Monday, December 27, 2004

Match Report 041226 at West Bromwich Albion: A Merry Christmas!

5-0 win in away and it is an excellent, although I would prefer to spread a few goals to the other away games so that we can get more points. But on a day all teams above us except Boro win, we definitely need this win.

We started the game brightly and have a lot of possession, and we never in danger apart from a few unlikey error from Carra, which Hyypia and Dudek handled brightly to help Carra out. Riise in particular was superb. 2 goals, 2 assists and in fact he should score at least 2 more. And Milan's miss penalty did not even matter. Hope this won't affect his confidence.

Player Rating:
Dudek: 7.5 Finally a cleansheet. And Dudek had made a fewgreat saves when te game was not fully settled.
Finnan: 7 A good display linking well with Nunez.
Carragher: 6.5 Certainly not his day. Have a slip and that almost result to a West Brom bt luckily Hyypia saved Carra.
Hyypia: 7.5 Saved Carra and he is very solid throughout.
Traore: 7 A better performance than the previous few games.
Nunez: 7 He's getting there. His crossings were very good and one of his shot resulted in Contra handballed and got sent off.
Gerrard: 8 His assist to Riise's first goal was superb. And scored another great freekick. Rafa even has the luxury to rest him after 62 minutes.
Hamann: 7 Proves he still has a place in the team especially in away games. And his assist to Gerrard was simple and effective.
Riise: 10 Two goal, two assists. What can you say? Perhaps he should score more?
Pongolle: 8 Worked very hard and was very lively and causing West Brom defense lots of problems. And he scored a well derseved goal with the perfect 1-2 pass with Riise.
Baros: 6.5 Not his day. His penalty was weak. And we need him back to his best ASAP to face Southampton and Chelsea.

Substitutions:
Alonso: 7 Provided some classy passes and one of it resulted in the 2nd Riise goal.
Garcia: 7 Provided us another dimension of attack when come up, and scored a great goal thanks to yet another Riise assist.
Warnock: 6.5 Not much impact when come up.

Rafa: 9 Excellent tactics and get a well derseved win. He should also note Riise plays better at midfield than defence, and Traore is definitely a left back, not left wing.

West Brom: No team at the bottom of the league at Christmas Day will every survive in the Premiership, and I don't think they will be an exception.

Man of the Match: Riise. How can you not give him credit for such a performance?

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