An unthinkable fourth defeat on the spin for Arne Slot’s Liverpool requires some tough conversations and even tougher choices to be made…
WELL, IT IS WHAT IT IS.
There are numerous ways we can approach this. A full rant and rave about the defence, about Mo Salah, about thinning the Anfield posts and everything in between, or you can look objectively at the system, shake it up and approach this season as an experiment as to what works best.
Me, I just wonder if we get that result if The Best Referee in the Country TM stops the game for the head injury that he’s blatantly looking at. That’s just me. Sour grapes not needed.
If he didn’t see it, what were the rest of his team doing? It’s not as if they let the game go because they just wanted to see what happened with the United attack. That would be unprofessional and potentially dangerous.
I know. You can’t blame the referee for a bad result, particularly when you’ve literally got a full game to play, but that knocked the wind out of us. Absolutely nothing will be done about it.
That’s not an excuse — anyone can see that we have issues and there has to be some uncomfortable conversations around the training ground this week — but mistakes like that (laughingly justified immediately by his mates) don’t help. Ah, well.
The second-half was interesting when Liverpool went gung-ho. Exciting but rarely sustainable.
When Tottenham bought Jurgen Klinsmann in 1994 manager Osvaldo Ardiles abandoned their standard formation and went with five forwards, also including Darren Anderton, Ilie Dumitrescu, Nick Barmby and Teddy Sheringham. They played some breath-taking stuff and were a joy to watch. Tonnes of intricate, attacking football with loads of goals. The fans loved it.
They finished 7th. 27 points behind Champions Blackburn.
I shuddered when I saw that mad formation. Oh, it was exhilarating but …
I get why we decided to play that way but it’s a risky strategy. Credit to the manager for keeping it that way to try to win the game but these things can go either way. This time it went the other way.
Anyway, it leaves us with four straight defeats. That’s the harsh statistic.
Despite that though, there were times when we looked great. The move that led to Cody Gakpo’s first date with the post, the lovely ball Fede Chiesa puts in just before the equaliser, a decent cameo from Florian Wirtz and Hugo Ekitike’s aggression were wonderful to watch. It just didn’t work out, but it doesn’t help when we’re chasing the game before you’ve sat down.
But there has to be uncomfortable conversations now. Has to be. The lack of control is a factor. Also, you can’t concede two goals per game and expect Premier League points. We need to work out what our best strategy is. Maybe we’re closer than we think, I don’t know, but it doesn’t look like it.
It’s not only on the pitch that things need to change.
We should also look at Diogo’s song. Bear with me here.
It’s beautiful and obviously we all know the reason why it’s sung on the 20th minute, but I’m not sure it’s helping anyone now. Maybe before the game or in injury time when we’re winning, as we do with YNWA would be better. But reminding the players about that horrific event halfway through the first-half may not be wise.
That’s not for me to say, obviously, and it’s not as if we can have a vote on it, but that’s just my view. I’ll understand if it’s lambasted.
But it is what it is. Liverpool is at odds with itself and that’s never nice.
These are the hard yards. The tough change from winning everything to being bloody awful. Younger fans aren’t used to this. Older fans had the 1990s so we’re a bit more accustomed to runs like this.
Ultimately, time outruns pain, and we’ll be back. It’s just going to need a lot of uncomfortable but necessary conversations for the good of the club. I’ve no idea how some players get starts and I suspect the manager is beginning to see that too. We’ll find out soon enough.
Onwards.
These are the hard yards, and you have to run them to return to the joy in all this.
Don’t give in.
