There's little that I feel like posting about today---more depressing/enraging news about Javier Mascherano's refusal to play and his desire to exit, the prospect of another bidder that will likely continue to torture us, and rallying cries from all corners that, for me, seem unnecessary this early in the season. One point from the first two is not great, and there's significant problems outside of the football, but it's not exactly a robot apocalypse.
Instead I'll share someone else's thoughts, which is something I'd like to start to do more often. I think as the readership and commenting around here has increased, the quality has followed suit, and I'd be remiss if I didn't highlight some of the solid stuff people are writing. The new commenting system makes things a little easier to organize, but I think some really insightful and/or funny comments also get lost or buried as the quantity increases.
What I'll start doing is asking that if you have something you wouldn't mind having run as part of a full post, just email me at liverpool@theoffside.com or liverpooloffside@hotmail.com. Continue to let loose in the comments section, but if there's something you'd like included in the post-match recap just shoot me an email.
For the first one I'll use someone I'm familiar with---when I first started here I had planned to write with someone else, and since my name starts with an "E" and his with a "D," "Ed" was born. But true to his form as a spineless weasel, he cut and run before we ever really got started. He still forces his thoughts on me via text, though, and most of them are really quite good.
I'll start with his, edited together and cleaned up from a string of text messages (minus my responses), below. I feel like I should note that many of you had similar thoughts on the match, but I didn't want highlight anyone if they weren't comfortable with it. This guy, I don't so much care about.
So I finished watching the match last night, and now I feel insane trying to sort out my analysis of it. I might be crazy but I feel like it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be after I talked to you.
Here's my analysis whether you want it or not---City just played really well both collectively and individually---some great performances all-around. They were scary efficient, absolutely dominated in possession, and were clearly the better side.
My biggest concern for Liverpool is that Hodgson didn't adapt and make a change. I actually thought there were some good individual performances from Liverpool, but it was pretty bad as a whole. That formation was sh*tty, and it was clear that it was sh*tty during the first half. Maybe bring on Poulsen, slide Gerrard up, or even bring on Maxi and put Kuyt behind the striker? But nothing happened.
There's other stuff too---Torres and Ngog were invisible, Liverpool had absolutely no width (and might need another wide player anyway), and Agger obviously can't be the left back---but the lack of response tactically was mostly to blame for me.
Or, they could have just PUT F***ING AQUA BEHIND TORRES, BEEEYYYYYAHHHHH.
You're going to post these? Perfect, hysteria and text messaging brings out the best in me. At least put in a link to that Chappelle Show video so people know what I meant with "BEEEYYYYYAHHHHH."
Feel free to start to send me yours if you want. I'll run them after matches, either the day of or the next morning. If it takes off, great, if not, pretend it never existed. We'll see what happens.