After my exploits with England at the World Cup it was back to Liverpool for pre season, I immediately turned my attention to transfers. Only two players left the club for money in the summer, they were Alberto Aquilani, who didn't get many starts and is getting on a bit, and Emilano Insua, who, after losing his place to Anthony Anderson, wanted games.
All the players who were released were young players, who aren't good enough. Obviously, after selling a left back and a midfielder I needed to replace them, and I set about straight away trying to do so. Here are the transfers in, only two players were signed, despite my huge transfer budget.
Stefano Paoli is the centre midfielder, although he is also a natural DMC and accomplished on the right wing. He has very good attributes, and at just 19, he has potential to be one of the best midfielders around. Particularly impressive are his mental stats, they are very good for someone so young. $21.5m is a big fee, but I'm confident he can repay it.
The other signing was, you guessed it, a left back. It is young regen Jonas Helland, he will play as a backup for Anthony Anderson, and he has good potential. Hopefully he can be a good player for us for many years to come.
With the new signings on board it was time to start the new season, here are the results:
Friendlies:
We only played three friendlies, but all of them were won, we played with confidence against both St Mirren and Wigan.
After that it was time for the first competitive match of the season, it was the community shield against Man City. The match wasn't a very good one, the first chance fell to David Silva in the 39th minute, and he tucked it home. It was level just two minutes later, and after that very little happened. Penalties were inevitable, I was confident going into them, but it seemed that we just lost our composure. After Wilshere and Gerrard both missed it was Alexis Sanchez who blew the crucial penalty, and City had won the shootout. I was disappointed as we had created the better chances during the game, but I guess the shootout is just a lottery.
We played three matches in the Premier League in August, and we looked in fine form, we bounced back quickly from the shootout loss to Man City. The Tottenham game was particularly pleasing, we absolutely hammered them, we were clinical in front of goal, partciularly from corner's, that were three of our goals came from.
UEFA Super Cup
The most important game in August was the the UEFA Super Cup final against Valencia. We were looking to win it for the second time in a row, here are the team line ups:
We were missing Valencia old boy David Silva, he had a minor injury, so Jack Wilshere came in. We started the game well, we looked very dangerous going forward, and in the 14th minute Wilshere crossed for Torres to slot in from ten yards. We still looked good, Valencia also looked dangerous on the counter attack. Unfortunately despite our chances we couldn't kill the game off, but Valencia were also wasteful. We managed to hold on in the nervy final stages, but I'm disappointed we couldn't score more goals. However, I'm delighted we have managed to win the trophy, hopefully we can make history and win it three times in a row next season.
We have climbed to the top of the table, I won't show you it, but we are three points clear after our great start.
That's all then friends, thanks for reading!
3 comments:
Is this still going?
@Anonymous, yes it's still going. I have been very busy recently, but I hope to be able to do a post in the next couple of days, maybe even today.
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