West Bromwich Albion 0 - Liverpool 0

oshawabaggie:

That point could be vital in keeping us up, especially with some of the others picking up wins today. On the face of it a draw against Liverpool is hard to criticize. Given the fact that our squad is full of slow, ponderous defenders Pulis sets us up to play the only way we can and get something out of a game, so they have to be congratulated for a job well done.

On the other hand we sit so deep, that you feel we could get scored on at any point. We did create three decent chances in the second half, but overall we would have been very lucky to come away with three points.

Assuming we do survive, and that is still not assured, it will be interesting to see how the squad is strengthened this summer. The possible sale of the club doesn't help at all. Peace has apparently set a deadline after which he will reaffirm his commitment to the club, but that must be unsettling to Pulis and his staff. After all he quit Palace because of a lack of clear commitment by the owner. Macca showed why we forked out four million quid for him and Mozza was his usual energetic self.

It's hard to see us holding out Chelsea, Arsenal and Man U playing like that, so our best chance of points is at Newcastle, who must be getting very nervous at this stage. We are probably safe, but it will still be a nervous last month I think.

Didcot Baggie:

Are we safe? Probably, but anything could still happen - today's point could be really, really valuable so credit to the team and coach for making sure we got it.

A classic Pulis team performance. Big on hard work, gritty defending and organisation. Low on creativity until McManaman was introduced which suggested he looks like a good acquisition. The Albion performance can be summarised as great tackling, hopeless passing and distribution. We played far too deep - often with 10 men behind the 25 yard line. I like Craig Dawson but he is no full back - Ede gave him a hard time as have many others this season. Big Vic spent far too much time on his backside rather than holding the ball up.... but a point is a point - lets hope its enough.

Oh and a word about Mozza - player of the season by a country mile. Once again worked his socks off to good effect.

Kev Buckley:

Dunno what the coach said to them at half time but it worked.

We went from 22% posession to 24% by the time the game ended, and 3 shots with 0 on target had become 10 for 4.

It was a bit of gamble though, in that Liverpool's 7 and 0, became 22 and 5 once we'd come out of our defensive shell but I guess that's the risk you have to take if you want to play that sort of football at home.

I suppose this just throws up the old question, asked of many of the same old starting XI many times before: why can't they play as well as they do in the second half, from the start of the games?

One more half-time stat caught my eye, a comparison between Gerrard and Fletcher: Gerrard completed 51 passes, at a 71% completion rate, whist Fletcher made thirty passes less and completed just 7 for a 33% rate, in other words, he can't pass to a team-mate two out of every three times he tires to. Is he really any better than Graham Dorrans ?

I guess his acquisition is just a logical addition to our goal of doing the bigs clubs a favour by taking their "not quite ready for prime time hopefuls" on loan instead of using our contracted squad, in that we'll also give their has-beens a place to go to see out their last days too, even though we already have enough of our own.

Moments to savor were bringing on a winger, albeit taking off the only player with any height up front who might have got on the end of a cross, and a sublime use of the ball by Chris Baird, brought on to be the final nail in the defensive coffin placed around our goal, a ball played, in the 87th minute, into an empty far corner, but weighted so perefctly that it didn't go out of play and so used up a few more precious seconds whilst Liverpool retrieved it so as start again. It must take hours of practice during the week to make the kind of pass that not only kills time but also doesn''t fool your team-mates into thinking it was a ball meant for one of them enough that they'd bother using up energy chasing it. Perfection!

Those of you who are still paying to watch this shite have my utmost admiration, whilst those of you who excuse it by saying that a Liverpool who were dicked by an Agbonglehor-less Villa the week before, required such an approach to be taken, at home, should be asked to pay twice to be able to revel in it all, so as to lower the cost for everyone else.