Neil Atkinson’s post-match review for The Anfield Wrap after Man United 3 Liverpool 2 in the 2025-2026 Premier League at Old Trafford…
CUTTING edge. In football everything is cutting edge. And the Liverpool team drops and it has none. The Manchester United team drops and it has loads.
Liverpool spent a load of money in the summer on a title winning side and find themselves thoroughly outgunned not for the first time this season. And not for the first time this season, Liverpool would have looked better with Darwin Nuñez.
Not Luis Diaz, European Cup challenging Luis Diaz, though obviously him as well. Just Darwin Nuñez. Because Nuñez would have offered a driving force, an arrowhead. Instead we see the bluntest team imaginable.
And we suffer it.
So – it is better than it could have been, Liverpool. There was no giving up. Two crappy goals given away in the first 15 minutes and we have an opportunity to show lessons have been learnt from the match against Manchester City. This is now a clear chance to show what not giving up looks and feels like.
Michael Carrick has this lot drilled. They were never bad footballers and like us from time to time they forgot who they are and how they play. Not today. They are tight defensively and in love with the counter-attack.
They know Liverpool will give them one. Give them two. They know they will be quicker and they are just smarter. But it isn’t complicated.
Their shape can be seen from space. Their forwards are better than their defenders and they know that too. Sesko is physically strong and buĺlies his way for his second on 14 minutes after Cunha has made the most of a sleepy Liverpool on just the 6th minute.
You can’t help but wonder in these early minutes if this is it. Are we heading straight to recriminations? No one is happy, for sure, but in those moments half way through the first-half, decisions have to be taken.
The first decision is not to let them have anymore. And Liverpool make that choice. This is neither Dominik Szoboszlai’s or Curtis Jones’s best game of this frustrating season, but both of them are never too far away from the ball. Between them and Mac Allister things start to look up in midfield. Our passing improves by 20 percent and we start to work United a little more.
Maguire and Heaven are being pulled wide by Frimpong and Gakpo and whilst Liverpool are playing without a centre-forward, they are leaving space in the middle. Gakpo has spotted this and is trying options to exploit it. There’s no result in the first-half but there is threat.
There it is. A threat. And by implication, Liverpool have not given up.
The issue is Liverpool can’t hit the box. They can move around the box but they cannot get inside it. They have no plan to score a goal from inside the area that I can see. It would be my first question at any press conference. Describe a Liverpool goal please, Gaffer.
Then, suddenly, the second-half comes as almost the mirror image of the first-half. Liverpool’s two goals exploit a Manchester United who were starting to assume they were home and dry. The first from an Amad error, the second from a goalkeeping error.
This is not a Liverpool goal as per the above. Forcing errors is part of football but Liverpool have so much ball in United’s final third and so little in United’s box. It isn’t good enough and it isn’t smart enough.
Szoboszlai scores the first and facilitates Gakpo for the second. A Hungarian delight, a smack back at Old Trafford that sees Liverpool gain hopes for more. It raises the stakes and raises the whole game.
Passing is better on both sides, Liverpool suddenly play fearlessly if imperfectly. We dominate in possession which suits both sides and United bring on Dorgu.
United find the gap and then edge it and get the 3 points with a fierce Mainoo strike. You wonder what today would have been like with a less injured Liverpool. An Ekitike, an Isak, an Alisson distribution. It is disappointing not to get a point. It is a disappointment to lose to these.
If there is one thing Slot does get right today, it’s the substitutions. Andy Robertson makes way for Milos Kerkez’s younger legs. In the end, that’s the future. Likewise, he brings on Rio Ngumoha who needs to play in games like this and who could have come on earlier. Jeremie Frimpong shows today he is game but not a right-sided forward. He is a right-back. And a last minute sub bringing on Chiesa almost works. That would have been joyful.
In a way, it’s alright that some of the younger players got a chance to experience this fixture red in tooth and claw to be ready for that fight when it next comes. They got that and can process it.
But – again today isn’t good enough and it isn’t smart enough and I can see all of the mitigation, there has been a season of seeing the mitigation but there is also a season of seeing Liverpool be less than the sum of their parts. A season of seeing Liverpool lack fire and intensity. They almost get away with it today.
We lack cutting edge. Lack a plan to show cutting edge, can’t find our gears. Liverpool showed bottle which last time in Manchester they lacked. But it isn’t enough. Wasn’t enough. Better Liverpool sides have lost here to worse United sides. But still, we’re left wanting more.
Cutting edge, a plan comes from having the players obviously. But is being greater than the sum of your parts too much to ask?
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The dismal defeat in the League Cup Final 13 months ago was the warning that Slot’s tactics and style were flawed. There has been absolutely no progress since and no sign that he will be able to do anything about the decline. The first half today was another unworthy of a Liverpool team, whilst a brief rally in the second half aided by an excellent solo goal and a cock up was better, it simply showed that the team lacks, structure, organisation, self belief and leadership. After 13 months surely FSG are not blind to the fact that Slot is not good enough to be given another season?