NOT dissimilar to the aftermath of Bournemouth 0 Liverpool 4, what’s really important here is that 5-0 home wins don’t feel mundane. Shouldn’t feel mundane. Not now, not ever. To put it in context, in the whole of the 2006-7 season only once did Anfield see a side score more than four goals. That was Arsenal scoring six against us in the League Cup.
There will be those whose immediate reaction to the above will be defensive, will point out that that season Liverpool reached a Champions League final. They’d be right to do so; in the end outlandish European success was also deemed mundane and — to some — boring. That was ridiculous and wrong.
But so too is shrugging shoulders after another side has been decimated by Liverpool. So too is acting as though we get this all the time. We haven’t and we don’t. Barring Rodgers’s 2013-14 side this is a Liverpool rarity this decade and arguably in the one that proceeds it. Liverpool supporters have been used to winning well and winning comfortably but not like this, not with this regularity.
This Liverpool side has now scored 75 goals in this 2017-18 season in all competitions and it has one more game before 2017 flips into 2018. It shows no signs of letting up. It’s a team built to score. It will score any goal you like — the breakdown, the breakaway, the tap in, the effort from distance. The ball can be thundered or placed beyond the ‘keeper. You name a type of goal and it looks like they will score it, apart from, just maybe, the key goal.
However this side shouldn’t have needed that many key goals as it slaloms through the season to this stage. I mean, that’s sort of how key goals work. They aren’t a constant. You have them in key moments and key moments usually come in the second half of the campaign. All this is about positioning. It’s why the lack of one against Arsenal hurt and why the sudden need for one hurt even more. That would have been a key moment had the goal been snaffled.
Today the side stuck so firmly at second best in the country drew at home and the task ahead of every team with ambitions of finishing in the top four became clearer still. The league leaders don’t need many more — if any — key goals either. But the rest of us all will. We’ll all need them as right now we are all positioning ourselves for the struggle to come.
No side is doing it with greater aplomb, greater elan than Liverpool. Liverpool can be a joy, a riot, an absolute delight. Today they were all the above even while not being very good for significant sections of the game.
Roberto Firmino bags a number nine on toast brace meaning he has four in the last three. Philippe Coutinho is the absolute business — he has more hips than any other footballer alive. They never stop jinking and shifting. He plays on the quarter turn, the seven-eighths turn. He’s a hexagon against an opposition of squares, a footballer able to shift through dimensions in the way some players manage gears.
Trent Alexander-Arnold blammed it in, giving it the two-thirds Yeboah, a slab of Flanagan. His celebration as good as his finish. All arms and glee and open mouthed because being brilliant is one thing but being brilliant having come through the ranks has he has is something else. His whole performance marvellous — he was better than any Swansea player bar maybe Roque Mesa — and capped by that blinder.
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain looks snug as a bug in a rug in this Liverpool shirt now. His finish was calm personified. He wanted a goal and he got it. Across the park Liverpool ran the show, a Boxing Day treat for Kopites. Let’s see it as such. Five home goals — last season in the 2017 part of 2016-17 we never managed that once either.
My point is this — come and adore them. And adore them. And adore them. Often there has been bits and pieces to damn them with, but today, wherever you are, whatever you are doing, do it with adoration, adore the thing. These lads are a treat. Let’s not be spoiled by Christmas excess and consider it just what happens, just what good sides do. Bar the lads in sky blue doing everyone’s head in, I don’t see anyone else doing it, not like this.
Well in, Liverpool. See you Saturday. See you Monday. It doesn’t let up. Let’s get in position. Let’s be ready for some key goals. Let’s be adorable. Let’s be adoring.
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Pics: David Rawcliffe-Propaganda Photo
Oh Neil ….. hexagon against squares. Where did that come from. Beautiful
…falling off the toilet seat and looking at the floor tiles the morning after?
(Agree, nice piece by the video artist and nice match.)
Trent’s goal more Gerrard, as was that raking pass from right to left. Oxlade Chamberlain never scored a goal like that for Arsenal and Robertson and Klavan had really solid games. Lots to be optimistic about tonight.
another 6 on the end of TAA number,and he could be the number of the beast.
Football can be made easy and I hope we are now learning to make it easy bring the big guns win it and then bring in the future prospects to do some shooting practice.
Keep the momentum sort the centre back and keeper potions and we we will be unplayable because of the 5 top leagues in Europe we are the third highest scorers after PSG answer City Klopp please sort it out
Klopp please get the players to all watch the part where King Salah rolls it for Bobby to tap into an empty net let them watch it on repeat for four hours with Mane and Bobby in the front row seats I can guarantee you more points in the rest of the season after that
Good stuff Neil. I agree there is nothing mundane about this. How can anyone even think that is beyond me. You get to see some good football and some of the players dreams come true of scoring in front of the Kop. Walking in the footsteps of Legends is very special.
For me the best moments were, TAA’s determination to get that goal, very reminiscent of what Reds of the past used to be all about. Just go and get that. It has been sorely missing.
The Ox and Bobby going through the opposition and scoring for fun.
Salah’s selfless pass.
Teamwork and more.
We beat a team that came not to play. Job done, kept it simple at the back and even Migs made a save to ensure a clean sheet despite the scoreline at that moment.
Let’s hope we maintain this in the upcoming cramped fixture list. Klopp needs a chance to build in the upcoming window, even though it may not happen, I am really hoping FSG backs him if he has earmarked players.
Looking forward to the next match.
Up the Reds!
This is right. That was a great deal of fun to watch. As the article says, never fail to enjoy it. It’s what we all want. Our boys in red scoring five goals against a team that just can’t compete. We didn’t go easy either. We punished them for being shit. We were like Paddy Considine in Dead Man’s Shoes: “you’ve got a lot of nerve coming to my door in that shape.”
By the final ten minutes I didn’t want the final whistle. There were still goals to be had for Lallana and Solanke. Alas, that is for another day. Another rotated starting line-up, another win. Coming along nicely.
One more important stat for 2017. Whoever was captain won the toss on every single occasion (or so it seems!).