Sunday, August 30, 2009

John Aldridge: Liverpool FC At The ‘Must Win’ Stage Already

It sounds daft to say it so early in the season but Saturday’s match at Bolton really is a must win game.

Two defeats in the first three games isn’t the start any of us were expecting and the players have to put things right.

Teams have won the league despite losing five games in recent years but there is now little room for error if we are going to challenge at the top.

When you lose to the likes of Tottenham and Aston Villa you put yourself under pressure when you go into the big games against Manchester United, Man City, Arsenal, Chelsea and Everton.

We’ve got four league games before we go to Stamford Bridge on October 4.

It’s imperative that we beat Bolton, Burnley, West Ham and Hull just to ease that pressure a bit before facing Chelsea.

Bolton are feeling the heat as well at the moment but for different reasons.

They have started poorly and could find themselves in a relegation battle this season.

Bolton hasn’t progressed as a club since Sammy Lee left and if anything they have gone backwards.

The match against Villa on Monday was hugely disappointing.

We created more than enough chances to win the game but we gave away three very poor goals.

It was a silly foul Lucas gave away for the first one. We gave that referee too many opportunities to give free-kicks against us in dangerous areas.

Villa had a huge slick of luck with the own goal and then we switched off at a corner.

It was a seriously bad goal to concede at a seriously bad time.

After that it was an uphill task and the penalty killed it.

Steven Gerrard will hold his hands up for that mistake.

It’s too easy for people to say we’re missing Xabi Alonso.

There were too many basic errors and it’s up to everyone to roll their sleeves up and prove we have the quality to bounce back.

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