Liverpool didn't deserve the win. Anyone who says otherwise is kidding themselves. The West Ham game was completely different though. They upped their game sufficiently against us, we played poorly and the Hammers deserved what they got. I must admit though, losing in the manner we did was not to my liking.
Then we have the debacle against Viking where, quite simply, I could not believe what I was seeing! We were outplayed by a bunch of also-rans. Yes, the statistics may say that we had more possesion but we lacked a cutting edge in our passing whereas they seemed to have precision in their touch and excellent movement. It will be interesting to see if they raise there game like that in their league matches this year...
The players, to my great surprise, raised their game against Liverpool though. I expected Ranieri to ring the changes, but he stuck with the majority of the players and they repaid his faith with a resolute performance.
Even the usually ineffective Manu Petit was excellent and I'm hoping that he can build on this performance. And wasn't Marcel Desailly and William Gallas superb as a partnership. John Terry is going to have to wait in the wings for a while yet as these guys are forming quite a bond.
But Jesper Gronkjaer is one player who needs to take a good look at himself and decide, "do I want to take my game to the next level?"
He has so much promise and the way that he glides past players is a joy to watch. But his end product is so poor! He constantly wastes excellent chances with his lacklustre crossing and poor judgement. It is frustrating to say the least but, with the right coaching, it can be overcome. And if it is, we will have the new Ryan Giggs...