'What's this? A preview about an AWAY GAME!? John, are you going to Liverpool to watch Dem Blades take on Klopp's men?' I hear you, dear reader as you shout this question at me through your computer screen. Firstly, could you be a bit more quiet next time? The cat's woke up and now it's more angry than Jose Baxter in a pub in Ireland. Secondly, I'm not going to Liverpool no. unfortunately. Instead, I will be watching this match completely legally (I swear) via British Telecom's sporting channel. I don't know if away match preview/reviews will become more common in the second half of the season but I'm doing one now. So... City away, that was a bit of a mad one wasn't it?
After 11 months and 18 matches, Sheffield United lost an away match. I suppose if your going to lose a long unbeaten streak, the home of champions of England is not a bad place to see it go. But it's never that simple with United and, if things had gone our way *cough* Mousset's early goal *cough* we maybe, just maybe, could have come away with three points. Couple of changes for The Blades in this one, Robinson came in for McGoldrick and Besic came in for big lad Lunny. United took it to the champions early doors and Mousset was causing the City backline problems early doors and nearly scored from a header close to goal. Shortly after, United did have the ball in the back of the net! But VAR got involved and despite very little being in the call, it was ruled off because of course it was. No matter, United kept on going and managed to get to half time level. So far, so good. Let's see how the momentum carries on into the second half. Referee's aren't supposed to get involved with a game of football, or at least that's the idea. Chris Kavanaugh obviously has different ideas to everyone else about how a referee gets involved in a game. So let's set the scene, Oli Norwood tries to play a simple ball to John Fleck. Kavanaugh decides that instead of staying out of the way of Fleck, he'll just walk straight in front of him and block him off. Fleck couldn't receive the ball and poked the ball into the path of Sergio Aguero and Aguero does what he does best and slotted the ball home. But surely the ref will recognise his error right? VAR will surely help us out on this one right? No. No it didn't. City's goal stood and United were undeservedly 1-0 down. I'll be honest, the rest of the match I didn't really care about. To have something like that happen to your team and nothing being done to rectify it was just soul destroying. The fact that the ref was GOING TO BLOW FOR THE DROP BALL THEN CHNAGE HIS MIND just made it even worse. City scored again, I didn't care. It was a cruel way to lose and I hope the higher ups do something about it. I know they won't, they're too stubborn to realise that the system they are implementing is hopefully woeful. But hey, at least they can put some adverts on them, at least there's money to be made. Who cares about teams and supporters being left in the dark about what the hell is going on in the ground. So we lost, but we really didn't deserve to. Enough about the English champions, let's talk about the European champions. Liverpool have been on an absolute tear in the League this season, winning 19 of the 20 games they've played. They drew the other one. Could they become the new invincibles? Quiet possibly. The danger men are rich in this Liverpool side, Robertson and Alexander-Arnold are two of the best full backs in the country with Alexander-Arnold's set piece taking being particularly deadly. Just in front of them players like Fabinho and Jordan Henderson (yes, really) pull the strings in the engine room, then there is the front three. Salah. Firmino. Mane. Three footballers who are all elite talents and are all incredibly good at what they do. Not much more needs to be said other than our backline will have it's hands full. And on that note, my prediction for the match is I hope we don't lose. I'm not going to do a score, just not a loss. I know our boys will give everything in Liverpool and you never know, Liverpool might have an off day. Everyone has had one, why not them? As ever, until next time, UTB.
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AuthorHi my name is John and i will be giving my thoughts on the blades matches and all blades related news in this section Archives
November 2022
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