Man U v Liverpool....an exciting game a real derby affair in the 2nd half. The score flattered Liverpool somewhat who scored both goals from set pieces. Nani and Scholes had decent games but Berba stole the show with a fantastic performance with a super hatrick. Carragher looked very much out of sorts !!

Agreed, it is bollox. I too wait for them to play a half decent team. Out of the 5 games they've played so far four of those have been against teams who have a reasonable chance of filling the bottom four places by the end of the season. And let's face it, Stoke are hardly going to set the world alight either.

Does anyone think Championship football for Liverpool next season could endanger their plans for the new stadium etc?

Why Chelsea is the number three club in London. How success has brought (or should that be bought) bugger all fans.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/article-1313469/Martin-Samuel-Roman-Abramovichs-457m-1-639-new-Chelsea-fans.html

I am still wondering why the hell Gerrard & Torres stayed???

You could say the same about Fabregas

Woy will turn Liverpool's fortunes around I am sure of it, but only enough to get them competing with Man City, Arsenal and Spurs. The top two spots look done and dusted to me, but it's a long season and you can't really go pinning winners medals on anyone until christmas at least.

With the depth of squad they have though, if Chelski are 4 or 5 points clear in January then you could probably give them the title.

Sunderland unlucky on Saturday evening, cracking atmosphere and a good game. Not sure what Whinger was going on about, we put more of a boot in against Man City and I think there were only 2 challenges in the whole game, he really is a dillusional fool and I fear he is going the way of Cloughy at the end of his career.......

Looking at the Liverpool team at OT on sunday IMO only Gerrard, Torres (when fit), Reina  and possibly Cole / Johnson are good enough for the famous red shirt. Liverpool team is full of mediocre talent they offered very little flowing football and only looked capable of scoring thru set pieces. Woy has his work cut out an excellent manager he is but hes took on a task..after years of mismanagement by Benitez.

Which followed years of mismanagement by Houllier, which followed years of mismanagement by Evans, which followed years of mismanagement by Souness, etc, etc.

There needs to be a wholesale rebuilding of the team if Liverpool are to compete for the title. Given the level of transfer fees for top players these days, that would take an investment of £100m+. But sugar-daddies are hard to come by.

As for why Gerrard & Torres stayed, I think the speculation over new owners played its part. I can't see Torres staying beyond this season if the Yank parasites are still there - but then again, who'd want him on this form? I think Gerrard is in a more difficult position. I know players value medals, and rightly so, but I can't help thinking that moving to a mega-rich, dominant club who are probably going to win the league is just cheating. For players who've moved here from abroad, I imagine it'd be less of an issue, after all they'll already have moved clubs at least once. But for a one-club player like Gerrard (especially when that club is your home 'town' club), it must be very much harder. Perhaps I'm being too idealistic, but I'd imagine a Premier League medal won with Chelsea would mean far, far less to Gerrard than one won with Liverpool.

Good news for Liverpool fans. Blackstone tell Hicks to fink off, apparently.

http://www.goal.com/en/news/9/england/2010/09/20/2127994/investment-group-blackstone-refuse-to-refinance-loans-for

Yeah, it's a tough one. I guess, though, in these days of the mercenary footballer, it's quite nice to see some players wanting to just play for thei hometown club, spurning more succesful clubs in the process.

I've never understood the animosity toward Lampard. Alright, he did the dirty on his missus and 2 kids, but apart from that - and he's hardly alone there - it's not like he's dirty or cheating or got a hugely overblown opinion of himself - just an honest player with a knack for getting goals.

A poor man's Gerrard, just as Barry is a poor man's Hargreaves. Unfortunately, Capello can't use Hargreaves. He has more wiggle room in terms of Lampard. Hopefully, he'll use the opportunity to tell Fat Frank it's time for him to retire. Unfortunately, it probably won't happen.

Lampard - superb for his club, rubbish for his country. He's not the first and wont be the last. John Barnes...

Not even consistently good for his club. Many Liverpool fans never took to him.

Pretty much for the reason you posted in the first part, he opitomises that greedy, mercenary that is the modern player. I know that there are hundreds of them and he is hardly offensive, but he pledged his heart and soul to West Ham, told them he was a one club man etc.

Ah, right. I'd not thought of that. Who was the West Ham player than very publicly slapped in a very public transfer request the very day they got relegated the other year? Was that Defoe?

Seemingly, Rafa's legendary man management skills haven't improved.

http://www.goal.com/en/news/10/italy/2010/09/21/2128901/inter-striker-diego-militos-agent-he-misses-jose-mourinho

It was indeed Defoe, I heard him speaking about this recently and bleated on about bad advice from agents etc and him only being 17 or 18 I think. That doesn't really hold with me although he did come across as genuinely regretting the whole affair.

Maybe someone should think about putting much of the blame for all of the woes of the Premier League on Rupert Murdoch.  It was he who decided to use football to further his global media interests via Sky TV and started the huge flows of money which led directly and inevitably to the spiralling wages.  If you combine emotion, the desire for success, greed and sometimes limited commercial sense why are we surprised by the result?

if you were suddenly paid £50k per week would it not alter your behaviour and outlook - eventually?

And not forgetting the Bosman ruling, which, while necessary, provided early Xmas pressies for agents and players alike.

Quite. As the expression goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions....

Speaking of the road to hell...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wear-11387989

Obviously at this stage it's just an unproven allegation, and there seems to be a cottage industry of nasty, thick b*tches who try to make a name for themselves by getting gang-banged by footballers and crying rape.

But there's also a history of footballers whose arrogance stemming from taking home as much money in a week as most people take 3 or 4 years to earn, leads to them thinking they can do whatever the hell they like. Footballers and mysogyny seem to go hand in hand.

If thick, overly-made-up slappers wearing next to nothing go to a thick, knuckle-dragging footballer's hotel bedroom at night, the likelihood is it'll end in tears if they're not prepared to whore themselves out to said footballer and any chums (or is the correct vernacular "bros"?) he thinks might also fancy a ride.

A plague on all their scummy houses.

Ye Gods.

What a legacy Benitez left behind. They should re-name him Gordon Brown.

Can Liverpool fams take much more of this?

As a distant Liverpool supporter myself since I don't follow much for years now. I never see how poor Liverpool lately and on that rate they would be relegated.  20 years since their famous Champion title and will be 21st next year.  I wonder how Ian Rush feel?  That what got me interested in Liverpool in the 80's because of him.   Last heard he moved to Cyprus to be a fooball trainer for the local youths, not in any football clubs.

Ha! Ha! Ha! (at the result)

An absolute joke. The players look like their heads have gone, albeit that was a second-string side tonight. Already murmers of discontent coming out of the club's grapevine about Hodgson's tactics - if (and it remains a big if) new buyers with deep pockets can be found, Hodgson may not last into the new year.