Liverpool 2-1 Atletico Madrid: Live match thread and post match frustration

There was nothing wrong with the effort the players gave last night, in fact they all put everything they had into last nights game but what did us was our luck over the two ties. We had a perfectly good goal not given in their place, and that sums up our season, a season where nothing has balanced out, we have lost numerous games due to a pen or ten not being given, any number of bad decisions by the referee's starting with the beach ball and two sending's off at Fulham, these decisions have not evened themselves out other wise we would be in the top four easily and in the UEFA final, the match over the two legs, again we did not get the rub of the green and a bad decision by a ref in the first leg has cost us dear.

I thought the Aquilani played some passes that were out of this world and now if Rafa is given funds to rebuild around players like Aqualini, Mascherano, Agger and Torres to name just four our future is assured.

That was a nice goal, ruled out wrongly, wasn't it? Thought he was onside.

He was offside to be fair.

Still f*** gutted.

As for the starting XI  - you can only say that with the injuries we have defensively, Degen is not trusted by Rafa (with 2 LB's injured, and 2 CB's out, rafa switched our RB to LB, and put Masch there.)

As for the subs - can't argue with who he took off - although it does highlight the weakness of the bench that there was no 'game changer' available.

Just proves once again we need investment in the team - esp strikers.  Really hope we can get back up for Sunday's game, but we looked so tired tonight....

Talking of holding midfield players I noticed Barcelona do it along with MC and Chelsea yet it's never a problem when they do it but when Rafa plays that way it becomes another stick to hit him with. Because of not putting anything into the first team for the last couple of years, we now need more investment than would other wise be necessary.

At the end of the day we are not going to win games when you have the lack of quality on the bench as we did last nite .

The goal of Yossi that should have counted you mean?

I disagree - you cant use the "offside or not offside goal" to justify our failings in the away leg.

Other than this disallowed goal we didnt manage another shot on target all game and that was the biggest problem we faced. The selection was wrong in that match.

AM are a decent side but are not outstanding - we let them play in the home leg and virtually destroyed them for long periods of the game last night.

The difference was purely attitude and intent - in the away leg our intent was not to lose but we did, last night we had to go for it and boy did we give it a try but it wasnt to be.

JD and RK summed it up for me in terms of the game from this post on to the end of the page:

http://www.lfcreds.com/reds/index.php?topic=29625.msg653677#msg653677

Still shattered.

I disagree - you cant use the "offside or not offside goal" to justify our failings in the away leg.

Other than this disallowed goal we didnt manage another shot on target all game and that was the biggest problem we faced. The selection was wrong in that match.

AM are a decent side but are not outstanding - we let them play in the home leg and virtually destroyed them for long periods of the game last night.

The difference was purely attitude and intent - in the away leg our intent was not to lose but we did, last night we had to go for it and boy did we give it a try but it wasnt to be.

If that goal had been allowed (which it had to because it was obviously not offside) we would have gotten our precious away goal and everybody would say we got a good result after such hell of a trip by train and tactics would have been good. So why are the tactics wrong if the referee makes a mistake and wouldn't they if the ref didn't make that mistake?

That was my first european game- i got home at 2.30 this morning!
I thought the fans were fantastic- although abit quiet towards the second half- but im thinking that was down to nerves, Had a sore throat when i got home!  Throughly enjoyed myself-
   Although i am upset that we didnt win- and there is not much left to play for- I cant blame anyone,
The team gave their best- Agger kept Aguero quiet, Masch was brilliant as usual, Aquliani... i could name the entire team!
The fans gave their all to be the 12th man once again-
Rafas subs made sense- you rafa-bashers have to think outside the box sometimes- Rafa knows more than we see, he knows the state of every player-and they wernt pissed off to be leaving the field.
   As i told my Dad lastnight- dont analyse it too much- we lost, but we went out fighting! We cant talk about the owners, investment, our `sh*te` players, Rafa, tactics, subs, etc- Its not about any of that-  It just wasnt our night.
   Roll on next season...

If that goal had been allowed (which it had to because it was obviously not offside) we would have gotten our precious away goal and everybody would say we got a good result after such hell of a trip by train and tactics would have been good. So why are the tactics wrong if the referee makes a mistake and wouldn't they if the ref didn't make that mistake?

The point I am trying to make is that if we had been more positive in our attitude out there and had more than the 1 shot (offside goal) on target then things could have been different and we should not hide behind this 1 chance for our clear failings to create anything else in the away leg.

If you think we played well in Madrid then thats your choice but I still think this is where the tie got away.

I was proud of our team though we did not make it through we won on the night and we gaveit our all

Well  done LFC...we are all behind you...we know the players are hurting as much as we are.

Fair play to Madrid too.

In terms of subs Aquilani was taken off for El Zhar he was carrying a knock and was shown immediately with an ice pack on his kneee.

Masch pulled up and limped off in extra time and Degen came on to cover the right side..makes sense.

Pacheco came on for Benny with 7 to go because Benny was breathing out of his ass.

The sub decisions were not that dismal.

Thanks for that mate. I guess i'll have to watch the second half and injury time, as painful as it is going to be. I must say though, El Zhar, please, do i really have to say it?.

Thanks for that mate. I guess I'll have to watch the second half and injury time, as painful as it is going to be. I must say though, El Zhar, please, do I really have to say it?.

Zero talent and a league 2 player at the least, yes

Very surprised Yossi hasn't got more MOTM votes, thought he was outstanding last night.  Toss up between him and Aquilani for me but since Yossi had a more lasting impact on the game, he got my vote.

Masch was great and all, but how many times did he run the ball out of touch or overhit a pass? Too much.

Didn't see the first half, was in town for a meal with work cos one of the girls is leaving. (got a F***ing bollocking from some for putting work before me club - trust me wasn't my decision, got dragged to it)

Luckily, we fu**ed off to that kozys in town (they wanted to go kareoke) where the match was on. Over the bloody moon I was to see it.

Now surrounded by god knows how many (all got told to F**k off if they got in the way of the telly though), couple of bottles of ale inside me and the nerves of a European semi final me judgement may be a bit off on what I saw. But I've gotta be honest, I don't know where all this F***ing hard work from certain players is coming from.

The ones who I thought looked good were Yossi, Carra and Agger. The rest seemed very disappointing. Their goal was a F***ing embarrassing catelouge of errors. Was like so many we conceded in the Champions League (remember that competition?). Just switch off and allow them time and space to do what they want. Cross not being closed down by Johnson - there's a novelty - and that c**t Forlan cruising into the middle unmarked - another first for the season.

I've seen Aquilani's goal and it was a little peach, as for Yossi's - what a F***ing finish la. Was a beast. Chuffed to bits when that went in. The roof went off Kozys. We were F***ing rocking. Then that one F***ing mistake caused heartbreak. Sitting there surrounded by bitters didn't make it any better. Me and Chris just couldn't believe it.

The substitutions were strange but that's often the case with Rafa Benitez isn't it. Very rarely does he make three subs we all agree with.

The fans were excellent. Not surprising considering the few I seen in the Cabbage before we went to town. It was heaving in there. Took me back to when I was going the match on a regular basis. Got the butterflies right back only to F**k off out an miss the first half. Unfortunately though, that atmosphere isn't there all the time but that's a different kettle of fish all together right now.

Overall though, who cares we're out. It's only the Mickey Mouse cup, nobody really wanted us to win it if we're being honest. Only small clubs take this competition seriously.

In all honesty, I am disappointed we went out. But from what I saw, we didn't look like scoring anyway. Once they got their goal, I don't think we had another shot on target. That's not good enough. We had to score and didn't show the signs of doing so in the final 15 of extra time. Knackered or not, we still had to have that one final push. One last effort for a final in the Europa League and we just didn't have it.

Ah well. Always next year I suppose. But for now, our priority is beating Chelsea and Hull before we can start looking ahead to next year. We've got six points to play for in the League, so lets go all F***ing out and end this season on some sort of high.

Liverpool Football Club.

Still gutted today.
Great game last night and our goals were stunning.
Could see the players starting to tire in extra time and I was on the edge of my seat hoping for us to get a third, cause I always felt we might concede. Can't fault the effort of the players. Aquilani, Gerrard, Masch, Benni, Babel everyone seemed to leave it all out on the pitch. Pity we didn't have the quality to come off the bench and win the tie.
I would have liked Kyrgiakos to come on at two nil and push Mascherano into the middle with Lucas, with Johnson to RB and Agger to LB, but didn't happen. Said it already but El Zhar and Degen aren't good enough for this club. Reckon we need four or five quality signings this summer.( If we have funds)

Anfield sounding rocking last night. Well done to all the fans who stayed still the death urging the lads on.
You did us proud.

YNWA

I'm pissed that somewhere around 60th minute the players just started waiting for extra time. And when we scored the 2nd, there was no subs. Knowing that the goal was scored in ET, Rafa should of brought in a defender or at least take a tired player off.

If Johnson and Masch would have more experience on playing on the sides like they did yesterday, I'm sure that we wouldn't have conceded that goal.

Didn't see the first half

I don't know where all this F***ing hard work from certain players is coming from.

If you'd seen the first half DLS, you may understand that a little better, for the first 45 we had Athletico pinned in their own half for the majority, it was like a seige mentality, to be honest I've never seen the first ten minutes of a match go by so quickly, it was like we kicked off, what felt like a minute I looked up ten minutes had gone.

We started brilliantly. Faded and the players were tired, not enough on the bench but please to see Pacheco play.

We tried our best and we knew the dangers they posed, these things happen. Think it'll be a good final.

It was my first European game and i thought the atmopshere was pretty good, even if i was in the Annie Road end

Well I just have one thing bothering me about the game. Why did we concede to extra time so easily. We easily had our strongest 11 on the pitch within the 90mins. Wouldn't it have made sense to try and nick another before the 90mins elapsed? The bench we had suggested the starting 11 had to win the game comfortably in hope we'd not have to rely on the bench. I thought with 15mins to go we seemed happy in taking it into extra time. I'm sure if we had attacked before that we'd have scored and that would've been through. A valiant effort but it could have been handled better by Rafa.

Overall though, who cares we're out. It's only the Mickey Mouse cup, nobody really wanted us to win it if we're being honest. Only small clubs take this competition seriously.

Could not disagree more. Of course the CL is the tournament every team wants to win, but there are other challenges out there too. The fans should not take CL participation for granted and get hardly excited about anything else. Last night the team gave their best, and their best was not good enough, so I guess we are either a Mickey Mouse club or this tournament is not so easy to win. 

Mickey Mouse or not, we havent won anything now since 2006.

On an even more sour note - if Fulham win the Europa League, do they get the 3rd and final Europa slot for next year ?

A bit off topic, but what the F**k is up with Aguero's hair? In one match he has long hair, and in the other he has short hair?