Saturday 20 February 2010

Crucial Clash in Race for Champions League

The Reds travel to Middle-Eastlands on Sunday to face Manchester City in what could turn out to be a season defining match for both teams. With the battle for 4th spot heating up Liverpool and Manchester City will be looking to claim a massive 3 points, to distance themselves from each other, and the chasing pack.

City are currently in 4th place, one place and one point above Liverpool, and after playing one less game than the Merseysiders. However, their recent run has produced some disappointing results, with the Middle-Eastlands faithful losing patience with the team and the manager, unlike the majority of supporters at Anfield, who have backed the team, and manager, throughout a difficult season.

After losing out to their bitter rivals, Manchester United, in the Carling Cup thanks to a last minute goal from Wayne Rooney, the Blue Mancs have managed only 2 wins out of their last 5 matches in all competitions, a disappointing return considering those games came against Portsmouth, Hull City, Bolton Wanderers and Stoke City twice (once in the FA Cup), all games that they were expected to win comfortably.

Also, they struggled badly away to Stoke in the league, as they could only earn a point against the determined 10 men of Stoke City. It could have been much worse for Mancini's men though as a last minute goal from Ryan Shawcross was inexplicably disallowed.

Conversely, Liverpool head into this critical encounter following a run of very good results. Before losing at the Emirates, Liverpool had kept 6 clean sheet in their last 7 League games. Moreover, they claimed all 3 points in 5 of those 7 matches, including victories over Aston Villa, Tottenham and Everton.

On Thursday night Liverpool won 1-0 at home to the Romanian side Unirea Uniceni in the Europa League thanks to a diving header from David Ngog. The Reds dominated possession but lacked a cutting edge thanks to the absence of key attacking players, such as Glen Johnson, Fernando Torres and Yossi Benayoun, due to injury.

Liverpool will now take the confidence gleaned from this run of results into their Sunday clash with Manchester City, despite of the fact that they have not been performing incredibly well during the last few games, instead grinding out wins thanks to hard work and determination. This fact was even admitted by club captain Steven Gerrard in a frank interview with Liverpoolfc.tv,following the Derby victory, where he said, "We're not playing terrifically well to be honest. The last few performances have been more about being solid defensively and nicking important goals. We can certainly play better."

I predict a sneaky 1-0 win for the Reds after yet another strong and determined performance.

YNWA

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