This will sound like me being a Negative Nancy just for the sake of it, but I have to agree with Eamonn Dunphy - last night's game wasn't all that good. To use a television analogy, it was like an episode of Lost. It had no pattern, people were just making things up was they went along, and there were plot holes right left and centre. Was it entertaining? Sure, but only because it was a farce. People are describing this game as "epic", an historic encounter between two superpowers. I disagree.
Liverpool went 2-0 up without really playing all that well. A great freekick and a penalty probably flattered them, but then with the way Chelsea played you could say that they deserved to be 2-0 down. Chelsea came back into the game in the second half, but only thanks to an horrendous error by Reina. Their second was a freekick, which I think could have been stopped. So that's four goals, three of which came from set plays and one of which was extremely dodgey.
Liverpool looked bereft of ideas at this point, and Lampard put Chelsea 3-2 after a horrible pass by Alonso was punished by a good pass by Ballack and neat play by Drogba. Benitez then withdrew Torres, thus signalling the white flag. Then out of nothing -- aka Lucas Leiva -- the Reds clawed a goal back Frank Lampard style - a deflected hit and hope. A Dirk Kuyt header followed a couple of minutes later and quite remarkably Liverpool were within one goal of going through. Lampard squashed any hopes of a thrilling finish by netting the goal of the game, and that was that.
In short, if I wanted to watch this kind of football I'd tune into the Dutch League, where players of Kesman's quality get 103 goals in 7 matches. Lots of goals does not equal a good game. These kind of mistake-ridden matches may be fun to watch, but give me a high quality 0-0 any day of the week. A game of football should tell a story; a coherent story. As with a great footballer, a great football match should make sense. The true beauty and entertainment of football is not found in the cheap thrills of a-goal-a-minute. I can appreciate people enjoying the game last night. Heck, I used to enjoy Lost. But I cannot go so far as to call it a great game.
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On another note, Ribery was quite brilliant last night. If Barcelona or United sign him they will be fearsome if he can perform like that week in week out.
Liverpool went 2-0 up without really playing all that well. A great freekick and a penalty probably flattered them, but then with the way Chelsea played you could say that they deserved to be 2-0 down. Chelsea came back into the game in the second half, but only thanks to an horrendous error by Reina. Their second was a freekick, which I think could have been stopped. So that's four goals, three of which came from set plays and one of which was extremely dodgey.
Liverpool looked bereft of ideas at this point, and Lampard put Chelsea 3-2 after a horrible pass by Alonso was punished by a good pass by Ballack and neat play by Drogba. Benitez then withdrew Torres, thus signalling the white flag. Then out of nothing -- aka Lucas Leiva -- the Reds clawed a goal back Frank Lampard style - a deflected hit and hope. A Dirk Kuyt header followed a couple of minutes later and quite remarkably Liverpool were within one goal of going through. Lampard squashed any hopes of a thrilling finish by netting the goal of the game, and that was that.
In short, if I wanted to watch this kind of football I'd tune into the Dutch League, where players of Kesman's quality get 103 goals in 7 matches. Lots of goals does not equal a good game. These kind of mistake-ridden matches may be fun to watch, but give me a high quality 0-0 any day of the week. A game of football should tell a story; a coherent story. As with a great footballer, a great football match should make sense. The true beauty and entertainment of football is not found in the cheap thrills of a-goal-a-minute. I can appreciate people enjoying the game last night. Heck, I used to enjoy Lost. But I cannot go so far as to call it a great game.
**************************
On another note, Ribery was quite brilliant last night. If Barcelona or United sign him they will be fearsome if he can perform like that week in week out.
2 comments:
Couldn't agree more Decie. It annoyed me after the game when people were calling it a classic and ''one of the greatest games ever''. It was a shambles, an entertaining tragedy. I saw it written in the times (via 365) that it was described as ''football for adults'', that's nonsense! It was shocking standard at times and football for kids who just appreciate goals would be more accurate description.
Yeah I read all sorts of reaction praising the game, and I was like "were we watching the same game?" I find it disturbing that professional football writers were so taken with it. I think its just because people were fearing "boring" 0-0 draws between the clubs, therefore a 4-4 draw was a pleasant surprise. I wonder what the Football Weekly crew thought of it...
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