Neil Atkinson’s post-match review for The Anfield Wrap after Liverpool 3 Crystal Palace 1 in the 2025-2026 Premier League at Anfield…
THE day after, you are calmer.
But Andy Madley spent the game stopping the action as soon as an outfield player hit the deck. That was mostly, but not exclusively, the Crystal Palace contingent. There was a lot of a prone Brennan Johnson during the first-half of the game and on two occasions the trainer didn’t even get on. Being fair, he stopped the game quickly when Mo Salah was sadly down.
This is what made the decision to watch Freddie Woodman roll around in agony especially odd and ultimately infuriating. Post-match Oliver Glasner made the point that we don’t want the match to stop before the second phase when a keeper is on the floor. This is fair but there are nuances to this sort of thing. The ball was all the way outside of the penalty area, there was actually a tiny lull in the game before Daniel Munoz floats it into the back of the net.
Munoz does what he probably should – the onus is on the referee, not him. Some players may not. The crowd then does what it does – get on his back and the referee’s.
And crucially Liverpool do what they should do – galvanise themselves and make it irrelevant. A big response of “not today”. Yeremi Pino has one shot. Jorgen Strand Larsen is offside when he runs through and while that flag doesn’t go up it would have done had the ball spun into the net.
Instead Liverpool defend well within their structure. Which isn’t the same as saying the structure defends well. When the manager removes Alexander Isak and shifts from 4-3-3 to something which could be called 4-2-4-0 Liverpool become easier to play through. This isn’t even necessarily the wrong move in and of itself because what Liverpool wanted at 2-1 was to continue having the option to play to Cody Gakpo aerially on the left flank, especially for Freddie Woodman. So it becomes a choice – move Gakpo or no centre-forward.
And that choice means there is more defending to do. Liverpool do it and do it well and then Florian Wirtz gets the goal both he and we needed.
The scorers and the order of the scorers are what you’d have written down before the game if you were given a 3-1 to script. Even the nature of the goals. Alexander Isak was a great bit of centre-forward play. Glorious touch, scruffy finish and exactly what Liverpool have invested in. It’s another step forward and another game where you could see the movement he offers. He isn’t going to be a footballer constantly involved in games but when LIverpool realise the best ways to get him the ball he is going to carry serious threat,
The sweeping move and finish for the second was so joyous. The entire fifteen seconds unfolded beautifully. From the Woodman save, to seeing Liverpool race forward as a collective, to Curtis Jones picking the right pass and for it to end with Andy Robertson’s emphatic finish. It was the moment we wanted for him, for us, to be shared. It looked like a Liverpool goal from your dreams. The perfect way to go 2-0 at Anfield. The perfect man to do it.
The third was emphatic and what the doctor ordered. Florian Wirtz has still felt too peripheral to the scant amount of big moments we have had. Him getting this one on this day when he had grafted his way beyond the injury time board and when there was a sense of injustice the thing that most helped was that it was emphatic. It was the end of the argument from the second it left his foot.
It’s a great win in the context of this season and means Liverpool can now focus on looking up the table and do a little less looking down it. Things haven’t been anywhere near good enough and some of the issues there have been all season were still present yesterday but Liverpool weren’t punished for them and Liverpool didn’t play as though they were waiting for said punishment to manifest itself. They didn’t feel sorry for themselves. We didn’t feel sorry for ourselves.
They scrapped and dug in for each other. We scrapped and stuck up for them. It’s a simple enough equation and maybe winning an away Merseyside Derby makes that equation make more sense for everyone. There will be no turning of the corner – Liverpool are imperfect. But an uneasy peace can be made with that now, from this point until the end of May before aiming for perfection needs to be restarted in earnest.
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The day after, are you calmer?
On the Post-Match Show last night Damian Kavanagh both praised the ownership for the long term record and absolutely castigated them for now doubling down on the price rises. The protest showed the breadth of discontent about the price rise plans.
It’s felt like misstep after misstep on this. The idea of settling the ticketing conversation for a few seasons isn’t a bad one; it would allow the club to plan and it would allow the excellent supporter representatives we have to look at other matters, but the key word there is conversation. Imposition is not conversation and imposition is what we have had.
Further, the missteps have included the club continually reiterating an increase in running costs for matches, making the point that everything, energy included, is more expensive.
For the love of Christ, Liverpool, everyone knows energy is more expensive. Everyone is opening their own bills and seeing their money not go as far. And Liverpool could also allow for the fact that a number of their season ticket holders are involved in the running of businesses and not talk down to them about that being more expensive too.
British society, for a variety of reasons, is angrier in the last few years with factors people see as outside of their democratic control and the cost of living, including, led by, energy, is a big part of that. Does OFCOM do a good enough job for ordinary people? Has regulation failed? Is the nation’s energy sufficiently secure?
The general feeling that things have been badly run for the longest time adds to the general sense of societal discontent and it is in that context Liverpool FC want to increase the prices on their regular (both season ticket holding and membership based) support. Is this wise? Is this worth all this hassle and noise? Is now the time to impose?
But when we talk about the cost of staging matches, it means first and foremost we should ask for whom are the matches staged?
Let’s be honest about this in a way too many people in the supporter space have arguably failed to be: Champions League and Premier League supporters (arguably Championship ones too) are paying participants in the creation of a television product.
You can not like that but it is our reality. Further you are a consumer of a television product. I am prepared to say with certainty that the vast majority of the people reading this watch the majority of the football they watch via television. I include Liverpool season ticket holders in that, the vast majority of whom are not able to go to Liverpool away games so they are already 50/50 over the course of the season before we wonder about which of us is watching Match Of The Day.
The point as it connects to the prices is this: The costs of staging football matches has increased, yes, but these matches primarily aren’t staged for us. They are staged for a TV audience. Are we saying nobody is switching the energy intensive floodlights on if there is no one in the ground? The lads are playing in the dark? Further, we are the studio audience, the chorus, the laugh track, the reality TV element, the bringers of the emotion, the conduit of all the drama. Our actual attendance, the fact that 60,000 come to a place and care, care with all their hearts, it is this that gives it meaning.
Our participation, which we pay for, gives it all meaning.
The amount of money television has brought into the game across the last twenty years has grown enormously. All clubs earn more. Premier League clubs earn an unbelievable amount in comparison to most of their global peers and fight tooth and nail not to share it with the rest of the league pyramid. Champions League teams earn more again.
So it costs more to stage your television production. That’s the case across the board in the television production industry. Take the increased costs out of that revenue and stop trying to add those costs to the people who are opening their energy bills and seeing their living costs rise. Then take that argument to the Premier League to lobby for general admission price caps that are both in Liverpool’s competitive interest and in the interest of the wider game in this country.
Lead. Don’t follow, don’t mention competitors, especially when it then shines a light on Manchester City or today’s opponents freezing their prices. Grab this moment with those sides and anyone else going and put it on their toes to argue for a cap collectively.
Every penny Liverpool earn goes back into the team. I don’t resent a single salary Liverpool pay out and that includes at director level. A lot of people have done a good job of running Liverpool for a long time and the way the club fought for its own after Paris even now shouldn’t be forgotten.
But stop making going the match worse. Nobody wants to end a season, and certainly not start a season, like this. Instead people want to see Liverpool take the fight on ticket prices in concert with their supporters to the rest of the Premier League.
The whole thing is better when we are together. We need next season to be a fresh start full of togetherness. Liverpool should not be creating division through imposition. You earn the big bucks. In all the ways, you earn the big bucks. Fix it.
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