In the past 20 years, both the world and the way we watch football have seen significant change. To observe how Liverpool has changed, we went back and looked at more of their website.
Some fans, like the author of this article, weren’t even born when Liverpool’s official website went live, yet it’s common knowledge that information posted online remains there indefinitely.
This has given us the opportunity to search through the archives and find some unusual characteristics by today’s standards.
When it comes to fan media, Liverpool supporters have often been in the lead before the team, whether it be through forum organization or the creation of broadcast-quality programs.
We choose to take a look back to see how these websites stack up against those of today.
The beginning
The company helped launch Liverpool’s media after Granada acquired a 9.9 percent ownership in the team in 1999, which ultimately resulted in the development of LFCTV.
We can see how simplistic the initial edition was, though, if we start with the Reds’ official website.
The official website looked like this when it first launched in March 2000, when the url was Liverpoollfc.net.
Up until 2001, when the team switched the domain and created liverpoolfc.tv, the website remained rather simple.
This was a significant step for Liverpool, who boasted “5 channels of “web TV,” a “TunnelCam,” and “a post-match email from the manager with his comments on the game,” as you can see here.
We don’t even have a live tunnel camera today!
Once operational, Liverpoolfc.tv appeared as shown below, which is unquestionably an improvement over the previous year.
Because of poor search engine optimization, headlines could refer to Chris Kirkland and Gary MacAllister by their nicknames, “Macca” and “Kirky,” respectively.
After a year, the official website had advanced significantly. By 2005, it had a slightly more modern appearance than we would anticipate from a site today.
As of the morning following Liverpool’s victory against AC Milan in the 2005 Champions League final, according to the official website:
And by 2017, the page resembled what you see today quite a bit.
Time travel to 2023, and you can see how far This Is Anfield has progressed thanks to its four million social media followers.
