Recently by Luke Traynor

THAT'S 4. That's right, four.
How refreshing it was to see Liverpool finally rediscover inventive, positive football.
There were some of us who thought it had well and truly been banished from Anfield.

SOME people were describing this game as a 'gimme' for Liverpool leading into it.
I remember thinking at the time that was a bizarre comment.
Gimme?
For a team playing so poorly? And a team that has never risen above average all season?

WHO rankles us Reds more, Neil Warnock or Sam Allardyce?
Now, there's a question.
Every time we play a Big Sam-run team, there's always plenty of pretext and sub-plot and veiled chatter, which often, is more amusing, provoking, or downright irritating, than the action on the field itself.

WHAT a task just to type out their name!
And what a task it was to play them, Anfield bearing witness to an obdurate display from the little-known Romanians.

Liverpool's good run of form, or at least, results, had to come to an end at some stage.
Recently, we have displayed lots of grit, but there was never enough quality to convince us that we wouldn't come unstook once we met a really top side away from home.
Even debatable 50-50 shouts for a last-gasp penalty don't mask the fact that we didn't quite do enough to warrant anything from the game.

WHAT'S great about this picture?
Have a look and tell me what you think. And describe exactly what is so great about it.

IN CONVERSATION with the ECHO's Everton reporter Greg O'Keeffe after Saturday's derby, we both hit upon a similar conclusion.
"Liverpool are Merseyside's new Dogs of War,' we agreed. "It's come a full circle."

FIGHT, passion and commitment.
That's the first way to battle out of a crisis of confidence that is seeping through Anfield at present.
When signs of footballing quality are in short supply, one of the initial things fans demand from their players is effort.
And to be fair to the Reds, last night, they gave us that in spades.

LAST night, Liverpool FC surrendered limply to a side struggling at the wrong end of the Championship.
Not only we beaten, at supposed fortress Anfield, but we were outplayed.
The Reds were palpably second best in terms of fight, commitment, ideas, creativity and skill.
Now is not the time for delusional hopes, skewed statements of how we just need our luck to change, but for cold, hard, plain facts.
It's only facing up to the reality that will possibly drag us out of this sorry, sorry mess.

AFTER many of our dismal draws or defeats this season, some fans have been quick to chirp up and say: "What do you expect, when the owners won't financially back the manager?"

A fair point, some would offer.

But dropping points at well-baked Spurs and being held at home to money-bags Man City is one thing. Being outperformed by a side five places from the foot of the Championship is quite another.