Pack your bags. Find the nearest exit door and skedaddle with as much velocity as you can muster. Leave TV’s, computer, dogs, cats, small goats, llamas, goblins, dragons and children who can’t run behind, it’s time. The meteors are reigning down from the sky, chaos reigns, the distinct piercing sound of glass shattering permeates your very existence and you find life to be a constant flurry of doomsayers and fretful agitation as you scurry to find any hope left…The world is ending!
Except it’s really not.
Liverpool were beaten by a very good side, some might even call the side extraordinary, considering they’re the current champions and all. A stretch then, to say the Reds should’ve beaten them comfortably. Liverpool beat Arsenal 5-1! And Tottenham 5-0! And United 3-0! They’re going to surge towards the title with as much ferocity as the lads can muster in an undying, unlimited barrel of relentless attacking energy! That’s the plan! Why on earth can’t the boys beat a Manchester City team that currently not only lifted the Premier League trophy last year but also contains a more noticeable spine than a hunchback? Well, that’s it then, relegation here it comes. They might as well fight it out with Manchester United to get that nineteenth spot, everything is god awful. You know what, I might go support MK Dons; I hear they’re a decent team.
The trivial, mood-swinging tendency of football supporters to enter a rage-induced cacophony of warped pessimism and overreaction is a blindingly dreadful thing to observe. We all know that group of supporters who can’t stand to see any kind of mistake being made, especially when the hypotheticals were so promising, when the potential to come out of the team (obviously disregarding any realistic effects) was practically beyond limitation and the gaffer spoke so well about how we’d retain that attacking force, with a young, vibrant team capable of doing extraordinary things.
So, you can imagine that the sorry-sight of many Liverpool fans over social media (approximately fifty-sixty percent of social media supporters at around 10 o’clock Monday evening) experiencing a sheer discombobulating overreaction was a slightly irritating and incredibly agonising thing to behold. The expectancy for Liverpool’s defence to somehow immediately gel overnight, after spending the better part of two weeks as a unit was mind-boggling, and the sudden need for Brendan Rodgers boys to simply score and score and score defied any comparable logic of the game itself.
Firstly, however, let us, the negatives of the loss must be addressed, if for nothing more than pure appeasement.
Primarily, the leakiness issue has obviously not been fixed with simple masking tape. Spending the ₤36 million (plus however much Atletico Madrid is owed by the buyout option at the end of Javier Manquillo’s loan, supposing it is executed) does not immediately fix what is an obvious and persistent hole in Liverpool’s play. Here are two defenders always playing on the back foot and letting the opponents closer to goal than they should be; in Glen Johnson and Martin Skrtel. It’s not necessarily a detriment to be on the back-foot (actually it kind of is) but when contrasted to the newest duo to line-up ahead of Simon Mignolet’s left side; Alberto Moreno and Dejan Lovren, who very much prefer to break up attacks in their early stages and press forward on the front foot, it causes a few problems.
Putting defensive frailty down to individual errors is as easy as blaming the loss on “us not being able to score more than them”, yet neither have any real significance.
On the flipside of the pitch, Daniel Sturridge didn’t have one of his better games in front of goal, and the cutting edge in the final third was lacking. Centrally, Jordan Henderson was boxed out and cut off from his engine work by a behemoth of a City midfield, and Phil Coutinho was once again ineffectual in creativity.
The second half emphasised the need for cohesion, sure, but it also emphasised the need for patience. You can’t stick eleven people in a room and pray they get along; it’s not going to happen. The benefit to this side is the core; that part remains unchanged, and the bedding in process should thusly be swift. For forty minutes Liverpool were the better side, undoubtedly. However, once the first goal pierced the net, City went in for the kill, ruthlessly punishing any defensive sins they came across. Liverpool lost 3-1 and it was not a great result.
Now, can we all just chill out?
The capitulation of social media by some (once again approximated to around fifty percent of the fanbase perceived) completely ignored the obvious positives to be taken out of the game.
Individual mistakes were made, sure, but the blame for those can only be put down to a lack of cohesion – something that comes with time. The bizarre disregard for the excellent forty minutes put in by the team is astoundingly ignorant, and the superb performances by Alberto Moreno, Lazar Markovic and (for the first half at least) Joe Allen were deserving of plentiful plaudits. Markovic came on and immediately proceeded to terrorise one of the best defences in the competition, and put in a good case for a starting berth. Meanwhile, let’s get one thing straight.
Manchester City is the best team in the Barclay’s Premier league, until proven otherwise.
Raheem Sterling was boxed out of the game by one of the best centre halves in the world, as was Daniel Sturridge, yet Liverpool were able to garner more shots (11) than City’s (9), and on another day, with better quality in the final third and a defence privy enough to one another, they could have easily taken a result from the Etihad Stadium. Something very few teams will achieve this season.
Liverpool are better off this season than last already, with three extra points from the two corresponding fixtures, and travel to Spurs next week with superstar arrival Mario Balotelli and silky smooth Adam Lallana raring to make their debuts. Tactically, the arrivals give drastic improvement to the side, not only in their individual effort, but in the formation change; Rodgers now able to use his preferred 4-4-2 diamond formation, with a dance partner for Daniel Sturridge up front.
And that is the reality of it. Individual mistakes are just that; mistakes, just as individual performances are solitary performances. Collectively, however, is where the difference lies. When individuals combine, and the engineer gets his machinations moving in sync, this team will set the world ablaze.
But for the love of God, give it time. The world’s not ending, the streets aren’t filled with the red of blood, they’re filled with the red of passion, and though last season has everybody dreaming again, this is a side missing the third best player in the world, and is expected to reach even higher levels. Perhaps expectations must be lowered, for the time being at least. Will it take time? Of course it will.
Is the world ending? No. It isn’t..
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