I now have the same sick feeling in my stomach I had when we lost away to Arsenal 1-0 three seasons ago (which was not helped by the Balotelli meltdown and sending off - remember?). We came back to win the league against all odds that time but I can't see it happening again and to be frank we don't deserve it because that performance now follows a long string of cowardly performances against the top teams in recent years, its as if we are still carrying a deep seated inferiority complex against our 'betters' and we can't get over it: the Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal fans carry great optimism into every game they play against us, and it isn't hard to see why.
That said we never do well at Anfield or Highbury and so its honestly hard to judge exactly what today means, especially when you throw in two completely unstoppable shots from outside the box that Hart could do absolutely nothing about: you cannot account for goals like that - its just amazing how much luck Liverpool have against us.
Like some on here, I'm kind of getting sick about reading about formations: 4-4-2 versus 4-5-1 etc . When we won the Prem first time around, is it me, or it did only really click when we had Tevez and Aguero scampering around as the '2' upfront in a 4-4-2. ( Lucky for us that Balotelli got sent off in that Arsenal game as it became the only option left to Mancini and we never looked back.)
You can only play the formations that your players let you play, and I think what people really mean when they say play 4-5-1 is that they recognise that Dzeko simply isn't good enough against top opposition: if not why not say that up front? i.e.
"I want 4-5-1 because Dzeko is not good enough": that makes sense to me rather than I want 4-5-1 (followed by nothing else said.)
Sadly I'm starting to wonder if with Bony, we are going to find the same outcome as with Dzeko. and maybe in reality Aguero is actually best paired with a highly mobile runner, rather than a tall target man: it could be an expensive way to find out but I'd rather see Bony from the start in future rather than in desperation with 10 minutes left.
I'm glad we've already won the title twice, (and only just in each case) because after today, you'd think we'd never get the damn thing over the line.
That said we never do well at Anfield or Highbury and so its honestly hard to judge exactly what today means, especially when you throw in two completely unstoppable shots from outside the box that Hart could do absolutely nothing about: you cannot account for goals like that - its just amazing how much luck Liverpool have against us.
Like some on here, I'm kind of getting sick about reading about formations: 4-4-2 versus 4-5-1 etc . When we won the Prem first time around, is it me, or it did only really click when we had Tevez and Aguero scampering around as the '2' upfront in a 4-4-2. ( Lucky for us that Balotelli got sent off in that Arsenal game as it became the only option left to Mancini and we never looked back.)
You can only play the formations that your players let you play, and I think what people really mean when they say play 4-5-1 is that they recognise that Dzeko simply isn't good enough against top opposition: if not why not say that up front? i.e.
"I want 4-5-1 because Dzeko is not good enough": that makes sense to me rather than I want 4-5-1 (followed by nothing else said.)
Sadly I'm starting to wonder if with Bony, we are going to find the same outcome as with Dzeko. and maybe in reality Aguero is actually best paired with a highly mobile runner, rather than a tall target man: it could be an expensive way to find out but I'd rather see Bony from the start in future rather than in desperation with 10 minutes left.
I'm glad we've already won the title twice, (and only just in each case) because after today, you'd think we'd never get the damn thing over the line.