STATEMENT OF INTENT

Some days it's just brilliant to watch Liverpool. Sunday was one of those days.
A combination of some wonderfully fluid passing and incisiveness from the Reds, and some wretched defending from Newcastle was responsible for the 1-5 drubbing.
In truth, 1-10 wouldn't have flattered us, as we spurned some great early chances that fell to Gerrard, Gerrard, Lucas, Lucas, Hyppia, Hyppia, Hyppia, Kuyt...and they're the only ones that I can remember.
For once, there were big performances right across the Liverpool side. Only Babel failed to deliver.
And it was a joy that the usual brilliance from Gerrard was matched with outstanding contributions from Lucas, Kuyt, Benayoun and Mascherano.
It's a genuinely frightening prospect that we played with such devastating poise without the £50m talent of Keane and Torres.
From the start we cut through the limp Newcastle resistance.
Sometimes Kuyt is criticized from his work up front, but his performance as the lone striker was crucial.
His control, willingness to show for the ball, ability to bring other players into the game, and desire to chase anything played up to him was top, top class.

All across the park, we had confident players asking Newcastle serious questions.
Benayoun was having one of those afternoons where he looked a real threat on the ball, a case in point for the first goal.
An under-pressure Mascherano played a lovely ball through to an onrushing Israeli, who showed great composure to set up Gerrard who couldn't miss.
The captain was having one of those afternoons were it was almost impossible to stop him, and the performance of the whole side vindicated Rafa's somewhat baffling decision to keep a patently in-form Robbie Keane on the bench.
As strange a choice as that was, there can be no complaints when Rafa's chosen 11 play as well as this.
Vying with Gerrard for Man of the Match was Lucas Leiva, who truth be told, was outstanding.
The Brazilian has had many critics, myself included, but performances here, against PSV and Arsenal recently show he might have finally turned a significant corner.
Tellingly, he has started to get in goalscoring positions and is starting to look like the rampaging midfielder we salivated over in all of those YouTube clips.
He saw a lot of the ball at St James' Park, and he decided to pass the ball forwards, creatively, rather than touch three yard passes to a colleague, his big failing of the recent yesteryear.
He should have scored a hat-trick, but was denied by various bits of brilliance by Given, but it was heartening to see the South American getting into the box so regularly.
And the pass for Gerrard's second was a true sign of class - if it had been delayed a split-second longer the captain would have been flagged offside.

All round the pitch, there were notable showings.
Mascherano was snapping at anything in black and white that moved, Yossi had a real appetite for causing havoc on the right and Carragher, Insua and Agger brought the ball out of defence with authority.
Only Babel was a let-down. Given a start by Benitez, the Dutchman never looked like troubling his full-back, and moves frequently broke down when the ball reached the feet of the winger-cum-striker.
It didn't particularly matter as all the other players were so dominant, yet the lack of end product from our £11m signing is becoming a big concern.
Still, he did score after some more comedy defending from the Toon Army, and produced a Tardelli 1982 World Cup celebration of ecstacy to boot.
It was only a tap-in, our Ryan!

We'll have many tougher tests to come, but beating Newcastle so comprehensively minus Torres, Keane and Riera was a real filip.
And Chelsea being pegged back by Fulham was a lovely belated Christmas present. All we need now is a slip up from Man Utd when they start playing their catch-up games and we'll be in one hell of a position.
There are still improvements to be made, something alluded to by Gerrard in post-match interview, which was pleasing.
The continual spurning of gilt-edged chances in the first half was very reminiscent of the Spurs game, when they cruelly came back to bite us.
If we can learn to be a little bit more clinical when we're swarming all over teams, we could be soon the complete package.
But points like that seem incidental after a 5-1 rout away from home.
Even the so-called experts are being forced to take Liverpool seriously now. Let's keep hoping.