Weekend round up - sort of.

Now, as you all know, La Liga is taking a winter break, which means no games to report on for a couple of weekends. There is still no such break in the Prem though, and I am thankful for the xmas period when games are sometimes played midweek, or at a time I can watch them. Seeing as I really have no excuse for not watching the game today (I'm home, I have nothing else to do, I miss Liverpool) I thought I may as well do a proper match report on the game instead of just linking you up to the match report on the official site. First off, I hope everyone had a lovely xmas and Santa brought them lots of nice presents. Think of this as my present to you - an actual match report complete with mean comments about the Bolton bullies etc etc.

So, with Man U and Chelsea having won already earlier on, Liverpool were under pressure to perform at home and get all three points. Nothing less would be good enough to keep them top. It shouldn't be a hard task for them, they're unbeaten at home all year in the Prem. They started very brightly, defending well and making forward runs, trying to break the deadlock. With the news that Alvaro Arbeloa was injured, Sami came into the team to replace him. The strikeforce was still missing Fernando Torres, and he was at the stadium (so was Skittles!) but neither one was deemed ready for this fixture.

Dagger was looking hot as ever, and Riera put in some great crosses, none of which came to anything in the end. Just past the ten minute mark, he missed a glorious chance to put Liverpool a goal up, his shot going horribly wide. He made amends 15 minutes later, getting on the end of a Gerrard corner to put the ball beyond the outstretched arms of Jussi Jaaskelainen. There were other missed chances, and Liverpool should have been at least 2 or 3 up at half time, but they will have been happy with 1-0 as longas it brought 3 points at the end.

Ever so slightly off topic - that Steinsson bloke has nice tattoos, no? Actually, so does Matt Taylor. Not as nice as Dagger's clearly, but they're pretty good all the same. Anyway, back to the important stuff. Robbie Keane is really starting to find his goalscoring boots. 2 goals in two games, I'm impressed. I'm still not entirely convinced by him, but keep it up Robbie! Ok, better make that 3 goals in 2 games, he scored his second of the game a mere five minutes later. That was game over for Bolton, it was just a question now of what the final score would be.

The first substitution of the day was El Zhar on for Riera, who scored a very important goal to get the ball rolling for Liverpool, but with the game already won, it was perhaps time to take off some of the big guns and keep them fresh for the next fixture on Sunday. Stevie soon made way for Lucas, handing over the armband to Jamie Carragher. The final change of the game for Rafa (who was also in the crowd) was Ngog on for Dirk Kuyt.

I'm not going to lie. I am happy about the score, 3-0 after a series of draws is great. The annoying thing is that they should have had more. They could easily have scored 5 or 6, and Keane really deserved to get his first hat trick for the team. Still, 3 goals, 3 points, top of the table. Not much more I could ask for really.