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Liverpool FC Team Talk, Gossip, Rumours 2024/25

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Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,664 ✭✭✭theoneeyedman


    Madrid and Barcelona, both well k own teams competing in the EPL....... Very relevant 😂.

    Sure Lance Armstrong was. cheating as well, whatabouthim????



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 32,144 ✭✭✭✭~Rebel~


    That cheating obviously got them where they are, it's been the foundation of literally every aspect of the clubs success. Back when those charges were made it was also reported there will be further charges for the following years, but it just takes time to put these cases together. If this first tranche of 115 charges can be made stick, that'll make the following ones much easier too.



  • Moderators, Education Moderators Posts: 5,503 Mod ✭✭✭✭spockety


    One thing I noticed is that Darwin is happy to show desire when subbed off, but there was a chance on goal where he slid off the pitch today, and instead of busting a gut to get back up (ball was still in play and in our possession) he just sat on the ground behind the goal line watching it play out until the ball was dead. He should have sprung up as if there was a chance the ball might make its way back to him.



  • Moderators, Education Moderators Posts: 5,503 Mod ✭✭✭✭spockety


    I think hoping that there'll be any significant finding against them is almost as desperate as hoping they'll drop points on a title run in. It's not happening.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 699 ✭✭✭PaddyCar


    100%, chasing games is unsustainable in the long run.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 32,144 ✭✭✭✭~Rebel~


    The league levelling those 115 charges is the thing I thought wouldn't ever happen, but once it did, that's the league actively officially accusing them of cheating. From there it just depends on how watertight those allegations are, which I have to imagine they are to have made the big statement of the accusation… I think they might well be made to stick - but, i could see it happening so long after the fact as to be effectively irrelevant. City will keep petitioning and blocking and appealing the case for years down the line until its far enough in the past that they feel it won't tarnish their 'present'.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,585 ✭✭✭mormank


    Yeah Arsenal couldn't even do us a favour in our race for 3rd!! 🤣



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,349 ✭✭✭Zak Flaps




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,349 ✭✭✭Zak Flaps


    Jesus Toby, I can almost forgive you for all the nauseating Rocky gifs with this post.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,349 ✭✭✭Zak Flaps


    It's one sided for sure, as Man City refused to contribute. But if you believe Man City got to where they are today without foul play behind the scenes, you are kidding yourself.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,595 ✭✭✭kingshankly


    No point crying over city’s 115 charges every time we have a bad result let’s focus on ourselves twice in recent weeks we had it in our own hands and we couldn’t handle it . There is no way city lose at home to palace in a title run in

    And if we are being totally honest this side simply isn’t good enough and have probably overachieved this season



  • Posts: 0 [Deleted User]


    Considering a lot of people didn't think we'd make top 4 this season we've done ok.

    We've just hit a bad patch at a terrible time. It happens. Brutal timing.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,476 ✭✭✭decies


    this is brutal though and I refuse to believe it’s not down to one thing . Somethings are not right behind the scene rather then woeful shooting or defending . This is way way worse than just a single incident here or there .Lets see how the games left pan out but if it continues at this rate well we need to revalueate what are plans player wise for next season . Would the quality players please stand up .



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,476 ✭✭✭decies


    we will never forget



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 249 ✭✭Tommysocks11


    Disgusted this morning, how did nunez, salah, jota and Jones not score their chances yesterday? If we had gotten a draw I would have accepted it as Palace should have scored another one if I am being honest, we had no luck yesterday whatsoever and now city will inevitably win their 6th in 7 years while the FA look on and punish Everton an forest etc without doing anything about city, another thing next season there should be no refs heading off to Saudi reffing games getting wined and dined, it's a conflict of interest and surprise surprise we get denied a blatant penalty against city, its rotten to the core and no wonder klopp is getting out and I hope he refers to it when he is finished and points out the cheating etc



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,955 ✭✭✭dogbert27


    There's six games to go in the season.

    Our manager and back room team are leaving.

    We thought we would get Alonso. He didn't want to come.

    A deal announced for Amorim. He said no contact has been made.

    Players are going to have their agents in their ears telling them make sure they do not get injured in the next 5 weeks to keep their options open.

    While we can say Klopp's announcement gave us a boost at a time that we were struggling with injuries and gave the players something to play for, in early February that was a long way in the future.

    Now mid-April reality is sinking in with those around the club. The Klopp era is ending on May 19th and right now nobody knows what's happening on May 20th.

    All our hopes are in Edwards getting it right again.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,749 ✭✭✭giveitholly


    Where and who said there was a deal announced for Amorin?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,955 ✭✭✭dogbert27


    It was in the papers last week. Verbal agreement reached with Amorim and Liverpool representatives.

    It was posted in here too.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,595 ✭✭✭kingshankly


    was it the same paper that said there was a heat wave coming 😂



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,313 ✭✭✭✭citytillidie


    ******



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,369 ✭✭✭✭SlickRic


    Man Utd and Crystal Palace were games we bottled. let's be honest.

    as far as I'm concerned, the players failed to execute normally basic skills in the moment they were needed to. it's just that simple.

    were they bloody incredible to be any position to challenge for the League? Yes.

    do I thin they players have been brilliant all year, despite the injuries? Yes.

    But did the pressure get to them when they were in the penalty area multiple times over 2 games, and failed to score? Yes.

    All those things can be true at once.

    City have been belting in screamers all week to win their games. they're a machine. a well-oiled (yes, I've said that on purpose) machine. It is what it is.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,313 ✭✭✭✭citytillidie


    And Liverpool were quick to say they didn't speak to him and so has he.

    ******



  • Registered Users Posts: 304 ✭✭IrishOwl...


    I think those months between December and February sum up the last few years under Klopp. Probably the best, most entertaining side going when they're fully on it. But if you re-watch some of those matches, it's a completely unsustainable style of football to play over a full season. But I'm not sure Klopp knows any other way.

    It's manic, helter-skeltor stuff. The games against Chelsea and Newcastle are perfect examples, Liverpool could have scored 10 in both. But at the same time you never felt either of those 2 teams were out of it until the last 10 minutes. Chelsea could have had 2 penalties and missed 2 absolute sitters. Newcastle were absolutely batter but it still took a late penalty for Liverpool to kill them off.

    There's very rarely any sense of control, or ability to see things out when I watch Liverpool. It's just 2 extremes. I know people say Pep is boring with his total control style precisions football. But in order to be successful in the long run, you need to have some of it, and this Liverpool side lacks badly in that department.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,749 ✭✭✭giveitholly


    It was also in the papers that we would get Alonso. Until there is an official announcement from the club everything you read in the papers or here has to be taken with a pinch of salt.

    Remember paper never refuses ink



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,664 ✭✭✭theoneeyedman


    Paper never refuses ink.

    Look, last week was a bad week on the field, but for those of us old enough to remember 1989,today's date puts all of that into some perspective.

    YNWA.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,415 ✭✭✭✭LuckyLloyd


    Yeah the bristling at the reality of what happened against Utd and Palace is weird to me. It wasn't the game plan, if it was we wouldn't have created such a massive preponderance of chances. It wasn't a capability issue or being not good enough, if it was we wouldn't have created such a massive preponderance of chances. It wasn't even tiredness, miles on the clock, etc - because, again, if it was we wouldn't have created such a massive preponderance of chances.

    This is squarely mental, and when it's squarely mental it is probably pressure. Snatching at the wrong pass when you are in a 3 on 2 break in space, is "bottling". When the player can make the right decision / the right pass and did so multiple times earlier in the season. Continued poor finishing, when we know the players can finish because they did earlier in the season, is also "bottling". As is Quansah's mental error leaving a ball short, as is leaving space in that part of the box against Palace, etc.

    I can live with this by the way, this is what sport is. It's really **** difficult to win stuff. But we have not been "mentality monsters" the last week, it's been the complete opposite. I also don't think it's "luck". It's annoying and, sure, there is some variance involved. But putting the ball in the **** net is part of the game, it just is. Salah and Nunez are NOT getting unlucky. They are just playing terribly, they are bottling it.

    The commentary and analysis on Sky always plays its part to confuse people here, of course. Carragher talking yesterday about how Palace were "brilliant" and Liverpool were "rubbish". As Palace ship sitter after sitter that is just missed. Palace executed well, relative to expectations. But that's a ~4 - 1 defeat for them any time other than exactly the last 8 days. It therefore requires a different lens of analysis, that is all about mentality, pressure and execution imo.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,415 ✭✭✭✭LuckyLloyd


    I expect City to win the league now with games to spare, making it their 6th title in 7 seasons. The Title race got talked up and all that, but it will look a bit silly in retrospect. City have that ability to just go on long punishing runs of wins when it counts, to a degree nobody else other than ourselves in our very best era of Kloppball were able to manage. It's a stunning level of domination, and hard to see how it changes outside of Pep retiring and / or the EPL sanctioning their historic misconduct.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,476 ✭✭✭decies


    any chance in coming games especially league ones that klopp changes it up or do we just sail into forever repeating mistakes after mistakes with certain players that look shot . There’s one thing being loyal another just not clever . Just a a small example Danns has being completely forgotten last few weeks where we patiently just watch in some cases pub league finishes . I mean we CANT win the league if we don’t win now going forward , please shake it up more likely too late but honestly do something , it’s just all too predictable with lineups and players I know they got us there but at the business end of a marathon we are crawling across the line .



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,369 ✭✭✭✭SlickRic


    i'll still believe on Thursday that we can do something ludicrous.

    i'll still have that 2% of me that will believe we can somehow win all our games and have City slip up.

    but even if/when those things don't happen, i think it needs to be said just how amazing this era has been for us, because a lot will be written and said in the press, as well as by rivals, that is complete and utter nonsense. a small minority will hype our achievements up too much, while many others will call him a failure. it's already happening.

    Klopp has been the perfect manager for Liverpool Football Club at a time when it was desperately needed. Post H***s and G*****t, and into the FSG tenure, after realising that despite having, in Luis Suarez, the most talented player to ever play in the league outside of Cristiano Ronaldo, and arguably the greatest midfielder of his generation in Steven Gerrard, we couldn't win the League any time soon. So the thing had to be rebuilt in another person's image, and that image was Jurgen Klopp.

    Over the course of 8 years he has transformed the club into one where success is expected. There is no other manager in the history of the Premier League, with the resource disparity he had compared to City and Utd in particular, who could have done what he's done. Not one. We weren't set up to win, unlike the City that Pep walked into and spent over £1bn on. Nobody else could scare Pep like Klopp did. Nobody else could have kept the Premier League entertaining during these years. The Premier League was a Farmers' League without him.

    And despite all of that, such is his greatness, and the change in expectations he brought about, I feel as though his tenure was one where he slightly underachieved. For what he ended up having, with the mentality he fostered, and the superstars that he created, I think he left at least one CL and one PL behind, despite the ludicrous standards of City.

    But it's been a spectacular ride, and he's left us in a place where we are unquestionably one of the elite. It's up to the next man to keep us there and build.

    Is Klopp the greatest of all time? No.

    Is his legacy on the level of a Pep or Ferguson, or even Mourinho? No, not really. Just a tier below.

    But is he the only one who could've done what he's done at Liverpool? I'm pretty sure he is.

    That'll do for me, and then some.



  • Administrators Posts: 54,164 Admin ✭✭✭✭✭awec


    You're right, it's manic, it's fast paced, it's unsustainable, we can't play at 100mph for 90 minutes in every game.

    But we shouldn't have to.

    This system worked great for us in the past because we had forwards you could rely on to put the ball in the net, so when we did up the pace for a period in the games and did play the helter skelter football we would get 2 or 3 (or more) goals as a reward for it. We don't do that any more.

    Said it last week, Diaz and Nunez are a big problem for us. Two starting players who are very wasteful in front of goal, we cannot afford to carry two players like this. One of them has to go.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,182 ✭✭✭chicorytip


    Ah, come on. The ball was struck low, from distance, at or slightly above head height. He's 6'4". You'd swear he was another Ray Clemence the way some are talking him up.

    Dropped yesterday.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,370 ✭✭✭✭8-10


    He was outside the box though, at the time I was very glad he didn't handle it as it would have meant Adrian for the remainder of the game and a suspension.

    With hindsight it wouldn't have made a difference but if he would have saved it it's a red card



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 16,189 ✭✭✭✭Fitz*


    If he handled the ball, he would have been sent off as it was outside the box.



  • Registered Users Posts: 304 ✭✭IrishOwl...


    The last time I checked, keepers can't handle the ball outside the box!

    He also wasn't dropped. He simply the No.2 to one of the best goalkeepers in the world, who had just returned from injury.

    Post edited by IrishOwl... on


  • Registered Users Posts: 304 ✭✭IrishOwl...


    I still think that system is not sustainable in the long over a span of 2/3 seasons which I was what top teams look to achieve. I think 18/19 to 20/21 is the last time Liverpool put back to back decent seasons together. Even having the best forwards in the world, they will inevitably lose form and miss chances.

    It also a sure fire way to wear down your squad. Regardless of how good you are up front, really great teams can get a run of 1-0's together when they're not fully motoring, get over the line, control a game and get a job done. I wouldn't trust this Liverpool team with a 1-0 lead if my life depended on it.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,522 ✭✭✭✭noodler


    Delusional if you think Kelleher was dropped.

    Allison was simply reinstated.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,415 ✭✭✭✭LuckyLloyd


    "Unsustainable"…compared to what? Ferguson's last 3 peat or Mourinho's first 2 years with Chelsea took place in an entirely different era of the game. We are in the "wall of money" era and City are proving the most dominant force in English football history. Liverpool in the 80s and Utd under Ferguson had stretches where they were immense but neither of those eras managed 4 titles on the trot. Ally that to the inevitability of the football; the holistic success in cup competitions and in Europe; and the historic points totals - and this is something completely unlike what we've seen before. It is better funded than any team in history, has a deeper squad and youth structure than any club in history, and it is more litigious than any club in history. This is complete and utter domination.

    During this period of Klopp's 9 seasons, Liverpool have gone to 3 CL Finals and have gone over 90 points 3 times. The formula is repeatable, the system works. You can't do these things without control of football matches, like you suggest. The difference between Klopp and City is the same difference that existed between Klopp and Bayern: MONEY. To roll all these seasons in a row like City have together is not about style, it is about the ability to keep the players you want to keep (they have NEVER lost a star to Real / Barca / Bayern) and add the players you want to add. Whatever is needed to continually improve and freshen things up and adjust to whatever relative weaknesses were exposed the prior season can simply be paid for.

    And I'm not whining here, this is matter of fact. I get the confusion from Utd fans, they have been so delighted to see Liverpool pipped by City that they ignored how monstrous City became. The chasm between City and EVERYONE is cavernous. This was fully on display last week, they got Real's best game and Real have clearly improved massively compared to last year - and they just had the quality to keep throwing counter punches.

    It is a folly to talk about sustainability for anyone else in this context. Nobody is coming along winning multiple leagues in a row so long as this City model and Pep exists. There is no style you can deploy, there are no players you can reasonably sign. City will eat your lunch in the end. And then - because you lose - someone wants to come in and talk about how you are responsible for the loss, what you did wrong. How many more titles would City need to win for people to get it? Or will they only get it when they are the ones good enough to be trying to keep pace with them?

    Because post Klopp, Liverpool won't be up there. We can talk about "sustainability" then.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,369 ✭✭✭✭SlickRic


    lads, success like City's is not sustainable in the PL outside of City, oil money, cheating and Pep. not in this era.

    Liverpool have been just about as competitive as anybody could reasonably expect them to be.

    I don't think people realise how mental 4 in a row would be. It's as big an achievement as the Treble. Only a club that essentially has 18 of the best players in the world can do it, because with the amount of games that have to be played these days, injuries will come, form will drift, and players aren't machines.

    But if Laporte disappears and Stones is injury prone, and you can just slot £50m Ake or £90m Gvardiol in, you're grand. Never mind talking about Ruben Dias.

    If you lose Gundogan, but can just slot in multiple time CL winner Kovacic in, you're grand.

    If you don't fancy the false 9 anymore, just buy the best striker on the planet.

    City don't have a massive squad. but it's a ludicrous squad built of only absolute elite players, with the best manager in the world, supplemented by an oil-bought state of the art academy of the highest calibre. And they always keep their best players. Why? Because they have the most money.

    Pep + having the most money = cheat code. Not one club, in the history of the Premier League at least, could have competed with them any better than Liverpool has. Not one.



  • Registered Users Posts: 304 ✭✭IrishOwl...


    I wasn't comparing anything to City, as there's no point. I was merely making a point that all title winning teams, in every league know that they is some games that you just have to go out and get it done, a scrappy tight 1-0 affair against some dogged team. Good and all as this current Liverpool side is, one thing is they don't seem to have that type of performance in the locker. That's all I was getting at.

    Post edited by IrishOwl... on


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,807 ✭✭✭Enzokk


    I hate playing at this time of the year, there is just something that is heavy on club when we are playing around the 15th April. That said we have dropped our level the last few matches. Maybe I am missing something for yesterday but it just seemed like Palace had one of those days as well, but going for them. They pressed and harried and they had bodies and body parts in the way of everything we threw at them. Maybe it is payback for the 7-0 when every shot went in for us, this time they had somebody in the way. I doubt they do this again in another match, but that is just how it goes.

    What we did see, players coming back from injury, and long term injuries, is great but they will take time to get up to speed and up to their high standards. I am still proud of this team, for making me dream. I still hold out hope for a miracle but will not begrudge those on the pitch that do look out on their feet some times when they are having difficult moments.



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  • Registered Users Posts: 2,899 ✭✭✭Girly Gal


    Tbf, they were doing this up until the United FA Cup match, grinding out the wins, and again against Brighton and Sheffield, but, you can only do that for so long without actually getting back into form, instead we have ran out of steam. Personally I think this team is a step below the team that won the league and CL a few years back, just not clinical enough and making hard work of most matches, we haven't really had any period this season, where we won matches with ease. You can't keep going to the well all the time, eventually it'll run dry!



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,522 ✭✭✭✭noodler


    Ah it's a level or two below the other title winning and challenging sides.

    Hendo, Fab, Gini, Bobby, prime Mane and Salah. It's not even close for me.

    City aren't going for 100 points this season and that has helped us a little.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,899 ✭✭✭Girly Gal




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,349 ✭✭✭Zak Flaps


    oops!



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,522 ✭✭✭✭noodler


    Crazy.

    What's the definition of Big Chance?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,522 ✭✭✭✭noodler


    Is there anything to be said for just playing Mo through the middle?

    You still fancy him to finish more often than not even if he is finding less joy coming in from the right.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,632 ✭✭✭Damien360


    not on current form. He had one cut back in chance from the right with a shot on target in the palace game. Some of us had put this down to Ramadan constraints but I’m not so sure any more.

    Nunez has to go and take Diaz with him. Not long ago, I would have said he will come good. It ain’t happening. Regardless of what’s a big chance from the graph above, it’s plainly obvious he misses an awful lot. He is a liability and Diaz for all his runs doesn’t produce either.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,546 ✭✭✭✭BorneTobyWilde


    The 10 misses that might have ended Liverpool’s Premier League title bid

    By Philip BuckinghamApr 15, 2024

    Liverpool’s hopes of winning the Premier League are hanging by a thread.

    No sooner had they dropped two points when failing to beat Manchester United away last Sunday, another wasteful performance brought a far more shuddering setback when losing 1-0 to Crystal Palace at home seven days later.

    Jurgen Klopp’s men have gone from holding a three-point lead over Manchester City to trailing their old title adversaries by two points in the blink of
    an eye. What will really sting Klopp is that these problems have been
    self-inflicted.

    And with just six games left to play, there is a danger the swing will prove decisive. Not even Arsenal’s own shock defeat to Aston Villa could shake the nagging concern that Liverpool ceded ground they might never recover.

    Season over? Quite possibly given the 3-0 drubbing by Atalanta in the Europa League quarter-final first leg.

    So here it is, a Premier League advantage surrendered in 10 misses…

    Dominik Szoboszlai 

    Manchester United, 3mins
    Difficulty rating: 3/10
    xG value: 0.47

    Liverpool’s world looked very
    different in the opening stages of last weekend’s trip to Old Trafford.
    There was a spring in their step and confidence that an FA Cup defeat to Manchester United three weeks earlier would be avenged.

    That
    would eventually prove misplaced — but you would not have known it
    during a dominant first half. Liverpool cut United wide open on the
    counter-attack in the opening minutes, with Mohamed Salah sending a sumptuous threaded pass through to Szoboszlai.

    The Hungarian was clear on goal but Andre Onana produced an excellent stop with his outstretched left hand. The harbinger of the wastefulness that would follow…

    Dominik Szoboszlai

    Manchester United, 18mins
    Difficulty rating: 8/10
    xG value: 0.27

    Liverpool were refusing to let
    United settle in a first half of dominance that played out just as many
    had predicted. A ragged United defensive line that Brentford and Chelsea had picked apart in the previous outings could not contain Liverpool.

    Andy Robertson’s
    advances down the left produced another big opening but, again,
    Szoboszlai fluffed his lines. A low cross was met on the run but fired
    harmlessly wide from the penalty spot.

    United had not tracked the midfield run of the Hungarian, who could shoot without an opponent within a yard of him.

    Darwin Nunez

    Manchester United, 53mins
    Difficulty rating: 4/10
    xG value: N/A (due to Nunez crossing not shooting)

    Nunez
    is the poster boy of Liverpool’s wasteful week and a figure that, for
    all his recent improvements, offers little reassurance he is ready to
    deliver consistently. Context was key for this miss, with Bruno Fernandes cancelling out Luis Diaz’s opener early in the second half. United were bubbling to life and should have had wind drawn from their sails.

    Salah
    was again the architect of the opening when picking a pass that sent
    Diaz into the United box, and the choice to pick out Nunez at the back
    post soon proved unwise.

    The Uruguayan was caught between two
    minds from a tight angle and dragged the ball back across the face of
    goal when the moment begged for him to rifle home, or square to the
    unmarked Szoboszlai.

    Mohamed Salah

    Manchester United, 79mins
    Difficulty rating: 5/10
    xG value: 0.16

    Oh how Liverpool long for the
    Salah of old: that ruthless, unforgiving marksman that has punished
    defences year after year. He might have scored five goals since
    returning from injury last month but he has not convinced.

    This opening summed up his current lot in life. Liverpool were pushing for an equaliser after Kobbie Mainoo’s
    wonderful goal gave Manchester United a 2-1 lead and Diaz’s shot from
    the edge of the box could only be palmed out into Salah’s direction by
    Onana.

    Salah has taken far tougher chances, even under pressure. But this wild, uncontrolled finish was high and wide.

    Liverpool’s
    top scorer would go some way to making amends when converting a penalty
    for 2-2 minutes later, but that was dependent on Aaron Wan-Bissaka’s challenge on Harvey Elliott.

    Luis Diaz

    Manchester United, 90mins
    Difficulty rating: 6/10
    xG value: 0.31

    A chaotic game had swung from one
    team to the other but the man who started the scoring from close range
    should have ended it during stoppage time.

    A United team that
    brings the guarantees of chances found time for one more in stoppage
    time after Robertson had won a back-post header, but Diaz could not
    produce the finish to make himself a hero.

    There was space found between Diogo Dalot and Willy Kambwala, but not calmness. The finish was snatched and, leaning back, Diaz fired over.

    Another chance as good did not arrive, no matter how hard Liverpool pushed at an open door.

    Wataru Endo

    Crystal Palace, 27mins
    Difficulty rating: 7/10
    xG value: 0.15

    The significance of this miss was
    not altogether obvious there and then. Liverpool had time on their side
    to overturn Palace’s lead, as well as the muscle memory of a hundred
    comebacks.

    Yet Endo, who has only
    one Premier League goal to his name, will know it might have been very
    different had he produced conviction inside a goalmouth scramble. A
    scuffed shot was hooked against the crossbar from six yards out before
    the ball was eventually cleared by Palace’s defence. Tellingly, it would
    get no better.

    Darwin Nunez

    Crystal Palace, 55mins
    Difficulty rating: 2/10
    xG value: 0.13

    Liverpool’s king of chaos but also their prince of profligacy. On the same pitch where he had
    shanked wide a golden chance against Atalanta in a bruising Europa
    League defeat, there was another lamentable episode in a season that
    might have yielded double his 18-goal haul in all competitions.

    Credit went to Dean Henderson for keeping out Nunez’s goalbound shot, but the Palace ‘keeper should not have been given a prayer when Nunez met Virgil van Dijk’s knockdown from a corner.

    Klopp,
    justifiably, had seen enough and hooked Nunez 11 minutes later.
    Liverpool, he concluded, would be better off placing faith in others.

    Diogo Jota

    Crystal Palace, 72mins
    Difficulty rating: 1/10
    xG value: 0.45

    Jamie Carragher recently made the bold claim that Jota was the most accomplished finisher of Liverpool’s Premier League era. Not on this evidence.

    Szoboszlai
    had done everything right when bursting into the Palace penalty area
    and drawing Henderson from his goal but Jota, presented with an
    unguarded net, could only hit the former Liverpool defender Nathaniel Clyne.

    Either
    side of the Palace man and it would have been 1-1 with ample time to
    push for a winner. Jota, only back from injury this week, can typically
    be counted on for more.

    Curtis Jones

    Crystal Palace, 75mins
    Difficulty rating: 3/10
    xG value: 0.52

    On and on Liverpool went, still
    searching for the equaliser that would elude them. Palace were tiring
    and Jones, one of the few Liverpool players to drive forward, came as
    close as anyone to breaking the visitors’ resolve.

    The dribble was
    perfect, taking Jones away from two defenders. There was time to steady
    himself and dispatch beyond Henderson. Then came the finish… wayward
    and regrettable.

    The sinking feeling, by this point, was calcifying.

    Mohamed Salah

    Crystal Palace, 90mins
    Difficulty rating: 3/10
    xG value: 0.36

    Seven minutes of stoppage time
    offered hope of an equaliser and maybe more, but Liverpool were unable
    to deliver another rescue act.

    Salah, so often the hero, was on the end of a clipped ball into the box, but Tyrick Mitchell’s covering challenge from nowhere would spare Henderson from even having to make a save.

    A poked effort was blocked from three yards out as Palace clung to the clean sheet that few had seen coming.

    Mitchell
    — like his Palace team-mates — deserved enormous credit. Liverpool and
    Salah, though, only had themselves to blame in a first Premier League
    home defeat for 18 months.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 32,144 ✭✭✭✭~Rebel~


    Definitely wouldn't be selling Nunez just yet. He's been much much better this year than last year, so I'd like to see another year of development. But he just doesn't need to be starting every game, especially with 5 forward options now. Get him out of the team, and let him start rebuilding confidence through sub appearances - he's also the ideal sub option as the only one who can cover all three forward positions. Gakpo deserved the start yesterday, he's clearly the man in form, and the only one of our forwards that looks to have a bit of confidence right now.

    In general, Klopp's making some odd choices… every time he's used Szobo over the last while, I think Elliott would have been a better option. Szobo's been our worst midfielder of late, but keeps either starting, or coming on at half time. Elliott isn't as physical, but he keeps the ball much better and keeps moves going.



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