Liverpool VS Manchester,2nd leg

Great atmosphere in Greenbank preceeded this important match for Liverpool on sunday. The lads from Salford got the best from Nottingham by 2 goals, so that meant that a victory would qualify Liverpool for the playoffs The first half was all about 2 awesome defences and 2 very inspired keepers. MAnchester´s top scorer Thomas was under control thanks to a brilliant defence by Sean and amazing saves by Yetis. Scores were only 4 to 3 to Liverpool with 10 minutes to go! Things carried on this way until the end of the first half,but 2 things were already developing: Liverpool´s players return to defence started to fail,which started to affect the concentration of the players in defence, and Manchester changed their attacking system to a more mobile one with Thomas in the centre and lots of line-player involvement. Liverpool were up by one at break, but they needed to get their strenght and concentration in defence back if they wanted to maintain their advantage. This didn´t quite happen in the 2nd half,and slowly Manchester got closer and passed Liverpool in the score. At this point it was going to be small things that would decide who the winner of the match was going to be...And that is were Liverpool failed,as it has happened several times before this season... Silly technical mistakes (lost easy passes, steps...) and hot-headness at crucial points helped Manchester to get a 4 goal lead,the biggest in the match so far... Nonetheless and despite being drained physically (Liverpool had lost one of their new signings due to a shoulder injury,a very skilled french player), the team fought hard and gave 100% and suddenly we were back in the game with 2 goals down,2 minutes to go and the ball in our possesion That is were the dream finished,after another silly lost ball and the lack of players in the court at that moment that could take "cost-effective" risks,MAnchester were able maintain the lead and finally win the match 3 goals up. Now Liverpool depends on Liverpool Speke Garston to maintain their playoff hopes: if they win in the last game of the regular season against Nottingham we will qualify,watch this space!!

Liverpool VS Salford, 2nd leg

The match started with both teams going for powerful shots, attack prevailing over defence... Liverpool relied more on its taller players, Salford playing the ball and creating gaps. Liverpool´s 5:1 defence couldn´t control Salfords moves and they went ahead on the game. At this point Gonzalo came on the game. Tall left hand player, he started scoring for Liverpool too. Now Salford was getting hit from both sides and when Liverpool started defending 6:0 they got the edge over Salford and went 3 goals up with about 6 minutes to finish the first half. Things starting to get rough then. Salford´s young players got frustrated and started hitting harder in defence, hitting in the necks and grabbing players from behind. The referees didn´t sanction and stop this type of defence play and some of the Liverpool players started to get involved in the roughness, talking back to the Salford players and coach-goalie... Salford got what they were after as all this mess de-stabilised Liverpools game, which started to become sloppy and unnecessarily risky, all this culminating in a direct red card to Gonzalo after pushing Salford´s winger in a break. Salford ended up only one goal ahead in the first half, but Liverpool players looked defeated already, one of their best men out for the whole game and their game nervous and full of silly mistakes again. The second half followed the path of the end of the first. Salford carried on ahead. Some unbalanced decisions from the refs helped get the edge over Liverpool, who got back-to back 2 minute exclusions for 10 minutes, while Salford players where allowed to shout at the refs and hit Liverpool players with no intention of getting the ball... About 20 minutes left, and the refs decided to give another red card to Sergio, one of the pillars of Liverpool´s defence, after a late hit on Salford´s centre back player. The direct red was unnecessary as there had been far more voilent hits during the game. Added to this, unexperienced Salford players, especially the left half, went on and on during the match doing steps, double-dribble, attack faults... none of this was picked up by the refs, which added to Liverpool´s players and coach frustration. Whether this lack of refereeing of such basic things was due to simple bad refereeing skills or taking pity on unexperienced players remains to be seen, but nonetheless it won´t help Salford in the playoff games where refereeing gets more serious... they will probably get very frustrated then when they start getting stricter ref decisions against them! After this the game went on, each team scoring on turns... Liverpool got a few goals back at the end of the game after playing a 5:1 defence on Salford´s most dangerous player, Aden, and the match ended with Liverpool 9 goals down and thus Salford taking the edge over them looking at the playoffs. Now Liverpool needs to at least get one point in their last game against first spot Manchester to go through to the playoffs!

By Tavi Aragon

30/01/10

LHC won the 27-18 against a determine Manchester University team to set up a must win and crucial game against Salford for the playoff positions on Sunday 14th of Feb at Greenbanks. Due to exams the university team was not at full strength but they did show a fighting spirit having won their previous game. The game started evenly with a 3-3 draw after the first 10 minutes. However after a sending off for the university team and a score of 14-6 at half time it was unlikely for them to stage a comeback.

Authors View: Maybe a sloppy preformance at the end of the game (last 10 min). The defense was superb at the first half with only conceding 6. Best Performance so far from Antonio Juan (Toni) for the Team. Well done to the team for the win.

Liverpool Handball Club achieve that highly regarded national standard Clubmark.