The Brilliance of Steve McManaman
When listening to Champions League matches on BT Sport, there’s perhaps younger viewers unsure of the ex footballer on co-commentary. For the past few seasons a certain Scouse voice has echoed through the midweek coverage, and everyone should be made aware of what this man was, as a player himself.
When thinking of the former Liverpool player, Steve McManaman, I try not to immerse myself too much into what he offers from the gantry, but the absolute brilliance he brought …
Terry McDermott - You’ll Never Walk Alone
Having been born in 1981, I had the privilege of watching legends and players of such quality, and that European and domestic dominance was assured. John Barnes, Ian Rush, Peter Beardsley, Alan Hansen, Ronnie Whelan & Bruce Grobellelar were just some my first generation of Liverpool players, albeit at a very young age. My best and clearest memory of Liverpool FC probably started at the back end of those players, as King Kenny neared the end of his first reign. …
The Team That Was - Liverpool 1989/90
I was lucky enough to grow up in an era where Liverpool won an array of trophies on a regular basis. If we didn’t win the league one season, you could bank on us winning it the next; such was our dominance.
Sadly, these trophies dried up to largely become few and far between. In the case of the league title, it completely evaporated. As rival fans like to shove down our throats, Liverpool have never won the Premier League …
Faith and Football: Liverpool's Muslim Men
What do Mo Salah, Sadio Mané, Xherdan Shaqiri and Naby Keïta have in common? Besides their football club, of course. The answer I'm looking for though is their religion, Islam.
It's very rare in my writing that I stray away from tactics, statistics or areas in which I feel well-versed in, indeed, identity and faith are aspects rarely covered by sporting literature in general. Exceptions do stand out - take Muhammad Ali as a physical manifestation of a religiously-centred sportsman, …
Liverpool FC: More Than Just a Football Club
On Thursday afternoon, Liverpool FC's Twitter account tweeted a video of the new CEO, Peter Moore, detailing how Liverpool FC would be a proud member of Liverpool Pride:
https://twitter.com/LFC/status/888042309505470464
I was not prepared for the comments that followed in response to the tweet. Similarly, the same type of comments were directed at Peter Moore, who also tweeted the same video. Initially, taken aback, I remembered that intolerance and homophobia within football are something that, even now, in 2017, is a prevalent …
Magic Coutinho Impresses Origi
As I sit down to write this, there are actual people of intelligence preparing to watch David Moyes' Sunderland take on Arsenal in the hope that the Mackems will eke out some kind of result. This is the kind of entirely avoidable madness that leads to dark bouts of depression. To compound the lunacy, the same people will probably have one eye on Everton's attempts against the Gunners on the final day. If anything, expecting an Evertonian gift is the …
More Birthday Blues For The Reds?
Birthdays can be a real source of emotional volatility as one gets older. On the face of it, it's a great blessing to have lasted another year in a world moving at such a distressing pace, in a direction which no longer seems certain, but on the other hand, one is afflicted with terrible and crushing angst about just where one fits in, nowadays. Why is everyone dabbing, for example? What even IS dabbing? Is anyone else cold?
Having reached …
Desert Island Reds: My Dream Liverpool XI
My Desert Island Line-Up is made up of players who have represented Liverpool from 1989, when I first started supporting the club, to the present day. The formation is 4-3-3:
GK Pepe Reina
Liverpool have had some truly dodgy goalkeepers in the past 28 years (David James, Sander Westerveld, Jerzy Dudek to name but three) so any who was even half consistent would get into this team. Reina was more than that. Not only a hugely reliable presence for the …
Liverpool Are Lacking That One True Superstar
As Zlatan Ibrahimovic inspired Manchester United to their League Cup triumph on Sunday afternoon, it was impossible not to feel a twinge of jealousy.
Liverpool’s most bitter rivals had been outplayed for much of the game against a slick Southampton side, but Ibrahimovic was ultimately the difference between the two sides.
The legendary Swede has been an enormous success story at Old Trafford, unfortunately, with his all-conquering swagger both on and off the pitch helping transform a club in delightful …
Eleven Games In for Liverpool: 2016-17 vs. 1987-88
If you were fortunate enough to be at Anfield on Sunday, you probably left the ground with conflicting emotions. Watching the league leaders take the seventh place team apart while our rivals stutter was a joy to behold, but there’s a voice somewhere reminding us of false hope. Hubris kills.
Title challenges come rare to Liverpool – 2002, 2009 and 2014 being probably the last three – but as the Chelsea and Palace games were only a couple of years …