Emmo’s Blog

A Fernando Torres double helped Liverpool to a hard fought 2-3 win against West Ham on Saturday.

The reds could have been a goal behind after 90 seconds when Carragher was caught in possession on the edge of the box by Hines whose shot hit the post .

Liverpool took the lead halfway through the first half when Torres picked up the ball on the left hand side. He turned his marker inside out before poking the ball high into the net from a tight angle.

A few minutes later the hammers were level when Carragher who was having a nightmare was judged to have used a bit too much force on the livewire Hines and the ref pointed to the spot. Debutant Diamanti scored the resulting spot kick with the help of both feet and the teams were level. The penalty should have been retaken.

It didn’t seem to matter when Dirk Kuyt then restored Liverpool’s lead when he poked home a goal bound Steven Gerrard header. But the lead was again given away cheaply when sloppy marking from a corner lead to Carlton Cole heading home unchallenged to make it 2-2 and the teams were level at the break.

The second half started with Liverpool coming out of the traps a bit quicker than their hosts. The game seemed to be heading for a draw with no real chances being created. Benitez then brought on Babel for Kuyt and it was he who put in a perfect cross for Torres to out jump marker and power home a header that would seal the points.

Torres now has 5 goals in 5 Premiership games. It was also his 5th goal against the Hammers in 4 games.

The win saw Liverpool climb to 3rd in the table and the reds now have 4 wins on the bounce.

Next up sees a much changed Liverpool travel to Leeds United for the 3rd round Carling Cup tie. This game is live on Sky Sports 2 HD and K/O is 8pm.

This week’s frosted little gems for the ears are:

 
Juvenile Offender – Little Angels

I Could Never Live Without You – Enuff Z Nuff

Sweet Soul Sister – The Cult

The Bleeding – Five Fingered Death Punch

Don’t Follow – Alice In Chains     

                                     
Nuggets Of Ear Candy returns in a fortnight…

Liverpool have a tricky Premier League fixture tomorrow afternoon at Upton Park.

Last season this match saw Liverpool cruise to a 3-0 victory with the game effectively over after 90 seconds when Gerrard powered through to slot home. When Liverpool score first they rarely lose. A Gerrard penalty and Ryan Babel header sealed the points that day.

Liverpool still only have 1 main injury and that’s to Italian Aquilani who is still yet to make an appearance after his summer move from AS Roma. The squad has been boosted over the last week with the return of Aurelio and Mascherano who made cameo appearances in the midweek victory over Debrecen.

The reds will have to put on a better performance than Wednesday if they want all 3 points tomorrow. The Merseysiders go into this game on the back of 3 wins on the bounce and 2 clean sheets in the last 2 games.

The trouble is with West Ham is consistency. They can be good one week and poor the next. The fans just don’t know what West Ham will turn up each week..

But Upton Park isn’t an easy place to go and I expect West Ham to give a good performance in front of their home fans.
Carlton Cole is looking a different player under manager Zola and he should keep Skrtl and Carragher busy.

That said I think Liverpool will have too much for the east Londoners and will claim all 3 points to carry on their good form of late.

My prediction: West Ham 0-2 Liverpool (live on ESPN K/O 5.25pm)

Anyone think that the Champions League needs a revamp?

The group stages are nothing short of a boring farce and fans are now letting the empty seats do the talking.
Liverpool and Chelsea’s games this week were well short of selling out. The “official” attendance of Liverpool’s game with Debrecen was just over 41000 but judging by what I saw on the TV that figure was way too high.

For Champions League games the home team has to keep empty the first two rows of seats all the way around the stadium. They then have to have a few rows of seats separating the home and away fans. I also noticed last night at Anfield that the side of the stadium that you see due to camera placing was nearly a quarter empty. The Kop also had a few spaces.

The reason for this? Liverpool were playing Debrecen.
Who?
Exactly.

For those that don’t know they are the Hungarian Champions. But they are a poor opposition for a top European side.

Liverpool laboured to a 1-0 win. The crown couldn’t be bothered to cheer (or turn up) and the team couldn’t be bothered to break sweat. This resulted in a dull game with no atmosphere. This happened not just at Anfield but in most of the Champions League games played this week.

The fact is that fans don’t want to shell out hard earned money to watch teams like Debrecen. There is a common myth that Anfield rocks on a European night. It does but only from the knockout stages. Teams in the group stages have chance after chance to still get through so there is no excitement. What’s a draw or defeat matter when there’s another 5 games to come?

Last season Liverpool lost 2 and drew 1 of their first 3 games. They still got through by winning the final 3 games. There is no excitement in the group stages until maybe the final game where a team has to win to go through. It’s all about getting to the last 16 where the real football starts as one error and you could be out.

So why don’t UEFA turn the Champions League back into a knock out competition like the old days? The answer of course is money. But eventually these group stage games will see stadiums become even more emptier than they are now. There are 32 teams in the competition. Why not just chuck all the names in the hat and have an exciting 2 legged match?

Imagine if Barcelona drew Real Madrid? Surly that’s better than Barcelona and someone like Debrecen (which could still happen of course). It would be down to the luck of the draw. But again UEFA bigwigs won’t do this. They seed teams so that the big guns miss each other. UEFA would hate their showcase final to be AZ v Olympiakos for example. By seeding teams it guarantees at least 1 of the top 10 teams in Europe will be in the final.

Last Night Inter Milan put 11 men behind the ball at home so they didn’t lose. Why? Because they have another 5 games in which to qualify. They wouldn’t have done that if it was a two legged affair. The biggest Champions League attendance of the week 83000 left the stadium bored out of their brains as they watched what was in reality a training match of attack versus defence.

Eventually the Champions League will turn into the European Super League and will be played in midweek running alongside each countries own league. Top sides from Europe’s strongest teams will play in a league that will have a better standard of games each week and most importantly generate millions from TV rights and sponsorship.

People will want to watch AC Milan versus Valencia or Arsenal versus Real Madrid as its far more exciting than the Group D match which took place this week of Altetico Madrid and Apoel Nicosia. But for now we have to put up with 5 more rounds of dull football.

Wake me up in March when it gets exciting.

Dirk Kuyt scored the only goal on the stroke of half time to give Liverpool 3 points in the Champions League group stages.
The game was dire and Liverpool sensed the crowds less than enthusiastic approach to this game against a bunch of unknowns. Still 3 points is what its all about at this stage.

Liverpool travel to West Ham on Saturday in a game that will be shown on ESPN

Some exciting news for Pro Evolution Fans

Tomorrow 17th September sees Konami release the demo for Pro Evolution Soccer 10.

Users of Xbox 360 and PS3 will be able to download the demos via their marketplaces.

Users will be able to select from Liverpool, or Barcelona, or the Spanish, Italian, French and German national sides. The selected sides can then be played against the CPU or a friend in a five-minute match.

The full version is released on 23/10/09

 Music News

Alice In Chains release their first album since 1995s self titled album on 28th September.
Black Gives Way To Blue will be the first release to feature new vocalist William DuVall who replaced original singer Layne Staley after his untimely death from a drug overdose in 2002.

Neil Young wannabes Pearl Jam release their 9TH studio album Backspacer on 21st September.

80s glam rockers Danger Danger are back with original vocalist Ted Pooley and they release a new album Revolve on 21st September. The band have said this is their best work since 1991s Screw it! album which was the bands biggest seller.

Guitarist George Lynch and his band Lynch Mob return with a new album Smoke And Mirrors in early October.
This will be the bands first release since 2003. Will it be as good as Wicked Sensation? We will soon find out!

WASP release their new album Babylon on 10th November and this will be followed by a UK tour.

Finally If you like songs that go on forever and a day then the Porcupine Tree release their double album The Incident on 15th September. Disc 1 is just one song that’s broken down in twelve parts and goes on for 55 minutes!!

 Classic Jovi from 1989

Some song titles for the new Bon Jovi album The Circle  have been given to a Tokeyo radio station by Jon Bon Jovi himself.  Its not clear what songs will appear on which version (normally the UK version differs to others)  but Jon named these in the interview the other day.

Below is a list of 12 songs that will appear on the different versions. Having heard 3 of these songs the order of songs will be different to what’s below.

JBJ also mentioned there is another song to be added but as yet thats unamed.

We Weren’t Born To follow
When We Were Beautiful
Work For The Working Man
Superman Tonight
Bullet
Thorn In My Side
Live Before You Die
Broken Promise land
Love’s the Only Rule
Fast Cars
Happy Now
Learn To Love

 The Circle is out on 10 November and will be preceded by the single We Weren’t Born To Follow which is already on heavy rotation on radio stations in the UK.

Liverpool blitzed Burnley 4-0 in Saturdays Premiership game at Anfield. There were no international hangovers despite the loss of Mascherano to a pelvic injury as the Reds cruised to victory.

Liverpool took the lead after 30 minutes when a nice through ball from Johnson was picked up by Benayoun who turned Alexander inside out before placing the ball in the bottom corner.

The Reds went two up just before the break when from a Burnley corner a swift move involving Torres, Insua and Benayoun ended up with Kuyt putting the ball in the net after the keeper had spilled a Benayoun shot.

Just after the break Liverpool wrapped up all three points when another nice move ended with Torres feeding Gerrard who skipped a challenge before cutting the ball back for Benayoun to tap into an empty net from two yards.

Benayoun was then denied a hat-trick after Gerrard’s free kick was dropped by the keeper and was tapped home by the Israeli international. TV replays showed he was well onside.

But Benayoun wasn’t to be denied the match ball and he coolly slotted the ball home from 6 yards a few minutes later after a lovely through ball from sub Voronin.

So a nice stroll for the Reds before the Champions League game against Debrecen at Anfied on Wednesday

To celebrate the release of The Wildhearts new album Chutzpah! this weeks Nuggets Of Ear Candy is a Wildhearts special.

The Jackson Whites  (From Chutzpah!)

Do The Channel Bop  (From Fishing For Luckies)

The Only One  (From Chutzpah!)

Schitzophonic  (From Fishing For Luckies)

Love U Till I Don’t  (From Earth V’s)

Join me next week for more top tracks from the Ipod