And Adopted Scouser

[uskopite]

(2 - 1)

Up by one on us, you could see Sheff United start to slow down play, eating up possession with simple passess to open guys, and not at all looking to attack. The tactics almost backfired when in the 72nd minute Nardiello intercepted a back pass, and fed me through for a great chance . . . but I walked away shaking my head in disgust after blasting well wide -- again.

While desperately trying to earn possession back, Kelly and Flynn both earned yellow cards on, you guessed it -- Robertson. But these times, you'd have to admit that they weren't without cause.

Try as we may, we just couldn't get the ball back. 86, 88, 90 -- Injury time . . . And then we did get it. Kelly blasted through Sheff's Adam Newton (M L) on a tackle that might have earned him his second card. Newton lay writhing in agony on the pitch, adding more time to injury time, as thier PHYSIO's stretchered him off. The game was signalled to end on the 3 rd minute of injury time. But that was extended. We stole possession of the ball on the restart, and for what seemed like an eternity we looked everywhere for a through ball to unlock the Sheffield United Defense (now down to 9 men). A chance open up for ME, and my toe poke was deflected wide by an heroic lunge from Dawson. Unsure of how much time remained, I raced out to take the corner. Sheffield's Defenders looked about, angrily casting glares at the ref waiting for the whistle that would bring and end to the match and all three points . . . and nobody was standing on the posts! My cross, normally a ball that would have been well contested by the back post defender, WASN"T contested. In fact, it landed squarely on the forehead of Adam Hitchen who had slipped in behind to the back post. There was no mistake -- and there would be no three points (2 - 2, Hitchen 90')

We hadn't won, but we all felt like we had, running around like . . . well . . . school boys! Increadible drama, and a well earned draw seeing as how we had to fight the ref and Sheffield United for it.

Stats: Terry Murphy (8 Form) 1 GOALS, 1 ASSISTS . 90 mins, 39/50 passes completed (3 key), 3/3 tackles won, 6/8 headers won (4 key), 2 intercepts, 2 run, 0 offside, 1 fouls, 01 fouled, 4/12 shots on target.

-------------------------------------------

Sorry about the split post - hit the wrong button. I was also trying for something different up top. Something more asthetically pleasing and fun -- and was hoping that I could show how my line up was set up -- IT DIDN'T WORK RIGHT. I'll try something different.

[uskopite]

23 August (Tuesday)

The buzz around Brandon Noble continued to build as he told us more clubs were coming in for him. He was huffed about it, and who wouldn't be if they are in demand . . but he assured Ronnie, Leagear and I that he had no intention of breaking apart our partnership. Good. I suspect that if we had all been together on the pitch yesterday we wouldn't have needed the last minute heroics for a point.

The story on Alejandro was a different story. He was beeming with excitement as he revealed that he had agreed to go on loan to Bolton for 3 months. Bolton were a suprise relegation team last year, as nobody would have suspected that Big Sam and his bunch would take the drop. However, they were in a great position to jump back up as they had only lost Kevin Nolan during the fall. We clapped Fernandez on the back, and wished him well. I only hoped that he wouldn't be too disappointed if he didn't really get a good shake in the starting 11. I could see him filling out the Reserve side alot, but he would have to make it past such strikers as Jay Jay Okocha, Keven Davies, and Ricardo Vaz Te for a spot on the field. Still, the lad so hyped. Three months. . . that is a long time!

[uskopite]

24 August (Wednesday)

2nd Leg at Wisla Krackow, Poland. We'd always had Sky Sports going in our house before I got in at the Academy. But we bumped up the package to make sure that no matter where Liverpool went, we would be able to watch the game. Money for it came out of my stipend from the team, but it was money well spent.

Last game Cisse blistered Wisla for a hatrick, and today he was in the starting 11 again.

Though trailing by 3, Wisla looked very defensive. It looked like they were hoping to keep it tight at the back and maybe sneak one on set peices. That was all well and good for the first half hour - until thier hopes were shatter when Olszevski came over the back of Zenden while fighting for a lofted pass in the box. The referee was poorly placed to see the incident, but the linesman flagged the assualt right away. The ref pointed to the spot, Cisse was given the green, and on 32 minutes Liverpool pretty much sealed the tie into the group stages of the Champions League. 4 goals in two games from Cisse was something to be proud of. So what would you say to 5! 4 minutes after the restart Glowacki was guilty of climbing over the back of Cisse 5 yards outside the box. In a bit of trickery Cisse signalled for the quick free kick - before the wall was even fully formed he cracked a right footer through the wall, the ball taking a nick on the way through, and was found bulging the onion bag! Brilliant. It was only going to be Cisse for man of the match.

Momo Sissoko also had a good game, deputizing for Gerrard in the midfeild. He was unlucky not to have scored late in the game when a second chance off a cleared corner game to him. But the second best player on the pitch, Wisla Keeper Olszewski, instinctively stuck a paw up and punched it off the line.

Kewell came on for Zenden near the hour mark, and had the Wisla defense all twisted several times. Liverpool could have scored more, but in the end a 5-0 aggregate was a great result. Champions League and more European Night were in my future.

[uskopite]

With a week left in the transfer window, speculation over who would be coming and who would be leaving Anfield was running RAMPANT. Some were sad to see Milan Baros leave, and some said "Don't let the door his you in the arse on your way out." In any case, most were hoping that the money brought in on the sale would be used to 1) Bring Owen back home from Real Madrid 2) Fund a right sided midfeilder, or 3) bring in a top rated Center Half to step in when the aging but excellent Sami Hyppia finnally retired.

Amidst all of the excitement, the real reason why Belgian U-18 International Jonather Legear was unhappy surfaced. He was being distant with everybody at the Academy, basically becuase he felt he was above all of this. Although the article was buried in the ECHO's sports pages (this was, after all the academy - small news, especially with the end of the transfer window coming) -- there it was in print, and in Legear's own words. He had come to Liverpool with the assumption that he would, at the very least, soon feature in the reserve squad. Now, with everybody and thier mother clamoring for a right winger to be brought into the SENIOR squad, Legear felt that surely he could at least be given a run out to show what he could do. But here is was "stuck" at the academy, a man playing with boys.

In truth, he was a cut above what you will see at the U-18 level. His form was increadible, and which ever side of the pitch he was playing on, it was from that side many of the attacks seemed to materialize from. But you could see that his frustration was affecting his development at the academy. When early on, it seemed that his crossing was becoming more refined, now they lacked that exceptional bite. Sunday's game at Sheffield United was symptomatic of that frustration, getting sent off for not controlling his emotions. I'm sure Coach Owen and Mr. Heighway talked to him after the match, but it didn't sound as if he was taking too kindly to thier repremand, no matter what the circumstances. The article mentioned that he would seek a audience with Rafael Benitez and Mr. Heighway, and talk about his future with at the Academy and with Liverpool in general. One thing was for certain, he had already distanced himself from the rest of us -- having him in the locker room and in the team was going to be tough. I would not be surprised if they decided to bring him up to the Reserve team, and equally I wouldn't be shocked if Rafa decided that he wasn't going to fit into his plans and ship him out.

[uskopite]

27 August

It was going to be a few more weeks before the U-18 squad saw any more competitive action. There were rumors that a few of us might be called up to fill the reserve ranks while several key members where away on loan but until then we would be heavy on training.

After afternoon session, it was away with the boots, and on with our kits to go sit in the KOP and cheer the Senior squad as they took on the Villian of Aston Villa.

Several starters were rested after sitting out the Wisla Krackow match, and returned to the side for the run out at Anfield. However, a glaring absentee from the Aston Villa line up what newboy Milan Baros! He wasn't injured that I knew of, yet he wasn't even on the bench!?

Liverpool ushered off the visitors in European Champions style. Riise, who had been having a quiet year, opened his 05/06 scoring account when, in the 13th minute, he launched a throw in into the box. Cisse (who remained in increadible form) headed down, back out to Riise who bent a curler from 35 yards out into the top right corner over the Villian goal. Fantastic.

Gerrard was an engine all night at the center of midfeild. His excellent play put Crouch down into the corner with plenty of time to turn, pickout Kewell slanting to the front post. Kewell, for his part, finished expertly -- and the route was on.

Cisse was next to score - this time from a corner kick. All alone, lingering out side the box, Riise lofted the corner over to him. Cisse struck the ball soundly on the volley through the crowd. It was likely the goalie probably didn't see it until late as he barely reacted.

Kewell finished off the night when in extra time, he collected a Gerrard pass out wide, beat his man soundly off the dribble, and slipped a shot to the right, past the keeper in the net at the KOP end. Kewell would probably merit MOM honors, though everybody on the night performed will excellence.

Liverpool were clicking on all cylinders. Should they go ahead and pick up a wide man on the right to provide Morientes and Crouch some good service, this would promise to be a surpring season.

4 days until the close of the transfer window. Owen rumors heightened. Frenzy would be an understatement. Several swore that Owens was on his way back to Merseyside. Other's were incensed that Cisse was being included in on all of the silly season nonsense. Flo Sinama-Pongolle was starting to be rumored to be on the way out. Bolton took another stab at bringing in Hamann (whom they had approached in the summer before he re upped with Liverpool).

Crazy, crazy, crazy

[uskopite]

29 August

Predictably, Legear was amoung the crew that would be brought up to fill out the reserve side while some key guys were out on loan. Also included in the fun would be Bertini, Barragan, Mangani, and . . . Nardiello . .??

What the hell? Nards had just made it up to the U-18 side, and now he was being brought up to the reserve side!? OVER ME?!! Well, true enough Neil Mellor was out on loan, as was Tony Le Tallec. Flo Po was getting a good run with the senior squad becuase he could play right wing. I suppose they were lacking for attacking options - And likely Alejandro Fernandez would have been brought up had he not also gone out on loan. BUT crap -- I think I could do the job as good as Nards. . .

Oh well . . . good luck guys, and all that jazz.

-----------------------------------------------

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> Sky Sports

Michael Owen has arrived in England to hold talks with Liverpool and Newcastle.

The Real Madrid man was left out of the squad for his side's 2-1 win in Cadiz on Sunday night and Sky Sports News has reported that Owen has arrived in the North East for talks.

Owen would prefer a move to Liverpool and said he would only go to Newcastle on loan, but Toon chairman Freddy Shepherd's big-money offer to Real is aimed at pricing The Reds out of the running.

</div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Michael Owens was back!! Apparently he was in town to discuss a move back to the English Premiere League. Surely the Prodigal Son had returned. The news of his return had spread like wild fire throughout merseyside - and and Echo's website server must have been crashing due to the amount of traffic for people logging in for a hint on the latest.

YES!! Surely Owen had to be coming back. Owen was one of the orginal reasons that I had become a Redbird fan. He was a model footballer, and seemed to be a down to earth guy. He owned a house in nearby North Wales - and was still chums with Jamie Carragher and Stevie Gerrard. Liverpool had to be his only choice if he was going to come back to the Premier League. HAD to. This was shaping up to be the greatest year in the history of a young lads life!

[uskopite]

30 August 05

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> Sky Sports

After concluding talks with Newcastle and Liverpool, Michael Owens has returned to Real Madrid. A move back to Merseyside seemed imminent, however Sky Sports has learned that Real Madrid would not agree to a year loan with an eye to a possible 12 million pound permanent deal at the end of the summer. Michael did visit with Newcastle bosses Shepherd and Souness, but when it became clear that a permanent move with them would not be countenanced, Newcastle would not agree to a year loan.

Owen's was clearly dissapointed that a move back to Liverpool failed to materialize, leaving many to wonder if Rafael Benitez really wanted him back after last summers shock move away. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Sorry all you NEWCASTLE FANS, but without going into the database (and risk corrupting the game) I could not make the trade happen.

To say that this was a huge let down would be making light of the situation. Was this all a big tease. What the hell was going on. It was clear Saint Mike wanted to come back, yet somehow we botched it.

A look at the comments in the blogs and from people following the transfer move revealed that many people's faith in Rafael Benitez had taken somewhat of a hit. Still, there were one more day left in the transfer window. Maybe still time for something to happen. One thing was for sure -- I WAS GUTTED.

Oh, and Liverpool Reserved beat Ipswich Reserves 3-0 with Conal Platt netting all three, and Michael Nardiello assisting on all three. Yeah, yeah -- now back to getting us a center back and a right wing. C'mon Rafa -- don't let us down.

[uskopite]

August 31

Today's workouts were held with the Reserve Team members who did not play yesterday. Tomorrow would be another reserve match, and Herrera was looking to set up his side again. In between practice session myself and the rest of the lads were parked in front of the tele waiting on needles for any word of a possible new face to cheer from the KOP. Morning rumors had us linked to Parma CB Daniele Bonera, and a renewed interest in Aston Villa's Nolberto Solano.

In the afternoon Solano had already moved to Newcastle (after stating that a move to the reds would be the perfect move for him -- ) and the Bonera rumor had been replaced by confirmation that Liverpool had made a bid for Benifica Captain and Right Winger Simao Sabrosa, and that the player would shortly be making his way to Anfeild for a physical.

By the evening Simao went balls up after Benfica Fan's went a riot, and Benfica priced him out of a move.

At the death of the day, Liverpool would face defeat one last time as Valencia rebuffed a bid for CB David Navarro, and Sao Paulo axed a move for Uruguayan Stopper Lugano.

. . .

What an absolute shambolic mess of a day for Liverpool supporters. The next day, surely there would be rediculous talk about sacking the CEO Parry, and absurd doubts on the team planning from Rafael Benitez, and the odd Everton Fan rubbing the salt in the newly opened wounds.

I noticed that the only person looking on with anything other than frustration was Jonathan Legear. News had come that he had played pretty well on the right wing in yesterday's Ipswich match. It wasn't so much that Coach Herrera wanted him in his side, but almost that Rafa needed him at Anfeild. It was now apparent that Legear would be given a good run in the reserves, and if he continued to perform well, he might be the first to make the jump up.

Well, although it wasn't our greatest moment, the night certainly wasn't bad enough to waste sleep over.

[uskopite]

1 September

Liverpool Reserves v. Middlesbrough Reserves

Venue: Billingham Stadium

Attendance: 1299

Score: Boro Res. (2 - 0) LFC Res.

I don't know if it was the general malaise that had set over the city that was affecting thier play, or if it was just a really good Boro reserve team, but that was a very depressing game to sit in the stands at Billingham and watch. What made it worse were the former Liverpool U-18 standouts Robbie Foy and John Welsh, who both had been sold to Middlesbrough earlier in the summer, were the men who bossed the pitch, and who served as the spark for both Boro attacks which netted them the win. The first came in the 44th minute as Welsh and Foy combined to put Nemeth through one on one with Paul Willis. Willis would parry a few shots away that day, but could not reach Nemeth's low right sided shot which opened his account for Boro.

Nobody really had a bad game, but our guys just couldn't stop anybody. Bertini and Roberts gave a good accounting of themselves with the reserve team, but they just didn't have the answers to hold a blank sheet, and the game was killed off during the 65th minute, Welsh again played Foy out wide in plenty of space. Bertini was dropping off the play, and couldn't close down space in time to stop the cross. Foy flashed the ball over his head, finding Nemeth again, racing to the near post to head comfortably past Willis.

Many of the reserve team were down on the field afterwards to talk with Foy and Welsh. They reported that, although Boro were the victors in the day, Foy and Welsh really missed being at Liverpool, and were still hoping someday to return to their old stomping grounds and again pull on the red jersey.

The most interesting thing about the game was the notable absense of Jonathan Legear. Legear wasn't to be found anywhere! I thought, surely he would have featured in this game to give Rafa a look at what was in his own quiver givin the right wing situation. Could Rafa have taken Legear straight up to the Senior Team?

[uskopite]

2 September

I was laughing the next day pondering my question of the previous night. Why wasn't Legear featuring in the Reserves Team.

Well, the next morning's paper explained it perfectly. Legear was off on International duty! I felt a bit like a guff. I guess he played well, but was subbed at half time during a game in which they held Bosnia's team scoreless. They topped the group that they were playing in.

England U-21 team also had a masterful display while crushing the Welsh U-21 team 5-0.

During the day, Coach Owen called Myself and Paddy Gamble into his office - And immediately I was struck my the fact that Mr. Heighway was there also. They both beemed widley, shaking our hands as we walked in, and bid us to sit down. Mr. Heighway explained that the Academy had occasionally been honored to take part in developing the future of English football, not only Liverpool FC football -- and he was proud to announce to us that England was looking to bring myself and Paddy Gamble into the U-21 side. My heart jumped, and my mind started racing. Before we got too out of hand, Mr. Heighway explained the it wasn't unusual for England to pull up prospective players to give them a trial when they were still young. Gamble and I were both 17, so we fit that profile. He explained that he was sure we would be given an opportunity during various times during the year to go and practice with the U-21 team, and would have a chance to make a spot our own on the team. He also explained that it might be a few years before we ever really nailed down a spot as there were plenty of other talented youths much more developed and along the path than we were. Another such player was Liverpools own Scott Carson and we would do well to talk with him about the experience if and when we were called into camp.

That was extrememly unexpected news. We had figured Ronnie Bridges or Mark Noble would figure into the U-21 or U-19 sides -- and they still might. But me? I was at best an Adopted Scouser. True Scouse blood was jokingly only half recognized as part of England by the rest of the footballing country -- and here I was only a half blooded Anglican, being considered to joining the three lions.

Then another shock hit me. Did I want to play for England. What about my Irish blood lines? What about my American blood lines? Would they come a knocking asking for me to play in their countries teams? There was definately alot to think about in the Murphy household - alot to ponder. I still had some time I guess. Until I was actually invited to go to camp I was still not committed to any of the countries. A lot to consider indeed.

[uskopite]

3 September 2005 -

World Cup qualifications were quickly drawing to a close showing England atop it's group with 6 wins and 1 tie -- but that tie was an embarrasing 1 - 1 draw with Azerbaijan.

Recently, much of the talk had been about the massive amount of talent that England had roaming the central midfeild positions. With Frank Lampard, David Beckham, and Liverpool's own Steven Gerrard, surely England stood as good a chance as any other in claiming the World Cup. But with so much talent, everybody was looking to grab the spot light and prove they were hands down the best. A case of too many Chef's spoils the pot.

Well, let me tell you -- EVERY media pundit in the country was going MAD when Sven Goran Erickson trotted out his latest tactical "masterpiece" in the world cup qualifier against Wales. This was featured Stevie Gerrard. . . .At Right Back!!

Do you know what the funny thing about that is. During the Red's Champions League triumph in Turkey, the last minutes of regular time, and in extra time, Steven Gerrard featured at Right Back -- AND DID A MASTERFUL JOB . There were many comments about how Steven could very well be the best Right Back in the world, and among the best at central Midfield.

England pretty much outclassed Wales in this one. Michael Owen (who had played a total of 12 games last year at Real Madrid !!) claimed his 30th career goal for England in the 16th minute off of a brilliant head down from Rooney in the 6 yard box. The second came in the closing 1/4 hour as Owen Hargreaves found space going forward, and recieved a slotted ball from late substituate Alan Smith. But the player to bring home man of the match? STEVEN GERRARD

Steven Gerrard, Gerrard

He passed the ball forty yards

He's big and he's ****ing hard

Steven Gerrard

The Liverpool talisman Completely shut down his side of the field, and even bossed the center of the pitch during set pieces, allowing England to get more people forward than normal, and leading to several clear chances that might have made the score laughable.

In other action, for the youth sides Legear again took home MoM honors as he scored a goal for Belgium against the Faroe Islands

John Paul Kelly played for Ireland U-21 side, as they suffered a bad 1-4 loss at the hands of the French U-21 side which included Florent Sinama Pongolle (who scored twice), and on loan Anthony Le Tallec.

Finnally, Antonio Barragan earned his very first U-21 international cap as he featured for Spain against Serbia Montenegro, and even scored in the process.

Rafa's investment in young blood was beginning to show it's class.

[uskopite]

6 September 2005

International week ended with England showing very well against N. Ireland (yeah, I know that sounds strange - but it's true - in this alter reality). Sven trotted out another side with Gerrard in at Right Back again. I can only think that is because, it worked the previous week. Stevie would go marauding down the right flank time and time again - so even from such a set back position he was a constant worry. Sven awarded his industry with a chance at many of the set peices, which Gerrard cashed in on it the 23rd minute. He crashed an indirect freekick right through the wall into the top of the net. Smashing goal.

Owen, despite being increadibly rusty from not playing much at all with Real Madrid, quickly got in the groove of the game and set up both Wayne Rooney goals (17th minute and 37th.) North Ireland got one back late Phillip Mulryne converted from the penalty spot after Alan smith was caught clutching Danien Johnson's shirt to impede him from getting to a high ball.

Ireland got goals from Damien Duff and Ian Harte to earn a draw from the always dangerous France. Steve Finnan featured in defense that held off some late pressure from the indominable Thierry Henry (who despite close marking, notched a brilliant goal in the 69th minute to draw parity.) to close out the point. With that draw they remained in second place for thier group, a scant two point ahead of Israel, Switzerland and Cyprus with just two games left in the qualifying portion.

And SCOTLAND you ask? Well, you don't want to know. Let's just say that though they are not mathematically out of it, they've been leaking goals to the tune of about 4 per game. They've scored to the tune of 2.5 per game. so not all is lost yet. (Norway 5 (Riise 2 assists)- 2 Scotland)

[uskopite]

8 Septmember 2005 --

Status Quo was definately not the order of the day after the Internationals had finished up. The rumor of Legear's promotion were NOT exagerated. My first inclination was to rant a bit about how poor it was that a whinging moaner had been rewarded for his poor attitude and brought up the Melwood after he threw his dummy out of the pram. So, . . . what? . . all I had to do was throw a big enough fit and I could find myself in Anfields first team!! BULLCRAP!!

Mark Noble was of a more sound mind about it when I was ranting to him about it. There is a reason why he is the U-18 captain. He always thought with a level head. He saw it as the natural progression of a good young player who was benefiting from Liverpool's misfortune at failing to bringing in more established talent on the right wing during the transfer window. It was apparent to everybody that he had the best bit of service from out wide that anybody had seen come through liverpool in a LONG time. Additionally, Morientes and Crouch were large targets and Rafa was building Liverpool to take advantage of service from the wide men (as was I, which might have been another reason I was upset to see him leave - subconciously). To leave him in the Youth team would have been quite and oversite on behalf of Coach Owens, Paco Ayesteran, and Rafa.

G'dmn Noble -- always talking too much sense. Feck it then! Good luck to you Legear - you're setting the mark for all of us to reach to. If he does settle in at Melwood and in Liverpool, then maybe I'd be benefittng from his crosses again before too long.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The second surprise of the day was Antonio Barragan's promotion to the Reserve Side as well. I just couldn't get as worked up over his move up, as he wasn't part of my closer circle (as Legear was). Antonio was a centerback/fullback. In his time at the Academy, he had already formed a strong partnership with Hobbsie. With thier dominance across the middle, the only blemishes we had in six games were the 2 goals that we had given up to Sheffield Wednesday's U-18 team last game. Additionally, several of the regular reserves who worked in the defense had gone away on loan for the next few months. Names like Medjani, Raven, Traore, and Whitbread were away, and Callum Woods was out injured. Barragan was needed to shore up thier thier ranks until their numbers got back up to normal levels. I had the feeling that Coach Herrera might just want to keep Barragan up, even when the other's returned.

[uskopite]

10 September 2005 --

Strict orders from Coach Owens today. We were all encouraged to go to the Liverpool FC game against Wigan @ Anfield, BUT NO rousting about after the game. Straight home and straight to bed as we had a game tomorrow.

We had our marching orders! Now off to take our seats in the KOP!!!

Speaking of seats in the KOP. A lot of talk around town recently about the desire to return to KOP end of Anfield to the traditional terraces. Really was a lost topic - as there was no way that the English FA would allow it since they moved to require all-seater stadiums. Some of the elder locals whinged on endlessly about how the atmosphere wasn't the same as when they were wee blokes. It probably wasn't as bloody brilliant as the days of yore -- but you can't tell me we didn't rival the legendary crowds of the past as we cheered our beloved Redmen to victory over Olympiacos, Leverkeusen, Juventus, and Chelsea during our magical run out to Champion's League Victory last season.

That said, the crowd wasn't half as enthusiastic about our victory over Wigan that night. It seemed for a while that Wigan were going to somehow skulk out of town with an ugly point when, embarrassingly, they practically played with ELEVEN men behind the ball all game. Rafa had the tactics off a little bit, as Bolo Zenden was turning Wigan's Teale inside out all game, but Crouch was to far behind the play to threaten the goal mouth, and Cisse and Garcia just couldn't out jump their markers to get on the end of the lovely crosses. Garica SHOULD have opened his Premier season account in the 34' minute of play after he was called on to take a penalty that Bolo Zended had manfully won blowing by Teale for the umpteenth time. (Teale practically tore a whole in Bolo's jersey when he slipped past). Unfortunately Garcia could not hold his nerve, and his shot, though well placed, could not beat Wigan's Keeper Filan.

Rafa began to change his tactics in the second half, when it was obvious that Wigan would not be a threat to hit back in the slightest (They only got 1 shot on target the WHOLE GAME - and only 33% of possession!). Garcia was having a mare, so Rafa subbed him for Sinama-Pongolle, and directed Ponge to form a three man partnership up top (Crouch to be the middle man to take advantage of the good service.) The Gaffa moved Finan up to Right Midfield to preserve width, and subbed out Warnock for Hyppia. The side was a 3 - 4 - 3 in essence. Still Wigan was hanging on by the skin of their teeth. FINALLY, in the 74th minute, Zenden's great play was rewarded as he skinned Teale and darted a cross into Crouch's head. Bingo. 1 - 0.

Wigan opened up to chase the game, and that brought Cisse and Ponge more into play. 8 shots in the space of 10 minutes! The assault went on, and soon the war was over, when Zenden's first touch on a cross field pass from Pongolle put him well past Teale. He side foot the keeper right to Cisse, who couldn't have missed if he had tried.

So here's a song for Zenden compliments of The Bill Hicks Appreciation Society. You regulars to the RAWK will know what I mean.

'to the tune of no limits"

BOLO ZENDEN PLAYING WITH PRIDE

IN A RED SHIRT PLAYING OUT WIDE

BOLO ZENDEN WONT GIVE UP THE FIGHT

HE'LL GO DOWN THE FLANK OR HE'LL CUT IT INSIDE

[redsrule]

Quality mate, i have been engrossed in this story. It is even bringing a tear to my eye when you get overlooked for the first team. I may have to edit you into my game and give you the first team spot you desire..

Keep up the good work

[uskopite]

11.9.2005

(U-18 Group 4 Week #3)

Venue: The Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

Opponent: Nottingham Forrest U-18

Attendance: 902

U-18 LFC Starting Line-Up:

…………………Black

……………………………………Kelly

Noble…Flynn…Murphy …Bridges

………

Mangani…Hitchen…Hobbs…Barnes

………………Lancaster

Bench:

1.Gamble

2.Hammill (on 86')

3.Smith

4.Charlie Barnett (on 60')

5.Frayne (on 86')

Score: Liverpool U-18 (3 - 1) Nottingham Forrest U-18

Liverpool U-18: Murphy 15'(FK), 51'(Bridges), 65'(Mangani)

Nottingham Forrest U-18: Newbold 12'(Mullarkey)

Man of the Match: Terry Murphy

We hadn't played for what seemed like ages, so I was really up for this match. It did seem a little odd that we were missing so many of our "normal players" with the likes of Barragan and Legear being gone. I wouldn’t 't be too shocked to see Ryan Flynn work in now into our midfield rotation system - if not then Noble, Bridges, and Myself would be playing every game (not that I'm opposed to that)

Nottingham forrest were smack dab in the the middle of the table on 1-0-1, and we figured that this game would be a good indicator of where we would finish this year in the U-18 competition.

Well, it all started out wrong when after a few up and down chances - Nottinghams Mullarkey beat Hobbs off a flick on from Richards. Mullarkey's shot was clawed away by Lancaster, but fell for Newbold who stuck it in the back of the net while Lanc was still on his knees. Immediately I thought how Barragan would have been there in a situation like that to snuff out the rebound. Looks like we were going to have to get used to the idea that he wasn't going to be there for us (for awhile at least). (LFC U-18 0 - 1 Nottingham Forrest U-18 )

Just scant minutes later we had our first real chance. John Paul Kelly was cutting across the box, looking for a ball to run onto when Nott Defender Richardson caught him with an elbow. The referee saw it and immediately awarded a card and the free kick. Ronnie nodded to me to take it. It was perfectly placed. Center of the box, 5 yards outside of the penalty area. The wall would block the keepers view. Just had to . . . PERFECT! To the right of the keeper, in the corner - He didn't really get a chance to react until it was too late - and we were level. ( LFC U-18 1 - 1 Nottingham Forrest U-18

Nottingham Forrest continued to play the long ball down the center - so Coach Owens directed us to get more narrow and drop back a bit to counter. That enabled Hobbs to use his height a little more to advantage, and we began to gain the tactical advantage.

Ronnie and Mark were also beginning to impose themselves on their men - so Coach signaled for more play up the wings. We responded with two nice chances on goal - in the 28th minute, Noble's cross came to me high, and I just couldn’t' get over it to keep in down, or we would have gone ahead. Then in the 31st minutes, Noble again pushed passed his man - this time his cross came all the way across to Bridges who took it with nice technique on the volley. Nottingham's Deakin stretched out and batted it away.

After half time, Nottingham did nothing to change their formation or tactics, so it was no surprise to see our adjustments come off good. In the 51st minute Noble again sprayed a cross field pass to Bridges. With tons of time to pick out a man in the box, he whipped it in. I was just turning to make a run to the back post when I caught, out of the corner of my eye, the ball coming right to me. I tried to twist to bring it down, but it struck me before I could. The deflection totally caught Deakin off balance, and a ball that otherwise would easily have been picked up, virtually rolled across the goal line. Not what I had in mind, but that'll do. Tomorrow’s score line will make it looked lke I rocketed it into the back of the net. ( LFC U-18 2 - 1 Nottingham Forrest)

Knowing that I was on a hat trick brought more determined marking from Nottingham. However, that only served to open the flanks up even more as I made bursting runs down the center of the pitch. 4 times Noble and Bridges would get crosses in to me in dangerous spots. Twice the keeper kept it out, and twice I just couldn't get it on target. All of their opportunities were drying up, as our defense stayed tight at the back and our midfield dominance would force turnovers with each attempt to bring it forward (we would end up with 65% of the possession!).

Looking for the goal that would kill off the game, Charlie Barnett was brought on for Ireland U-18 International Kelly, whose touch was letting him down when on another day, he may also have taken a goal. Charlie knew that the hat trick was still on - and it was a gift from him that brought me the match ball. Right after Barnett's introduction, Noble stole the ball and played to Mangani making a run on the right wing. Mangani, though less refined at passing than many, played a low cross into Barnett. The cross just skipped away from Charlie's boot and short hopped Nottingham's Deakin, who was not able to hang on. Charlie pounced on the ball and with the whole net to shoot on - he laid it off to me, charging late into the box. I emphatically blasted the ball in, and jubilantly raced with the team over to the bench. What a fantastic feeling. Who knew how many more times I might get the chance to score three, but I was quite enjoying this one. ( LFC U-18 3 - 1 Nottingham Forrest U-18)

Our dominance lasted the rest of the game, but nobody could quite add to the score line. Thrice Charlie Barnett provided chances for Noble, myself and Black to run onto, but less than fine finishing denied Charlie a hat trick of assists. Near the end of the game, Coach Owens did me a great honor by bringing me off to the applause of the 900 or so supporters, bringing Hammill in to play the last 5 minutes.

I listened to see if I could hear the hint of a newbie composer bringing out a song for me for the first time. Almost all players for Liverpool had a song waiting to be sung about them. Something to be added to the pantheon of legends already inhabiting the walls of Anfeilds Museaum and Trophy room. I wondered if I would ever hear my name sung out from the KOP or Anny Road. If I could continue at this goal-scoring pace, surely someday I could.

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Stats:

Name(form)min/pas,cmp,key,tck,won,hea,won,key,int,run,off,fou,fld,sho,sot-gls/ast-note:

Terry Murphy(10)86/ 29 22 1 2 2 14 11 5 0 5 0 2 1 9 4 - 3/0

[uskopite]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by redsrule:

Quality mate, i have been engrossed in this story. It is even bringing a tear to my eye when you get overlooked for the first team. I may have to edit you into my game and give you the first team spot you desire..

Keep up the good work </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Thanks redsrule. I'm afraid I won't quite be ready for the first team (I don't think) any time soon. Were it not for the fact that I am 6'6 (or 7), and can get on the end of even average crosses, I wouldn't be making such an impact. Bridges is a quality crosser of the ball (and so WAS Legear till he got moved out) and at the U-18 level will surely shine. Noble is a good crosser, and a good passer, so many will also benefit from his service.

[uskopite]

13.9.2005

Though part of Liverpool FC's heritage now, that didn't mean that we got liscense to go to all of the games. Especially the away games -- and especially in Europe. I'm sure there would be special occasions where the U-18 side, as a team would attend big matches, but this time around we would be relegated to a hard days training, followed by European Nights at somebody's house. Last time it was my house. This time it would be Mark Noble's place.

Mark's set up was not quite as nice as mine, but he did have the bean bag chairs - which was a really nice touch. So we settled in.

The line up against AC Milan was a bit of a shocker. First of all - No Steven Gerrard!! How can you explain that? A European game without Steven Gerrard - that's like steak and potatoes, without the steak!! What was Rafa thinking?

Secondly, there, lining up at right wing - was our own Jonathan Legear. Immediately pangs of jealousy struck me. I looked at the others to see how they were reacting. Hah!! Same look!! I knew it. I wasn't the only one who wished it were me in Legear's place. Such a huge game, and Jonathan looked so small out there.

Finally, there was no Djibril Cisse. Cisse had been huge for us in Europe. And yet, I was mystified not to see his name in the starting lineup. He would no doubt be gutted he wasn't started. In his place was Fernando Morientes (who had yet to open his scoring account in the new season), with Little Luis Garcia playing just off him.

[uskopite]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> Sky Sports News

REDS DEAD IN THE GROUP OF DEATH

Liverpool's hopes of making it into the knockout stages of the Champions League were sure to have taken a hit tonight as Rafael Benitez's tactics hit an early snag against Inter Milan.

The talismanic captain, and engine in the midfeild, Steven Gerrard, was noticeably absent from the starting eleven for this crucial matchup, and watched as Liverpool fell behind 1-0 just before the stroke of half time as Inter Milan Left Winger Stankovic's strike put the Champion's of Europe on the back foot.

Half time saw the introduction of Steven Gerrard and Djibril Cisse - to immediate effect. Cisse scored twice in succession to put the visitors back on top and in control of the match. However, Inter milan drew even and then ahead as Inter Milan striker and strong candidate for European Footballer of the year Adriano demolished the Red's normally solid defense. Jamie Carragher and Sami Hyppia had no answer for the pace and strength of Adriano. The match was put out of doubt in injury time as substitute Guiseppi Favalli caught the Liverpool defense out on the break to put Inter Milan up 4 - 2 with three crucial points in Group D (Inter Milan 3, FC Bayern 1, Deportivo 1, Liverpool 0)

</div></BLOCKQUOTE>

As is typical for Liverpool, at first the shock of the loss brought out the nay sayers. Rafa this and Benitez that. Lazy team, bad line up, poor tactics. La de dah . . .

Then, a few hours later, when aftershocks had worn off, and so had the hangovers, things were back to business. We just had to buckle down and make sure that we took the home match against them. Deportivo would probably be a difficult match up, but most were confident we could take both games from them. FC Bayer would be favorites to win the group, but we should still be in for a shout with second top.

Legear had a poor day. He was largely punching above his weight through out the game. He didn't track back to help in defense and his lax defense certainly contributed to the second half surge of Adriano. Finally, to get some punch into the attack, Rafa subbed him out and put Garcia wide With Cisse taking Gacia's old spot.

Now the question was, did Rafa rate Legear enough to keep him in the first team. After that performance, I would be very surprised if he stuck in the first team. He would likely only be a back up player for now.

[uskopite]

14.8.2005

Liverpool Reserves v. Everton Reserves -- The mini-derby (next to the U-18 derby of course).

Zak Whitbread came back from his loan to Notts County yesterday, and was inserted into the Reserves starting line up today. Don't know if that was really wise -- since Zak was going on about how he was going to miss playing for Notts County. It's NOTTS FRIGGIN COUNTY -- The nowts if you will. Didn't exactly show the state of mind that you would want from a Red. And this right before the Everton game.

A lot of the U-18 crew went to support the Reserve Team - especially to see Antonio, Bertini, and Nardiello play. Many of us would probably be using this game to see how we might stack up against opposition at the next level, since we all had ideas of how we'd do against Nards, Bert, and Barragan.

To our dismay (or relief?!) nobody really went on to distinguish themselves.

Barragan was actually moved up to Defensive Midfield, and was looking a little out of place, until the end of the game, when CD regular O'Donnelly was injured and Antonio Barragan was moved back to cover.

Nards SCORED! - But that is pretty much about all he did. He wasn't very creative at all, seemed to be a step late, and played too safe, especially for an Everton game. His goal came off a nice cut back pass to him that he fired in. The shot was decent, and Everton's keeper, though able to get a mitt to it, could not palm it out.

and Bertini. Well, he was just increadibly average. He contributed very little to build up at all, but as he is always apt to do, he marked his guy closely, and always managed to get in the way.

The lack of creativity of those three was certainly matched by the rest of the team, and though Everton were away from home, and certainly no better than us, they managed to put two in the back of the net and take home all three points with a 2 - 1 score. One goal came off a total clanger from Paul Wilis who flapped at a cross, only to push it into the path of (Evr) James Morrision.

The second was a forray down our left flank, cutting right through DL Danny Smith. An easily placed pass put Marcus Bent through past Smith, and Bent finished with ease, slotting his pass past Wilis.

I got my composing career off the ground despite the loss. Daniel scored. . . so I figured I would break out my back handed cheer to him.

"Nards, Nards, kick em in the Nards"

(and repeat

and repeat

and repeat)

he he he . . .

I'll get me coat . . .

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[uskopite]

17.9.2005

(U-18 Match #3)

Venue: Lyme Valley Stadium, Newcastle-under-Lyme

Opponent: Stoke City

Attendance: 312

U-18 LFC Starting Line-Up: ( 3 – 5 – 2 )

………Black ……Barnett

Noble ……………………… Bridges

……………Flynn……Smith

………………Murphy

……Hitchen……Mangani……Hobbs

………………Gamble

Bench:

Lancaster

Stewart

Hammill (on 74’ for Bridges)

Kelly (on 74’ for Black

Frayne (on 74’ for Noble)

Score: Stoke U-18s 0 – 4 Liverpool U-18s

Stoke: None

Liverpool U-18s: Murphy 14’(Black), 36’(Bridges), Hobbs 23’(Noble), Black 40’(Noble)

Man of the Match: Terry Murphy

Stoke came into the game tied for second with us in the table. They were in good form but I didn’t think they could maintain that for long. However, one thing that they did have on us going into the game was that we had an unusual shape because of the number of movements up to the Reserve squad for injury cover and otherwise. Our tactics called for maintaining possession in the offensive end of the field, because if we couldn’t we left ourselves open to the counter attack.

At first it wasn’t looking good. We weren’t really clicking on the passes, and Stoke was able to break down the field quickly a couple of times. But in the 14th minute of play, Hitchen hoofed a long ball down the center of the park which fell to Black. Black played down to me running through the midfield, right into a nice seam in the defense. I was in the box before anybody could really get close, and had already picked out my spot as the keeper came out. The shot looked nice going in, but didn’t really have to be all that exact as I had so much of the net to look at. Stoke switched formation to put an extra attacker forward, but it ended up working against them. We held the ball nicely in their end of the field for much of the entire half, reeking havoc left and right. They could never get the ball off us and never really looked dangerous on the break. Before they finally switched to 5 at the back in the second half it was much to late.

Our second came off a corner in the 23rd minute. Noble played a high in-swinger that Hobbs skied over his man to get his head to. He had a cheeky grin on his face after when recounting the dizzying heights he had reached to get that ball – and how I’d never know how that would feel.

The service from our wings was of nice quality during that first half. I took my bite of that cherry from Bridges during the 36’ minute. Ronnie was finding a nice home on the right wing in the absence of Legear. In fact, we weren’t missing Legear at all for that matter. Ronnie beat his man comprehensively and played a floater over a pack of 5 Stoke City defenders in the box – to me at the back post. Paddy Gamble remarked that a better keeper (meaning him of course) would have snatched that off my head. I don’t know about that. Pretty high to have to jump to if you’d ask me. In any case, I nodded back against the flow of the play into the other side of the net – and amazingly I was on a chance for a hat trick again. I had a whole half to go searching for that third goal!!

Our fourth goal of the half was a slap in the face for the Stoke keeper Nathan Harrison, and a sign of just how bad he really was. Noble cut a nice little inside pass to Black, who in turn cut it back outside of his man. In doing so Black had created a little bit of space, but his chipped cross meant for Charlie Barnett at the back post was poor and floated way off target – right into the far corner of the net!! Red faced stuff really.

When Stoke trotted back on in the second half, the only thing that they had on their minds was damage control. This game could easily have ended up 8 – 0 . I was a bit disappointed that I never got my third goal, though I did have a couple more clear chances from Mark Noble. Mark had played a good game, but I ended up taking man of the match for my two well taken goals. Nobody else got on the score sheet as we found less and less space to move around in the oppositions half. We still held a massive preponderance of the ball, but much of it was sideways passing, or near misses.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Stats:

Name(form)min/pas,cmp,key,tck,won,hea,won,key,int,run,off,fou,fld,sho,sot-gls/ast-note:

Terry Murphy(10)90/39 31 7 5 5 10 7 3 1 4 2 2 5 2 – 2/0

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The goals just kept on coming for me. I thought surely it wouldn’t be too long until I would make the jump up to the reserve team myself. I was being romantic to think that Mark, Ronnie, Legear, and I would all make the next step together – but in reality, we all wanted to succeed, and soon.

[uskopite]

18.9.2005

Liverpool @ Arsenal

Waiting to pile on to the coaches that would take us cross country to London and the Confined of Highbury, some of the Liverpool supporters recognized me from the U-18 team. . It was a very proud moment for me, to actually have somebody stop and say "Oi, don't you play at the Academy!"

Many of the other's standing in line around turned to look. Proud, yes, but I felt a little bit awkward at the same time. The fact that I am 6'7" ish has always attracted a bit of attention, but now, my mind flashed back to the **** take that more than a few fans were having at Peter Crouch because of his less than impressive figure. I cringed a bit, preparing for the worst . . . But was over the moon at some of the remarks.

"Feck me, you are on fine form. Murph here has potted som'n like 7 goals recently!"

"Magnificent. Totally unstoppable. Can get on the end of practically anything put in the box."

"How many was it yesterday Murph?"

"Erm, it was two. But I really should have had four." I said with a big smile.

When I spoke, more peoples' heads picked up. They noticed the accent. Not quite local!

"Blimey, he's a Yank!", pipped one teenager, probably a little louder than he'd realized, because he colored red pretty quick. I blushed too, but answered back (for some reason feeling that I had to somehow justify myself) "Yeah, my dad's American. I lived Stateside for awhile. Me mum's British though. From Upper Heyford out East. They were married when my dad worked on the Air Force Base out there."

"Well, mate" chimed another older guy standing if front of me, "if you keep scoring goals like you are on - we won't hold that against you. Just work on yer accent with Zak Whitbread - He's turned out just fine!" A couple of laugh rolled around the lot as we piled onto the coach.

Wow, somebody actually recognized me! LOL. Totally Huffed.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Today was going to be a huge game for the senior side. Arsenal played some of the best football in the whole of the Premiere League. Thiery Henry was far an away one of the greatest strikers I had ever seen, and was flair and speed personified. Cisse was cut from the same cloth, in my opinion, but had yet to really prove himself in England.

After taking a lot of criticism for his starting eleven versus Inter Milan, Rafa fielded a much more traditional lineup. Gone was Legear, who predictably didn't even make the bench, and back in the heart of midfeild was Steven Gerrard.

Liverpool started strong when in the 3rd minute the Liverpool Captain found Cisse with a nice pass through the center of the park. Cisse used his speed and skill to go past (Ars) Toure, and crack a left footer past (Ars) Lehman into the right side of the net.

Not too long afterwards (Ars)Henry showed his magic as he took similar pass from (Ars)Ljungberg and when past Sami. Pepe Reina was strong on the initial shot as he parried away Henry's drive to his right, but the rebound fell right to Pires who was all alone at the back post, and Arsenal pulled even.

Arsenal looked the sharper side in the first half, and but for some timely interventions by Carragher, Finnan, and Riise, and some good saves by Reina - they would have been the good bet to go into the half up. But Liverpool was tenacious, and after picking up a couple of yellow cards for rough play, went into the half all square.

Cisse picked up a knock in the first half, and so Crouch was brought on to partner Morientes - giving Liverpool some large targets to knock the ball up to.

The second half continued to be very lively - with each side showing very positive moves in attacks, and some staunch defending. The (Ars)Brazillian Gilberto put Arsenal up in the 55th minute after Ljungberg again drove deep into the Liverpool area, and laid off back to Gilberto to curl a blinder from 25. It was a great goal, and would have broken lesser teams.

But Liverpool fought back when Harry Kewell, playing very lively on the left wing all day long, was upended in the box by Ljungberg. Garcia stepped up to smash in the spot kick. Liverpool were even, and then pulled ahead as Morientes opened his regular season account. Again it was Kewell the inspiration for the attack, spotting Morientes with a booming 50 yard cross that can only be described as poetry. Moro's first touch took him nicely around Lehman, and he clinically finished the move.

The next 30 minutes looked to be a textbook in tactical attack, adjust, and counter attack. Each side looked sure to take at least one more -- but each time, the defense somehow beat away the onslaught. As the whistled sounded the end of the game, the travelling faithful belted out Campioni and YNWA - and applauded both sides for a very entertaining game.

[Spav]

This is a wonderfully detailed story which I am totally enjoying. Brilliant work, uskopite.

[uskopite]

21.9.2005

Next up for us would be Hull in the 2nd Round of the U18 Cup. Remembering back to our 1st Round game, I realized that game was the last time that Alejandro Fernandez had played for us before heading out to Bolton on loan.

Wondering what he was up to I looked up the last few games for Bolton online. It turns out the Alejandro had not gone directly into the first team. Instead he had joined the ranks of the Bolton Reserves. It appears he had finnally found his shooting boots as, in 3 reserve games he had put in 2 goals and set up one. But more impressive was his jump up to the first team during the two League Cup games. He played well in both, and had scored and impressive winner against Tottenham in Bolton's last. I wondered if, when his loan tour was over in two months, what his desires would be for Liverpool's U18 team after playing 2nd team football for Bolton.

How were some of the other's doing?

Anthony Le Tallec played in all 9 of Ipswich's league games, setting up three goals, and taking an astounding 4 man of the match awards for the first team on thier way to a 6-0-2 record and 2nd place in the Coca Cola Championship League.

Carl Medjani had been running hot and cold for Sheffield Wednesday in the Championship League. In 6 games since his loan began, Carl had played in four of them, and could not stop Shef Weds slide toward the bottom of the league to 18th spot.

Neil Mellor was outstanding for Burnley in the Championship League. In 8 league games, Mellor had netted 5 for Burnley, including 1 game winner, and 2 strikes to salvage them a point. Burnley were 3 wins 4 draws and 1 loss during that time and were sitting 10th only 2 points away from playoff contention.

Nobody who had gone out on loan had done poorly, which testified positively to the potential quality that lay dormant in the Liverpool Youth system.

[gyoza]

Hey uskopite, I've been reading your story, and enjoying it very much! Could I ask you a quick question about the mechanics of how you're doing this story (since I'm thinking of doing a player story as well)?

Are you actually managing Liverpool in the game, or playing a spectator's role and just observing matches? I'm thinking of being a spectator (as the temptation to put myself in the first team would be too great) but how would I stop the manager from selling me to another team at some point?

Anyways KUTGW

[uskopite]

gyoza -

First of all, thanks for the encouragement.

I am managing the senior side for Liverpool, and for the most part I have left the bulk of the games to Paco Herrera with the Reserve side and John Owens with the Academy side. I have asked them to keep my tactics as the baseline for thier games. Admittedly, a couple of times I have taken over the reigns of the Academy team(you'll be able to tell that with the comments on the change of tactics that my character notices during the flow of play) and have put the kaibosh on Paco taking some of the Academy players up too soon. I was amused to see Nardiello make the jump up, so I let Paco take him - but when Neil Mellor comes back from loan, I suspect Michael Nards won't get a game, so I'll send him back down.

[uskopite]

23.9.2005

Neil Mellor returned to Mellwood and the Reserve Side today. In an interview on .tv he talked about his success at Burnley and his desire to transfer that success to Anfeild.

I am a fan of Mellor. He was great for Liverpool last year, when during a stretch of about 10 games the senior squad had a striker injury crisis and Neil was crucial in contributing to some fantastic performances, including a now legendary last gasp victory of the Gooners of Arsenal. Still, there was someting lacking about Neil's play, and although he talked of confidence at Liverpool, I just couldn't see him staying on for very long. He might very well end up filling the nets for some Premiership team, but that would likely be after a campaign of helping them get to the top rung from the Coca Cola Championship league.

With Neils return to the Reserve side, Michael Nardiello would very likely be headed back to the Youth side, no doubt head swollen with egomaniacal confidence of showing that he could play, if but for a couple of weeks, at the next level.

-----------------------------------------------

Training sessions were coming along nicely. Coach was working each of us individually on some of our strengths (as well as weaknessess) and I really felt that my ability to win a high ball was getting even better. I was finishing more chances that I ever thought possible - and that might just be good fortune, and could very well dry up on me. But I was very happy so far.

Paul Lancaster also seemed to be getting stronger. He and the Mr. Heighway were still looking to put out feelers on if any sides would like to take him on full time, but for now, he was enjoying his time with the Youth squad. He and Paddy had been going back and forth on form as to who would mind the nets. It looked like Paul would be getting the nod in the next match up.

[uskopite]

24.9.2005

Drawing for the Micky Mouse. . . er. . . League Cup were held late yesterday. Rafael had let it be known last year that he intended to play the 'kids' for a run in the cup. The Reserves chosen played extremely well, and distinguished themselves in great victories, especially against a full pro Tottenham side. Rafa was making the same overtures this year.

Several hearts must have taken a dip when, of all teams, Arsenal were drawn for the 3rd Round Match. They would be a tough squad - and an early exit would mean less of an opportunity for our young guys to shine. Who knows, maybe I would make the jump up at some point if Liverpool made very far at all in the contest.

------------------------------------------------

John Paul Kelly took a knock to the knee in training. This on the very same day that he told us some teams were out to take him into thier side for some first team action. Didn't know if he would still get that chance now, being damaged goods, but he seemed to think the knock was too bad - more just a bad hyper extension.

[uskopite]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by uskopite:

------------------------------------------------

Didn't know if he would still get that chance now, being damaged goods, but he seemed to think the knock was too bad - more just a bad hyper extension. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

But he seemed to think the kncok WASN'T too bad - mor just a bad hyper extension

[uskopite]

24.9.2005

There's a bit of a question out right now as to who our biggest rivals are. Some would say that it is the Blue***** of Neverton, other's would claim it's now become Chel$ki with their recent and forseeable dominance of the League with their mega millions. But odds are that a good portion of opinion still wieghs heavily toward Man United of nearby Manchester.

Personally, I would much rather see us put the boot to Everton and thier smug "the people's club" claim. But next in line would have to be a victory over ManU, home or away.

Today featured the first meeting with the Mancs of the season, and a very important meeting as Liverpool FC lay at the top of the league with thier victory over Arsenal and Chelsea stumbling out of the blocks. If Manchester could pip it at Anfield, they would go top the league and take momentum.

We filed into the Kop, scarves in hand, and banners in place - everybody ready with the 5 fingered salute that would surely shut tick off even the most even keeled of Manchester fan's.

Rafa came out with his normally solid midfeild in place. However, spark plug Cisse had picked up a shoulder knock during the victory at Arsenal - so Liverpool was going with strength in the air with both Crouch and Morientes leading the line. Moro was playing off the striker, much the same way that Garcia had been, but Moro was much slower and so there would not be many flick on's to affect. Long balls played up to Crouch and Morientes would have to be played back into the the teeth of the midfeild, giving the advancing midfielders the opportunities to score.

The game opened a tense affair, but rather than being conservative, both teams were throwing people forward in attack. But with the frenetic pace play would break down after a few quick touches, and one errant one would get picked off.

Ryan Giggs and Riise would pick up very early yellows. And then, inexplicably, Ryan Giggs, targetting Xabi Alonso with a two footed lunge, hacked the play maker down in a moment of madness. To the derisive howling of the travelling ManU supporters, Giggs was shown his second yellow card and given his walking orders, but really it was clearely a bookable offense. From that point on Liverpool surged forward in number. Rafa went even so far as to make a tactical substitution in the first half hour - putting Garcia on for Hamman in the 27th minute to capitolize on the situation.

Manchester held up admirably, and were able to limp into the first half all even.

The second half the flank play come more and more into play as Garcia and Bolo Zenden had free rein up the flanks with Manchester so narrow to guard being a man down. Liverpool finnally struck gold when Garcia, off a pretty flick 30 yards out set up Alonso to crash home a dipping twisting dagger. It was a thing of beauty to see the volley fly in and sent us in the Kop into excstacy. Great individual skill by Xabi.

Liverpool was keeping the pressure on, and ManU absorbed a lot of punishment. But on the hour mark or so, ManU had to open up to try and take something from the match. Throwing all hands forward again, Man U all but levelled the score in the 72nd minute as an Alan Smith center deflected of Riise and fell right to Keane, who had been laying back in midfield but was now very forward and all alone in on Reina's goal though at a tight angle. The dangerous blast was brilliantly parried away by Reina, huge in the net, and bounced out to Finnan. Finnan blasted a long ball out to Crouch who headed wide to Zenden. As only the Liverpool Captain was apt to do, time and again, Gerrard was bursting forward, box to box. Zenden flung a delicious 45 yard ball over Man United towers in defense to Gerrard who touched it down and in two step stung his shot to the left of Tim Howard and into the back of the net. Kop end. If Anfeild had a roof it would have come of the joint.

Admitting defeat, Man U dropped back into full defense, not wanted to concede any more goals to the hated rivals. Zenden made way for Flo Po in the last quarter hour, and to a massive standing ovation from the Kop Zenden applauded back. Any number of Liverpool players could have taken Man of the Match, but it had to go to either Gerrard or Zenden for that counter attacking goal to put the Mancs out of our misery.

The victory was complete and held Liverpool firmly at the top of the table. Under Benitez's reign, Liverpool were looking strong to once again ascend to the lofty heights of the footballing world and this victory would keep them in the national spot light for at least another few months - and would surely be a mountain to climb for the other's of the "Big 4".

[uskopite]

My apologies to the forum and those reading this story. I'm currently experiencing serious laptop power problems - so my two stories are on hold until I can somehow convince my wife that another new laptop in less than a year is in order - or I can transfer the files to my desktop and pick up the action there.

[Spav]

Mmmm, redheads have a mind of their own, so good luck.

I'd go with the file transfer to your PC if your laptop will allow it.

[uskopite]

25.9.2005

(Under 18s Cup 2nd Rnd)

Venue: The Circle, Hull

Opponent: Hull U18s

Attendance: 385

U-18 LFC Starting Line-Up:

………Nardiello……Barnett

……………………………………

…Noble ……Hitchen……Bridges

……………Murphy

Mangani……Flynn……Hobbs……Barnes

………………Lancaster

Bench:

Gamble

Black (70’ – Barnett)

Hammill (70’ – Bridges)

Frayne

Stewart

Score: Hull U18 2 – 6 Liverpool U18

Hull: Mason 46’(Phillips), Hotte 75’ (Phillips)

Liverpool: Murphy 16’ (Hobbs), 45’ (FK), Nardiello 30’ (Lancaster), Barnett 42’ (Nardiello), Noble 52’ (Barnett), Apsden 90’ (og)

Man of the Match: Mark Noble

These first few rounds of the Cup were always looking to be walkovers. Liverpool is a huge club, and with the addition of the Academy facilities and the wealth of talent that Rafael Benitez was bringing into the team for the future, we were stacked against such a small club.

We jumped up on top after intense pressure from the kickoff. In the 15th minute Noble lofted a throw into the box as I was pushing around for a spot on the near post. Hobbs rose to meet the effort and pounded a header into my zone. A fortuitous bounce off the leg of Hull fullback Paul Wilson came to me. I would have been off side position if not for that. The ball sat up, and I pounded the free ball into the roof of the net over Curtis Aspden.

15 minutes later we had our second. Lancaster, back in the net for us, blasted a long freekick. Paul Wilson was having a mare when he misjudged the flight and Daniel Nardiello raced after it as it went by the hapless fullback. Apsden did his side no favors as he raced to Nards to close down the angle leaving the net wide open. Nard showed good skill to slip the ball under Apsden and into the back of the net.

The third came as the half was wending to an end. Hull got a little loose with their passing, and Nards stole in to knock away a side pass. Charlie Barnett speed through after the tipped pass. One touched and he was into the box. Apsden loomed large as he came out, but left the wickets open, and Barnett rather cheekily nutmegged him and the game was basically over. But the half wasn’t – and neither was the pain. At the death of the half, Charlie Barnett was pulled down not too far outside of the box. I was given the usual nod to take the shot, and dispatched my shot, intending to curl it into the near post. The effort took a deflection off the wall. Apsden had already committed himself to the initial trajectory, and watched from his knees as the ball deflected into where he just stood.

4 – 0 at the half

Hull came back out with some more fight that they showed in the first. They took one back right away when Mason struck a Phillips cross on the volley past Lancaster. But noble took the game in his hands, organizing the side as you would expect from this natural talent. Playing a two man game with Barnett, Noble teased the Fullback out, and then played a quick one two and beat the goal near the penalty spot.

Whole sale changes saw Bridges and Barnet come off for Black and Hammill. That left us a bit less cohesive. Hull had a few more chances, and when Adam Hitchen was pulled out of shape at the back by Phillips, he left Hotte unmarked. Phillips nice little pass was finished easily by Hotte.

Apsden’s mare finally came to a fitting yet tragic end, when off a corner, he tipped the ball into his own net when trying to top the ball over the cross bar.

6 – 2 was much closer than the game actually was, believe it or not.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Stats:

Name(form)min/pas,cmp,key,tck,won,hea,won,key,int,run,off,fou,fld,sho,sot-gls/ast-note:

Terry Murphy(9)90/17 14 2 5 3 8 4 0 2 1 0 3 0 3 2 – 2 goals/0 asts

[uskopite]

1.10.2005

(U18s Group 4, Week #4)

Venue: The Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

Opponent: Port Vale U18s

Attendance: 348

U-18 LFC Starting Line-Up:

………Nardiello……Barnett

……………………………………

…Noble ……Flynn……Bridges

……………Murphy

Mangani……Hitchen……Hobbs……Barnes

………………Gamble

Bench:

Lancaster

Black (70 for Nardiello)

Hammill (45 for Barnes)

Frayne (70 for Bridges)

Score: Liverpool 3 – 0 Port Vale

Liverpool: Murphy 40’ (Mangani), Alexander 64’( o.g. ), Chambers 78’(o.g.)

Port Vale: N/A

Man of the Match: Mark Noble – Though Bridges often leads us out as the spiritual leader of the team, Mark Noble marshaled us along, and though many of his contributions came to nowt, it was through his design that Port Vale were constantly thrown back on the defensive.

Match Description

Port Vale is an example of what happens when you suddenly have a rush of blood to your head in tight situations. No, not for us. For them. We played reasonably well from my perspective, but in our dearth of chances we were able to tally only one while they tallied two – BOTH FOR US.

We came out cracking – with 14 shots on goal in the first period. I had a better first half and set up a few chances. One in the first few minutes to Noble who blazed over the cross bar. I sent Nards through on a nice ball, but his marker just caught up to him and pushed his shot away. I missed a couple of good chances myself, skying one high and wide after a scramble in the box. But what was really telling was that Port Vale were very aggressive to high balls played into the area, and they somehow snatched away chance after chance – either taking it off my head, or flashing in front to take good chances away. I though that I had broken through in the 26th minute when I redirected a Barnett cross into the back of the net, but the goal was whistled back when the ref claimed I had climbed over my marker, Port Vale CB Harrison, to get to the ball. This is my one big frustration – being that I am so tall. Often I look a bit gawky going for the high ball, and I’m a bit shockingly big, so that even when a bloke barges into me, often I will get whistled, because it looks like I’m climbing on him. Well, I pled my case to the ref, but he was having nothing of it.

We were getting a bit frustrated that nothing was going in. Several times Charlie Barnett was sent through, only to fluff his shot, or have the keeper flash a nice save. Even Nards was just a step slow getting to the balls or couldn’t ‘t get out of his own way to put it in the back of the net.

Finally in the 40th minute we won a throw in deep in Port Vale half. Mangani raced up to take it. As always, my direction was to take up a position close to the near post. Mange wheeled it in, and Noble broke for the ball just in front of me. I almost began circling to take up a heading position when I realized he had dummied the ball and in doing so, had taken my marker off me. The ball came right to me. I turned and from a tight, but unmarked angle, blasted the ball over the shoulder of the keeper and into the roof of the net.

Nards and Barnett continued to misfire on goal, but kept up a steady diet of good passes and crosses not to totally fall out of the game. Still, we went into the half only up by one, when it could have been over had we been a bit more clinical.

At half, Coach switched us to a 3 – 5 – 2 since we had been dominating possession so much. The extra player in midfield might provide the pressure needed to kill of the game. In some ways it worked – I guess.

Port Vale continued to beat us to the best chances, all but taking me out of the match going forward. The fell back into 5 in defense, and their tallest guy seemed to shadow me all over the field. Noble was taking up the space ceded to me in attack, but still our finishing let us down.

Off a free kick from about 40 yards out, I played a quick little bouncer into to Daniel Nardiello. Deceptive in his movement, he had one shoulder on his marker (Port Vale’s Alexander) as they both pushed into the box to try and latch onto the ball. Both lunged for the ball, but Alexander just beat Daniel to it, but laid there in horror as he watched his to poke beat his own keeper to nestle in the back of his own goal.

At some point, Ronnie Bridges had taken a knock to his shoulder, and was troubled by the physicality of the game, so Coach Owens brought Frayne on in his stead. Almost immediately Frayne had an impact, and almost scored had not the Port Vale Keeper stuffed him with a nice reflex save. Moments later Frayne was at it again; trying to blast a through ball past the keepers near post, but the Port Vale Keeper was brilliant at the first. What happened on the rebound would fuel quite a few stories in the papers, and make for some good tales for our kids when we were older. The ball came down in a melee in front of the goal. Port Vale’s Alexander tried to clear the ball over the touch line, but his clearance was blasted right towards his own goal. The Keeper flashed a hand up and redirected it onto his cross bar – right to Port Vale’s other CB Tom Chambers, who one upped Alexander by smashing his clearance clean past the befuddled keeper on a brilliant finished that saw us all come up and rub him on his head.

We played out the rest of the game, and took the win, though in truth we had only scored one of our own.

The victory was our 3rd on the trot in the League, and held us up in second, still behind Derby (3 – 2 – 0) but we had a game in hand coming at some point (3 – 1 – 0).

I had scored in 6 consecutive games now. Not one of by better games, but very well might have been more notable if the likes of Barnett and Nardiello had finished a couple of their opportunities off of my boot.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Stats:

Name(form)min/pas,cmp,key,tck,won,hea,won,key,int,run,off,fou,fld,sho,sot-gls/ast-note:

Terry Murphy (7) 90/31 22 2 0 0 7 4 0 0 1 0 4 1 9 4 – 1 goal/ 0 assts

[uskopite]

3.10.2005

In kick around today, Noble and Bridges brought up that I have been in unbelievable scoring form, and would not be surprised if the Reserve team would look to bring me up for a few games. I played it down, like it really wasn't a big thing, especially since I would have rather that we all make that jump up to the next level together, but deep inside, I was wondering if they had even considered bringing me up for at least a look. Something to let me know that I was in thier plans, and that I could cut it at the next level.

After afternoon session was over, I took the opportunity to talk with Coach Owens, and asked him how he felt my game was coming along since I had arrived at the Academy not too long ago. Coach Owens smiled and had me sit down. "Terry, it is a bit unusual how you came to us at the Academy. Usually we don't go about looking to bring in school boys from local leagues. But your case was a little different, as you came into your game a little later in your young life. We are very high on you, and your great potential. We have little doubt that you will get better, especially as you get more used to your body and how your talents can be best used in footballing.

I've talked to Coach Herrera about your recent form. He and I feel that you are imposing yourself on the games well, and that even in the short time that you have been adjusting to the training regimes, you have improved your physical form and leadership on the pitch. He is very intrigued by the options that you would give him in the Reserve side. However, he doesn't think that you are quite ready yet.

The thing is Terry, much of our tactics are built around providing you with plenty of scoring chances. That you are taking them is obvious to be seen. However, you should really be imposing yourself more, physically on your markers and in the games. You noticed that last game, you had your moments, but Port Vale were able to take you out of the game despite your physical size. Paco Herrera feels that were you to bulk up a little more - get some meat on your bones - and start really mixing it up in the middle feild tactically, he would snatch you up in a moment.

Now that leaves you with your fate in your own hands. There it is - you have to start eating more pies - simple as that," he joked.

I left his office knowing that I was very close. I'd double my efforts on the pitch at getting to everyball. It would be difficult to put some weight on during the footballing season, but I would do my best to bulk up, and add some muscle to my frame. I've never been very big, and have always had the metabolism of a bird.

Maybe I would stop by Neil Mellor's place. I hear that his mum makes good pies.

[uskopite]

5.10.2005

We had the late game at Anfield this week against the dregs of the Premiership: Leicester.

Although Leicester had done well to win the Championship League and earn promotion laster year, there was no way on Fowler's Green Earth that they were going to escape the drop right back down when the best they had to offer was journeyman James Skowcroft and some good, yet inconsistent young blood in Jordan Stewart, Ryan Mc Gavin and Tommy Wright. Leicester was stuck to the bottom of the league (1 - 1 - 7) - and weren't going anywhere soon; leaking goals to an average of 2 a game, and having only tallied five strikes in 9 games all year.

Rafa decided to give Kirkland a run out in goal. The lad must have been down as Pepe Reina had basically come into the team and was handed the starting spot. Both Dudek and Kirkland must have been disconsolate, and both would be looking to move on - maybe even as early as January. There was some rumor that Arsenal was looking for a replacement for Jans Lehman, as he was getting a bit dodgy in the net for them, and a little bit older in years. Kirky could do a job, for certain. But for right now he was a Liverpool player, and we would be 100% behind him (well, at least 50% of the time, since we were in the Kop).

In truth, Kirky wouldn't have much to do all game against Leicester, as they had only 2 shots at goal all game, and those two came on half chances from distance which never would have found the net had Kirky fallen over himself and broken his leg going over to pick it up (which we all know Kirky is liable to do - the brittle tall bast@rd)

Rafa was giving many of his normal starting XI a rest after the demoralizing 2 - 0 loss to Chelsea on Saturday. Amazingly, earlier on the day, Chelsea had lost in thier match - allowing Liverpool to stay at the head of the table 2 points up on the Blues. Rafa feilded a line up which featured Sinama Pongolle on the right, Sissoko and Hamann bossing the midfeild, and Luis Garcia partnering crouch up front. Every move seemed to pay dividends as little Luis struck gold on 10 minutes when his cracking shot deflected off of Leicester defender Dabizas, and skipped off the wet surface into the side netting.

Sinama-Pongolle was torturing his marker all game, but often found his crosses lacking in precision. In the 26th minute, one of his crosses was just good enough, and Sissoko outraced the keeper and the centerback to the ball. On the diving header, he sliced one into the back of the net to effectively seal the game. At the close of the half he had a brace in hand, as he again jumped over his man to reach a ball lofted in by Zenden, but the Ref dissallowed the goal, judging that Sissoko has used his marker to make up the distance to reach the height of the ball. Questionable at worst. Whatever

The team played a lot of longball to Peter Crouch, and although Crouchie didn't have a stunner of a game, did well to both provide chances, and create his own. Finnan had come on for Sinama-Pongolle, and was now playing up the right flank. On his only cross of the day, he picked out Crouch at the back post. Crouchie SOMEHOW beat his marker to the high ball - and nodded into the back of the net - sending everybody home satisfied that we had faced an inferior team, and made them to look inferior.

"We’ve won it 5 times

We’ve won it 5 tiiiiiiimes

In Istanbul we

We won it 5 times"

I love that song -- One of the best ones we sing on the Kop

Champions of Europe. But could we be champions of England again?

[uskopite]

5.10.2005

Liverpool's Reserve Team also had a game on the day. The Ressies were sitting middle of the table. They had talent, but were inconsistent as there was always people coming and going from the side. The latest to make his way back, and was a sight for sore eyes, was Neil Mellor.

Neil was finally getting back in shape after coming off a bit of injury and some time away from the team. It was a bit shocking at first, as he had put on quite a bit of weight. You could especially tell through the face with him - but he already had a baby fat face as it was!

In any event - the Res. Team had lacked some scoring bite at the beginning of their season and lost two on the trot to Middlesboro and Neverton (bitter loss that was). Nards was brought up to augment thier attack (and had played well, it must be said) -- but now that Mellor was back from his loan Spell at Burnley in the Championship League, there was a more settled quality about the side. Mellow had potted 5 goals in one assist in 8 appearances for Burnley - so he was feeling very confident coming back.

His confidence paid dividends against Wigan Res. as his brilliant hat trick, brought a successful day for Liverpool to and end. I don't think Neil Mellor will ever make it into the First Team side with any regularity - but he will always be a legend at the Academy and for the second Team.

What was more interesting of the Reserve game was . . . a few very influencial members had taken knocks of varying degrees, and were out of the side. Antonio Barragn and Jonathan Legear had both pulled up lame during the match with pulled thigh muscles. Add that to Zak Whitbreads knee trauma (out two months after surgery) and David Mannix high ankle injury - and then factor in that mainstays such as Djimi Traore, Darren Potter, David Raven, and Carl Medjani were all out on loan! The Reserve side was patchwork at best . . .

This left a lot of holes in midfeild and defence that needed to be covered. I know that Coach had just said Paco Herrera wasn't quite ready to take me and the other guys up yet - but if there was every a time when necessity called for some boldness - this could be it. The Reserves next match was a week from today against Leeds. If the injured and walking wounded didn't show considerable improvement - they would either have to play several players out of position - or . . . an opportunity could fall our way.

[uskopite]

8.10.2005

(U18s Group 4 Matchweek # 5)

Venue: Field Mill, Mansfield

Opponent: Mansfeild U18s (0-4-1)

Attendance: 72

U-18 LFC Starting Line-Up:

………Nardiello ……Black

……………………………………

…Bridges……Flynn……Smith

……………Murphy

Mangani……Hitchen……Hobbs……Barnes

………………Lancaster

Bench:

Steward

Noble

Hammill (on 45' for Ryan Flynn)

Frayne (on 85' for Neil Black)

Barnett

Score: Mansfield 0 - 5 Liverpool

Mansfield: none

Liverpool: Murphy 28'(FK - Flynn) 40' (Nardiello), Black 49'(Bridges), Nardiello 52'(Murphy), Frayne 90'(Nardiello)

Man of the Match: Michael Nardiello

Mansfeild was another smallish club in our Division. Small as they were, they weren't really doing poorly. In fact, they had only lost one up to that point and had recently put away Morcambes U18 side to advance to the third round of the U18 cup.

Our line up remained the same as we had been feilding, excepting that Noble was suffering a little bit for fitness after the last run of games and the knocks he was picking up. He would sit this game, and Bridges would go to the left side to pick up the attack. Smith would come on to spell him on the right side.

Remembering my conversation with Coach Owen, i was determined to do a better job at getting to the 50/50 balls and imposing myself more on the match. Judging by all results, I think I showed that I could do just that.

from the get go, Michael Nardiello was on a tear. He would seem to be everywhere at once, setting up goals, and taking chances of his own. In the fourth minute he put me through into the box with a fine pass, but my shot went high over the bar and into the stands.

Bridges, drafted in to play the left wing, also had a pretty good game, and was up for it early, earning a yellow card from the ref for a challenge on Manfeild's Walton.

Nardiello and Black would both challenge Mansfeild's nerve, drawing a good save from Mansfeild Keeper, Hudson - and a good block from Man's Gregory for a corner. However, off the corner came the seemingly inevitable - from the boot of your's truly. The corner came in and Mansfeild headed cleared and tried to push out. Bridges latched on to the clearance, and burst forward on a dribble. His deft lay off found Flynn who looked dangerous as he turned with the ball at the top of the circle. Man's Brown came cruising in with a hard tackle which the ref blew down. A free kick, from a really bad position for Manfeild. Licking my chops at this one, and with a nice dipping curler, I put it past the keeper before he could react to the twist on the ball.

Mansfield 0 - 1 Liverpool

Mansfield reacted to the goal by sending more forward, and looked dangerous after Adams and Gregory had chances on goal off of a break and a corner. But when that came to no avail, Nards again popped up in the 40th minute to create the second goal for us - again to my benefit. Bridges fed a ball up to Nardiello, who was immediately put on pressure by Gregory. Gregory had nipped the ball away, but Nards fought back and wriggled it away about 10 yards outside of the box. Seeing that Nardiello was about to win it back, I leaped up into the box. Nards took control and skipped past Gregory, holding up play just long enough and lofting sweet lob into the box. I meant to chest the ball down and volley through the defensive lines, but miscontrolled the ball right into the back of the net. A little lucky there, but then again, you make your own luck I suppose.

Mansfield 0 - 2 Liverpool

Half Time - We looked for more of the same. The only change came when Coach put Hammill in for Flynn, who had taken a little knock and was laboring near the end of the half

The third goal, to essentially kill off the match came shortly after the restart. In a rather comical fashion, Gregory look to play a long ball into our area, but he hit the ball fat, thumping it right into Bridges. Black was on the deflection like lightening, and easily outpaced the Manfeild defense to calmy slot his shot past Hudson.

Mansfield 0 - 3 Liverpool

Our fourth started out of nothing when during the 52 minute, Lancaster lumped a goal kick down the field to me. With time to bring it down, I turned and beat my marker who was caught in no man's land between going for the header and blocking my way. Michael Nardiello had shook his man and was along free near the back post. With a 40 yard cross field beauty, that other wise might have appeared to be going out, the Mansfield defense and keeper were surprised to see the ball fall nicely for Nards from my boot. Michael touched it well, and crashed it past Hudson who could only wave a glove at it. It was actually my first assist all year - having spent most of my productive time at the business end of crosses like that.

Mansfield 0 - 4 Liverpool

Mansfield were lucky not to go down more soon after as Nardiello was denied by the keeper, and one of my freekicks skimmed the top of the bar, after Gregory pulled down Hammill in frustration (earning a yellow card)

Black also came agonizingly close when a furious volley rocketted just wide of the goal. Coach took Black out and inserted James Frayne to run out the rest of the match. Run it out he did, when he jumped on a Nardiello chance which Hudson had pushed away, and tapped into an open net for the last strike in extra time.

Mansfield 0 - 5 Liverpool

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Stats:

Name(form)min/pas,cmp,key,tck,won,hea,won,key,int,run,off,fou,fld,sho,sot-gls/ast-note:

Terry Murphy (10)90/30 18 4 2 0 9 8 2 1 5 1 3 1 6 3 - 2 goals/ 1 assist

[uskopite]

8.10.2005

England beat down Austria 4 - 0 as Michael Owen contined his stellar play for country despite not getting a game back in Spain with Real Madrid. Defoe and Jenas were also strong, chipping in a goal each before Sean Wright-Phillips put Austria out of their misery. At 8-1-0, Sven had already qualified for the World Cup Finals, and was looking to give names like Jenas and Wright Phillips thier due in the team.

The international break also became a waiting game for me. The Liverpool U18 side wasn't going to be playing again for the next couple of weeks - but the prospect of being pulled up to play with the Reserve Side soon was looming large. Every passing day would be spent in sweet agony, hoping that I would get my break.

[uskopite]

10.10.2005

Early in the morning, Coach Owens rang me up and told me to come into the grounds and pick up my equipment - I was headed up to Melwood to start practices with the first team. I was shocked.

I asked Coach what had changed Paco Herrera's mind, and he said that two more of his side had been cut down by injury. The reserve side was becoming the walking wounded and unfit - the latest to fall down was Danny Smith and Antonio Barragan.

Coach said that they still thought it was too early to make a permanent move, but this would be a great opportunity to show the desire to make it in the Reserve team. Mark Noble might have been called up in my place - but Mark was away with the English U18 squad for internationals. Finnally a stroke of good luck!

Not wanting to bruise feeling with Bridges and suddenly appear on the Reserve side without letting him know - I called him up. Bridges was extremely gracious in his congradulations. I know that when I had been left behind in other call ups, I was dying inside, but if Bridges felt the same was, he never let slip. I tried to mitigate the call up by saying that it was likely only going to be for a couple of games, until the regular reserves either got back from loan, or reached fitness - and then added that maybe his call up wouldn't be to far behind.

I reached Melwood by late morning and met up with Mangani (who was also being called up). Coach Hughie McAuley greeted us in the parking lot and talked us down from our buzz while we were getting ready in the locker room. We pulled on our gear to run out to the pitches to warm up. There were some familiar faces around the feild - Simone Bertini and Paul Barret were about - but others like Leagear and Barragan were at the physio's and wouldn't be in for awhile.

Practice was a bit disjointed for me - never really feeling comfortable. I probably didn't reach out to my team mates as much as a newbie should in trying to make a good first impression - but I was always a bit of an introvert, telling myself that I led by example and not by word. I found myself working out of the midfeild and I had to smile inside knowing that it was very likely the place where I would see action on the pitch. I had previously been called on to play in defense when first invited to the club - but here was something I was much more comfortable with. Additionally, i think Paco Herrera wanted to keep my roll in the team as similar to what we had been practicing at the Academy so as not to overwhelm us during the jump up.

[uskopite]

13.10.2005

(Group 1 Reserves, Week #6)

Venue: Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

Opponent: Leeds Res. (3-0-2)

Attendance: 2061

U-18 LFC Starting Line-Up:

………Mellor……Platt

……………………………………

…Townley……Murphy……Guthrie

……………Mangani

Gonzales……O'Donnell……Woods……Bertini

………………Kirkland

Bench:

Barrett

Roberts

Jones

Peltier

Smyth

Score: Liverpool Res 2 - 0 Leeds Res.

Liverpool: Platt 8'(Murphy), Mellor 35'(Guthrie)

Leeds: None

Man of the Match: Terry Murphy

I think I was more nervous for this game, than I had been for any of my previous games. Last night I had a dream that I had scored a hat trick running away from Leeds, and had set up another one. Of course, during the dream, I figured out that I was dreaming, because I found myself on the bench during the game talking to Steven Gerrard. Funny, even in my dream I was quite star struck.

Anyhow, in real life, I felt like I was going to lose my lunch, minutes into the start of the game. Coach Herrera gave me very similar instructions to that which I had been getting from Coach Owens. Namely, get back on defense when you can, but jump up into attack and make your self a nuisance in the box. The thought was this would open space up. 7 Minutes into the game, I was in jostling in the box on a break, when Townley served in a dipping cross. I went up between two defenders and powered a header which the Leeds Keeper palmed back out, but Conal Platt was following in nicely and pounded in the rebound. We were off to a quick start - and a dream start for me. I would have rather punched in the cross, but the chaos in the box was sufficiently, uhh, chaotic - and Conal took advantage. (Liverpool 1 - 0 Leeds)

While I had hoped that would be the beginning to my dream and the beginning of Leeds nightmare, Leeds proved they were more than game, when away from home they came close to equalizing twice. The first was saved only by some timely intervention from Bertini, who would himself have quite a game. The next came at the expense of Bertini, as he cut down a Leeds break away, by cutting down the Leeds player - and earning a yellow for his troubles. The resultant free kick had Kirkland beat from go, but the Leeds bench jumped, only to watch the ball swerve around the pole.

Have lost the initiative, Leeds was staring at 2 - 0 in the 35th minute. A good run down the right wing had earned Townley a corner. Guthrie went over to take the set piece. Mellor took advantage of a situation that I have seen go for nowt thousands of time in pro and park games. A ball that is often over struck, normally rolls off the other side of the pitch because for some reason nobody can be arsed to show up at the back post. Such an easy situation to control. Maybe that is why Mellor comes up with so many goals, He is savy on the pitch. Guthries corner was a bit over struck, but Mellor was perfectly positioned, and took the corner sweetly on the volley, right past the keeper. (Liverpool 2 - 0 Leeds)

Conal all but made it three, but he volley off a flicked ball crashed off the post, just eluding my boot on the follow. I had the last effort of the half, when Townley's early cross put my half through in stride, but my rushed effort flew agonizingly inches left of the goal into the side netting.

Up two nil going into the half is often a very dicey score. It seems that more teams lose a clear to points when the opposition manages to get one back early, and presses and presses until that seconds one finally comes. Coach Herrera was determined not to let that happen. he subbed out Callum Woods, who was having a poor game at the back, and pushed Mark "Speedy" Gonzalez up the left flank to take the wing position from Townley, who had taken a knock near the end of the half. Peltier was brought in to marshal the central defense, and Mangani was dropped to left back to shore up the hole there.

That spelled a bit of doom for me, as that meant I would have to stay back a little more to provide cover for the back four.

I did get one last chance near the end of the game to strike a free kick for goal, but saw my effort go over from 22 yards.

We survived the early onslaught from Leeds, who were denied three times in a row during a stretch of play which saw Kirkland acrobatically tip a ball over. The corner was headed onto the frame of the goal, and a Leeds player following up the ill fated ball found himself blasting high into the stands when it would have been easier to just tuck it in.

The remainder of the game was relatively uneventful, as neither side could put their foot on the ball. I felt happy with my play, as my unique "talents" of being taller than anybody on the pitch was put to some use, and my build up play was good. I hoped that I had shown something to Coach Herrera. A few of the papers picked up on my play, and awarded me man of the match, while some gave it to Bertini or Kirkland for their heroics while the game was still in the balance for us.

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Stats:

Name(form)min/pas,cmp,key,tck,won,hea,won,key,int,run,off,fou,fld,sho,sot-gls/ast-note:

Terry Murphy(8) 90/13 10 1 1 1 8 7 2 1 2 1 2 4 3 1 - 0 goals/1 assist

[uskopite]

15.10.2005

I didn't know how long I was going to be at Mellwood for this stint, so I was determined to soak it up a bit. I still had to pinch myself a couple of times as during breakfast at the Canteen I would find myself sitting down from Gerrard and Carra. They'd be staring at the tele to get the latest, while I'd be staring at them. Bertini elbowed me once to break me out of it, and a couple of the other lads joked about me fancying other lads the way I was staring. Glad all this was out of ear shot of them. Didn't want them thinking I wasn't normal. . .

. . .trust me - you'd be doing it too if you were living such a dream.

[uskopite]

16.10.2005

What could that idiot have been thinking - was my first reaction to the news. What was he out doing instead? It's not like he was all that enamoured about the city of Liverpool and the community. He made it known that he'd already felt ill at ease here on the Mersey.

Hobbs had come in for dinner at the club resturant, and plopped down beside myself, Bertini, and Mannix (who was the guest of honor, as he labled himself - and for whom we were forced to pick up the check - ) Hobbs was still in with the physio working on getting back to full fitness. We were all floored when he announced that Legear had not shown up for treatment yesterday, or today. The cheeky little fecker had up and gone without leave.

That's it. For me, that was the last of him. I had no more time for the complainer. I would not be surprised if Rafa soon got shut of him, and either he was sent back down to the Academy to rot, or sent him away on loan to remove the distraction. I just didn't get it. I'd tried, others had tried - even Rafa had taken special care to bring him up a bit quicker (so it seemed to me) to urge him on and give him things to concentrate on. But the stupid g1t thought only of himself, so it seemed.

He'd better not be down with the Academy when/if I got put back down, as I would permanently put him with the physio's.

[uskopite]

19.10.2005

Liverpool v. Deportivo (Champions League)

With Liverpool jumping out to such a poor start in their champions league group with wildly entertaining, but dissapointing loss to Inter Milan, the kop choir was in full form to cheer the lads on against a recently impressive Deportivo side. Saw a couple of new banners and tee-shirts around the Kop end. A lot of us were getting together to fund a new - big style banner that would be passed around during the opening of games at Anfeild. There were already a couple of these larger than life sheets passed around - but this one looked sharpish. Didn't know when the banner itself would come out, but the tee-shirst were already making the rounds. I'll have to get a copy and show it to yers.

Anyhow, YNWA - and we were off to a quick start when off a corner kick, Sami Hyppia - stalwart and faithful, headed into the back of the net. Five minutes on and Momo Sissoko cracked a low flying screamer off a Kewell pull back, that would have snapped legs if a defender was unlucky enough to get in front of it. The net billowing - gave me a chance to start my latest Kop creation - penned for Momo . . .

to the tune of "JAWS"

Momo . . .

Momo . . .

Momo momo momo momo momo momo momo momo momo momo (repeat until the lad puts in his next crunching talking) then AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

It was simple - but we got a great laugh from those standing around us. I was hoping that that would catch on. Would be quality if it did.

Cisse put us up 3 nil just before halftime when he was dragged down in the box on a clear break away. He broke out his trade mark chest thumping celebration after sending the keeper the wrong way.

Morientes finished off the Liverpool scoring fun at the hour mark with a nice take down and volley off a Riise cross. Depor added a conselation strike in the dying minutes - but the full three points found Liverpool looking good to advance to the knockout round of the tourney. Both Bayern and Deportivo were floundering poorly - so another victory in the next three games would have us with one foot in.

[uskopite]

21.10.2005

It was very odd to see that the U-18 side were queueing up for a match that I was not going to be involved with. For whatever reason, Coach Herrera and Owens had kept me up with the reserve team for training. I supposed that was allright with me, as it would give me more time to show what I had in training and otherwise. Some of the other lads returned to the Academy in preps for the upcoming match against Derby's U18s. Ronnie Bridges had stayed behind and Mark Noble had returned from England U 18's recent European Qualification triumph. Jack Hobbs had gone back to shore up the defense, and perhaps get some training in after trying to come back from his recent knee injury.

I think that I could make it to the match as we would be in training at Melwood, but I'm sure word of how things went would filter up pretty quick.

No word yet on what the coaching staff's reaction was going to be for Legear's latest stunt. He was back in with the physio's but was looking none to happy to be there.

Gobshyte! Can you tell that I'm still fuming over his whinging?

[uskopite]

22.10.2005

The U18 side indeed had done well. Word came back to Melwood that they had defeated Derby 2 - 0 on goals by Nards and Noble. After the afternoon training session I phoned up Bridges and Noble to see how they made out. I guess Noble really bossed the midfeild, and his goal at the beginning of the second half had taken all of the wind out of Derby's sails, sealing the game. Bridges came on in the position that I normally take up, just behind the CM, but pressing forward in attack. He said that Hobbs looked okay, but was still struggling for match fitness and was clearly winded at the end. Everybody was pretty ****ed to hear that Legear had been acting a fool, but Noble opined that perhaps we shouldn't pass judgement on the lad as we didn't know what he was up to, nor what was going on in his head.

In any event we were made up to all get down to Anfeild right away as Liverpool squared off for thier home matchup against Premiership newcomers West Ham.

[uskopite]

22.10.2005

We were a bit late in taking up our seats in the Kop, so we didn't get to see Fernando Morientes goal in the 5th minute of play off a corner. The early strike had energized Anfeild, who might otherwise have had a lazy day watching West Ham try to smother the Reds in an effort to eek out a point.

The Hammers were giving a good account of themselves in the Premiership, looking odd on to avoid the immediate drop back down. But they came into to fortress Anfield with very little hope against ours - who were top of the League and on a great run of form - taking 21 of a possible 24 points.

We were in place to celebrate the second half of Moro's brace on the day in the 25th minute - and everybody sensed that the route could be on. West Ham cut into that buzz when Anton Ferdidand first brought down Crouch with an ugly tackle, from which he Crouch didn't get up from too well. To add to insult, Anton slotted home the Hammers penalty which Allen won when Hamman obstructed his dribble in the box.

In what would be a stroke of tactical nouse, Rafa brought on a very hungry Florent Sinama-Pongolle in place of Crouch at the half. At first he took up a position on the right wing, but later in the game, Rafa moved him off striker when Kewell picked up a knock and Zenden was brought in his place. Garcia moved out to the right wing, and Pongo began to run roughshod all over the Hammer defense.

Pongo earned a free kick near the Hammers box, which Riise bounced off the woodworks, and Zenden pounced on to put the Reds up 3 - 1.

A few minutes later, Sinama-Pongolle was at it again, put through by Risse with a nice pass - and his sweetly struck ball found it's way to the corner for 4 - 1.

King Luis finished off the absolute romp on West Ham when Zenden ripped the Hamers Defense to shreds and side footed a clear opportunity over to Luis to punch past the keeper.

Everybody was on 8 and 9's that game. But it was clear that Florent Sinama-Pongolle's intro in the second half is what cued the arse-kicking. It was good to see a previous Reserve regular do well up with the senior side. The other strikers behind him were as refined as Flo Po - but they saw him as a target, and as inspiration that maybe they too weren't far off from getting thier chance in front of the KOP.

[uskopite]

25.10.2005

As darn luck would have it, Liverpool had drawn Arsenal in the 3rd round of the League Cup. Not a ideal first matchup to come in on the tournament at - and not a fixture that would allow more of the reserves to figure in - if Liverpool wanted to advance to the later stages.

Having just handed the West Ham Hammer a comprehensive 5 - 1 shelacking though, most of the first teamers came into the game with buckets of confidence that they could turn Arsenal over, especially since we were drawn at home. Becuase this was a fixture that the reserve team normally figured heavily in, we were given the option of attending the game - and option which I was always eager to take up on.

Rafa had taken to pushing Gerrard out on the right flank with much more frequency and confidence now, especially as Gerrard had expressed a desire to serve Liverpool in whichever fashion the gaffa wished of him. The move truly did bring balance to a Liverpool team lacking in quality on the right side. . . The move seemed to do the trick as Liverpool opened up with a series of good chances - but then it all went south, as is apt to happen when Thierry Henry has an opening . . .

[uskopite]

. . . twice, in the space of 10 minutes, Henry darted through the offside trap to go one on one with Reina. If there were one player that most would love to have on thier team, it would be Henry. The silky smooth bastage ripped us for two before we even knew what hit us. Normally livepools trap is good, but Josemi had picked up a knock and was a step slow in keeping the line pushed forward.

Josemi was the subject of much debate at Liverpool. As a player, he seemed to have all the physical tools to dominate his side, and when he was on his game, he could also contribute mightily to the attack. But he suffered at postional awareness, and was apt to lunge into a tackle, when the better option would have been to corral the attacking to another defender. At any rate: Both times - Henry was played on by him. Josemi would be mortified - and later in the game, he would be subbed out for Finnan, who was quietly and unspectacularly the best RB on the team.

The funny thing was, that even as Arsenal were up 2 - nil, Ours kept right on battling. Chance after chance came, as first Gerrard would make a gut busting run, then Alonso would open Arse up on the break, or Kewell on the wing. However, it felt like one of 'those' days when it doesn't matter how many good chances (did I say good, cause I meant brilliant) you have - nothing is going to find the back of the net.

Deep into the second half, and it looked like we were going out of the cup early. As quickly as Henry had struck us - fate struck back at the Arse. Viera -- the destroyer and lynchpin for the team, when down in the 71st minute grabbing his calf. In the 73rd minute - Alonso, finding himself with loads more time on the ball picked out Cisse with a peach of a cross. Cisse's blast was stopped, but spilled by Lehman, and Crouch was there to bundle in the rebound. 1 - 2

LIFE . . .

10 minutes later, Gerrard fed Cisse a through ball. Cisse was felled by Campbell, just outside of the box. Alonso stepped up to bang in the free kick, which took a deflection on the way to the back of the net. 2 - 2

EVEN

Cisse had a chance to end it before the extre periods, but blasted his chance high into the stands.

Extra time - for a Micky Mouse cup wasn't exactly what the lads were hoping for. So they might as well win it if they were going to have to play it.

In the 99th minute of play - Alonso banged in ANOTHER free kick - this one from about 30 yards out. Again it took a deflection to get it past Lehman, who was difficult to beat until the last minute of the 2nd extra period, when Cisse burst through the Arsenal defense and basically dribbled around Lehman to tuck the final kick of the match away. 4 - 2

Though the game lacked the atmosphere of a European Night we were in raptures for the thrilling display witnessed.

[uskopite]

29.10.2005

It has felt like ages since I last played. 2 weeks now - and what was worse, the U18 and the Seniors were ramped up for ANOTHER run out. Me . . . sitting here . . .dying to get a game. I swear, if I dont' make it into the next reserve game, I am going to go mad!!

After that fantastic win by liverpool over Arsenal in the league cup, everybody in the reserve was hoping for a much easier draw in the fourth round - with an eye to competing for cup glory and catch Rafa's eye. So, when Birmingham came out of the hat there were a few sighs of frustration from the more fringe players, who were hoping for at least a Championship side to roll out on. However, overall people felt it could have been worse. Mellor and Sinama-Pongolle were both looking for a run out. With Mellor's patience and form, I don't think he would be long in the waiting.

Liverpool had travelled on the day to The Valley, to take on a fairly consistent Charlton side who were sitting 6th on the league being paced by Matt Holland and Jason Euell, both with six talles apeice. It was also another reunion and chance for former Red Danny Murphy to link up with some old friends.

Danny Murphy had left under dissapointing terms for him. Danny was part of the good ole boys of English clique, which included the likes of Mike Owens, Gerrard and Carragher. When Rafa was brought in, Owens already had one foot out the door on his way to Real Madrid. (I checked the stats for Mikey, and the poor lad was still getting next to no consistent first team action, yet was still plugging away at more than a goal per game!!) Rafa brought Alonso and Garcia with him, who both became instant kop stars, as well a few few other Spanish league flavors. Rafa also sought to break up the English clique, which Murphy hinted that he didn't like. It was obvious that Alonso was going to get the run outs and free kicks that Murphy had been getting under Houllier, so he wasn't too upset that Charlton came knocking. Rafa also didn't object, as he looked at the money he would get for Murphy as a means of justifying the players he had already brought in. So there it was. Now Murphy was playing good football at another team, and had something of a scab to pick at left over from his Liverpool days.

The reserve side wouldn't be attending as we had our own business to attend to. I'd have to catch the details online or in the papers.