I think the Delap handball should have been a penalty and while our penalty was soft, Carragher did have his arm wrapped around Walters. The Upson handball would have been an extremely harsh penalty as it came off his leg onto his arm which was by his side. Our defending today was superb, but apart from that we were awful, and we were very lucky to come away with three points. But hey, that's football, you'll play worse and win, and we'll play better and lose. We had an awful run of refereeing decisions last season which made our blood boil at the time, so you have my sympathies where that is concerned and hopefully you'll get some that go your way soon. All the best for the rest of the season, and please don't take today out on us in the return fixture!
Thanks, I feel frustrated nobody managed to put away some of those clear cut chances we had but I suppose that'll come as the campaign wares on and when Gerrard returns. If we win at Spurs next week then all will be forgotten! Good luck to Stoke too! I fancy you to finish 7th this season, might even stick some money on it despite the fact I'm not a gambling man.
Maybe i'm just being pedantic but how regularly is regularly? And what about sprinklers, should no team water their grass more than another?
I remember the game you had against Spurs (I think) where you'd actually scored and Crouch blocked it behind the line. The referee literally had to look around the post to see the ball, which, from the angle he was stood, is a tell tale sign to anyone with an ounce of sense or bottle that it was over the line.
When Stoke played FC Thun in the Europa League they had a plastic pitch giving them an unfair advantage over any opposition. As if this was not bad enough they then absolutely drenched it at half time to the point that the ball in the second half had a trail of water zipping off the back of it on every pass or shot. I remember years ago John Beck making players have cold showers before games and throwing ice cold buckets of water over them to get them fired up and angry pre match. It's just the nature of the beast and each club and manager have different views on how the game should be played and won. I do think Liverpool should have had the Delap penalty and even though ours was a soft one Carragher as an England international should know that when you grab a player in the box you run the risk of being penalised. Great game and a great atmosphere and I applaud the Liverpool fans for being proper fans and accepting defeat although probably non deserved in a dignified manner. No doubt you will turn us over at Anfield again and so I wish you guys all the best for the remainder of the season!
Found this article guys at different managers approach to winning games and getting players up for it! http://www.midfielddynamo.com/gaffers/gaffers_teacupthrowers.htm
Great analysis but I have to say the pitch is something they used to play to their strengths, surely the FA have a maximum length of grass and Stoke were under it, no arguements. Stoke impressed me, winning an away fixture at Stoke must feel like something along the lines of a Cup final victory. We created plenty of chances, Carroll could have been more targeted when he came on, they had crosses but didn't particularly look for Carroll. Credit where it's due and Stoke defended brilliantly today, we were unfortunate not to walk away with something, but this match will make it even sweeter if the dream of the 'Stoke City vs Barcelona at the Britannia stadium' were ever to be pulled off. Well done Stoke For us, we'll accept the result, the decisions and the performance and move onto the next game
the size of the pitch is under the control of the home team(within certain measurements, the pitch is inspected by the ref (grass height etc) do you want every team to set up what best suits liverpool that day. grow up. you got beaten end of.
The grass length I'm not too worried about, just as long as it's not ridiculously long... having it cut before a match would be the sensible thing to do, then the clubs can determine how much they want it cut but atleast it's been cut and it's all the same length grass. I'm more concerned about pitch sizes, it's not really keeping in line with playing football is it? It's an advantage yes, and you should take that whenever you can - but no viewer wants to see a team unable to play it's tactics properly because of the size of the pitch.
Calm down lad. I want the size of the pitch controlled by the FA to be a standard size, it's sensible that this should be the case. If Tennis courts could change their size, or cricket greens could change theirs - do you not think something would be said about it?
This isn't about Stoke, Waddos_legends highlighted it up there about FC Thun, should they be allowed to do that? Is that encouraging a good game of football, or not?
you know what you,re getting when you go to stoke. if you,ve just got 1 plan you havn,t done you,re homework or you,re not good enough. it,s like wenger complaining teams are too physical, he justs wants teams to play how he plays so he can beat them coz player for player his were (not any longer) betterI,m not trying to wind you up but you sound a bit silly now.
Silly for suggesting that pitch sizes should be standardized? I'm not saying that the pitch size is the be all and end all, but Waddos_Legend's story highlighted how much it can affect a game. That's shocking.
I agree about FC thun they took it to the limit. but this was about stoke, it,s like other teams complaining you,ve got 2 good wingers and make the pitch as wide as possible.
This wasn't about Stoke, I said that in the article the long grass was a problem with Stoke's pitch but after looking into other anecdotes it's not something anyone can control and I exaggerated the effect it had on the game. The pitch size is a completely different story and has nothing to do with Stoke, just a general gripe I have on modern football. They insist on players tucking in their shirts and any sort of touch in the box is a penalty, but they're willing to let the size of the pitch differ by about 80sq metres.
Guys, our finishing lost us the game yesterday. Not the length of grass or the dodgy decision making, or the size of the pitch....not even Stoke's heroic defending. Our tactics were spot on, we dominated the game and created the chances and limited theirs; we didn't need a plan B, plan A was perfect...sometimes this happens, we shouldn't get sucked into a discussion on some of these minor details only to be accused of being sore losers. Let Stoke do what they do best, we won't be the first top 6 scalp they take this season at home.... All in all, should make for an interesting spurs game
I did I have no problem with teams using every potential 'trick' in the book, within the rules of the game to level the playing field. It's that type of attention to detail that won us a rugby world cup a few years back (read Winning by Sir Clive - great read!). Appreciate that this is just my opinion and others will totally disagree.
I'm pretty sure fans of the other team do. I wouldn't mind having a very wide pitch when playing against Stoke so that their throw ins are not as effective.
