Match Preview: Liverpool FC v Manchester City
2016 is a Leap Year, the footballing gods have looked down upon the fixture list and set aside a special day of celebration following the final.
But who will be leaping for joy?
“
Liverpool Football Club exists to win trophies.”
Bill Shankly.
“
Reaching a final is great but in the end it is only memorable if you win it and that's what we have to do.”
Jurgen Klopp.
And so we arrive at Jurgen Klopp’s first opportunity to win some silverware at Liverpool FC. It may not be the most prestigious competition, but it is one that
Bob Paisley,
Joe Fagan,
Kenny Dalglish,
Roy Evans and
Gerard Houllier all took seriously enough to add it to the club’s vast collection of titles. In fact, no club has won this competition as often as Liverpool.
And while the debate will rage about whether it’s worth the time and effort, anyone who was watching any of those eight glorious victories will tell you exactly how wonderful it feels to see a Liverpool captain lift it.
Jordan Henderson has had to be patient, while his illustrious predecessor lifted cups aplenty in his stint at the wheel, the lad from Sunderland has yet to lead his side up those famous steps and lift a pot.
The mantle passed on.And if he has shown patience, a lot of us haven’t. For a club steeped in victory, raised on pride, bred to win championships at home and abroad, these have been lean years for Liverpool Football Club. Since the miracle of
Istanbul, which promised to reignite the old passions and wake the sleeping giant, we’ve faltered off and on the field and won just two domestic trophies.
And now, armed with a visionary manager who marries charisma with tactical nous, and a young, hungry squad of players, we are looking to rebuild. The new
Main Stand at Anfield provides a perfect image for this club; in outline, in presence, in potential, it towers over the landscape, visible for miles around, but it is very much still a work in progress, not quite ready yet to seat the faithful, not quite at the stage where it will provide a backdrop to the creation of new footballing legends, but it’s coming, you can see it,
my god can you see it, and soon, soon.
But to talk too much of the future is to ignore the realities of the present. We go into this match as underdogs. Something undreamed of back in
1981 when we lifted it for the first time, or in
1984 when we lifted it for the
fourth, consecutive time the
only such record in any senior competition in English football.
The lads celebrate with the trophy.
Our rivals are the richest club in world football, and recently pinched one of our best young prospects in a £50m deal. Things are so different now, but the
League Cup remains, a fixture on the footballing landscape. Sometimes it is seen as a platform to greater success, as in 2001 when it became the first piece in Gerard Houllier’s
unique cup treble winning season. Or in 1984, where it laid the marker for Joe Fagan’s legendary treble of senior competitions (
the first in English football history) And it still, uniquely, provides a vital path to Europe, something Liverpool actually need at the moment.
But most of all, it is a trophy, and that’s what LFC is all about. Shanks said so.
History of the competition
Often regarded as the cheeky little brother of the more esteemed FA Cup, The League Cup was established as recently as 1960. The brainchild of
Sir Stanley Rous, (who incidentally was the last honest man to be honoured with the title President of FIFA,) the original idea was for a competition beginning in mid-season for teams who had been eliminated from the FA Cup itself.
Sir Stanley relaxes at home by leaning against the sideboard and looking uncomfortable.
This intriguing suggestion never took off, but the idea was revisited by Football League secretary
Alan Hardaker when he was charged with exploring ideas for reorganisation of the league structure. Although the league structure was to stay much the same, his proposal of a secondary cup competition to make up for a potential shortfall in fixtures won approval. With a large number of grounds installing floodlights at the start of the 1960s, the League Cup was initially pushed as a competition that could be played mid-week with evening fixtures. This was something of a novelty at the time, and may partially explain the relatively low profile of this slightly gimmicky concept.
It also came relatively hot on the heels of the formation of the
European Cup, and comparisons were predictably snooty.
“
Where men like Count Bernabeu with his wider horizons, think in terms of a European-league for the future in which a lead could surely now be given jointly by our leaders, the Football League propose next season to implement their useless Football League Cup to be played in midweek. It gets the players, the clubs and the public nowhere." The Times. 30th May 1960.
But they've always been wankers, The Times.
When the league came to vote on whether or not to go ahead, sixteen clubs voted no, while thirty one voted yes. With this somewhat lukewarm approval, the competition went ahead, with
Aston Villa the first to lift the trophy after a two-legged final with Rotherham United.
The Cup became something of a political football itself, when Hardaker used it to pressure UEFA into awarding the winners a place in the
Fairs Cup, a fore-runner to the
UEFA Cup and present day
Europa League.
Tottenham Hotspur were the first team to benefit and made the most of it, after winning the 1971 edition of the League Cup, they won their first European trophy, the 1972 UEFA Cup. (Imagine that, Spurs winning trophies in consecutive seasons! Fuck a duck, as they say around the
White Hart Lane ghettos.)
To this day, the League Cup is the only secondary cup competition which provides a place in European football to the winners.
Sponsorship of the Cup began in 1982, when the
Milk Marketing board attached their names to the competition, at the same time running a memorable advert that would now be considered an early example of viral marketing with its “Accrington Stanley? Who are they?” “Eggzakkly” catchphrase.
Other sponsors followed suit, and there was a clear progression of ever less healthy beverages from milk to
Coca Cola,
Worthington’s Bitter and finally
Carling lager. (Rumours abound that next up will be
Domestos,
Smack and
Teachers Whiskey, completing the cycle.) The competition is currently provided by barely-legal loan sharks
Capital One, although losers
don't typically get their legs broken.
Liverpool, of course, are the most successful club in the League Cup’s history.
Wins: 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1995, 2001, 2003, 2012
Runners Up: 1978, 1987, 2005
<![CDATA[<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/OVHA12O9DEQ" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/OVHA12O9DEQ</a>]]> 1981 Liverpool - West Ham – The first final match was played at Wembley and ended 1-1, with the reds winning the Villa Park replay 2-1 thanks to goals from Dalglish and Hansen.
<![CDATA[<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/4klQg_z47Lc" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/4klQg_z47Lc</a>]]> 1982 Liverpool – Tottenham – The Reds went behind to a Steve Archibald goal but drew level through Ronnie Whelan and eventually won 3-1 in extra time thanks to a second from Whelan and one from Ian Rush.
<![CDATA[<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/MN5dHN6QXKU" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/MN5dHN6QXKU</a>]]> 1983 Liverpool - Manchester United. – This time it was the old enemy Manchester United who took Liverpool to extra time, and Ronnie Whelan who again scored the decisive goal in extra time.
<![CDATA[<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/Rv2dLKTthXg" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/Rv2dLKTthXg</a>]]> 1984 Liverpool – Everton – The first ever all-Merseyside cup final saw the Reds defend their League Cup title yet again, with the game again going to a replay and Graeme Souness making history by grabbing the winner in a 1-0 win.
Two great late faces of Merseyside football. Howard Kendal and Joe Fagan with the "Milk Cup" in 1984.<![CDATA[<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/AHsMYY7ZjA4" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/AHsMYY7ZjA4</a>]]> 1995 Liverpool – Bolton Wanderers – After a gap of a decade, the Reds once more lifted the famous trophy, thanks to two goals from the sublime Steve McManaman.
<![CDATA[<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/RgxBAWo77Eg" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/RgxBAWo77Eg</a>]]> 2001 Liverpool – Birmingham City – At the Millennium Stadium, Robbie Fowler’s early strike was not enough to win it in normal time, and once more the fixture went into extra time, this time without a decisive winner, and so it went to penalties. Sander Westerveld’s heroics in goal, and a thumping decisive pen from Carragher won it in the shootout.
<![CDATA[<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/2aWugJIQM2M" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/2aWugJIQM2M</a>]]> 2003 Liverpool – Manchester United – Again played in Cardiff, under a closed roof, the old rivalry was renewed in this cup tie with local heroes Gerrard and Owen providing the goals.
2012 Liverpool - Cardiff – this time the game was played at Wembley, but against Cardiff. And once more, it went to penalties, with Steven Gerrard astonishingly missing the first and Charlie Adam the second. The reds kept their cool though, and Dirk Kuyt, Stewart Downing and Glenn Johnson found the target from the spot, bringing the Cup home once more and delivering Kenny Dalglish the final trophy in his astonishing career as player and manager.
Man City
Wins: 1970, 1976, 2014
Runners Up: 1974
Manchester City – Profile
An enigmatic club, wealthy enough to buy their way to the top, City field thoroughbreds in every part of the field. The whole is often less than the sum of its parts, however, as their recent FA Cup exit to Chelsea demonstrated. On paper, City are by far the strongest team in English football, with quality and depth in every part of the pitch. Their manager is an experienced and intelligent tactician who has won everything in the game, including the League Cup itself in 2014. There remains something very soft at the heart of this team, however, and four home losses in the league, plus three away from home suggests a team that can be beaten more often than you would expect. Liverpool have beaten the Citizens in their last two meetings, with a 4-1 rout in November one of the Reds best performances of the season. City’s focus may be divided, as they will arguably have one eye on the Premier League and the other firmly on their real target of European supremacy. Having crashed out of the FA Cup so recently, however, they may be motivated to make amends and win a pot to put their obvious nerves to bed.
Team:
In recent weeks, we’ve got to know what a Klopp side looks like, with the club injury jinx making selection a bit of a formality at times. With this game presenting an opportunity for silverware and a quick route to Europe, Klopp is likely to field the strongest side he has available, and with a sudden reduction in fixtures following the seemingly endless spree of games since his arrival, he will have a little more time to prepare the side for this match. The game comes three days after Augsburg’s visit to Anfield in the Europa League, but Klopp has indicated that he probably won’t be resting any key players for either match. (Don’t be surprised if Sturridge is yanked off early doors on Thursday if things are going well, though.)
Expect us to start with a front three of Sturridge, Coutinho and Firmino, along with Milner who will also be able to drop back into midfield alongside Can and Henderson.
