They’ve been the two dominant teams in England for decades now. The last 28 championships have been won 18 times between these two, with the odd guest appearances from Arsenal, Leeds, Everton and even Blackburn (did that actually happen, or was that season just a dream for us all?) Between 1947 and 2000, Liverpool won 14 titles, and Man United 11. The next best was Arsenal with 6, then Everton with 4.
Of course, this ‘supremacy’ has not been slogged out between the two clubs year after year, but has instead come mainly in two nice neat packages. Liverpool from 1973 to 1991, United from 1993 to 2001. Not in my lifetime have both teams been at the height of their powers at the same time. Not until now.
United are the current Premiership champions three times running. Liverpool are the current holders of every other English domestic trophy, the UEFA cup and the European Super cup. Liverpool also moved up the final league table last season from 4th the year before to 3rd, while being all conquering in the cups. So far this season, they are leading the pack.
Since the arrival of Gerard Houllier, Liverpool have been slowly but surely gaining momentum. Only 3 seasons ago, they ended the campaign with a miserable 15 wins and 14 defeats. That, in Liverpool terms, is a disaster of a season. Since those dark days, when by the way, United were winning trebles, times have changed quite dramatically at Anfield. Houllier has rekindled the Liverpool spirit of old, and the good old days have returned. Now Liverpool are the ones winning trebles.
For the last couple of years, Liverpool have been closing the gap.
The signs are that the tide has turned, and that the Reds of Liverpool are back on the same level playing field as the Red Devils of Manchester, and that their momentum is about to take them clear.
‘Bollocks’ I hear the Man United fans saying, and they have a right to, seeing as we Liverpool fans have been hollowly predicting their demise and our uprising for the last decade. So let me tell you why this time it’s not a hollow statement, and back up my prediction with the supporting evidence.
Two seasons ago, United won the league by the greatest margin ever. 18 points, scoring 97 goals. Liverpool finished 24 points behind them and scored just 51 goals. Even though Liverpool’s defence conceded 15 fewer goals that season, we still finished 31 goals behind them in terms of goal difference…. and we finished 4th!
But Houllier was in the process of rebuilding, and doing so by focusing on steadying the ship defensively. As such, scoring goals had to take a back seat at the time.
Last season, United finished only 11 points ahead of 3rd placed Liverpool, scored just 8 goals more, and had a better goal difference by a margin of only 16. Liverpool had edged closer. Importantly, they also scored 20 goals more than the previous season, while still having the 3rd best defence in the league.
Ok, so what? It’s true that statistics can be manipulated to tell you what you want to hear, but there’s a significant point here. All great teams have had a foundation built on defence. The Thompson/Smith/Yeats/Hughes Liverpool in the seventies, the Hansen/Lawrensen/Gillespie/Neal team of the 80’s, and the Bruce/Pallister/Irwin Man United team of the 90’s.
Who comes to mind now when you think of great defence? I’m pretty confident that Hyypia/Henchoz/Carragher/Babbel come to mind for most of you, versus the current shambles on show at Old Trafford. Of the 8 defenders to pick from, I don’t believe there is a decent combination of 4 amongst them. Another significant factor is the goalkeeper. In the 70’s, Clemence was one of the world’s best. In the 90’s Schmeichel simply was the world’s best. Grobbelaar is the exception, but he was protected by the best back 4 England has ever seen (16 goals conceded one year proves that.) Now, Liverpool have completed a formidable back 5 with the superb Dudek. Man Utd on the other hand have a goalkeeping liability. He single handedly put them out of the FA cup last year, made a schoolboy error allowing Robert Lee to score for Newcastle this season, and was a nightmare in Europe and in the Premiership recently. He has the worst shot/save ratio in the Premier league, and his defenders have lost all faith in him. A dodgy goalie always results in a dodgy defence, because they’re lacking confidence in the man behind them. Dudek on the other hand, is supremely confident, and does things the way a true world class goalkeeper does. No rushes of blood, no showing off, no party tricks. Barthez, on the other hand, only adds to United’s defensive frailty.
Last season, Man United conceded just 31 league goals, but they had Japp Stam helping to protect Barthez then. Without Stam, they’ve conceded 23 goals so far in just 13 league games. At this rate, they would concede 67 goals by the end of the season! Now I don’t expect that will happen, but there are also no defensive options yet untried by their manager. He’s managed to put together a very, very poor back 5, no matter which 5 he plays. With the two current defences, Liverpool can routinely win games by scoring just 1 or 2 goals, because they rarely concede more than one. Man Utd need to score at least 3 a game to be sure of a win, because they average 2 goals against. Maybe it'’s the influence of Kevin Keegan moving in across the city!
Their saving grace is that they have the fire-power to do just that in many games. But not against the really good teams like Liverpool and Arsenal in the Charity Shield and Deportivo in Europe. It’s no surprise that they’ve already lost 7 games out of 17 this season given the inadequacies of the defence.
There’s more supporting evidence than just the defensive problems though. There’s the mindset of the two managers too. Gerard Houllier is half way through a long term vision. A five year plan he has meticulously drawn out. He’s ahead of schedule, but has an unrelenting passion to succeed, and knows he’s 2-3 years away from where he wants to be. Ferguson has a very, very short term plan driven by his pending retirement. His decisions in recent months have been very selfish in his quest to go out in a blaze of glory. Why on earth would you off load Stam and replace him with Blanc? That is a shocking error of judgement, and selfish because he put himself before the good of the team when he felt Stam had undermined his authority. He didn’t want anyone screwing with his obsession with winning the Champions League in his home town of Glasgow. His obsession has clouded his judgement.
Ferguson is also a changed man these days in defeat. A couple of seasons ago, a Man Utd defeat was a rarity, but even so, the manager would fly into a rage and publicly condemn the team to the media. ‘Simply not good enough for Manchester United’ he would say. ‘The players should be ashamed of themselves.’ His fierce will to win was there to see. For whatever reason, (and my belief is that he’s terrified of rocking the boat while he goes after his obsession,) he is now accepting of even a home defeat to Bolton. ‘My little football team spoilt my day’ he said, with little emotion behind his words. ‘We were lethargic.’ 2 years ago, the paint was stripped off the walls when they lost, even though they might have been 10 points clear at the top. Since then, they’ve been hammered by both Liverpool and Arsenal…. Serious title contenders.
Gerard Houllier on the other hand, loses to Bolton and promptly sacks his goalkeeper, realising he simply isn’t good enough. Days later, in comes Dudek, and another piece of his master plan is in place. Houllier’s facial expression when Bolton scored the winner that day was reminiscent of the anger shown in defeat by Ferguson a couple of seasons ago.
Houllier has some similar problems with Fowler in particular finding rotation hard to accept. So, he sold him. But the midfield seems to be ok with it, as do Litmanen, Heskey, and to a lesser extent Owen up front. But if you put these teams midfields and forward-lines head to head, they are very evenly matched.. For Keane read Gerrard, for Veron read McAllister, for Beckham read Litmanen, for Scholes read Berger and for Giggs read Riise. Up front, for Van Nistelrooy read Owen, for Cole read Fowler, for Solskjaer read Heskey. Overall, very evenly matched in my view, although I think that when you delve further into the squad, I actually think Liverpool are stronger. Barmby, Hamann, Murphy, Smicer and Redknapp are more impressive squad members than the Man United equivalents of Butt, Chadwick, Fortune etc. It’s this overall equality in the middle and up front that makes the defence so critical.
Another very obvious clue can be seen in the recent head-to-head games. Liverpool just couldn’t seem to beat United in the 90’s. A win was a rarity to be treasured. Now however, United can’t beat Liverpool. 4 successive wins for Houllier’s men, and every one of them thoroughly deserved. In those 4 games, Liverpool have conceded just 2 goals. Liverpool also gained their first win at Old Trafford for a decade, and the first double over them for many, many years. That Danny Murphy winner last season was an absolute hammer blow to Alex Ferguson. Had United avoided defeat that day, Ferguson would have held the record as the man who guided them to the most consecutive home games without defeat. He will now never hold that distinction.
Liverpool now have no fear of Man United, and the fans are confident of a 5th win in succession over the old. How many Man United fans are truly confident of a win against Liverpool now? 3 years ago, they were.
There’s one more reason why Liverpool are now ready to reclaim the crown. They now have a team of winners. Most of the squad have 5 recently acquired winners medals. The self belief that injects into players is massive. Prior to last year, they hadn’t won a thing as a squad. Man Utd had that self belief and experience to fall back on. Now Liverpool have it too.
The tide has almost turned. This season will see the two teams battling it out for supremacy, and with the imminent retirement of Ferguson, and hopefully a fit and healthy Gerard Houllier, Liverpool will pull ahead of their great rivals within the next 1-2 years.
The 70’s and 80’s belonged to Liverpool. The 90’s to Man United.
2002 is the year the pendulum swings back to Merseyside
Of course, this ‘supremacy’ has not been slogged out between the two clubs year after year, but has instead come mainly in two nice neat packages. Liverpool from 1973 to 1991, United from 1993 to 2001. Not in my lifetime have both teams been at the height of their powers at the same time. Not until now.
United are the current Premiership champions three times running. Liverpool are the current holders of every other English domestic trophy, the UEFA cup and the European Super cup. Liverpool also moved up the final league table last season from 4th the year before to 3rd, while being all conquering in the cups. So far this season, they are leading the pack.
Since the arrival of Gerard Houllier, Liverpool have been slowly but surely gaining momentum. Only 3 seasons ago, they ended the campaign with a miserable 15 wins and 14 defeats. That, in Liverpool terms, is a disaster of a season. Since those dark days, when by the way, United were winning trebles, times have changed quite dramatically at Anfield. Houllier has rekindled the Liverpool spirit of old, and the good old days have returned. Now Liverpool are the ones winning trebles.
For the last couple of years, Liverpool have been closing the gap.
The signs are that the tide has turned, and that the Reds of Liverpool are back on the same level playing field as the Red Devils of Manchester, and that their momentum is about to take them clear.
‘Bollocks’ I hear the Man United fans saying, and they have a right to, seeing as we Liverpool fans have been hollowly predicting their demise and our uprising for the last decade. So let me tell you why this time it’s not a hollow statement, and back up my prediction with the supporting evidence.
Two seasons ago, United won the league by the greatest margin ever. 18 points, scoring 97 goals. Liverpool finished 24 points behind them and scored just 51 goals. Even though Liverpool’s defence conceded 15 fewer goals that season, we still finished 31 goals behind them in terms of goal difference…. and we finished 4th!
But Houllier was in the process of rebuilding, and doing so by focusing on steadying the ship defensively. As such, scoring goals had to take a back seat at the time.
Last season, United finished only 11 points ahead of 3rd placed Liverpool, scored just 8 goals more, and had a better goal difference by a margin of only 16. Liverpool had edged closer. Importantly, they also scored 20 goals more than the previous season, while still having the 3rd best defence in the league.
Ok, so what? It’s true that statistics can be manipulated to tell you what you want to hear, but there’s a significant point here. All great teams have had a foundation built on defence. The Thompson/Smith/Yeats/Hughes Liverpool in the seventies, the Hansen/Lawrensen/Gillespie/Neal team of the 80’s, and the Bruce/Pallister/Irwin Man United team of the 90’s.
Who comes to mind now when you think of great defence? I’m pretty confident that Hyypia/Henchoz/Carragher/Babbel come to mind for most of you, versus the current shambles on show at Old Trafford. Of the 8 defenders to pick from, I don’t believe there is a decent combination of 4 amongst them. Another significant factor is the goalkeeper. In the 70’s, Clemence was one of the world’s best. In the 90’s Schmeichel simply was the world’s best. Grobbelaar is the exception, but he was protected by the best back 4 England has ever seen (16 goals conceded one year proves that.) Now, Liverpool have completed a formidable back 5 with the superb Dudek. Man Utd on the other hand have a goalkeeping liability. He single handedly put them out of the FA cup last year, made a schoolboy error allowing Robert Lee to score for Newcastle this season, and was a nightmare in Europe and in the Premiership recently. He has the worst shot/save ratio in the Premier league, and his defenders have lost all faith in him. A dodgy goalie always results in a dodgy defence, because they’re lacking confidence in the man behind them. Dudek on the other hand, is supremely confident, and does things the way a true world class goalkeeper does. No rushes of blood, no showing off, no party tricks. Barthez, on the other hand, only adds to United’s defensive frailty.
Last season, Man United conceded just 31 league goals, but they had Japp Stam helping to protect Barthez then. Without Stam, they’ve conceded 23 goals so far in just 13 league games. At this rate, they would concede 67 goals by the end of the season! Now I don’t expect that will happen, but there are also no defensive options yet untried by their manager. He’s managed to put together a very, very poor back 5, no matter which 5 he plays. With the two current defences, Liverpool can routinely win games by scoring just 1 or 2 goals, because they rarely concede more than one. Man Utd need to score at least 3 a game to be sure of a win, because they average 2 goals against. Maybe it'’s the influence of Kevin Keegan moving in across the city!
Their saving grace is that they have the fire-power to do just that in many games. But not against the really good teams like Liverpool and Arsenal in the Charity Shield and Deportivo in Europe. It’s no surprise that they’ve already lost 7 games out of 17 this season given the inadequacies of the defence.
There’s more supporting evidence than just the defensive problems though. There’s the mindset of the two managers too. Gerard Houllier is half way through a long term vision. A five year plan he has meticulously drawn out. He’s ahead of schedule, but has an unrelenting passion to succeed, and knows he’s 2-3 years away from where he wants to be. Ferguson has a very, very short term plan driven by his pending retirement. His decisions in recent months have been very selfish in his quest to go out in a blaze of glory. Why on earth would you off load Stam and replace him with Blanc? That is a shocking error of judgement, and selfish because he put himself before the good of the team when he felt Stam had undermined his authority. He didn’t want anyone screwing with his obsession with winning the Champions League in his home town of Glasgow. His obsession has clouded his judgement.
Ferguson is also a changed man these days in defeat. A couple of seasons ago, a Man Utd defeat was a rarity, but even so, the manager would fly into a rage and publicly condemn the team to the media. ‘Simply not good enough for Manchester United’ he would say. ‘The players should be ashamed of themselves.’ His fierce will to win was there to see. For whatever reason, (and my belief is that he’s terrified of rocking the boat while he goes after his obsession,) he is now accepting of even a home defeat to Bolton. ‘My little football team spoilt my day’ he said, with little emotion behind his words. ‘We were lethargic.’ 2 years ago, the paint was stripped off the walls when they lost, even though they might have been 10 points clear at the top. Since then, they’ve been hammered by both Liverpool and Arsenal…. Serious title contenders.
Gerard Houllier on the other hand, loses to Bolton and promptly sacks his goalkeeper, realising he simply isn’t good enough. Days later, in comes Dudek, and another piece of his master plan is in place. Houllier’s facial expression when Bolton scored the winner that day was reminiscent of the anger shown in defeat by Ferguson a couple of seasons ago.
Houllier has some similar problems with Fowler in particular finding rotation hard to accept. So, he sold him. But the midfield seems to be ok with it, as do Litmanen, Heskey, and to a lesser extent Owen up front. But if you put these teams midfields and forward-lines head to head, they are very evenly matched.. For Keane read Gerrard, for Veron read McAllister, for Beckham read Litmanen, for Scholes read Berger and for Giggs read Riise. Up front, for Van Nistelrooy read Owen, for Cole read Fowler, for Solskjaer read Heskey. Overall, very evenly matched in my view, although I think that when you delve further into the squad, I actually think Liverpool are stronger. Barmby, Hamann, Murphy, Smicer and Redknapp are more impressive squad members than the Man United equivalents of Butt, Chadwick, Fortune etc. It’s this overall equality in the middle and up front that makes the defence so critical.
Another very obvious clue can be seen in the recent head-to-head games. Liverpool just couldn’t seem to beat United in the 90’s. A win was a rarity to be treasured. Now however, United can’t beat Liverpool. 4 successive wins for Houllier’s men, and every one of them thoroughly deserved. In those 4 games, Liverpool have conceded just 2 goals. Liverpool also gained their first win at Old Trafford for a decade, and the first double over them for many, many years. That Danny Murphy winner last season was an absolute hammer blow to Alex Ferguson. Had United avoided defeat that day, Ferguson would have held the record as the man who guided them to the most consecutive home games without defeat. He will now never hold that distinction.
Liverpool now have no fear of Man United, and the fans are confident of a 5th win in succession over the old. How many Man United fans are truly confident of a win against Liverpool now? 3 years ago, they were.
There’s one more reason why Liverpool are now ready to reclaim the crown. They now have a team of winners. Most of the squad have 5 recently acquired winners medals. The self belief that injects into players is massive. Prior to last year, they hadn’t won a thing as a squad. Man Utd had that self belief and experience to fall back on. Now Liverpool have it too.
The tide has almost turned. This season will see the two teams battling it out for supremacy, and with the imminent retirement of Ferguson, and hopefully a fit and healthy Gerard Houllier, Liverpool will pull ahead of their great rivals within the next 1-2 years.
The 70’s and 80’s belonged to Liverpool. The 90’s to Man United.
2002 is the year the pendulum swings back to Merseyside
