sorry mate, but i disagree with u. i don't think u lost the match just in the final third.
liverpool played really bad yesterday, and i'm not talking about individual performances (some of liverpool player made good performances), i'm talking about the team.
yesterday liverpool didn't played football, they just did care of avoiding milan to play football too. and this is not "controlling the match"..... this is just killing the match, coz, when u play with 7 players behind the midfield line, your team won't ever score, and the opponent team won't ever manage to enter into your midfield.
at the end of the first half milan had 58% of possession..... but it was a useless possession coz milan players did always keep the ball in their own midfield trying to find a whole for a pass. liverpool didn't play football yesterday, and disallowed milan to play it too. that's why the match was soo boring.
i love liverpool coz it's one of the few balanced teams in england (and balance is the most important thing in football, imo)...... but what we saw yesterday was not a "balanced team".
a team is balanced when all the players are (almost) always in the correct position, according to the opponents players position and the ball position.
a team is balanced when the the 3 lines (defense, midfield and attack) are always close one to each other (the distance between theese "lines" has always to be short).
but theese 3 lines HAVE TO MOVE UP AND DOWN ALONG THE PITCH CONTINUOUSLY like an elastic, they don't have to be stuck in their own midfield. otherwise there's no balance, otherwise u're just nullifying your opponent (as u correctly say

).... but balance is not just about "nullifying your opponent", balance is about finding a good compromise between "controlling" (not nullifying) your opponent and PRODUCING FOOTBALL.
it's easy to defend with 7 players and leave the "producing phase" to the remaining 3... the real challenge is defending with 6 players and attacking with 5 players (letting your side defenders "flying", with side midfielders cutting inside, to leave them space).
that's the difference between defensive football and balanced football.... and that's why i always have a laugh at those people who say that italians teams use to play a defensive football.
nontheless i have to say liverpool was very unlucky yesterday... without that goal, at the end of the first half, the match could have been different (but u know, that's football).
i was really disappointed by rafa gameplay yesterday. but both teams truly deserved to play this final match, for what they did in this champions league
just don't care of him, Mad. there's plenty of nice, fair and polite liverpool fans in here.... don't waste your time replying to the only one who doesn't deserve an answer