The Liverpool Way - First Team

After a terrible week, the Reds got a much needed boost as a solid if unspectacular performance took us back to Cardiff for a tenth League Cup final.

Steven Gerrard's second half strike was enough to split the sides in a game that we never looked likely to lose.

Watford's players fancied their chances after limiting us to a 1-0 win two weeks beforehand, but in reality their fans knew they were bridesmaids only. How else can you explain the number of yellow t-shirts with "road to the semi final" on them.

Watford town centre has probably never been so busy on a Tuesday, with police who normally deal with skateboarders driving their CCTV vans round hoping to catch Scousers up to no good.

When I went to Watford in the league in 1999-00, a mix up by bar staff led to me having a free meal in the Rat & Parrot, although by my own admission I hardly tried to remind them of this at the time. It's played on my mind since, but any attempts to settle the debt were futile as the pub has disappeared.

The High Street is full of chain pubs like O'Neills and Chicago Rock, all of which are a ten minute walk from the ground leading to quite an atmosphere from the Reds following outside.

Once inside however it was diluted somewhat by large portion of daytrippers in the 4500 capacity away end. Towards the back the atmosphere was quite good, but nearer the front, where many tickets had been sold on general sale, too many needed to be told which colour Liverpool were playing in.

It's horrible when men take their clueless girlfriends to the match with them and I was unfortunate enough to be amongst many of them despite buying my ticket on the first day of sale. In front of me where one ridiculous couple who spent half time sharing a Mars bar and snogging.

Another frustration was the fact that Watford have one of those terrible stadium announcers, who tells fans when the teams are about to come out (just in case no-one knew kick off time) and also reminds them of the half and full time score.

The teams came out to thousands of balloons from the home end and then we were plunged into darkness as the lights in the stand were switched out. I know there's not much money outside the Premiership, but this was cost cutting in the extreme.

But I could see the game and that was the main thing, even though the first half was lacking in any real goalmouth incidents. Fernando Morientes was menacing, getting into positions as well as setting up chances for others.

He is looking fitter and sharper with every game and all he needs is a goal to really get him going. His best chance in the first half came in the 26th minute when a strong shot was deflected just wide.

Milan Baros tested Paul Jones with a couple of efforts but perhaps the best chances fell to John Arne Riise, who disappointingly sent one tamely wide and miscued another completely high into the stand.

We also broke well from a corner on the half hour only for Steven Gerrard to try and find Baros rather than run for goal himself. The Czech was then knocked off the ball near the edge of the box.

Despite having the better of the play, there was always the worry at the back of the mind that Watford would nick a goal, although the return of Jamie Carragher to the centre and Steve Finnan to the right did make us stronger.

There was always the danger that the "long pork sausage" would gift the opposition something, but unusually it was Finnan who almost got us into trouble in the fortieth minute, bringing down Bouzza.

Luckily Mike Riley was on hand to wave play on. Riley is one of the best referees in the business when it comes to totally alienating one section of the crowd and he did so again. It was nice to see that it was to our advantage for a change this time as he was booed off the pitch.

Liverpool upped the tempo at the beginning of the second half, clearly looking to kill the game rather than risk a late Watford winner taking us into extra time. Baros was clean through on fifty minutes but was denied by a Cox tackle and Morientes muscled his way through only to take one touch too many and Watford cleared.

Morientes then tried an overhead kick that wasn't too far away, but it wasn't all one way traffic. Helguson wasted a good opportunity and we had to rely on Pellegrino to clear from the six yard box. The Argentine probably had his best game so far (which isn’t hard compared to the other two) but in my opinion I don't see he is any better than Stephane Hanchoz.

Gerrard was doing his best to drive us on to the final. His passing was good, as was his determination to get into the box, but his corner taking was poor, with 50% of them failing to beat the first defender.

After he was brought down in the area and Riley waved play on, he provided a great ball to Riise who rampaged down the left only for Baros and Morientes to fail to meet the cross.

Biscan also had a low drive go across the face of goal. There are many who would say Biscan shouldn't play for us again after the Burnley debacle, but to be fair to him he put in a far better effort at Watford.

The deserved goal finally came on 76 minutes when Gerrard burst through and hit a low shot into the bottom left hand corner of the goal. Celebrations were not as grand as could have been for a semi final, in fact from my angle it was just relief that we had finally scored after three games without a goal and there'd be no extra time.

The whole of the team ran over to congratulate him, which I have to say was nice of them considering the low opinion he has of his team mates.

The last quarter of an hour passed without any real incident as Watford resigned themselves to their fate. We were much more likely to score another than they were, but there was time for Florent Sinama Pongolle to come on and tear his cruciate ligaments whilst simply trotting along.

It's hard to believe just how much bad luck we are having with injuries this season. Just as we get much needed firepower up front by signing Morientes, another forward drops out for the season. He was replaced by Luis Garcia, whose first act was to foul a Watford player. I suppose we should be glad he got stuck in.

It was then time for a quick YNWA before the final whistle and clapping the players for their efforts. It was nice to see Darren Potter get on, given the youngsters have made way for experienced pros now the competition has reached an advanced stage.

Then it was back to the car for a long drive home, preceded by 45 minutes stuck in a car park, ring road and roundabouts. Any town with a ring road and roundabouts has to be avoided and I'm told we should count ourselves lucky it wasn't Saturday, when it's twice as worse.

So now its on to Cardiff for our sixth trip there, equalling Arsenal's record. Personally I'm glad we've got Chelsea, as United owe us one for 1983 and 2003.

After the heartbreaking New Years Day defeat what more motivation should we need. The players should just think Mike Riley, Frank Lampard and Xabi Alonso, then fuck the arrogant bastards big time.

Liverpool: Dudek, Finnan, Carragher, Pellegrino, Traore; Baros (Sinama-Pongolle) (Garcia) , Hamann , Biscan, Gerrard, Riise; Morientes:

Agree or disagree? Email me at steve@liverpoolway.co.uk

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