Evans had Jones and Thomas too. Both great players and the tail end of Rush.
Mo Salah 2025/26 Season
- Thread starter Dreambeliever
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Yep, that was the issue with Roy's teams.
We could never match it with a Solid back 5 and a DCM. Ince was supposed to be that.
My enduring image of David James is him coming to intercept an incoming corner, rising majestically into the air ... with his fucking arms by his side!
Coventry at Anfield? that game then followed up with United at home. same thing
The attacking play under Evans, particularly when Fowler and Collymore briefly hit their stride as a duo, was a joy to watch.
It's a shame the joint manager thing with Houllier was a sham (apparently it was really about getting Roy a better pension) because if we could have found a balance between Houllier's pragmatism and Roy's attacking play then we could really have been in business.
It's a shame the joint manager thing with Houllier was a sham (apparently it was really about getting Roy a better pension) because if we could have found a balance between Houllier's pragmatism and Roy's attacking play then we could really have been in business.
Think you’re perhaps mis-remembering. Scales, Bjornebye and Babb were all above average but far from top drawer. Wright was at the latter end of his career. Backs ups were ‘meh’
James was ‘potential’ at that stage of his career and for us made mistakes. He wouldn’t find any consistency until 6 or 7 years later, and was the best of an underwhelming bunch to succeed Seaman who had been the benchmark for English goalkeepers for a good decade into the early 00’s.
The defence and GK up until Houllier got his hands on the squad, was always our weak point of the Evan’s era.
Solid my hole.
...and then we went and got Kvarme to make it even worse. Also, aren't we forgetting that hairy fatty, what's his name...
The only thing solid or enjoyable during the Evans years were the attackers.
The first thing Houllier did was to get two CB's and a DM and we suddenly looked a whole lot better.
The hairy fatty was signed by Souness, as was Julian Dicks. But yeah, Roy could've binned him off sooner.
I'm assuming you've chosen to forget his name, which is a good plan.
He could've been decent if he'd been remotely arsed.
We could have won the league inspite of him and have been 2 or 3 target players better off
I could have looked his name up, but I didn't bother.
I purposely left off Ruddock the 50p passing dickhead.
He can't have been the only one doing that, otherwise it's really not much of a game.
I’ve no doubt they all were but the prick thinks it’s a funny story to tell. Unprofessional dick.
Imagine if Rogers and Rafa were joint managers.
I'd like to understand the pension bit - he basically got an extra 3 months of NI, employer & employee contributions - the club could have moved him into a temporary advisory role to achieve that, or even just topped up his contributions on his behalf if they felt that strongly about it.
Joint managership was, predictably, a disaster and I am dismayed if it was just a tactic to put a few extra ££ in Roy's pocket when there must have been multiple other ways to achieve that.
It was a final salary scheme. He got a higher salary for his last 3 qualifying years so he got a higher pension entitlement. It wasn't about the contributions, so much as the enhanced salary that made the difference.
Yeah, there's a parallel universe where Brendan parked his ego and employed a defensive coach rather than insisting he knew what he was doing. We win everything under him and he was remembered as a club legend and his weird musings are just seen as a funny sideshow.
I never thought of it like that before. I always assumed that the club wanted to sack Evans in the summer of 1998 but didn't have the balls to do it.
You have to wonder though how much Evans was aware and involved in that. You certainly get the impression that the way it happened was quite hurtful and it certainly seemed very messy.
Funnily enough I have a DB scheme ... One of the last I suspect.
Even so, surely moving him to a senior advisor role for 6 months would have achieved the same and avoided the joint manager debacle
Regarding the Evans team of the mid 90s, my instinct was also that it had a great attack but a poor defence, but surprisingly if you look back at the tables then, our defensive record was pretty decent. Often better than teams above us.
The problem was serious inconsistency.
Probably the most famous game from back then was the 4-3 against Newcastle. Obviously a great match and still considered one of the best Premier League games ever. We followed that with a one nil defeat at Coventry.
The problem was serious inconsistency.
Probably the most famous game from back then was the 4-3 against Newcastle. Obviously a great match and still considered one of the best Premier League games ever. We followed that with a one nil defeat at Coventry.
That wouldn’t have worked as he wouldn’t have qualified for the scheme. It was for players and coaches only.
Don't forget Klopp was criticized for his defensive coaching in the early days when we conceded from too many set pieces. He was asked at a press conference if he needed a defensive coach and he reacted, saying he could write a book on defending set pieces.
He was right, but the book only had two words ... Buy Virgil
The building blocks of a top team were there all right. At the time I was pleased with most of the signings, who were predominantly good players that had legitimately caught the eye for their previous clubs. Oyvind Leonhardsen is sometimes referred to as an exception but we had had trouble coping with him when he played against us for the Wombles previously.
I'm afraid that for me (and I thought this at the time, not just with hindsight) the problems were down first and foremost to Uncle Roy. Off the field he was essentially too weak to prevent the whole Spice Boys thing from infecting the dressing-room. On the field he couldn't restrain himself from tinkering with players' positions instead of letting them carry on doing what had prompted us to sign them in the first place. Leonhardsen was an absolutely prime example, a dangerous CM whom Roy stuck out on the wing (from which his form never recovered), but there were others too.
Yeah, I used to go spare watching Leonhardsen, and then I realised that he was doing the best he could, he just wasn't Liverpool standard but that wasn't his fault, it was Roy's fault for signing him. And in fairness to him, on the rare occasions he does pop up in the media, he has only good things to say about the club. Top pro, good player, but we needed great.
And the positions thing is interesting. McAteer is a prime example, signed as CM, then played right wing back (where he was really good, to be fair) but then struggled to play as a CM again.
Yes, I agree with that.
Not many of Evans' signings really raised many eyebrows at the time. As you say, they had done well for their previous clubs.
Lots of clubs also wanted Collymore, Babb and Scales, for example. Berger had been one of the stand-out players in Euro 96.
McAteer was another one. A very effective player at Bolton but we played him as a wing back, and because of that we had to move Rob Jones to the left. That's two good players already not playing in their best positions.
These days you'll hear Evans say and you'll hear some of the former players say that the whole Spice Boys thing was overblown, was good for team spirit and didn't impact the team negatively, but the evidence speaks for itself. They will also say that United players were just as bad. That misses the point, as we clearly won almost nothing while United won everything.
And yet, in the two seasons in that period where United won the league and we won nothing, we conceded fewer goals than them.
That doesn't suggest that our defence was as awful as memory (including mine) suggests.
We didn't have the same winning mentality, and as has been suggested, it's probably the difference in losing a game and having to face the rage of Ferguson afterwards and losing a game and having to face the rather timid Roy Evans afterwards.
Ok well how many goals was it?
How many did they score?
How many goals did United score compared to us?
Well, in the 1995, 1996, 1997 and 1998 seasons they scored more goals than us in every season.
Nah, I was thinking conceded goals
