Angry Despite Winning: Why Liverpool beating Spurs away in the Premier League was still not enough for some fans…
YOU’RE A STEP ahead of me again here.
Three weeks ago I offered no views or insight into the West Ham game because I didn’t see a second of it. Instead, I was on a plane over Papúa New Guinea with no idea as to how the Champions were playing.
I missed the Spurs game because the glorious state of Queensland seems to have it in for the Saturday teatime game. That equates to a 3.30am kick-off here.
Bars don’t stay open that late here, even in Brisbane where I type these words and I’m not in a position where I can knock on a friend’s door and promise I’ll be quiet if they just let me watch.
Radio 5? ‘Due to rights reasons, we are unable to …’ oh, sod off.
So, any insight I could bring would be through the prism of the BBC website and peppered with the objective views of Leon Osman.
You know more than me about the Spurs game.
But reading the online comments during and afterwards has been interesting. Me? I’m a ‘three points is all I need’ sort of fan, but some are furious with the Reds and I can see why people are concerned when the Reds huff and puff a bit. A bit? Might be a lot. I don’t know.
That happens though. I’ll never forget leaving Wembley after the 2012 League Cup final and bumping into my mate Joe. We’d beaten Cardiff City on pens to win our first trophy in six years, but Joe was ashen-faced.
‘We got away with one there.’
He was right.
I get that, but my lads went home with a League Cup. It didn’t have to be perfect.
And yet you can be angry with a win. When we beat QPR 3-2 at Loftus Rd in October 2014 with the help of two own goals, I was almost incandescent with rage. Yes, yes, the three points, I get it, but Liverpool were abject against a side begging to be relegated.
It was a further reminder of how far we’d fallen. Two own goals and four goals from the 86th minute onwards. No control whatsoever, but Brendan Rodgers smiled at the camera nonetheless.
So I get that too. People being angry after Spurs.
I doubt Arne Slot will see it that way. Managers have to be pragmatic and they’re seldom fools.
I met Rafa Benitez once. Me and my mates were invited to a game after some work we’d done for a former player. We’d just beaten Bolton 2-0 in a freezing January game. Their manager, Owen Coyle, wore shorts on the bench.
We waited in a little room just off from the corner where the managers chat to the pundits at the end of Match of the Day. We watched Rafa on the monitors as he went through the litany of sound bites. ‘Hard fought win, great character, showed determination etc’ and told the world how he was generally happy.
Five minutes later he laughed with us. ‘Jesus, how bad was that first-half? Awful.’
He took the points. I would too, but then again, I didn’t see it.
I’ve not seen a game in December. I’ve been sailing, snorkelling and, as Martin and Emilia discussed on The Shoot Treatment this week, skydiving.
In answer to Emilia’s question, I’d like to say I didn’t make a sound as I passed through the clouds at terminal velocity, but I think I managed a 60 second long expletive.
I do that during some Liverpool games too.
The great thing about football is that you always get a chance to redeem yourself days later. The points come first but if you want to win AND play well, there’s a chance coming soon.
Personally, I’d never be disappointed at beating Spurs. I’m quite keen on it.
But that’s just me. And I didn’t see it.
Be of good cheer.
