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Okay, best-case scenario yesterday, before the sending-off, would have been that we battle through, scrape a point, play horrible football but defend like dogs and frustrate them.

But I'm sick of it – we are timid, fearful and lack imagination. There is no tenacity, no grit, no desire in Everton teams and haven't been for ages.

Lesser teams than Everton have gone to Anfield and got stuck in and played in a way you can admire. Everton's only 'progressive' tactic yesterday seemed to me to be just to press their back four into making mistakes and trying to do something with the scraps.

No ability to keep possession, build play, make space, create proper chances. There was none of that. In fact, since the great 85-87 period, I think Everton have only managed to properly go toe-to-toe with Liverpool in footballing terms on only perhaps two or three occasions.

The gulf has been embarrassingly vast for decades and I just now find derbies agonising to even contemplate. Their crappy plastic fans can't even be bothered about derbies anymore. They know they'll win, and it'll be easy, and we'll huff and puff and blame everyone else for losing, but lose we will. We always do...

I'm with you on this "victim stuff" — it drives me up the wall, fans whimpering in the corner like cowardly little fuckwits afraid to face the fact we lose because we're shit.

And don't get me started on the crooked ref conspiracy - fuck me - if a better example of a drowning man clutching at straws exists I've yet to see it.

If we had decent players, we wouldn't be constantly on the back foot in these games vulnerable to red cards and avoidable penalties. The only time I've seen us have a real go was under Martinez in the Goodison 3-3 and we were magnificent.

But of course he'd worked a minor miracle getting in game-changers like Barry, Lukaku, Barkley and McCarthy with Deulofeu to come on. I feel sorry for Dyche – if he tried it with this crew, the Red Shite would run up double figures.

In recent years, Martinez had a go and our last win at Anfield was under Carlo – who doesn't do intimidation.

Yesterday's result wasn't to difficult to predict – and hats off to the posters who, pre-match, also highlighted Ashley Young as a likely problem.

Trying to hold out for a draw only brought about the inevitable, we should have had a go at them as they weren't on top form.

I won't accept that. Shocking and biased.

I will accept we are currently gulfs apart on the football pitch. But when my son, who is way more balanced than me gets riled, I know something is wrong. That was wrong. Again.

We have narrowly escaped relegation by the skin of our teeth twice in two seasons. I know they are currently better than us, but we could have got something out of that if it had been a level playing field. It wasn't.

Yesterday's calling out of the officials is highlighting the incompetency and favouritism.

Imagine had the shoe been on the other foot. Do you think they are accepting that?

Absolutely not. And Klopp would have been up in arms.

See you at West Ham.

If only he'd acted and brought on Patterson for Young after 30 minutes instead of naively thinking Pawson wasn't just waiting for the wind to blow Young's way so that second yellow could be brandished.

Taking two attack-minded players off basically said that we were just booting the ball out of our own penalty area for the best part of an hour, it never works because you get penned in and eventually something goes against you, either a lucky bounce or a braindead Michael Keane moment.

I'm pretty sure Young picked up a yellow early against Brentford and managed to stay on. But yes, I'd have hauled him off not long after receiving the first yellow. Too old and too much of a liability for me at full-back. If Mykolenko and Patterson are fit, they should start.

Young still has plenty to offer, but from the bench.

The other thing in my opinion is that all the little decisions went for Liverpool too so the referee dictated that Liverpool would keep possesion by blowing up for fouls against us but not them.

The game is totally corrupt now and it is blatant. And no one speaks out like they should unless it affects one of the deemed big clubs.

Mykolenko is steadily changing the minds of critics or at least those who pay attention to what is happening on the pitch. In recent weeks he has defended well against Saka and Salah, two of the best left on right attackers in the world.

Garner's performance really concerned me. Many fans, me included, see him as a big part of our future in midfield. He was one player I was hoping would step up to the challenge yesterday. Instead he seemed to freeze, struggled to get into the game and looked lost at times in that first half.

It was almost as though the pace of the game in the opening half was too much for him. It was hard to escape the thought that for all the flaws in his game, Gana Gueye might have acquitted himself more effectively.

Mike (3) We didn't defend deep and hope for a point while we had ten men. Too often we were caught with most of our players upfield. That left the RS with acres of space to launch counterattacks.

I'm always conscious that there are much more important things but 'of all the unimportant things, football is'.

My brothers were concerned they might only stay top of the league for a few hours. I was more concerned about playing with 10 against 12 of them.

Many of my Liverpool mates have been gracious enough to acknowledge that the corruption of the referee was the game changer. So sad that you can see what is evident to everyone. But there again, it doesn't suit your agenda.

By the way, Tsimikas committed three fouls in the first half that weren't distinguishable from Young's but he didn't even get spoken to. Corrupt.

Big clubs at home get the benefit of the doubt. That's not a new concept. Make a big call at Anfield against Liverpool and your career is on the line. They'll hang you for it.

So what do we do? There's only one thing we can do. Don't depend on the balance of decisions going our way.

Our approach yesterday was to hope. Hope that Young can get through the game against Diaz. Hope that lot wouldn't produce something to break down our two banks of blue. Hope that the ball in our box for half the game didn't hit a hand, deflect in, or cause a rash challenge (no-one talking about the one Patterson got away with?).

If that's the plan, and that's where we're at as a club, then it's a bit rich to complain that the thing that was always likely to happen, happened.

We barely touched the ball. We offered little to the match. We chased and tackled instead of possessing the ball or trying to create something. They're the things we need to focus on.

You're making the club's and manager's excuses for them. We weren't just unlucky. We're in a position where these things will happen, and continue to happen. It's not bad luck when the practically inevitable happens.

Honestly, taking the incident in isolation, then Konate should have gone. Of course he should have. But that's not the cause of our problems.

This season, so far, we have had a great set of fixtures and have 7 points from 9. It's a dreadful return - and has been blamed entirely on bad luck.

We had high xG against relegation candidates but couldn't score. Bad luck.

We played really well but our striker was injured. Bad luck.

We had a goal disallowed against a team we had countless opportunities against. Bad luck.

We had a 38-year-old sent off against a tricky, fast winger at Anfield. Bad luck.

We had 20% of the ball at Anfield and they didn't get a player sent off. Bad luck.

When do we take some accountability? If your injury-prone striker is injured, that's not bad luck. If you pick holding midfielders with little ability in front of goal and they have lots of the ball but don't score, that's not bad luck. If you go to Anfield and disregard the ball, that's not bad luck.

Luck is the one thing that we can't control.

7 points from 9 isn't good enough. It probably won't be good enough. Yet we're adamant we're cursed or unlucky or conspired against. And it's being said on here with absolute conviction after every game.

There is a con job, but it's a different con job to the one you're complaining about.

A corrupt system by any chance? Totally.

I deliberately quoted people who had no affiliation to EFC to demonstrate that we were doomed by the (corrupt) system.

By the way, I totally agree that we have thrown away points in other games. But, we didn't play those other games yesterday. We can only play the latest game and that was one that the referee decided the outcome of.

Also, we can't change our ability to play football until we invest in better players, which won't be for quite some time, so absolutely no point in trying to argue that.

I have to give the polar opposite view to you on the half-time subs. They were not in any sense of the words "bold" and "brave". Quite the reverse (bold and brave would have been hooking Young for Patterson after his first yellow when anyone could have seen the writing on the wall).

They have weak full-backs and centre-backs who quake and shake when a ball comes anywhere near their penalty spot. What does Dyche do? He takes off our wingers.

That decision cost us, Paul, and for a while, we thought as the minutes passed that we might get a draw that we to some extent deserved. But we know from bitter experience that the back foot is the wrong foot at our old ground.

Young got two yellow cards that yes were harsh but equally very preventable by both himself and the manager acting faster to remove the possibility of a second yellow.

The half-time subs basically removed any chance or likelihood that we could get out of our half or support the lone striker who, even up to that point had been isolated when an equal amount of players were present.

Yes, the Michael Keane handball was a penalty; if it had been down the other end, then we'd be screaming for it. It was blatant, he did the same at Leicester in May, the guy is a walking disaster area.

Konate should have been sent off, yes, but it probably wouldn't at that stage have altered the way Dyche was seeing the game out.

We must appeal the yellow cards for the Manager and his assistant to be overturned on the basis that the referee was both wrong and inconsistent. Show video evidence from this and other games, not necessarily involving us, and shout it all very publicly, shame the man and the system that allows it to flourish.

Or are we too frightened that it will result in a more severe penalty from an "Independent" Commission. What's that old adage? "For evil to prosper, good men.... " That should be translated into a Latin motto.

Have to disagree with your assessment of Dyche's half-time subs as 'ballsy' though.

I don't think Sean Dyche had a good game at all on Saturday. I was willing him to sub Young after his first yellow. so if I could see a second yellow card coming a mile off then it's a bit worrying that our manager couldn't.

Ditto bringing Keane on, my heart sank and of course the inevitable happened. Keane shouldn't be anywhere near our first eleven again. He's a liability and we all know it. Godfrey is no world beater but he's a much better bet in a three at the back.

This is only one game, so I remain broadly supportive of Sean Dyche, there are positives, but I pray he's learning a few lessons here, even if he's learning them slowly.

Whilst I agree the referee was again a decisive influence in Liverpool's favour, it doesn't mean we shouldn't acknowledge some very poor decisions by our manager.

Compare that to a team made up of largely free transfers, loan deals, and buy-now, pay-later transfers.

Is it any wonder we struggled to have any influence on the game?

In reality, that's where we are as a club at the moment, sad but true. We stopped competing with them on a technical and ability basis, a long time ago.

Correct. In truth, our team did well to keep the game alive for as long as they did.

We seem to be going down the road of 'we're not good enough, but on this rare occasion we would have been if the ref hadn't messed up'.

Either we are or we aren't.

And we're not. The ref dropped a clanger, but we give refs plenty of opportunities to drop clangers. And very few opportunities for them to drop one in our favour.

It's hard to accept that, even though the ref had an impact, our team and management had a greater impact.

But last season we had the coady goal rubbed off. Would it have been disallowed because of such a fine margin if Liverpool had scored it?

The season before we had a definite penalty not given after Gordon was booked for something Salah does on a regular basis. They also should have had Mane sent off for an offence far worse than Youngs (compare Mane's offence with Doucoure's against Spurs last season. No comparison).

There are loads of other incidents in recent years and going back further. Clattenburgs offences were bad but when Suarez got Rodwell sent off by diving how come he didn't get punished for one of the biggest crimes in football? Because it was Liverpool. The game has been corrupt for years. And it has now gone to a new blatant level. It is as clear as day.

I really don't want to play tennis trying to score points particularly as we're on the same side, but clearly I've not articulated myself with the clarity I had hoped. Therefore I'll try one last time but now using your terminology.

Clearly we weren't (quite) good enough with 11 v 10 (or 12 v 10!) and, with the difference in resources who would have expected us to be, but we may have been good enough with 10 v10. It is this opportunity that the referee unfairly denied us. Therefore a simple binary of good enough or not doesn't work.

It is clear the referee unfairly influenced our ability to get something from the game – not only my view but also of those independents I had mentioned.

Ashley Young had been yellow-carded 3 times previously this season – all were in the 1st half:

Arsenal in the 45th minute which Everton lost 1-0,
Brentford in the 1st minute (!) which we went on to win 3-1, and
Bournemouth in the 11th minute, which we won 3-0. So, Dyche was justified in keeping him on.

I am surprised no one mentioned the absolute shit-housery by Diaz, who I am finding almost as despicable as rat-face Suarez. Rolling over 3-4 times for a normal footballing tackle is absolutely disgusting. I wish Young had sandbagged him on his way out.

Also, it is easy to forget that Young made a great block on Diaz's goal-bound shot which kept the game 0-0.

I also wonder what makes you think Godfrey is a better defender than Keane? Sadly, Covid seems to have taken out any bit of footballing skill he had, and Godfrey is now a much bigger liability than Keane or – dare I say it – Holgate!

Keane's handball looks bad in slow-motion, but when you watch it in real time, I doubt anyone else in his position could have gotten his hand out of the way quickly enough. Just plain bad luck that the ball struck his hand.

If you had kept Harrison and McNeil on for the full match and did not secure a point, then we would no doubt be in a worse position. Tradeoffs, maaan.

I will note that a few complaints about the substitutions have authors who also claim we were never good for a goal with eleven. Work that out and explain that to me if you can be bothered.

Re Godfrey. We've not seen him much since he had Covid. But let's not forget there were many here, and at the game, who saw a real player in him when he first arrived. I agree he's made mistakes, but often playing in an unstable defence, and he's still young. I'm not advocating for him in the first team, but he's always been less mistake prone than Keane. If Dyche goes three at the back he has to be worth a try, if fit of course.

I disagree with you about the handball too, another defender would not have had his arm hanging out in that position. Unlucky? Perhaps, but I'd rather Keane worked through his bad luck away from Everton and at another club. Sorry to sound blunt.

Although I agree, he didn't take to the derby occasion well, possibly, affected by being the only local lad in the team.