Hey everyone welcome to the latest Live Thoughts feed. I'm back now after being away for six days. I didn't post yesterday because I was just too tired to. You'll all know about my amazing adventure on this site in a few months I promise.
Onto the football. Naturally I didn't cover the win against West Brom last week as I was in Argentina but it was nice to not only see us win but for Andy Carroll to score. He's had a disappointing start to his season and is getting a lot of criticism. I want him to be a success and I don't believe in criticising players too much. He's still a new member of the squad with injury problems and deserves patience to get into the swing of things. Hopefully he can kick start his season with that goal last week. Let's hope we can start a good winning streak too, Swansea at home is a game we should win. Any other result will be a bad one, like the Norwich draw a few weeks back.
Here are the teams:
Liverpool: Reina, Johnson, Skrtel, Agger, Jose Enrique, Henderson, Lucas, Adam, Downing, Carroll, Suarez. Subs: Doni, Maxi, Coates, Kuyt, Spearing, Kelly, Bellamy.
Strong team, good to see Carroll getting another start. Hopefully he scores as I said before. We just can't lose or draw this game, if we do, things will be a little more concerning.
Swansea: Vorm, Rangel, Monk, Williams, Taylor, Gower, Britton, Allen, Routledge, Graham, Dyer. Subs: Tremmel, Sinclair, Lita, Moore, Agustien, Richards, Moras.
On paper it doesn't seem like much, but Swansea aren't pushovers, none of the promoted sides are. But we should be winning today, there's just no excuse! Sinclair and Lita on the bench is interesting.
2' - Slow start at the moment but we have the ball more than the opposition, which is always a good thing.
5' - Great to see Suarez trying his ball skills early. I love that man at the moment.
8' - Carroll! What a chance! A lovely ball from Downing down the left flank and Carroll connects and it hits the cross bar! Gutted!
8' - Carroll tries a shot from the edge of the goal line from the left but Vorm saves it with ease.
11' - Well we're definitely on top of Swansea, that chance before being one that we should have taken advantage of.
14' - Free kick for Swansea in a good area, just outside the box on the right. Gower is going to take it.
15' - The free kick is taken and dealt with, it wasn't easy though and the ball came back in the box a few times. Swansea's most dangerous moment so far has gone.
18' - Suarez! Close. Decent strike, he intercepts the ball around 25 yards out and takes a chance. He came very close, it skimmed past Vorm's right post.
20' - Suarez on the left wing swings in a lovely cross to Carroll but he wasn't deep enough in the box. But the way he lifted the ball for the cross was pure quality.
23' - Some good movement ends with a tame Suarez shot. Enrique crosses from the left and Suarez and Lucas are in the middle and neither really connect with force.
26' - We look comfortable but these games become concerning as they go on. We need a goal soon.
27' - Danny Graham! Great save by Reina! Good work from Wayne Routeledge, he dinks the ball over the Liverpool defence and Graham taps it and it was a lovely reaction save by our keeper!
28' - Suarez! So so close! He loses his defender on the edge of the box and goes for placement over power, and shoots to the bottom left and it's nicely saved by Vorm!
30' - Possession so far is 58%/42%, showing our general dominance. We need to score though.
33' - Johnson does a darting run through a few defenders and gets into the edge of hte penalty box, the ball gets cleared for a throw-in in the end. Nice to see Johnson back.
36' - Allen! Skims past the post. That's the second time so far Swansea came close to scoring. A nice bit of movement from Joe Allen and he makes enough space on the edge of the box and takes a fierce shot and it skims past Reina's left post.
40' - Graham! Again, close. It started from a corner that we failed to clear properly, a cross comes in from the right and Graham connects but thankfully it wasn't good enough, it goes wide to the left.
43' - Another potentially dangerous situation ends when Graham crosses and it's not deep enough and Johnson heads back to Reina. Swansea are finishing stronger than we'd like them to.
45' - One minute of added time.
45+1' - Carroll from the corner! Close. We got another corner but that dissolved too. Half time.
Well it's been typical Liverpool really so far, looking good, looking good, no goals. Towards the end of the half Swansea took some chances and they came close to paying off a few times. We have an awful record in terms of shots to goals ratio, and it doesn't look like it's getting any better. But we do score goals, that's the good thing, and let's hope we can get one or two in the second half.
46' - Liverpool Sub: Dirk Kuyt is coming on for Jordan Henderson. It must be tactical, not that Henderson really impressed in the first half.
48' - Swansea are playing some decent attacking football, they are very similar to the West Brom sides of a few years ago, it's nice to see these smaller sides play football and it's a shame when they break down and concede a lot. That being said let's hope that's what happens today.
51'- Swansea are looking more and more confident. We need to stop that and soon. We can't lose or draw today, it would be really bad.
54' - The game is starting to stretch a little, both sides playing good football.
55' - Neil Taylor gets a yellow card for Swansea.
56' - Suarez header and it's straight at Vorm. It was the end of a free kick from Charlie Adam.
57' - Reina nearly fluffed up big time! Johnson gives him the ball and he takes a touch too long and Graham almost scores! Relief.
59' - Joe Allen takes a shot from range and it was always going wide. Nice try though.
62' - Swansea are definitely enjoying themselves at the moment, they're playing the better football and we just look nervous for the most part. We need to change the tables sooner rather than later.
64' - Double save from Reina! He's more than made up for his fluff-up before! A long range shot from Dyer is saved nicely and Graham comes for the rebound and Reina saves that too! It's not good for us at the moment and if it wasn't for that man we'd be a goal down.
66' - Daniel Agger goes in the book, yellow card.
68' - Free kick in a VERY dangerous area for Swansea. The foul was on the line, it could have been decided it was a penalty. Gower takes it and it was very poor. Still, we're giving Swansea the chance for glory today and it's not good.
69' - Wayne Routeledge comes off worse from a mid-air battle with Skrtel. Haven't you heard how badass Skrtel is? Check this out for evidence.
71' - Joe Allen runs from the Swansea half into deep into our half and battles about four Red shirts before going down to a Glen Johnson tackle. Great run from the young Welsh lad.
73' - Scott Sinclair is about to come on, and Craig Bellamy.
73' - Swansea Sub: Wayne Routeledge comes off for Scott Sinclair. Things can be a lot worse if Sinclair is on form today, he's a promising young player.
74' - Liverpool Sub: Craig Bellamy comes on for Andy Carroll, who hasn't been impressive really today, which is a shame.
75' - Haha, Cardiff boy Bellamy is getting a lot of boos from the Swansea fans.
75' - Downing takes a shot and it goes well over the bar. It had a feel of desperation that shot.
77' - Finally, some great movement from Liverpool! Kuyt and Suarez combine nicely, and not for the first time, Suarez sets Kuyt up in the box but the ball is bouncing and it's cleared before Kuyt can shoot.
78' - Agger! Just over the bar! It came from a corner and Vorm punches the ball out of the box and Agger headers the ball just over. A nice spell from Liverpool, keep it going boys!
79' - Angel Rangel (awesome name) tries a Stevie G special from around 35 yards to the left and it was awful. Where's Stevie when you need him...
80' - Liverpool free kick in a VERY dangerous position, similar position to Swansea above, just behind the penalty area line, to the right. Suarez was the one to go down and Ashley Williams gets a yellow card.
81' - Charlie Adam takes the shot and it deflects off the feet of one of the Swansea wall-boys. Corner.
82' - Nothing comes from the corner and the ball is cleared dramatically.
83' - GOWER! What a chance! Brilliant Swansea attack, Dyer skips past Enrique and curls in a lovely cross to Graham, who heads the ball down perfectly for Gower who shoots far too hard and it's awfully over the bar. Best chance of the game and thankfully for us Reds it didn't go in.
85' - Last five minutes and we're looking desperate. Suarez tries to fight his way with the ball into the box and there's too many Swansea shirts in his way. Lucas gets the ball and handball's it. Desperate.
87' - Free kick for Liverpool, in almost the same position as before. Suarez takes it and it's deflected once again for a corner.
87' - GOAL! NO! OFFSIDE! Kuyt scored! Agger get's a touch in the box and Kuyt was offside when he did, Kuyt heads the ball into the net but it was too late. What agony, so close but so far away.
88' - SUAREZ! Saved brilliantly from Vorm! GAH!
90' - JOHNSON! What another phenomenal save from Vorm! We're bombarding these shots and nothing is getting past Vorm! One of the saves of the season that!
90' - Four minutes of added time.
90+1' - Sorry but there's so much going on at the moment it's hard to update. We had another great bit of play then but Enrique tries to cross but it goes for a goal kick.
90+2' - Swansea Sub: Mark Gower comes off for Kemy Agustien. Time wasting for Swansea.
90+4' - Full time.
Another embarrassing draw for us. Man of the match was definitely Michel Vorm, the Dutch Swansea keeper. The last 10 minutes he probably made at least half a dozen saves and was the reason we didn't score. We were not good today. We weren't awful, but we most certainly weren't good enough. We had a good start, and Carroll should have scored early but didn't make the most of his shot that hit the cross bar, and for long periods, probably between 30 minutes and 70 minutes Swansea were better than us. The last 10 minutes was very good stuff, but Vorm saved everything we gave. Another home draw against a newly promoted side. Good luck to Swansea for the rest of the season, they were great today and it was a decent game of football, despite no goals. But for us, it's the international break and we need to come back better than this, if we want Champions League football next season. That's it from me today, have a good one.
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