If this can't be defined as slipping towards crises then it is hard to imagine what can. We were beaten by a better team, simple. And we're now as close to relegation as we are Liverpool. Sure, we can point to the depleted squad and claim we're hampered by injuries -- Bellamy's warm-up injury resulting in us only having enough players to field four subs -- but take another look at that injury list. Now, who is going to come automatically into the team and weave a magic wand. Shearer may be a talisman but he isn't exactly the youngest player on the block any more. Besides, it hardly matters if he's there or not when the players behind him can't retain the ball long enough to move it forward. Butt might steady a and somehow help out a woeful defence midfield but he's hardly going to provide the skill and invention which seems to have vanished. And those missing from the back line are hardly better than those present in it -- and completely inadequate -- today. It's obvious to the blind we need the transfer window for the defence but one really must begin to ask just how much more we need help with. Can Souness find something (personally I doubt it---now is his test. Almost any new face would have resulted in a steadying of the ship; it's now that things are reverting back to dreadful play we'll see). This has gone on long enough. A football team with the sort of ambition we are meant to have ought to at least be able to pass the ball.
While the game started brightly really neither side were creating chances (though in Liverpool's case it was tricky to figure out exactly why not). Then we took the lead through Kluivert (who might on another day have been given off side---anyone believing that rule isn't at best grey should study this goal). To Liverpool's credit they were quicker than others at taking away that advantage (and how many times will we throw away a lead). And once Liverpool scored there was never any real danger of another four-three thriller. They worked harder, passed better and create more incisive chances. We did a lot of huffing and puffing and demonstrated exactly what a team desperately out of form (but who's players still seem to believe themselves better than they are) looks like. This needs to turn around and it needs to turn around now, or we really will be in a dog fight and teams at the bottom will (rightly) be thinking they can get something from us.
To compound it Bowyer, who had actually probably been our best player with industrious work, showed the side which just drives you mad to gain a second yellow card. Game over, as if it wasn't already. What's to be done? A defence please, and a couple less prima donas in midfield to be replaced with players who actually do something rather than look pretty. And still lurking in the distance is the fact that you know we'll need a striker (perhaps the chase for Rooney wasn't quite so crazy actually).
This is a turning point of the season. It has to get right come January or european ambitions can wave goodbye to relegation avoidance (the league form has finally filtered through to europe too sadly). There are many very good teams in this league and at the moment we are certainly not one of them. There may be a blend of players here who, with a couple of additions and changes, can become one---they have been known to show it in flashes---but it needs a leadership to get them there. Hope we've bloody got one, it's depressing to see the top half of the table, without us.
(@23:12)
