Liverpool vs Manchester United games rarely flow like classics. There have been a few 3-3 draws over the years, where early goals have opened things up.
Remember Russell Beardsmore and Razor Ruddock coning up with rousing equalisers at different times?
But Liverpool and Manchester United nevertheless remain clubs who have always been associated with playing the game in the right way. They are flare football clubs first and serial winners second.
So it’s been extremely hard to watch The Marouane Fellaini years at Manchester United. Not because TFF has any particular bias towards the club.
But because, Fellaini seldom fails to drag the quality of entire games downwards.
CHECK OUT THE PODCAST FOR A PREVIEW OF LIVERPOOL V MAN U
Midfielders, even tough midfielders, should have good ball skills and a liberal helping of craft as well as graft. They are, after all, located in the hub of the team.
But Fellaini spends most of his time with his eyes on opponents rather than the ball. He grapples, pokes, elbows, slides and leaps. But there is so little on the footballing side to admire.
TFF predicts that if Fellaini starts the game has little chance of succeeding as a spectacle. Instead it will become a stop-start affair and a bad tempered one at that as the midfielder attempts to stymie Liverpool’s fluency.
Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho has Machiavellian tendencies and has seen fit to regularly start The Belgian destroyer of games.
But if he does so on Monday I don’t think I’ll be able to watch. Because it’s an anti-football tactic which ruins the game almost every time.