Topic: CL 1st leg: L’pool 0 v Bayern 0

[-Willo-]

We played the best teams in the CL that season didn't we & why does it even matter what we did last year ?

Someone made a comparison about our performances in the CL this year, and said we've been worse.

I said we haven't because this season we've played much better opposition.

Last season by this time we'd faced Spartak, Maribor, Sevilla, Porto.

This season by this time we've faced Napoli, PSG, Bayern Munich.

I'm not saying it to be negative, its just facts... But people still cry for some reason.

[Rush 82]

At least they could bring Coutinho off the bench though

Yeah, the fucking wankers...

Oh wait....


Ummmm....I bet they had more shots on target though

[Red-Soldier]

Absolutely dogs going backwards this lot 

[SinceSixtyFive]

I thought he looked good, Salah didn't offer him much further forward, for a first game back up against Coman, a cleansheet isnt the worst thing in the world to have.

You said night all about 20 mins ago fella

True that but I decided to have another pint to celebrate a fairly decent European night.

[El Lobo]

Yeah, the fucking wankers...

Oh wait....


Ummmm....I bet they had more shots on target though

They didn’t.

But.

If they’d had Clyne, that game finishes 0-0 instead of 0-0

[Rush 82]

There has not been enough praise for the defence I thought we did really well. There were a few uncomfortable moments but overall they coped well. We still have every chance going into the second leg which is the most important thing.

Wish Matip had more luck though - he's shite at attacking shooting and heading

[arbiarbi]

I'm surprised Shaqiri didn't come on. Origi could have been replaced with a training cone and you wouldn't have noticed, that was a poor sub.

He is tall and Bayern is very very dangerous from set piceces.... It was the most important not to concede goal in the finish of the game.

It was good game, we had so many problems with team selection and it is good result, I am sure we will win in Munich!

[Ray K]

Hard to believe that neither of these Champions League games had any goals in them tonight. 

55 shots on goal between both games.

[jillcwhomever]

A fair point, of course.

Their plan was obviously to get us back to their place at least level then blitz us there. They executed the first part of the plan superbly well for me. Not pushing for the away goal was risky though, because if we are firing on all cylinders over there then we could get the away goal we need and they'd really have to chase it then, possibly leaving themselves vulnerable at the back.

Despite the fact I thought they were excellent tonight, they still should be quite nervous at their place. Their tactics tonight will only prove ultimately correct so long as they carry out the second part of the plan successfully. The good thing is that we can have a major say in how that turns out. It's still very interesting. We score over there, and who knows...

I think its fair to say it is delicately poised going into that second leg. If we could get an early goal that would really put the cat among the pigeons. When I've watched Bayern recently they often get really good starts, but then come off the gas and sometimes fail to finish off their opponents. I just wonder what their tactics will be in the second leg, they showed us a lot of respect tonight, so I can't see it being an open game second leg. But as DN said they will feel they can finish off the job as well. Winner takes all. 

[LallanaInPyjamas]

We need so much more composure from our full-backs in games like that.

[Gerry Attrick]

Absolutely dogs going backwards this lot 

Our xG was nearly 2 tonight. People are being very result oriented and thinking like "We didn't score, so they defended well". Much worse teams have held us to a lower xG than that this season. Goals were there but we didn't do good football. It happens.

[Jm55]

If we’d got that result away at Bayern; I’d be worried. The away goal is huge these days, I’d actually be interested to know how many teams have gone through over the last 5 years without one because i bet it isn’t many.

Bayern will understandably be happy with an excellent, organised defensive performance. They won’t be able to do that in 3 weeks though, and they missed their chance to take advantage of Van Dijk’s absence.

I was genuinely concerned we were going to get done at the end with a Lewndowski sucker punch, and to be honest I think Bayern really needed to push for that.

We’ll be sound, not worried at all to be honest.

[jillcwhomever]

Wish Matip had more luck though - he's shite at attacking shooting and heading

That chance he had in the first half was probably the best anyone had, just wished it had gone to Salah. 

[Ratboy3G]

I thought he looked good, Salah didn't offer him much further forward, for a first game back up against Coman, a cleansheet isnt the worst thing in the world to have.

You said night all about 20 mins ago fella

Sorry, my post wasn't particularly well written (as usual). I don't think Trent didn't play well, just that he looked rusty. It'll take him a while to get back up to speed.

[kennedy81]

Thought it was a brilliant game between two brilliant sides. We were really good, so were they.

Thought it was a poor game to be honest. Lots of poor passes from us when we got into good areas, giving the ball away too easily. Bayern didn't offer much at all.
The longer the game went on, we lost confidence and started to try and force it, and made it too easy for Bayern, who were well organized. It felt like one of those frustrating league games against mid-lower table opposition.

[Jm55]

Our xG was nearly 2 tonight. People are being very result oriented and thinking like "We didn't score, so they defended well". Much worse teams have held us to a lower xG than that this season. Goals were there but we didn't do good football. It happens.

Nah.

This isn’t championship manager mate.

Watch the match back and tell me they didn’t defend well.
Seriously.

[jillcwhomever]

55 shots on goal between both games.

Wow. 

[Trendisnotdestiny]

A few more thoughts:

1.  They did a good job of clogging the lanes against Firmino, Salah, Mane etc... in the middle, but we needed to do a better job of getting the ball wide and serving it into some dangerous zones.  Nothing is more depressing than missing the final pass for a shot (at least with a shot we got into that position to finish).  We need better decision making, technical execution from Andy and Trent

2. Both teams believe this result works for them, but only one will be right.  Either we regress a bit with our passing game and get punished or they'll really regret not attacking more when we get VVD back and Fabinho in the middle of the park.  James, especially, needed to find more space to get on the ball and make decisions.  Turns out Gnabry was their most forward thinking dangerous player today. 

3.  Our service has been poor on restarts and crosses.  This has got to be an area to work on (technical repetition) - maybe its the new ball and needing more time to get used to it, but this is an area we have to do better to win ties like this.

[kennedy81]

55 shots on goal between both games.

Most of those must have been from Barca? I only remember Neuer making the one save from Mane's header.

[Gerry Attrick]

Nah.

This isn’t championship manager mate.

Watch the match back and tell me they didn’t defend well.
Seriously.

I don't think they defended particularly poorly but also I'm not going to go overboard and pretend they were Simeone lite. If we didn't keep butchering our final pass or show no composure we could be taking a nice lead abroad. It's okay though. I still believe we can and will score at least 2 there. If I'm wrong and showing them no respect so be it. I'm not going to apologise for it.

[rushyman]

What I also love about that result is there’s nothing for the media to latch onto ahead of Sunday’s game

They were just waiting to push out over the top knee jerk all or nothing headlines tomorrow.

Maybe a journo will start a fight in the after match press conference

[Sat1]

That BT commentary was so shit. Did they realise we played Bayern and not some part timers?

Be a good game in 3 weeks, more open and we can score a goal or two

[Adeemo]

Our xG was nearly 2 tonight. People are being very result oriented and thinking like "We didn't score, so they defended well". Much worse teams have held us to a lower xG than that this season. Goals were there but we didn't do good football. It happens.

We've been very wasteful in front of goal this season. We can usually get away it, as we did against Bournemouth, a game in which we should have had 7 or 8 but against top teams where chances are limited you simply can't afford to miss the kind of chances that Mane regularly does.

[ahearnrm]

Not worried - would have been more worried if we had won 2-1

you realise 2-1 is a better result than 0-0 

[Waka]

Very disciplined Munich side. They will surely miss kimmich thought he was their best player tonight.

Even if we scored one you’d probably still feel the tie was still up for grabs

[Rush 82]

They didn’t.

But.

If they’d had Clyne, that game finishes 0-0 instead of 0-0

Deffo

If we'd bought Fekir we'd definitely have scored like Lyon did tonight


Oh wait....


Fuck...

[Rush 82]

He is tall and Bayern is very very dangerous from set piceces.... It was the most important not to concede goal in the finish of the game.

It was good game, we had so many problems with team selection and it is good result, I am sure we will win in Munich!

How dare you be logical

Besides, he isn't really that tall - it's an optical illusion

[El Lobo]

Deffo

If we'd bought Fekir we'd definitely have scored like Lyon did tonight


Oh wait....


Fuck...

Oooh Fekir, that’s a strong move 

I’ll meet your Fekir with a..... why did we sell Klavan?!

[kennedy81]

I don't think they defended particularly poorly but also I'm not going to go overboard and pretend they were Simeone lite. If we didn't keep butchering our final pass or show no composure we could be taking a nice lead abroad. It's okay though. I still believe we can and will score at least 2 there. If I'm wrong and showing them no respect so be it. I'm not going to apologise for it.

Yeah, I'd go along with that. They were tidy and well organized, but we didn't ask them enough serious questions. They looked like they could be rattled at the back easily enough if we were really on it, but we weren't.

[Rush 82]

55 shots on goal between both games.

The goal gods are mean bastards

[Barneylfc∗]

Not worried - would have been more worried if we had won 2-1

Full Everton. Never go full Everton.

[Son of Spion]

Yup.
Honestly its always a mistake not to try and score an away goal - they're in a really difficult position in the 2nd leg.
I'm mystified by the shouts they were superb.
They were lucky to survive in the first half then parked the bus in the second when they should have been trying to score.

If we'd have pulled that off away to Real, Barca, Juventus etc we would all be raving about it.

They respect Liverpool and knew we could/would have hurt them if they'd played their normal game here. They did their homework extremely well, kept possession early on to pacify the crowd and defended very well indeed. That was the plan. They hoped to nick one at the other end if they could, but the real aim was not to concede then have our team and fans breathing down their necks, potentially resulting in an avalanche. I'm surprise more people aren't seeing what they were doing and how well they executed it. The lack of an away goal might be their undoing, but I think they were prepared to risk that, and preferred that to possibly going home 3-0 down.

[deFacto please, you bastards]

They will need to attack and we can counter. It suits us perfectly. They aren't going to blitz us, they'll be aware of what we can do on the counter hence why both of their fullbacks didn't go passed their half-way line.

[SinceSixtyFive]

How dare you be logical

Besides, he isn't really that tall - it's an optical illusion

Looked tiny standing beside Naby I thought.

[Raid]

That was a really good match in my opinion.

Bayern defended as a pack really well. I've read a few posts on here suggesting Mo wasn't at his best, but it looked from my vantage point that every time he got the ball he had two or three on him immediately, including Alaba right up his backside, who I'll add did a very good job defensively. I've always remembered Alaba as a flying full back but he was clearly told to man his station tonight and did it very well.

There are a number of positives for us. Henderson put in a magnificent midfield performance in a game we needed him most with a makeshift defence behind him. His forward passing was excellent and he broke up play nicely. We certainly lost a bit of bite after his booking. Gini on the ball is getting better and better, and Keita is also improving with each outing. Fabinho put in an excellent performance against a top class centre forward.

There seems to be some knee jerk reactions to anything other than victories these days. Bayern very clearly were happy to take a 0-0, and frankly, I think we were in the end. This is two legged European football, we've stopped Bayern getting an away goal with our fourth choice centre back and a makeshift partner. We score first in Munich and they are in trouble, they will have to come out and leave space for our front lads that they didn't get tonight. They score first, and we'll be in control if we find an equaliser. Both sides won't be delighted tonight but neither will be unhappy, and that's the beauty of this competition. It's all to play for and I can't wait to see how it unfolds.

[didi shamone]

Anyone whinging about a score less draw against Bayern in a match where we were the better side needs a reality check. They totally outclassed Real last year until their goalkeeper made a shocking error.

The only worry for me is our away performances in Europe have been awful thus far. We only need a solid performance and a score draw to progress and we're well capable.

[Bjornar]

It felt like one of those frustrating league games against mid-lower table opposition.

It´s a game of opinions mostly, but that´s just nonsense. It faded out like that yes, but overall that game was football at the very highest level, and if we had performed like against Leicester and West Ham Bayern would have embarrassed us.

[Six Beardy]

Nah.

This isn’t championship manager mate.

Watch the match back and tell me they didn’t defend well.
Seriously.

Exactly. Fck all that xg shite the spods gush over, it means absolutely nothing. The score was 0-0 - that's all that matters.

We could have won but our forwards weren't quite on it and we lacked that little bit of the magic from our front three that has served us so well recently... and Bayern defended really well.

[TrueNorthRED]

Full Everton. Never go full Everton.

This comment wins all things today. 

[kennedy81]

It´s a game of opinions mostly, but that´s just nonsense. It faded out like that yes, but overall that game was football at the very highest level, and if we had performed like against Leicester and West Ham Bayern would have embarrassed us.

I'm not saying Bayern are only as good as Leicester or West Ham. I'm saying it felt like one of those games by the end.