Liverpool’s collapse is hard to fathom
YOU know what? Up to then they were doing alright. More than alright really. There were even little signs of the side we’ve come to know, and then, just like that, it all crumbled to dust. In the space of seven minutes they went from one up to two down. In the space of seven minutes they were left brutally exposed. All those cracks they’d been working hard to paper over for seventy minutes yawned wide open.
It was Liverpool’s season to date in microcosm. Everybody did their best in the run up to Christmas to shrug off the set-backs, but the hits they just kept on coming. Injury followed injury, and eventually it just caught up with them. That Liverpool were in the position they were, despite all that, heading into the festive period was pretty damned impressive. It was more than impressive really, and probably that is why what’s happened since is all the more shocking.
If Liverpool had limped and struggled a bit more before mid-December, the fall off would not seem quite as precipitous as it has. Still it has been pretty awful stuff since then. Jürgen Klopp’s men don’t seem at all the same team. It’s like the air has been left out of them, and in a very real way it has. It’s not just that they’ve lost the heart of their defence – which they have – it’s that the Reds have also lost their midfield as a result. That Jordan Henderson and Fabinho have performed credibly and admirably as centre-halves is in a way besides the point. The point being that without them the rest of Liverpool’s team has failed to fire. The pressing game hasn’t been as pronounced and, for all his admirable qualities, Thiago hasn’t provided the shot in the arm most Reds were hoping for if not expecting. To be fair to the Spaniard he’s not exactly gotten the chance yet to play in a settled midfield with all the chopping and changing at the back and in the middle of the park.
Some of this is just down to misfortune – who could possibly have imagined so many injuries in such a short space of time? More of it is down to poor decisions by the money men – selling and not replacing Dejan Lovren, waiting until the season was underway before signing Diogo Jota and Thiago, waiting until the very last minute in January to sign the two new centre halves. Some of it is even down to poor decisions by Klopp here and there – not making use of Takumi Minamino, for instance, and then loaning him out while keeping hold of Divock Origi.
It’s really been a perfect storm of awfulness, topped off by the terrible news that Klopp’s mother, Elisabeth, passed away last week. The German is understandably heartbroken. What a shame the fans can’t rally round him like they would in ordinary times. A year from hell.