I have avoided the internet since returning home from Phill's yesterday afternoon with a coal-black cloud hanging over me following Everton's meek Wembley capitulation to probably the worst Liverpool team and manager since the Souness era. I have also not watched any TV news or MotD, so all of this is without meeja influence.
Since the start of the week when I was optimistic of our chances of overturning a hoodoo against Liverpool in cup semi finals and finals that stretches back to 1906 would you believe, I slowly but inexorably became more and more pessimistic, a mood change that often accompanies approaching derby games. Arriving at Phill's some ten or so minutes prior to kick off you could have powered the TV from from my nerve endings, such was my charged state. As the game kicked off and despite Liverpool's initial gung-ho attitude, it soon became apparent that the blue team were the only group of players on the pitch who seemed to know what "team" actually meant. Liverpool looked like they had only just met each other and we slowly but surely gained the upper hand with an unsettling ease - optimism does not sit well with us Toffees.
Then a classic "to me, to you" moment between Carragher (couldn't have happened to a nicer bloke) and Agger let in Cahill, and there was only going to be one outcome once he had passed it to Jelavic. Woohoo! We were 1-0 up, looking the better team, and had we upped our game and taken it to them we could and indeed should have all but sealed the game before half time, but it wasn't to be as we seemed strangely reticent even after going a goal up. This can only be a result of the manager's defensive temperament taking over, as you can't imagine any team 'Arry manges going into their shell after taking a lead, can you?
Come the second half you knew that Liverpool would come out all guns blazing and this is what happened and this is also where the psychological hold they have over us came into play. Our key players were all disappearing, Baines never getting forward, Fellaini wandering about looking lost and Cahill invisible. To cap it all our most consistent defender of the season then gifted that dreadful excuse for a human being that is Luis Suarez with the simplest of goals and it was 1-1. Despite Phill's assurances that we would still win, I knew that there was only one team winning this game and it wasn't us.
By now Andy Carroll, the £3.5 million player for whom Comolli mistakenly moved the decimal point before signing the cheque, had missed a couple of sitters, to much derision from Phill, although I kept fairly quiet as I knew what was coming, and it duly did. Taking on the role of Moses, where Distin and Heitinga were the Red Sea, The Lummox rose like an overweight ballet dancer to Bellamy's corner, and even he couldn't miss the target. 2-1, game over, I went home.
In conclusion, I can only say that due to their performance in the second half and in particular the last 15 minutes, Liverpool deserved to win, and that is the fault of one person alone. We lost this match because David Moyes does not know how to attack a game when we've taken the lead, and this uncertainty translates itself to to the team. Although defending a 1-0 lead might work against West Brom and their ilk, it ain't going to work against a team like Liverpool, crap as they may be. He is also incapable of the psychological man-management that would get rid of a jinx that has gone on for far too long against our beloved neighbours.
About the only good thing you can say is that at least Liverpool cannot come up against a defence as generous as ours was in the final...ah...unless Spurs win this afternoon.
Right, I'm off to punch some walls.
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