RAPID FIRE REDS
They’re back on top of the league after 15 seconds!
LIVERPOOL regained top spot last night by thrashing hapless Huddersfield.
Naby Keita (far right) got them off to a blistering start with a goal after 15 seconds — the fastest Liverpool have ever scored in the Premier League. ‘His pressing is a massive strength. He’s a complete midfielder,’ said manager Jurgen Klopp of Keita.
There were also two goals each for Mo Salah and Sadio Mane — first and second in the race for the golden boot.
Roger Hunt was a World Cup winner. everyone knows roger Hunt. Sam raybould, that’s a different matter. He was an outside-right from the coalfields of Derbyshire, signed by Liverpool from New Brighton in the first month of the 20th century. raybould played for Staveley Colliery and Bolsover Colliery, among others — and, later, Arsenal when they still had Woolwich in their name.
Just so you know the type of records Liverpool are taking on this season.
Not just the recent stuff. Not just the records in colour. Until last night, Hunt and raybould shared the accolade of being the most prolific goalscorers across their first 100 games for the club, with 68 goals each.
No longer. When Mohamed Salah scored his second goal of the night, Liverpool’s fifth, he moved to 69 in a century of appearances. So this isn’t just about being good in the
Premier League era. Liverpool are transcending football’s generations, its centuries even. Whatever happens from here, their pointsper-game aggregate is going to be better than the 1978- 79 title winners, the team many regard as Liverpool’s greatest of all time.
other noteworthy achievements? Well, left back Andrew robertson beat the record for assists by a defender in the Premier League — outstripping the total of two evertonians, Andy Hinchcliffe and Leighton Baines. Trent AlexanderArnold, on the other flank, may go past them, too — although he is unlikely to surpass his team-mate.
And, yes, it was Huddersfield. There were 74 points between these teams at the start, 77 by the end, and that wasn’t the half of it, in real terms.
Yet at this crucial stage in the season, we can ask no more than that Liverpool win. The pressure is on them and while they were expected to dispose of Huddersfield comfortably, the manner in which they did was still impressive, given the circumstances. Liverpool took 15 seconds to score and the only surprise was that they hadn’t made up the entirety of Manchester City’s goal difference advantage when Kevin Friend blew the final whistle. Five is a significant inroad, though, considering City had eight on Liverpool when the night began.
of course, with so few games remaining, goal difference may not play a part. It would need a specific sequence of results for it to come into play and Liverpool still need City to lose, rather than rely on any statistical wizardry. even so, just psychologically, it is positive to be within touching distance of such prolific rivals. It is a measure of Liverpool’s greatness that they are more than keeping pace with one of the finest teams in history. Liverpool have done all they can by exerting this pressure.
City must win at Burnley tomorrow, or hand the advantage to Liverpool. Pep guardiola does not think his rivals will drop another point. Indeed, those whose job it is to monitor the surges and shortages of the national grid may have noticed a sudden absence of activity in the greater Manchester area at 15 seconds past 8pm last night, when hope of an upset sharply receded. once Liverpool had scored their fastest goal of the Premier League era, any hope Mancunians — of blue, and red, hue — had of witnessing them stumble was over.
There was to be no shock here, no upset, no choke. This was all going to go completely to plan. Had they remained tuned in for another 15 minutes, however, they would have seen Huddersfield respond to Liverpool’s goal in a very spirited way. They forced three corners and Jon gorenc Stankovic had a decent shot deflected wide. From there, normal service was resumed. Liverpool took control and Huddersfield demonstrated the frailty that saw them fall out of the top division in close to record time.
How did Liverpool score so early? Put simply: Huddersfield made it easy for them. Liverpool are a team that press very high, very quickly, so if their opponents attempt to play the ball out from the back, they have to be very good at it. Huddersfield are not. They have lost every game they have played against the Premier League’s top six this season, and it was not hard to see why. Stankovic’s first pass of the game went not to one of his own players, but to Salah who was already applying pressure deep in Huddersfield’s half. Fatal. He slipped the ball to Naby Keita, who finished smartly for his third goal in five games — having not scored for Liverpool until April 5.
Panic over. Not that there was much of it in the stadium — Jurgen Klopp even committed a small slip of the tongue in his pre-match press conference by describing Huddersfield at home as a game his team would win — but had the game dragged on a little, had Huddersfield goalkeeper Jonas Lossl made a few good saves, things could have got edgy. We have been here before. Sir Alex Ferguson was famously outraged at a similar stage in a previous season when thwarted by a West Ham side that had already been relegated. We’ve all seen ‘one of those nights’.
But this wasn’t going to be one of them, and Anfield soon knew it.
Before the game there had been a minute of silence for a legendary Liverpool captain, and it was ironic to see ‘2: Tommy Smith’ on the Huddersfield team sheet. One imagines even had the original in his prime been available he would have been unable to repel a Liverpool team of this brilliance. Huddersfield certainly did not have a defender who could live with them. The second goal arrived after 23 minutes.
Virgil van Dijk, recently crowned Players’ Player of the Year, and with good reason, brought the ball coolly out from the back, feeding Robertson on the left for the full back to deliver his 10th Premier League assist of the season.
And how often have we seen one like it? A perfect cross, straight onto the head of its intended target, in this case Sadio Mane. Terence Kongolo was nowhere and Mane’s header left Lossl clutching at air.
Huddersfield were done, and the only question remaining for Liverpool was: how many.
The third arrived before half time. It was the direct approach that Pep Guardiola says makes Liverpool so dangerous, a ball over the top from Alexander-Arnold, falling for Salah who only had to loft it over Lossl to complete the job. Liverpool’s African forwards seem to be in their own Golden Boot competition right now and in the 66th minute, Mane got his 20th of the Premier League season: another header. Liverpool know how to do the bread and butter stuff, too. No team has scored more headers this season, and a lovely cross by Jordan Henderson was steered back across the face of goal. Finally — history. Salah’s second and a goal of beautiful simplicity. An exquisite reverse pass by substitute Xherdan Shaqiri, whipped in by the magnificent Robertson, tapped in by Salah for his 21st League goal of the season. Match that, he seemed to say. And now we go to Turf Moor to see if anyone can.