Opinion‘We’d be trying to kill each other’ – What Everton’s Carlo Ancelotti needs to know ahead of first Merseyside derby
- Everton’s Carlo Ancelotti and Liverpool’s Jurgen Klopp square off in FA Cup fourth round on Sunday
- ‘Unbearable’, ‘horrible’ and ‘brutal’, says legend Mark Lawrenson of Merseyside derbies
“Derbies are meatier,” Craig Johnston said. “They are not like other games. They are brutal.” More than 30 years have passed since Johnston played for Liverpool against Everton but matches between the local rivals never lose their edge.
The 235th Merseyside derby takes place at Anfield on Sunday and there is more at stake than a place in the fourth round of the FA Cup. Civic pride means these games are always among the most important of the season.
“The result affects the whole city,” Mark Lawrenson, one of Liverpool’s finest centre backs, said. “Losing is unbearable. I had a sponsored car and it had my name all over it. If we lost, I hated stopping at traffic lights. You couldn’t look around because there’d be an Evertonian gloating or giving me two fingers. If someone beeped you, you learned not to look up. When we got beat, I used to use my wife’s car. It was easier.”
Graeme Sharp, the centre forward who was frequently matched up against Lawrenson in the 1980s, quickly found out how much beating Liverpool meant to Everton supporters after he signed at Goodison from Dumbarton. “Fans would come up to you and say ‘I can’t go into work if you lose’,” the Scot said. “You’d think, ‘is that really true?’ It was.”
There have been many changes to the sport since Sharp and Lawrenson battled it out but the mood on Merseyside has not altered. Derbies matter. Monday will be a grim day at work for supporters of the losing side. Jurgen Klopp and Carlo Ancelotti may consider the FA Cup low down on their list of priorities but once the game starts the players cannot help becoming caught up in the atmosphere. You do not have to be Scouse to be swept along by the emotion.