Liverpool on the brink
THE Lighthouse led the way. This was Liverpool quickly back to their best and Fabinho returning to his stunning dominance, capped with a quite brilliant goal which had that delicious trajectory of the ball still rising at it hit the net.
There was also the bonus of that wonderful ‘ping’ sound that can only be heard inside an empty stadium. Unstoppable, in fact. Utterly emphatic. Just like Liverpool this season.
Lockdown has been cruel and although there was never any doubt that when the Premier League resumed Liverpool would win their first title in 30 years – and would win it even if the season was curtailed – one unexpected plus has been allowing their Brazilian midfielder the time to fully recover from the ankle ligament injury which appeared to affect him since November.
It was Jurgen Klopp’s assistant Pep Lijnders who named Fabinho ‘The Lighthouse’ within the ‘organised chaos’ that the Liverpool manager demands. With his “timing, his vision, his calmness, it gives another dimension to our midfield,” Lijnders explained and in one performance Fabinho reasserted himself as the best defensive midfielder in the league during this campaign.
Fabinho’s goal took his side into a 3-0 lead against Palace but there was never going to be any repeat of the ‘Crystanbul’ comeback which ended Liverpool’s title hopes of 2014. This Liverpool team is a different proposition and Sadio Mane quickly added a fourth.
What will they become known as? We have had Manchester United’s treble winners, Arsenal’s Invincibles, Chelsea’s Special Ones under Jose Mourinho, a ‘fearless’ Leicester City and Manchester City’s ‘Fourmidables’.
Monsters
Maybe they will just be known, to use Klopp’s phrase, as ‘the Mentality Monsters’ because from the moment ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ faded around an empty Anfield there was never any doubt that they would collect the win that takes them to the brink of the title.
After all the talk of how it would feel to win it inside an empty stadium Liverpool may be crowned champions as they sit on their sofas at home should City fail to defeat Chelsea away tonight although the current times mean there will be no party around Jordan Henderson’s house as there was at Jamie Vardy’s following Leicester triumph in 2016.
It is shame for the club, the players and most of all their fans but this will have be an extraordinary title under any circumstances and not least because, let’s be honest, Jose Mourinho called it right back in November when Liverpool beat City 3-1 and he said: “The league is done.”
Mourinho was not even Tottenham’s head coach then, he was speaking as a TV pundit, and although it was a typical piece of bravura from him everyone knew that he was probably calling it correctly. Not least because he has won leagues early himself.
Nevertheless, what a statement that was and what a season this has been. Just a few months after losing out to City despite being defeated in just one league game in 2018-’19 Klopp’s side had effectively toppled a team we felt were unstoppable.
From August to November is just three months – the same length of time we have had to wait for football to find its way back amid this pandemic but the one certainty that has existed is that the title would be Liverpool’s. To go into the shutdown with a 25-point lead is, was, and ever will be simply stunning.
There was no messing about
against Palace. Klopp had paid Roy Hodgson the compliment of revealing that the former Switzerland coach had been one of the two managers he had been urged to study by a former mentor in the early part of his career. The other was Arrigo Sacchi.
Needless to say, Hodgson’s coaching manual would not have included normally placing 5ft 7in Max Meyer on the end of a defensive wall and Liverpool exploited that fully with a wonderful free-kick by Trent Alexander-Arnold to open the scoring.
The goals flowed. The ‘Mentality Monsters’ secured their first 2-0 halftime lead since December and were far sharper, far quicker and also, of course, far stronger than they were at the weekend away to Everton and rapidly doubled it with Fabinho the shining light. The social distancing partying can soon begin. (© Daily Telegraph, London)