Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Kenny's Exeter Plan

Kenny Dalglish admits our premature exit from last season's Carling Cup will be in his mind when selecting a side to face Exeter on Wednesday night.

The boss will make changes to his team while guarding against any repeat of our penalty shoot-out exit to League Two strugglers Northampton in last year's third round.

He told Liverpoolfc.tv: "We had a bad result last year against Northampton at home, and we'll do our best to avoid another bad result. We want to do the very best we can in this competition and although there will be some changes in the personnel we put out, the attitude should be exactly the same as it was on Saturday at the Emirates.

"We'll give people an opportunity to play. The training has been superb, as has their attitude and commitment, so they deserve a game.

"But it's not a game we just want to go through the motions for and fulfil our obligations in playing the fixture - we want to make sure we have a chance. We're not getting them (other players) involved because we're undermining the competition or we're undermining the football club at Exeter."

Paul Tisdale's side beat Yeovil 2-0 to progress to the second round but have lost their last three League One outings.

Last time they faced Liverpool in this competition it ended 11-0 on aggregate - with Dalglish scoring in both legs.

But the gaffer added: "You totally respect any team you're going to play. We've put as much effort into our preparation for this game as we did for Arsenal on Saturday.

"Exeter hasn’t had too much good luck, but they've played quite well - they've just not had any breaks at the right time. They had a difficult game on Saturday at Preston when they had a guy sent off after 20 minutes, but they only lost 1-0 and hit the bar in the second half.

"It's going to be difficult, but in the way we're going to approach the game we'll have no excuse for a lack of preparation."

Spirits are high among players and staff after our first away win at Arsenal in 11 years at the weekend, but Dalglish isn't getting carried away - nor is he prepared to countenance talk of a possible Wembley final in the New Year.

"We'll just take our time," he said. "If we have any designs on getting anywhere, then we've just got to take our time and be responsible.

"This time last year there was a lot of disappointment because the club hadn't started so well which fortunately we've changed a little bit - but let's not get carried away or be running before we can walk. Let's just take our time.

"The boys were brilliant at Arsenal on Saturday, but we're not going to get carried away with one result - and neither should anybody."

Dalglish, who has a full squad to chose from bar the injured Glen Johnson and Steven Gerrard, also had a few words to say about the transfer of Sotirios Kyrgiakos to Wolfsburg, which was confirmed by Liverpoolfc.tv on Monday night.

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