Gone For An Ashburton!

Arsenal 3 Liverpool 0

Flamini (41)
Toure (56)
Gallas (80)

Att: 60,110

Christmas came early for Arsenal at the Emirates yesterday with gifts not, as the stadium name suggests, from the East but the North West.

The first half was fairly even with, shock horror, Benitez actually fielding two forwards! We began well and looked lively and positive. Kuyt did well to fashion a chance that just sailed over the bar and although Crouch was clearly offside, the movement leading to the disallowed goal showed promise. It was encouraging. I didn’t pick it up watching it on the TV but the Sky team commented on how quiet and restless the crowd were in the first half. Signs that we were doing well? It would not have been an injustice had WE gone in at half time 1-0 up.

However the proverbial kick in the nuts came through Flamini’s goal. If I was being harsh I could say that Fabregas’ run was not tracked and that he was gifted a free cross but they had been pulling the defence around so much in the lead up that it was no surprise he got through. This was a bad goal. Not only did it undo all our good work beforehand but it most have had a big psychological effect on the team due to the timing, four minutes before the break.

Sadly the second half was different affair. The phrase keystone cop defending jumped into my head but this is inappropriate as least the cops ran around, albeit to no purpose. We just collapsed. Van Persie was given time to correct his miss control and pass to Toure who waltzed through a gap so large he must have thought some of the Liverpool’s defence were still in the dressing room! The third was even more comical. Gallas, like a gatecrasher at a wedding reception, simply walked into the penalty area and, unchallenged by a motionless defence, helped himself.

Elsewhere, Zenden missed a good opportunity to hit straight back after the second goal. Bellamy had a perfectly good effort chalked off but Carragher should have been sent off for an obvious second yellow card. The ref however let him off. I would have said he was a decent, non publicity seeking type of guy but then he did his dying swan bit.

In the previous blog I said this game was the acid test for us to see if we really showing signs of getting it together after an indifferent start and then signs of fragile improvement. Clearly there is still a long way to go. The worrying thing is that Arsenal didn’t exactly blow us away but still managed three goals with relative ease. In fact it could have been four had Adebayor not fluffed a one on one with Reina. Yes, Arsenal played well and were indisputably the better side in the second half but we made it oh so simple for them. I don’t wish to be disingenuous to Arsenal, credit were credit is undoubtedly due, but a lot of this defeat was of our making.

So, where does this leave Liverpool? It’s too early to arrive at solutions. At this stage all one can do is ask questions.

Defence. Having seemed to have sorted this last season we are back to our old ways of the season before that. What is the problem? It’s basically the same line up?

Why can’t we win away? Match of the Day pointed out that we’ve played Everton, Bolton, Chelsea, the Mancs and Arsenal. All these teams have been in the top three at some stage or another this season but that is no real excuse if we’ve got pretensions of improving on last years position. Anyway, no one, even the most pessimistic Liverpool fan, would have predicted a “nil points return” from these games.

Why won’t Benitez play Gerrard in the middle? It’s said he and Alonso don’t work well together so perhaps that’s why Zenden played there? Or is Benitez, in the face all the discussions about this, just being bloody minded? When Gerrard did move inside he set up Bellamy for the disallowed goal and hit the top of the net with a long range punt. Small scraps of comfort though, as overall he looked lost and thoroughly p***ed off.

Other random points. Mark Gonzalez started against Man United and Arsenal and has done nothing of note. Pennant comes on and does much better. Should he have started? He was playing his old club and would probably be more up for it? On the positive side, the first half was much, much better than the Man United performance. Kuyt worked really hard and again showed brief snippets of, continuing to build up a good understanding with Crouch and being much more at home in the Premiership er. that’s it.

The next game, inconsistent Middlesbrough, is another away one so we have got the chance to break this run. In the meantime I suggest Benitez uses the international break to study tapes of today’s game and get his case together for Saturday. It cannot be another trial like yesterday, where the defence rests!