Liverpool's pre-season
This pre-season was always going to be a very important one for Brendan Rodgers and his Liverpool team.
After an ok first pre-season and season, Brendan Rodgers now had to prove that the progression he oversaw was not a fluke and that his ambitions to rebuild Liverpool could keep being put in place and more importantly - keep working for the players and the club.
Beating Preston 4-0 was a fantastic way to start but with 6 more games to play the pressure was on to keep the winning streak going and show off what the new signings could do and get fans excited for the new season.
Did BR and Liverpool manage to do that? I'd say they did in all honesty.
Indonesia XI 0 - 2 Liverpool FC
Even though the Indonesia side were nowhere near the Premier League standard, they were still up for giving Liverpool a good game. Liverpool managed to beat these with two great goals from two players who really impressed in pre-season - Phillippe Coutinho and Raheem Sterling.
Melbourne Victory 0 - 2 Liverpool FC
This was the biggest game of Liverpool's tour with close to 95,000 people cramming into the MCG cricket stadium in Melbourne to witness the reds take on one of the biggest Aussie teams and give a goosbump-inducing rendition of Liverpool's famous anthem You'll Never Walk Alone. The reds were determined to continue their unbeaten run and goals from captain fantastic, Steven Gerrard, and new boy Iago Aspas made sure they were on track.
Thailand 0 - 3 Liverpool FC
The Thailand team were similar to the Indonesia XI for this game in a sense that they were nowhere near to the Premier League standard but gave it all they had. Plus they were used to playing in the intense heat unlike our reds. That however, didn't matter as the reds put three away courtesy of Coutinho, Aspas and Gerrard - all of whom had been on target in the previous games.
Liverpool FC 2 - 0 Olympiakos (Stevie's Testimonial.)
Steven Gerrard's testimonial was huge for Liverpool fans everywhere but the man himself clearly wanted to focus on Liverpool's pre-season and made this game more like the previous friendlies except the fans where focussed mainly on him. This was most probably the toughest game for the team to date but they still managed to run out winners with Joe Allen finding the back of the net after a few attempts and fellow midfielder Jordan Henderson scoring merely seconds after coming off the bench.
Valarenga 1 - 4 Liverpool FC
The second to last friendly was versus a team we encountered in our 2011-12 pre-season. They were tough and had a few dangerous players but Liverpool still managed to overcome them by a fine margin. Aspas and Sterling were on target yet again, along with Alberto who netted his first reds goal and Kelly who got a brilliant goal whilst on his comeback trail.
Celtic 1 - 0 Liverpool FC
Liverpool's only defeat of their seven pre-season games came in Dublin against a very strong Celtic side. Liverpool to their credit played well and kept attacking the Celtic goal but as was the case on many occasions last season, they just couldn't break through.
So, Liverpool's pre-season overall was extremely good with 6 wins and only 1 defeat with 17 goals scored yet only 2 conceded. The team got to see the massive support the club has around the world and experience it first hand. Brendan Rodgers has so far bought and sold very wisely, clearly wanted to build a Liverpool that will be a force in the race for the top 4 and even the title. His new signings and young players also showed that the faith Liverpool and BR has put in them would definitely be repaid.
This should all give Liverpool fans hope that this season COULD, not will, be the season that we return to the top 4...fingers crossed.
