Liverpool and England September and October

Hello everyone, first of all I'd like to apologise for the delay. Once again I've been really busy, I will try to get posts up quicker in the future, but there may be delays in the future, I hope not though.
Anyway, on with the story, after the European Super Cup win we had to continue our good start to the season, here are the results:

We have had a very good start, we are unbeaten, and have had some very good wins. The standout is the 9-0 demolition of Red Star, we absolutely tore them apart, the players looked like they were from another planet. We also hammered Chelsea, I was very pleased with that. The best players so far have been the strikers, Torres, Gignac, and Roman Vavilov have all been excelllent, we look very dangerous up front, and have scored a lot of goals.
As a result of this we sit 4 points clear in the league, we should win it with ease this year, the other challengers have been very poor.

Here is the Champions League group, we have been incredible so far, I am really pleased with the players, especially the goalscoring form, although a lot of the goals were in the thrashing of Red Star.

We played three England matches in the two months, thankfully all of them were won.

The Norway game was just a friendly, but I was still pleased with our attacking performance, and the wins against Estonia and Liechtenstein were very good, they looked in awe of playing at Wembley. Rodwell's hat trick was very pleasing, he'll surely be the future star of England, the natural replacment for an ageing Gerrard.

We are top of what is a pretty easy group, we should qualify for the European Championships with ease now.

Well then, that sums up the first couple of months, we have had a really good start so far, hopefully we can keep it up in the coming months.

Thanks for reading!

Liverpool July and August 2014

Hello everyone, sorry for the delay, I have been very busy recently. However, I now have time to write this post, so welcome back!
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!

Liverpool May 2014 - Chasing The Trophies

 Hello everyone, welcome back! After wrapping up the league title in April, we now had a chance to rest some players ahead of the FA Cup Final against Man City, and the Champions League Final against Real Madrid. Victory in both would secure a historic quadruple, I really wanted that to happen.

First we had three league games to play, and here are the results:

We absolutely hammered Middlesborough, they had no answer to the fantastic attacking play of my young team, Danielsson, Brown, Kortadi and Williams are all young regens, the oldest of them is 22. You can see there profiles (and all the other profiles of all players in the first team squad) in the 'Current Squad' pages.
The Man City game was very even, a draw was a fair result, but I was very disappionted with the West Ham game, the players were poor, it seemed like most of them were on their holidays already.

Here is the league table, another very good season for us, we wracked up 95 points, 1 point more than last year.

After those final Premier League games it was on to the most important games of the month, first up was the FA Cup Final, versus Man City, who had enjoyed a good season themselves.

I expected quite a tough game, but Man City were alot better than I expected. They started the game fantastically and ripped our defence apart in the early staged, deservedly taking the lead when Carlos Tevez rifled in a free kick. We hit back though, our first attack saw Fernando torres whip in a cross from the right and Steven Gerrard bundled the ball in. It was 2-1 not long after though, Jo finished a nice City move that left our defence standing. Once again we managed to equalise, David Silva had an easy finish after good work from Torres. The match then became more even, and I thought the game was going to penalties when Gignac, on as a substitute, was played in and slotted home. I was very happy, I thought the cup was ours, but with 10 seconds left on the clock Pablo Zabaleta powered in from range and the match went to extra time. Extra time was quite boring, little happened except that Sanchez got a second yellow, I was very disappointed with him for that, and the match went to penalties.

 I was quite confident as I chose the spot kick takers, but I was not preapred for what was about to happen. After Anthony Anderson and Carlos Tevez missed in the early stages, everyone on both teams scored until Jose Reina and Nedum Onuoha both missed. After that everyone scored until finally someone crakced under the pressure. Unfortuantely it was Glen Johnson, he rolled his shot wide and we had lost the shootout.

So we had lost the FA Cup Final, but we had to pick ourselves up quickly, we had the Champions League Final coming up! We were facing a very strong Real Madrid side, just look at some of their players!

Casillas, Ramos, Zapata, Pepe, Santon, Diarra, Velosos, Ronaldo, Vucinic, Higuain, Benzema.... not a weak link anywhere. They have such a good squad that Kaka was only on the bench!

R.Madrid started as the better team, they were knocking it about well. Our defence stayed strong, they had no clear cut chances, and we were looking dangerous on the break, using Sanchez, Silva and Torres' pace. We couldn't break through, and neither could they, the match drifted into extra time, and eventually, penalties.

We faced our second shootout in a week, and I'll admit that I wasn't too confident after losing against Man City. Everyone scored in the first five penalties so the match went to sudden death. We immediately had a chance to win it, after Sergio Ramos missed Glen Johnson had the chance to win it but his kick was saved by Casillas. We had another chance straight away, Evra missed for them, but Axier Kortadi couldn't punish them. Another two penalties went in, but Cristian Zapata missed for Real, leaving Nicolas Otamendi with the chance to win it. He ran up and belted it into the top corner, past Casillas, we had won the Champions League! It was our second in a row, I was so pleased that we had managed to defend our crown!

Here are some player stats for the season. I would say the best five players of the season are:

1 Fernando Torres

2 Steven Gerrard

3Nicolas Otamendi

4 David Silva

5 Andre Pierre Gignac

That's about all for now, we have a busy summer ahead, it's World Cup year! I will be leading England there, hopefully we can come home with the trophy, there will be a post about our adventures soon.

Thanks for reading!

Liverpool April 2014

Hello everyone, welcome back! At the end of March we were nearing another league title, we were also through to the Champions League Quarter Finals, we were to face Genoa. We had a crazy schedule coming up, we had ten games to play, including three in six days! It would surely test our fitness, I was expeceting a few tired players by the end of the month. Here are our results then:

You can see that we had a great win over Genoa in the first leg of our Champions League tie. Nicolas Otamendi scored twice, Fernando Torres got yet another goal this season, and goals from Glen Johnson, David Silva and Francesco Magnanelli completed an emphatic victory, one which put us all but through to the Semis. Federico Laurito scored the consolation goal for Genoa.
The second leg was rather boring, they opened the scoring, but once Torres equalised it was all over and we were through! We later learned that we would play arch rivals Man Utd in the Semi Final, it was sure to be a big game.
The Premier League matches against West Brom, Fulham and Sheff Utd were pretty straightforward wins, the FA Cup Semi Final against Aston Villa was slightly more difficult, but we managed to pull through and we are through to the Final!
After that it was on to the first leg of our Champions League tie against Man Utd, the first leg was at Old Trafford. We were missing both Javier Mascherano and Magnanelli through injury, and as I wanted to play a five man midfield, 20 year old wonderkid Adam Brown was brought in.

 He did quite well and we played alright, but United were the better team. However Fernando Torres nicked a goal, and although they equalised we never looked like conceding more, and we came away with a very good draw.

After the victories over the above mentioned teams we needed one more win to secure the title. It was a tough one, away at Chelsea, made tougher by the fact that we had played the first leg against Man Utd just two days earlier. The game wasn't very good but once again it was Torres who scored the decisive goal for us, he terrorised Terry with his pace. Chelsea didn't play well and barely created anything, so it wasn't too difficult for us to hold on to our lead. The victory meant we had won the title once again! I was very pleased, we can now rest players for the big matches coming up.
One of the matches in which players were rested was against Newcastle, and we lost, despite playing well going forward, we were poor at the back and Newcastle punished us and we succumbed to only our second loss in the league this season.
We had to pick ourselves up quickly for the final match of the month, it was the second leg against Man Utd. Mascherano was back from injury and the fit again Jules Jourdain came in for Carragher.

We played much better in this game than the first leg, Mascherano protecting the defence made a big difference. We dominated possession and had much more attempts, but we had to wait until the stroke of half time to go ahead, Torres was played in and he doesn't miss from 8 yards. We came put after the break still playing well and it was 2-0 when Gerrard slotted in after a through ball. Torres then slotted in another with Untied powerless to resist. After this I took off the key players with the game in the bag, and it finished a comfortable 3-0 victory for us, we had beaten our main rivals and are through to the Final!
We will face Real Madrid and all their superstars in the final, it will be a tough game, but we have a good chance of victory if Torres continues his form. He has now got an incredible 49 goals in just 45 games this season, one of those as a sub!
Here is the league table then, we are confirmed as champions, so I will rest a few players ahead of the two finals we have coming up.

We have a big month ahead of us, we have two finals, one is of course against R.Madrid, the other is the FA Cup Final against Man City. We have to play them in the league before that, whoever wins that may hold a phycological advantage come the final.

That's all for now then friends, thanks for reading and please comment!

Liverpool are the Champions!

It is with great pleasure that I can announce that Liverpool have won the Premier Division. Here are all the results dating back to the end of January. The 4-1 win at Chelsea was paticulary pleasing, with the team producing a great performance away from home. The last win, against Newcastle confirmed us as champions, and it was a very happy day for the Liverpool fans.

Unfortnatley we were dumped out of the Champions League at the quarter final stage by Man City. This was paticulary disappointing as we had gotw a decent 1-1 draw away in the 1st leg. Matters were not helped by Mascherano and Skrtel both getting sent off, and Tevez punished us with a superb hat-trick. The Champions League is definetly the target for next season, but we do have the FA Cup Final against Arsenal coming up, so hopefully can win another trophy.

Winning the league this early also means I can give the youngsters a run, and keep everyone fresh. Unfortunatley Riera broke his leg in a recent match and is now out for 4 months. There will be another post about the Arsenal game soon, and that will include the season stats. Keep playing Football Manager for now, FM fans!