[theo_luddite]

V

PRIMA DONNA LEAGUE
ANFIELD STADIUM
NEAR AINTREE RACECOURSE
SUBURB OF SOUTHPORT
L4 0TH
28/10/2017 15:00

Liverpool?
Aw'rite wack? Can a luk after ya car mista? Calm down, calm down. It's only a game of football, or as Shanks once said “Of course I didn’t take my wife to see Rochdale as an anniversary present. It was her birthday. Would I have got married in the football season? Anyway, it was Rochdale reserves.”

This is Anfield?


Heh! heh! Scousers - gotta love 'em

So, it was 23rd October 1972 since we were last at Anfield to play Liverpool in what was then Division 1 (lost 2-0) and 61 long years since we last won a Division 2 game there 2-3 on 18 August 1957. We beat them at home a few times in the late 50's, the last being a 1-0 home win on 28 November 1959. Remember this date for later in the thead.

Woa, woa woa! Doesn't this sound a bit all like last weekend when the other red lot from Lancashire came a calling? Anything to fear here? Lets have a closer look.

Liverpool Results


Town Results


So I make that
V Palace - we won, they won, 3 points each - but we won 3-0, away
V Newcastle - we won they drew, 3 to us 1 to them - OK, we were at home, but we lost at home to them last season and won at theirs
V Burnalee - we drew, they drew, a point each - but we were away, they were at home
v Leicester - we drew at home and they won away - but we had a perfectly good goal disallowed by a dodgy lino
v Man Utd - we won, they lost and we were both at home
v Spurs - we lost and they lost and we both got hammered. Only thing was, they lost at Wembley, where only Bornmuff have also lost this season in the Prima Donna League and Burnalee, Swansea and Chelski have plundered points.

So 11 points to us and 8 points to them against the same opposition.

Theo's opinion - Liverpool hold no fear for us - go get 'em Wagbo. We all know you are better than Klopp.

Since then it's been Liverpool won 7, drawn 4 including the 1999 FA Cup game played in mid December? I sneaked back from Canada to be at that game, I can't remember 3rd round games being played that early before or since. - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sport/footbal...561362.stm
Rampant League One leaders? Those were the days, eh Brucie?

The teams that day were
Huddersfield: Vaesen, Jenkins, Gray, Armstrong, Vincent, Gorre, Irons, Sellars, Thornley, Stewart, Wijnhard.
Subs: Margetson, Donis, Dyson, Horne, Schofield.

Liverpool: Westerveld, Carragher, Henchoz, Hyypia, Staunton, Smicer, Gerrard, Hamann, Murphy, Camara (what red card was that Jeff?), Owen.
Subs: Song, Meijer, Friedel, Matteo, Newby.
Referee: R Harris (Oxford)

Who would make the sides tomorrow if they were still young enough? I'd leave offside Clyde out for a start.

The ref has been doing bird ever since then for playing with his didgeridoo in the presence of children.

The sides last week were



I was back over the pond watching last weekend. Never before have I drunk so much coffee in the duration of a game. To say I was buzzing after it finished is an understatement. Fear not, I'm back and sitting in Row 26 for this one, unless some Scouser thieves me seat and I'll be properly refreshed this time.

Merson, Merson what's the score?
Paul Merson has now been adopted as our chief squad motivator after last weekend's prediction. His bs for this game will be posted here if and when when I track it down.

A tale of 2 Square Heads?
A lot of crap has already been written about the master and his apprentice by the numpties in the press. Suffice to say, we all know who the master is.


Town sit one point behind Liverpool with the same games played



with a much lower squad value

Liverpool Squad value .................................................. Town Squad Value


So a win would put us above them - you all know what song that will prompt to be sung long and loud on the Anfield Road End.

Will Klopp put out a full strength squad with a vital Chumpions League match to follow in mid-week? Well, with a narrow 7-0 lead to defend in the second leg against Maribo on Wednesday, he can't really afford to go all gung-ho now can he, what with away goals counting double and all that?

A Liverpool/Shankly History with a bit of Town thrown in.
(Look at what we could have won.)


Everton used to play at Anfield from 1884 to 1891. When they moved out after a row about the rent (Scousers arguing about the rent? Wouldn't happen nowadays surely?) and built a new stadium at the Gladhys Street end of Stanley Park, some squatters moved in and called themseves Liverpool FC. This was back in 1892 and is possibly the first recorded event of some Scousers taking owt that isn't tied down and that hadn't fallen off the back of a ship and claiming it as theirs.

In the 1950's they were a bog standard Football League 2nd Division club, playing other bog standard 2nd Division Clubs like Town but with one difference, they hadn't won owt worth talking about, well other than winning the league in 1900-01, 1905-06, 1921-22, 1922-23, while Town still had a few war veteran fans around who could remember us winning the League 3 times in a row straight after that run, not to mention the FA Cup and then letting our Manager of the time, one Herbert Chapman, go to Arsenal and build them into another 3x League Champions club. That was shortly before Arsene Wenger took over and made 4th place in the League the most important thing in his world.

Andy Beattie had brought an up and coming Scottish coach into Town as reserve team coach. A man who had served an apprenticeship as manager and coach at Carlisle, Workington and Grimsby (maybe not in that order). He took over as manager fom Beattie in 1956, brought a bespectacled Scottish youth to the club and gave the then 16 year old Dennis Law his professional debut and later sold him for a then record fee of £55,000 to the blue side of Mancland.


Dennis Law, shortly after his Town debut

The Town board at the time, being the bunch of brilliant forward thinking men that they were, went out and bought a brand spanking new set of floodlights for our then Leeds Road home, so we could play Wolves on a dark and stormy night under the glare of the new candle lit wonders. Their investment shortly blew down in a slightly stronger gale. The young Mr. Bill Shankly, suitably unimpressed with this and one of many sales of his best players, with no re-investment in players he was looking to sign was talked into joining Liverpool in December 1959. Town's board of course would go on and vow never to repeat those mistakes again. Indeed, we haven't had to replace our floodlights since the opening of the McGalphsmiths until this very season.

Do, do, do, do you remember the date I mentioned above? Was he tapped up? Too right he was.

So the thieving Scousers nicked our manager and he arrived in Liverpool to what he was told was the best club in English football, to be completley underwhelmed by the squad he inherited and he also thought the Mellwood training ground was such a shit-hole he thought Hitler had redesigned it on his way home from a bombing raid on Liverpool docks.

Any road, his coaching staff at the time included certain young men known as Bob Paisley and Joe Fagan.

A dynasty was in the making, formed in the Liverpool boot room, the like of which hasn't really been seen since. He brought in two more young Scottish players, Ron Yeats and Ian St. John, who he had supposedly recommended to Town's board but they had refused to spend the money. Floodlights don't come cheap you know, especillay when you buy them twice. Most of the Liverpool board also thought they couldn't afford them, but the arrrival of Shanks coincided with Littlewoods, they of the Football Pools and Catalogue empire, appointing Eric Sawyer to the board. He backed Shanks's ambition saying to other board members who said we can't afford these players that we can't afford not to have them. While under Shanks, Liverpool changed from red shirts and white shorts to the all red kit, first seen in 1964-65 in Europe to make the Diddymen of Knotty Ash seem taller than they really were.


Ian St. John with Shanks and the team in their all red kit
Don't they look tall?

Anything that made Saint seem taller than he was must have been a miracle if you ask Greavsie. They went on to win the League in 1963-64, 1965-66, 1972-73, and Shanks retired at 60 after wining the 1974 FA Cup but never winning the European Cup.

Sadly he seemed to get somewhat shunned at Anfield and Melwood afterwards and was actually warmly welcomed by one Tommy Dochetry at Old Trafford and by the board at Everton up the road.

The dynasty he created though went on. Under Bob Paisley (3 times Eurpean Cup winner) brought the number of League titles won between them up to 11. Joe Fagan won the treble of the European Cup, The League Championship and the League Cup in 83-84, but retired the season after due to the Heysel disaster.



In all the club has won an English record 5 European Cups, 3 UEFA Cups, 3 UEFA Super Cups, 18 League titles, 7 FA Cups, a record 8 League Cups, and 15 FA Community Shields. They joined the League Three-in-a-row club in the 81-82, 82-83, 83-84 seasons.

Whilst Hillsborough and Heysel left dark clouds over the club, the wrongs of Hillsborough finally being put to rights at long last with all seater football stadiums being a legacy of that, they are without doubt one of our most successful clubs. The Liverbirds of the 80's and 90's were only finally knocked off their perch by another Scot at the other end of the East Lancs Road in the 90's up until his retirement. They are still trying to get back on it.

Well we just beat that lot of Mancs and there's no reason not to have a good go at this lot too.

I could wax lyrical about the players of the time but hell - I need to leave some space for you guys 'n' gals to comment, plus someone has to do the home game.

So what about Liverpool, the city?

How to get there, how to keep your hub caps (or your flash alloys), where to drink - it's all in here.

http://www.footballgroundguide.com/leagu...expand=all

Music.

Liverpool has a bit of a tradition when it comes to music. A bunch of long haired mop tops from the 60's became the most famous band in the world at te time, a bit too famous for bible bashing America after John Lennon let slip his infamous quote on the Johnny Carson show. Hell, he didn't swear or throw up in the paper bin, what's up with you people?



The Cavern Club became notorious as the venue for what became the Mersey sound, along with The Beales, bands like Gerry and the Pacemakers, who recorded the Liverpool Anthem, You'll Never Walk Alone from the musical Carousel, as well as singing about a Fairy 'cross the Mairsey, the Merseybeats themselves, the Swinging Blue Jeans, a lass with a big nose called Cilla went on to make a lorra, lorra records and a lorra, lorra money are just a few of the bands and names from the 60's that made Liverpool one of the homes of British pop music - even if they did record at Abbey Road in London.


Not been to Liverpool in yonks, so going early on Saturday for a good mooch around before heading up to Anfield Road.

Wagbo talks pre-match

Quaner fit, Palmer in training but won't be back until next month.

Wagbo pre-match - The Radio Leeds edit
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05l5hq6

[Lord Snooty]

Nice one, theo.

I've been to Anfield twice. Neither to watch Town and only actually got in the ground once. The first time was in the 70s. A Leeds fan mate talked me into going with him, to which he would respond by going with me to a Town match. I seem to recall getting spat at and Kevin Keegan scoring twice in a 2-0 Liverpool win.
The second time was with an Arsenal fan mate. We never got in because it got postponed due to a frozen pitch. This was in the 80s, long after under ground heating had been invented, so don't know what went wrong there. We went back into town and got drunk.

[WakeyTerrier]

Nice one Theo, this will be my second visit to Anfield but my first watching Town. My first visit was to watch England v Uruguay in 2006 when England won 2-1..sadly we missed the the winner as we had decided the game was boring and headed back to the car for a quick escape only to hear Joe Cole poke in the Winner from the car park.
Stood/Sat on the Kop that day and despite it being a England game the YNWA anthem was sang and it is something that makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up..it's something special especially to me as that was the song played as my dad was cremated(Saturday could be quite emotional at 2:55)

I watched the 'Hearts and Mainz' programme on Sky last night about Klopp and Wagner and you can really feel the genuine friendship these two guys have for each other, believe me they will be wanting to put one over their 'Bessie mate' on Saturday. Watching that just made me more up for what's in store on Saturday.

[talkSAFT]

That's a fantastic Preview. If you don't do it professionally you should.

[Terrier1987cas]

Unfortunately the goal against Leicester was definitely offside, no matter how marginal.

Great preview, probably the game most Town fans have been looking forward to this season. One of few 'firsts' for me this season Anfield, so really can't wait for it.

[SHEP_HTAFC]

Brilliant thread theo......great read
Can't wait to watch this on a dodgy feed from t'internet.
I don't think it will end well for us.....predicting a loss. But not by much.

[theo_luddite]

Unfortunately the goal against Leicester was definitely offside, no matter how marginal.

Great preview, probably the game most Town fans have been looking forward to this season. One of few 'firsts' for me this season Anfield, so really can't wait for it.

My comment was tongue in cheek.

---

As is most of the thread to be honest. Must find a spell checker too. Still, I think you all get the gist.

[Lord Snooty]

That's a shame. Danny Ward's injured. Oh and some lad called Coutinho is out as well.

[theo_luddite]

Oh 'eck. Who's gonna score now then?

[Lord Snooty]

Oh 'eck. Who's gonna score now then?

Nish Kumar........


........one for Mock The Week fans there.