Neil Atkinson’s post-match review for The Anfield Wrap after Arsenal 2 Liverpool 2 in the 2024-2025 Premier League season at The Emirates…
WHAT a funny game.
It’s rare to see the games be quite this discombobulating.
Liverpool were much the better side to 1-1. Arsenal the dominant force between 1-1 and half time, which takes in 2-1.
Then, five minutes after the break notwithstanding, Liverpool were very on top; Arsenal deliberately reactive. This, to me, is the oddest period.
Post-equaliser, the game could go either way.
Why do Arsenal hand Liverpool the initiative? Ultimately, the issue is this:
These men are cowards.
This is reductive. This is cheap. This is unnecessary.
This is also just true.
Away at Arsenal is our second hardest game of the season and twice we fall behind and on neither occasion do they look to finish us. On both occasions, they instead look to manage the situation.
Managing the situation has been something good teams have done since the year dot. But some situations are best managed by virtue of going for the throat.
It gives me no satisfaction to say it, but Liverpool were there for the taking and Arsenal decided instead discretion was the entirety of valour. They wanted to see out what they should have killed.
These men are cowards.
Reductive. Cheap. Unnecessary. True.
All the odds were in their favour and they chose to play safe. And then the second half was Liverpool’s. Wave after wave of Liverpool. Inevitable Liverpool. Liverpool too good to allow dead to be played. Liverpool too active, too certain.
If Arsenal want sympathy, they’d have played the tempo of the game better with Odegaard. If Arsenal want sympathy, they’d have had a better shape with a more conventional centre back.
But if Arsenal truly want sympathy then they need to be prepared to gamble the house to win, especially when the odds are in their favour. But they aren’t. They will gamble nothing.
These men are cowards.
Ibou Konate puts in his second best ever performance for Liverpool; his second best ever performance against Arsenal. He won every battle given. It was obscene. He stood up and was counted. He was the best player on the pitch by a million miles.
Alternatively, both full backs struggled. Bukayo Saka should not come as a surprise. And yet, that said, Trent Alexander-Arnold was having an awful day and then suddenly played the ball that led to the second equaliser.
Darwin Nunez had done all of his best work in our half and then suddenly played the ball that led to the second equaliser. Mo Salah had struggled for space and then suddenly had the second equaliser on his plate and he gobbled it away.
This was the truth of the enterprise. That the small margins existed in both performance and outcome and didn’t just exist, but were emphasised.
The truth of the game is that these are amongst the eight best teams in the world. Therefore, the end of the match is almost a bit unedifying.
I’d have given an organ for a draw prior to kick off, but when it goes 2-2 I’m all in on this being Liverpool’s day. The game, though, gets put in the fridge while all of my instincts are about being certain.
I need to be honest with you; I despise the game being reduced to set plays. I adore the modern game – so much of it looks like Brazil 1970. Slow, slow, quick, quick, slow.
So much of it sees an additional runner on the outside. So much of it sees people gamble into the box, back their technique all over the pitch, find a yard and drive a ball home from 20 yards. Manchester City score so many goals from just outside the area.
I’m not against modernity. Quite the opposite.
But I am against knowing the name of set-piece coaches. I am against the idea that top quality sides, the best sides, playing for freekicks 40 yards from goal. I am against celebrating that sort of cleverness. I am against *plays*. Against an American-style adoration of the set piece setup.
Too much of the game, under this manager and his man who came before was about finding a setup and going from there in regular play. But you roll with those punches.
I am just against celebrating blockers (Alexis Mac Allister who was otherwise poor today) and offside cleverness deciding not who stays up, but who wins the league. This isn’t the essence of the game.
And I am in favour of the essence of the game. Arsenal are a smart group of big lads who can look after the ball like nobody’s business, a side who should win today – who abdicate responsibility to a different side, who therefore should win today – a side full of vim and vigour until they find themselves punched out.
I’m delighted with the draw. Delighted. Would have been before a ball was kicked and was stunned to see so many Anfield Wrap-types think a win was just there.
What do I know? What do any of us know? These men were indeed cowards. The points were there. But this is our second hardest game of the season and we emerge unscathed.
This isn’t a neat piece of writing. Apologies for that. I am pleased we got the point I would have been delighted with at 8am; frustrated we didn’t do the decent thing and almost irritated this gang, who are in year three with City, didn’t have more about them.
I am happy with Darwin Nunez and irritated we didn’t get more of it in their half. Happy Virgil van Dijk scored and annoyed he isn’t closer to Andy Robertson for their opener. Delighted with the manager, but annoyed there wasn’t more Arne Slot first half.
We’ve got what we deserved. Let’s parley it into everything.
These men, these cowards shouldn’t be our business.
So let’s make it so.
I was the opposite: I wanted a win before the game and was happy with a draw based on the fact that I couldn’t name a liverpool player who played well. Konate best of a bad bunch but still below his best (I thought). It looked like a performance begat by insufficient rotation. We looked shot midway through the second half and most of the greys played with as much colour as those shirts, as lively as a Theo Walcott soundbite. God is that boy dull, however much he waves his hands around.
Happy with the result based on how we played. Resilient and determined despite being outplayed for most of the match. Two sloppy goals given away which is unusual, what did Robbo think Sakah was going to do other than cut back on his left and drill it, as he’s done x100 times? And the 4 unmarked Arsenal players at the back post for their second was weird to see even BEFORE Rice took the free kick, it was so obvious where the ball was going to be targeted and yet we didn’t adjust.
Anyways well done the boys for coming back twice and we’ll take a draw all day all things considered.
PS There’s been a lot of fume about Kostas this last 6 weeks and the entrenched negativity seems unfair. He has played well this last month and actually improved us yesterday. If the boss rates him enough to hook Robbo – who is a legend – maybe he understand his qualities more than you guys. He’s not perfect but the confirmation bias that’s going on with him inside the TAW crew maybe needs re-examining – his energy, drive and excellent delivery of crosses and set pieces is more of an asset than I think you’re all giving him credit for. Rant over!
“Content” would be the word for the result, all things considered. Going into the match, I had hoped for the possibility of a win as any side challenging for the league needs to. Thought that opportunity was there for the last 10 minutes after Salah’s goal, but a point is a good result away from home all things considered, as I agree this is the 2nd hardest fixture in our league campaign.
Disappointing & uncharacteristic lapses in concentration from the defense, as all 4 defenders could share blame for different parts of the game. Robertson is bet too easily over the top & beaten by Saka, something he maybe would not have let happen 1-2 years ago, but there’s no cover or urgency from van Dijk. It’s easy to say Robertson should have anticipated Saka cutting inside, but it’s just as easy to say van Dijk had a long time to see Robertson was isolated & should have covered more ground to intervene when Saka did cut inside. Poor goal to concede. Made up for Virg that he goes down the other end & makes up for it with the goal shortly after.
The 2nd I found more frustrating & no one seems to have much issue with it. I thought Konate was immense for large parts of the game, of course, but he has to do more for the 2nd goal, he’s pushed off & blocked & there’s a free header at goal. I don’t buy into the “oh what a ball from Rice” or “you can’t defend against that” excuses. Arsenal have a well-choreographed set piece sure, but Liverpool do not respond or react well enough to pick up men.
All this said, Liverpool show a control & a resilience to fight back from both goals, which they may have struggled to in the last few seasons.
Those are season defining games & it is encouraging Liverpool come out unscathed & could nearly have grabbed all 3 points at different stages of the 2nd half. Very encouraging as we still have Alisson, Jota, Elliott, Chiesa & Bradley to return, with a massive run of fixtures coming up — which I’m confident of a result in every one of by the way.