| Xabi Alonso 的个人资料Road to World Cup 2006照片日志列表 |  工具  帮助 |
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3月31日 Xabi Alonso - March, 31st 2006After the win against Birmingham, the FA cup is our main objective in terms of winning a trophy but that does not mean that we are going to take our eye off the league. We still have to fight for second place and automatic qualification for the Champions league - not least because we have seen that this has been a very long season after having to qualify in August (July??). We know it is difficult because Manchester United have a big lead on us, but we won't give up or prioritise the Cup over the league. I don’t think that we would rest players in the league to make sure they were ready for the FA Cup. It shouldn't be necessary because we still have a week between each game and it would be risky to channel all our efforts into one competition. We know that the FA Cup is going to be hard still, especially having drawn Chelsea in the semi-final.
It's great to see Momo Sissoko back in action, too. All the news about his eye was terrible at first. Everyone was very pessimistic but when he came back to the UK from Lisbon, it was clear quite soon that the situation was not as bad as everyone first feared. I was surprised though to see him come back so soon, though, and delighted that he played so well. He has been told to wear some Edgar Davids-style glasses, but he seems a bit uncomfortable with them on. In fact, he took them off against Birmingham but it's important that he perseveres. He has to keep wearing them. Best wishes, Dr Alonso! 3月30日 Xabi Alonso - March, 30th 2006It's a relief for everyone at Liverpool that Rafa Benítez has nipped all the speculation in the bud and announced that he is definitely staying. It's great news for the club and it shows that he trusts in the project he has set in place for Liverpool and is determined to see it through. He's delighted with the club, the fans and the players, and we're all delighted with him.
It's good, too, that he will be signing players in the summer. The squad has been improved a lot since he arrived and if we want to compete and aspire to be the very best, then we have to keep improving and adding to the team. I wouldn't say it is impossible to compete with Chelsea in sporting terms, but financially there is no way that you can match them, which makes it more important to get it right on the field. Chelsea seem to have far more resources than anyone else. Rafa will be backed financially and hopefully next year we can put more pressure on Chelsea and push them all the way. 3月24日 Xabi Alonso - March, 24th 20067-0, wow! Against Birmingham City on Tuesday was just one of those nights when everything went in. We were two up after four minutes and everything flowed from there. We seemed to get everything right; we created chances and our finishing was excellent. That's the biggest victory I have been involved in at any time during my career. I have won 6-0 before but never 7-0 - and to do so away from home made it even more incredible. It's strange; not long ago it seemed like we just couldn’t score, like the ball wouldn’t go in no matter what we tried, and now all of a sudden it's the other way round. We scored 5 against Fulham, 3 against Newcastle and now 7 against Birmingham. 15 goals in 3 games.
Quite honestly, I don't think there's an explanation. We haven't really changed anything and we are working in much the same was as we always did, with the same formation and the same players. We made some small changes against Newcastle but otherwise nothing has been altered. Sometimes football is like that; you can search all you like for a clever explanation but you'll come up short. It was a great night. The only pity was that there were seven goals and I didn't get any of them! I did try and I went close a couple of times but the ball just didn’t want to go in for me. Even though it did for everyone else. Xabi Alonso - March, 24th 2006When I signed for Liverpool I knew I had to go to England with an open mind. I wanted to really enjoy it, so I was determined to embrace the change. The way of life is very different between England and Spain but I think I have adapted pretty well. I'm sure it would be different in London because it's so big, but Liverpool is a relaxed sort of city and small enough to get to know pretty well. I live right next to the river Mersey in the very centre of the city and I really like it, although it does get VERY windy! I'm getting used to it, mind you.
The biggest change is the timetables. People eat far later in Spain and spend more time outside. During the winter, it's practically night-time at 3:30pm here, which was a shock. You hardly get time to make the most of the day. I drink the occasional cup of tea now as well but I must admit I'm still more of a coffee person. Now and then I have an English pint too - not as often as some people, but every now and then. It takes some getting used to: they're huge compared to Spanish beers. But you've got to embrace British culture, haven't you?! 3月17日 Xabi Alonso - March, 17th 2006We are all deeply, deeply disappointed to be out of the Champions League. It hurts to go out as early as we have. We really thought that we had a good chance of defending the trophy this year, even after we lost the first leg to Benfica, 1-0 away in Lisbon.
We had our chances in the return leg at Anfield. We played well early on and could have been a goal or two ahead, but then they scored and you can feel a bit of the game slip away. That was always the risk: we knew that an away goal would be bad news but we also knew that we had to go for it, that we had to attack. When Simao scored it became much harder but we didn't think it was all over: we knew we had to score three goals but we had scored three against Olympiakos in a very similar situation the season before and, of course, we'd got three second half goals against Milan in the final in Istanbul. It was hard but we didn’t think it was impossible at all. When they scored the second, though, there was a huge sense of deflation.
It's hard to describe the dressing room after a game like that. There's a powerful sense of sadness and hurt. Hardly anyone speaks, you just sit there and go through the game in your mind; you think about what you have lost, what's no longer there. You think about the draw. In fact, you still think about that two days later. Watching the draw on Friday was strange, not seeing our name there. You see Benfica come out against Barcelona and you think: that should have been us. 3月16日 Xabi Alonso - March, 16th 2006I was really disappointed to pick up my first red card in England against Arsenal - and even more disappointed that I wasn't able to play against Fulham because the suspension it brought about. Because I was sent off for two yellow cards rather than a straight red, we can't even appeal. I feel a bit helpless really. The only way the decision could be overturned is if the referee had withdrawn the card but for some reason he has decided not to. On all the television footage you can see quite clearly that I just slipped.
When something like that happens you feel impotent. I slipped over and crashed into Mathieu Flamini and even he recognised that - he knew that it was an accident and he didn’t protest at all or appeal for the foul. The referee didn’t realise, though. You can see on the television pictures that he was looking the other way when it happened and he came over and took the card out really quickly. I tried to tell him that I had slipped but it was too late, he didn’t want to listen. Flamini didn’t say anything to the referee - he hardly had a chance because the card came out so fast.
I tried to watch the rest of the match from the top of the tunnel, but I wasn't allowed to so I ended up watching it on the television from the platform where they do the post-match interviews, down towards the dressing rooms. You feel a real sense of powerlessness watching it from there, knowing that you've left your team with a man less and then conceding that late, late goal the way we did. It wasn't a great experience - and, quite honestly, it hasn’t been a great week. 3月8日 Xabi Alonso - March, 8th 2006We're going to need our fans again against Benfica; we're one down from the first leg and we have to make this another one of those special European night at Anfield. Our fans play such a huge part and I know we can rely on them: they proved that last year. Without them, I think it would be no exaggeration to say that we wouldn't have won the European Cup.
We went to Lisbon for the first leg looking for the win and aware of the value of a clean sheet away from home. Unfortunately, we conceded from a set play five minutes from the end having had a lot of chances ourselves. We felt like we had the game under control and so it was a real blow, but we're well in the tie. 1-0 is not the worst result in Lisbon although we could have done with an away goal, and we will be very conscious of the risk of conceding at Anfield. We know it will be tough.
Our tactics will be much as they usually are, especially at home: to attack. We won’t be going mad because of the risk of the away goal, but we need to score. We can't risk leaving it 1-0 or even 2-0 because we know we'd be vulnerable. We're determined not to give up the European cup easily - and with Anfield behind us, we want to make sure we continue in the competition. 3月6日 Xabi Alonso - March, 6th 2006My family is a real footballing family and has always been closely identified with Real Sociedad. My brother Mikel plays there, I played there before I joined Liverpool and my father Pedro - Periko - played there too. He was playing for la Real when we were born and was hugely successful. He won two back-to-back league titles, in 1980/1 and 1981/2 - the only time the club has ever won La Liga. I don’t remember anything of the league titles (I'd only just been born when they won the second of the two), but when you live in San Sebastián it surrounds you and you get a real sense of what it meant for the city. Although my dad didn't talk about it much, everyone else did. Everywhere you go, people still speak wonders of that team.
My dad was a strong, powerful, aggressive player, a central midfielder whose strength of character was contagious: you could almost say he was the typical Basque footballer. He was a real team man and one of the leaders of that Real Sociedad side. I'm proud of what he achieved: that success that will probably never get repeated. Football is a totally different game now and it would be practically impossible for a small team like Real Sociedad to win two successive league titles these days. 3月3日 Xabi Alonso - March, 3rd 2006It seems to have been a time of injuries lately. I suffered a clash of heads against Manchester City and had to have metallic clips, rather like staples, put in to close the wound in my head but it's not serious: it didn't stop me playing for Spain against the Ivory Coast in Valladolid this week - a game we won 3-2. Far more worrying, however, are the injuries suffered by Mo Sissoko and Alan Smith.
Mo got a boot in the face against Benfica and at the time we didn’t realise how serious the injury was. I just thought he had got a cut and had no idea that he had damaged his eye. He was taken to hospital and none of us could speak to him immediately. He then came back to England for further tests and we've all got our fingers crossed. It's the kind of injury that comes as a real shock: it's such a delicate area and we're all awaiting the medical reports and desperately hoping he's going to be fine.
Alan Smith's broken leg and dislocated ankle, which he picked up against us, was another one of those injuries that really leaves an impact. It's such a shame and seems to be very serious; it looked like an extremely nasty break. From what we've heard there was an incident with the ambulance as he was on his way out of the stadium, too, which is very sad. The few people who did that do not represent Liverpool at all and I'd like to send my very best wishes to Mo and to Alan. |
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