corners in the league, meaning Benítez's men conceded on just 1.5 per cent of them. Only one team, Chelsea, were able to come even close to that, allowing three goals from 127 (2.4 per cent).n terms of goals conceded from free-kicks delivered into the box, Liverpool also allowed only two in the Premiership all season, again one less than Chelsea. So the Reds conceded one-third fewer league goals than the next-best team when defending set-pieces.

A spate of youngsters have left on loan in the last week and Mikel San Jose is the latest to join them. The 19 year old centre back is going to Atletico Bilbao for the rest of the season. Those who watch the reserves regularly like this kid so it should be a good opportunity for him to prove he has the quality to step up to the next level with the first team in August. The official site have a chat with Spanish kid Daniel Pacheco. He is one of the youngsters who is tipped to make an impact here.

Charles Itanje wants to leave Anfield. I don't think that anybody is going to stand in his way. Cavalieri has looked far superior to the French keeper this season.

Keeping the faith

Another 3-2 victory. This is becoming a habit. Coming form behind has become almost predictable. Did that make it easier to keep the faith on Saturday? Maybe so. Even when we were behind, I thought that we've been here before and got out of it. But while a comeback was somewhat predictable, a win against a Steve Bruce side wasn't, as it's something that's evaded Rafa over the last 4 seasons.

Going 1-0 down wasn't the ideal way to start the match. Agger looked a bit rusty and a poor touch left him in trouble with Zaki bearing down on him. The Egyptian stole the ball and finished beyond Pepe. Not clever. Agger showed his mettle by running the length of the pitch before setting up Dirk for the equaliser. Great way to show his mental fortitude or moral courage, if you prefer.

Albert Riera got the second equaliser to open his LFC account. A mighty strike, and with his right foot, no less. The winger has made a telling contribution since his arrival but I'm happy to see him get off the mark at Anfield.

The ruling out through injury of Torres and Babel during the international break was a major blow. But thankfully we had deadly Dirk deliver a dutch double. He could have had a hat trick had an earlier effort not been palmed onto the crossbar by Kirkland. Rafa really went for it by taking off both full backs and bringing Benayoun and El Zahr on, the latter making a great contribution to the winner. Kuyt now has three league goals for the season, more than he scored all of last year. Add that to his goals against Liege and PSV, and it's a rich vein of form for the Dutch destroyer. He reckons we can go all the way to number 19. I think it's too early to say. The match against Chelsea on Sunday should give us more of an indication.

Atletico Madrid are going to provide some stiff opposition on Wednesday night. The match is back in the Calderon which is great news for our fans who would have been screwed if it had been moved to Valenica or somewhere else. I'm looking forward to seeing Sergio Aguero perform, but hopefully he won't have a great night. It looks as if Javier will be back and Babel may be fit but Torres won't which is very unfortunate for el Nino. I'm sure it would have felt like a dream come true for him to be walking out in the Calderon again. But now he'll have to make do with a seat in the stands. I reckon we could be looking at a draw on Wednesday.

Some elements in the press linked Heskey with a return to LFC in January. Barrett in the echo says that a move is very unlikely, as are any signings unless they are preceded by sales. Pennant's refusal to move to Blackburn in August put paid to any spare change knocking around the club kitty.

Guillem Ballague effuses about some of our young talent on his blog. He rates Pacheco but thinks that he may be too small for England and will end up back in Spain.

Anelka reckons that Everton are shit. It's not really LFC related, it's just funny.

Have a listen to this. Sounds like the real Rafa, Stevie and Carra.

Tony Barrett in the Echo had an interesting piece comparing the strength in depth that we have now compared to when Rafa arrived four years ago. Our opponents in his first match were City and the bench consisted of Diao, Biscan, Pongolle, Warnock and Harrison. Last week, also against City, our bench was Keane, Yossi and Dossena who all came on and made a contribution to the comeback, and unused subs of Agger, Cavalieri, Babel and Lucas. Stark contrast which goes to show how much Rafa has improved the squad.

The "A Liverpool thing" blog has a translated interview with Dossena. He talks about settling in the team, the city and the training.

101 great goals has a video containing Gerrard's first 100 goals for the club. Hopefully it'll be boosted by a few more goals this year.

Xabi is leaving the door open for a move to Juve, despite Ranieri saying our boy Xab is too slow for Serie A. It seems quite likely that Ranieri may not be the boss for too long at the Della Alpi, so the next man may have the final say on a move.

The Guardian have an interesting piece on the history of terrace fan culture and the part the Kop played in starting singing in the early sixties.

Comeback kings

Rafa will not be happy tonight. Yes we won before staging a stunning second half comeback, we allowed city to establish a two goal lead at half time. That is a cardinal sin according to the gaffa. But that is the third time in the league this season where we've been behind and have comeback to win the game. The Marseille match was the same. Impressive, no? Rafa's new phrase is "on fire". I think he could safely say it about us now.

We were fairly shit in the first half and made some stupid defences mistakes to enable Ireland and Garrido to score. Pepe will be pissed off with himself for the free kick he conceded at the near post. It was doom and gloom at Eastlands when the half time oranges were being consumed. I expect that some journos were getting their pieces ready about Liverpool's title challenge only lasting until October. Alas for them, Torres and Kuyt had something to say. Three second half goals means that we're still joint top of the table. That was stirring stuff. El Nino looks to be regaining his form after a sluggish start. Ands we scored a goal directly from a corner, wonders will never cease. I'm very happy to see Dirk get the winner. It followed some great build up play by Yossi, another inspired Rafa sub. He get so much stick that it's great to see him score a winner and get some praise. He made for a terrible miss earlier in the match by hitting his first league goal of the season. I love the guy but there are games against the weaker teams when I don't think he's needed. It's been a good week for him though. Could this be true?

Riera had a good match. He looked dangerous on the left and caused the city defence lots of problems. Poor Marty Skrtel was taken off injured with his leg in a brace. He landed awkwardly on it and was in fierce pain when he fell and stayed down. It would have to be serious to keep Skrtel out of the line of fire. The upside is that we should get to see more of Dagger playing if Skrtel is out for some time.
Speaking of our great dane, Real want Agger according to sky who are picking up on a story in the UK press. Ballague discusses the rumours on his website and reckons that it's not cut and dry.

After the international we'll face Wigan who are doing well so far this year. I assume Skrtel will be out. Any chance of Degan being back soon? Slim. Let's hope we don't pick up anymore international injuries.

Chelsea are being linked with the newest of new Zidanes, a player we've been linked to in the past.

Aldo is worried about the American owners. Me too John. Parry says the stadium is being delayed due to credit crunch. The worst part is that I fear we'll be stuck with these jokers in charge for the foreseeable future.

Don't Panic

While I was away in Barcelona, I only got to see bits of the City and Wigan matches. Given Cities home form, I don't think that a no score draw was that surprising or that bad a result. They've already had good home results at home against top four clubs. But the Wigan result was terrible. It was another match where we created a good few chances but were unable to finish the opposition off. Torres scored a superb goal after some great build up from Finnan and Gerrard. But Kirkland pulled off some great saves to deny Gerrard, Mascherano and others, to make sure that we were vulnerable to a sucker punch like the one delivered by Titas Bramble with 10 mins to to go. Sickening.

I don't know why our home form has been so bad this season. Part of it can be explained by the lack of key players at vital times. Agger and now Sami missing, we aren't half as resilient at the back. In previous years we would have beaten Wigan 1-0 by shutting up shop once we took the lead. I think that Agger's return will bring a bit of stability and confidence back to the defense which has been a bit panicked of late. Xabi is back now and he should also bring some stability and passing penetration to the attack. I know that he wasn't at his best against Wigan but I think that his passing sharpness will return with game time.

It's the "magic" of the FA Cup 3rd round on Sunday when we face lowly Luton We have to travel to Kenilworth road to face Kevin Blackwell and his hatters. Like the Carling cup, this is a good competition if you win it but doesn't matter all that much otherwise. I wouldn't be unhappy to see some of the youngsters play on Sunday even if they get beaten.

Goran Pandev could be on the move. He's done pretty well for Lazio over the past few years. I don't know how much he'd cost but he might be a good option if we're looking to offload Crouch who's only 18 months left on his contract.

There has been some online chatter that we are looking to buy Ezequiel Garay from Racing Santander at the moment. He's a 21-year old Argentine central defender who can also play at right back. He also has an impressive record of scoring free kicks for a defender. The fee being mentioned is around £8m which would be a bargain.

Fulham are looking to steal a march on Bolton and others by lodging a £3m bid for Danny Guthrie. He's done well while on loan at Bolton and Roy Hodgson sees him as the man to inject some life into Fulham's bid for survival.

Yossi to the rescue

That was close, and it shouldn't have been. Wigan aren't very good but we made hard work of it. But maybe it's time to look at the table and saw we picked up another 3 points on the road (10 from 12) and we still have a game in hand. We're not playing great, but like Utd, we're getting the wins. If we can keep this up for the next few weeks until Xabi and Dagger return I'll be happy enough.



We did create a lot of chances but didn't put any away. Nando had a good chance in the first half after he was put through on Kirkland. Our former keep did well in coming out early and saved well. The rebound came off Torres and went narrowly wide. Gerrard had a few shots and Kirkland made a few more saves.

It was looking like the game was headed for a third successive premier league draw when Yossi stuck his oar in. His turn and dribble reminded me of Bergkamp against Newcastle a few years ago. Yossi's goal wasn't quite of that quality but was hugely impressive nonetheless. He has a fantastic ability to drift effortlessly past defenders and the ball control skills to embarrass even the toughest of opponents. He's a joy to watch and is pushing hard for a starting place after his goals here and against Reading in midweek.

Wigan pushed us hard until the final whistle and had a few chances. They will complain that they didn't get the rub of the green or any favourable decisions from the Ref. Maybe we're cashing in our Karma from the Chelsea match. Our defence wasn't what it usually is. Riise didn't have a great match. With Sami in for Agger, we are sitting deeper to compensate for his lack of pace. Added to that is the problem that our distribution out of defence is worse and Sami doesn't carry the ball out the way Dagger does. We miss the kid and the sooner he comes back the better.

Champions league returns this week and Marseilles visit Anfield on Wed night. Given the law of the Ex, expect to see Cisse have a stormer and score a few. In reality, I don't think that they're up to much and are doing shit in Ligue 1. They recently changed their manager so it might be good time to play them.

Gerardo Bruna - remember that name. He's a 16 year old Argentine player that we've signed from Real Madrid. They were expecting great things from him and were angry at losing him. He's already been dubbed "the new Messi" (is the old one old?). Not placing any pressure on him then.

The boy's done well

Three and easy for Torres. It was a great performance from the new signing and a good team performance all round. Yossi opened the scoring the first half with an amazing individual goal. Nice to see him get off the mark and show his skill at unlocking a defence. Then it was time for Fernando to take the stage. Good work for Seb Leto set up Torres for the first goal. He held off the attention of the defender and slipped it under the keeper. His second came after a nice delivery when Riise got past his man on the left. El Nino finished from just inside the area with a shot to the corner which gave the Reading keeper no chance. His final goal was the result of a fantastic through ball from Stevie G. Torres was 1 on 1 with the keeper and showed great composure to shoot beyond the goalie. Rafa will be disappointed that we conceded two but the first goal was offside. The second was poor defending and our new keeper didn't cover himself in glory. Lucas wasn't bad in the midfield but did fade somewhat as the match went on. Overall a very satisfying night.

It's a visit to the JJB tomorrow. Wigan have done better than I've expected this season. I was tipping them for relegation in August but they're looking like they will stay up if their form continues. Heskey has been doing well for them but he's not fit for tomorrow which is good news. He has his critics, and deservedly so, but when he's on form he's a nightmare for defences. I expect us to win this one. We've taken 7 from 9 points away from home so far and 10 from 12 would be a good boost to our title aspirations.

Crouch praised how Torres has settled in here. Gerrard reckons that he could be a modern day Ian Rush. High praise indeed.

LFC TV has launched officially now. I've watched a few programmes but have yet to see the John Barnes chat show. I'm looking forward to that one as I'm hearing good reports.

Some great old photo's from the BBC here. The bootroom one is special. Bring a tear to the glass eye. Have a look at these for some great photos of Liverpool in the 80's.For those who've been to the city recently it's interesting to see how different it looked 20 years ago. Some changes.

Until next time.

Double Dutch

Only one team wanted to win this match. Wigan showed up at Anfield on Saturday with very little ambition, adverture or attacking inclination. We were able to put them away with two strikes from Dirk either side of half time and could have had a couple more. All of this was achieved despite some rotation of key players and the fact that we didn't really get out of second gear.

Pennant put in another great cross from the left for Dirk to glance a header past Filan in the first half. He celbrated with the cradle rocking action as his wife has just given birth to their second child. His second goal was more impressive. Bellamy made a great run into the box and Dirk was able to find the room to turn and shoot. Kuyt now has 12 league goals this season. There are still a few matches left and he could get up to around 14-15 given that he's on good form at the moment. That would be a very respectable total for his first English season and the fact that he gets rotated and doesn't play every game. This win means that we are guarenteed at least fourth place and a champions league spot for next season. Given Arsenal failed to win against Spurs, third is looking more likely now.

It was good to see Chelsea only draw yesterday. I'm hopeing the fact that we have an extra days rest and had an easier match will stand in our favour when we meet Chelsea on Wed night in the Champions League semi final. It'll be a really tough match and I would be happy with a score draw.

G Unit

A second half "double-pack" from Stevie G was all that was needed to put Boro to the sword. Southgate's team didn't look all that bothered and at half-time I feared another 0-0 might be on the cards. Thanksfully, Gerrard popped up with a long range effort from nowhere to give us the advantage. Then we were aawarded a penalty when Crouch was standing in the box. I didn't see what it was given for but Poll was the ref so it's hard to know. Stevie stepped up to slot it away. Mascherano was unlucky to hit the bar with a header from a cross. Pennant had another good match and gave the Boro left back a torrid time, particularly in the first half. It was good to see the team play with confidence and get back to winning ways after the dour draws with City and Villa recently.

Gerrard now got 7 league goals this season which is a lot less than last year. Overall, I don't think that he's been playing as well compared to the high standards that he's set himself and I was a bit surprised when he was voted on the PFA shortlist by his fellow professionals. I fully expect Ronaldo or maybe Drogba to win it. Either would be a worthy winner.

Anfield will host Wigan this Sat while Arsenal travel to Spurs. We should be well capable of putting Wigan to the sword and hopefully Spurs might do us a favour. We're two points ahead of Arsenal at the moment and we should be able to hold on to third. Like I've said before, it's not hugely important, but it's a bit more prize money plus it's a marker for next season that we'll be closer to the leaders.

The first round of the FA youth cup was played on Monday and our team was beaten 2-1 by Man Utd. It's a pity that they lost after going ahead in the first half. But it's only the first leg and away goals don't count so they're still in with a chance when they go to Old Toilet next week. It would be great to see them win it there, on enemy territory.

The latest rumour doing the rounds on the new stadium is that it'll be built as planned with a 61k capacity. But the difference is that it'll now be expandable to a 77k stadium. The new Kop will be single tier with 18k seats which is a large boost on the current one. These are still rumours for now as they haven't been confirmed by the club yet.

Liverpool TV was announced this week. It will broadcast 7 days a week and I would imagine that it'll be subscription based. Maybe Hicks and Gillette think that there will be individual rights in the future so they're setting up a TV station now.

More after the pie-eaters visit on Saturday.