2025-26 UEFA Champions League

I don’t what your source but I think to say var didn’t follow protocol last night is plain wrong. Var can check for frees awarded on the edge of the penalty box to see if they were in the box, come on like…this is well established. It happened in Brentford vs Liverpool the other week

The referee in the Liverpool-Madrid game made 2 mistakes at once, gave a foul that wasn’t and gave it as a free when it was inside the penalty area. The decisions were poor, those referees need help. The VAR fixed the errors, shows why it is worth having.

I think having the VAR means the referee can get help on decisions like whether that potential handball was inside or outside the penalty area and I think that is a good thing, The VAR intervening to ask the referee to check when they have incorrectly given a foul that results in a penalty is also a good thing. End result here is 2 incorrect decisions were corrected. Ideally with Connected Ball technology working it doesn’t matter if the viewer can tell from a slow motion replay if a handball is inside the penalty area, the technology can map the location of the contact, I don’t know if this was used, or is permitted to be used, in that game for that situation.

But the bigger argument is how they have ruined football with stupid rules about what is a handball now. All this intentional/unintentional, natural/unnatural position etc. I think that decision last night against Madrid would have been a very harsh penalty. Guys have to be able to throw their bodies in the way of shots without having to worry about the lottery of whether the ball hits their arm or not. For me its over complicating the game. And ruining the consistency of decisions.

The lucky thing is it didn't change the outcome of the game

I feel we're just on the VAR discussion, which in fairness is important, but not talking about Liverpool's performance enough, especially Co Tyrone's Conor Bradley keeping Vini Jr quiet

Slot said afterwards that Real Madrid had won 14 of 15 games this season, scoring in all of them, with 24 of the 26 goals scored having a goal involvement (scored or assist) by Mbappé or Vini Jr

So the gameplan was to press high and then drop into a low block as soon as possible to prevent runs behind and Bradley was a massive part of that. All 4 defenders played well but he was a stand out

That's 2 clean sheets in a row with the same defenders and goalkeeper. Stability is helping, with Wirtz last night the only new outfield signing starting the game and none at the weekend.

Puts much less pressure on the San Siro game. Win against PSV and I think you can write off Inter Milan completely, wouldn't bother me to lose that one

Neither. I keep saying it but my point clearly isn't getting through, over 3mins were wasted during a review that were never added back, at a time when one team had momentum

I've never said anything about correct protocol not being followed?

And, since you ignored it, the actual point of that post is to highlight that we're focusing too much on the VAR incident rather than the performance, which I gave some discussion points on....and you want to pull it back towards VAR when I'm literally saying it didn't affect the outcome

There's much more to talk about from the game is my point. All 87mins plus added time.

I think the Courtois save from Szoboszlai was excellent and he parried away 2 more from him in that same half, I definitely think we were the better team by halftime.

I also think however that Madrid never played at more than 80% of their ability

They know that they'll walk into a quarter final with little opposition. As there's no peril in the group phase for them (they won first 3 games) it meant they didn't really have to go hell for leather in their away game against the Pot 1 team (on paper should be the toughest of the 8 games)

So I think that's what we saw a bit. They were trying, sure, but I reckon they had more gears and I wouldn't want to play them again in the knockouts

But the performance mattered much more to Liverpool given recent results and the game coming up this weekend

Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but since we also played Madrid at Anfield last season I think that means that if we qualify for the CL next season we can't draw them again at Anfield in the League Phase right?

Isn't the rule that you can't have the same fixture 3 years in a row in the CL?

If so, I'm delighted, don't want to have to face them again at home this time next year!

… La Liga is poor (two and a half teams, A Madrid being the half) but they get four automatic qualification places which just shows how the odds are stacked against the smaller leagues.
Villarreal are utter s***e

why osimhen is playing in turkey is possibly an even bigger mystery.

Also does any soccer broadcaster in Britain and Ireland not employ shay given as a pundit?

Is that Glenn Hoddle on co comms? No idea what he's on about, it's a clear foul

Andy Townsend

Damien Delaney looks like he has a very deep long cut under his right eye

Money I presume