TRENT LIFTS THE CURSE
Liverpool defender ends their six-match losing run in league at Anfield with late winner
TRENT ALEXANDER-ARNOLD and Liverpool have slipped into an unsettling cycle of sin and redemption as the champions have fallen from grace t his season. After ignominy against Real Madrid last week, the prodigiously gifted right-back chose glory against Aston Villa at Anfield yesterday and banished his team’s embarrassment over a losing home run in the league that stretched back to last year.
Alexander- Arnold, dropped from Gareth Southgate’s England squad and then the hero of Liverpool’s away win at Arsenal, was the fall-guy in Liverpool’s Champions League quarter-final defeat at Valdebebas, when he inadvertently guided a diving header into the path of Marco Asensio and allowed him to score Madrid’s second goal.
But, with Southgate watching from the near- deserted main stand at Anfield and the game slipping into injury time with the scores level at 1-1, it was Alexander-Arnold who appeared on the edge of the Villa box, collected a loose ball after Emiliano Martinez had saved brilliantly from Thiago Alcantara and lashed the ball back past the goalkeeper into the bottom corner for the winner.
And so if Liverpool’s 7-2 away defeat by Villa back in October had ushered in a season of confusion and malaise for Jurgen Klopp’s side, this comeback victory carried with it the hope that a corner had been turned. It was the first time Liverpool had won at their former fortress since they beat Spurs here on December 16.
The result was harsh on Villa, who had taken the lead through Ollie Watkins on the stroke of half-time. But after Liverpool had been denied a quick reply by a VAR controversy, Mohamed Salah levelled in the second half and the stage was set for the latest chapter in Alexander-Arnold’s dance with fate and fortune.
Liverpool had lost their last six home league games before Villa’s visit — to Fulham, Chelsea, Everton, Manchester City, Brighton and Burnley — and they must have been relieved that Jack Grealish, their tormentor in October, was absent with a shin injury.
The outgoing champions did not start well, either, and AlexanderArnold looked as if the memories of Madrid still haunted him. James Milner laid a simple pass out to him on the right and the ball bounced off his foot and into touch.
Alexander-Arnold, of course, is not the only one for whom things are not running smoothly. When Tyrone Mings made a dreadful hash of an attempted back-pass, his mistake presented Salah with a one-on-one chance with Martinez. Once, you would have bet the farm on Salah tucking it away. This time, he rolled it wide.
Nor did Liverpool look comfortable at the back. Ozan Kabak has hardly been an unqualified success at Anfield and he began the game by being eased off the ball far too easily by John McGinn and conceding a free-kick in a dangerous area. Midway through the first half, Kabak and the rest of the Liverpool defence allowed Ezri Konsa a free header at the back post that Alisson was grateful to see directed straight at him.
Liverpool created chances but never really looked like converting them. Diogo Jota was their sharpest forward in the first half but he headed over from six yards when he should have scored. Salah wasted another when he collected a pass from Roberto Firmino inside the Villa box but lifted his shot over the bar.
A couple of minutes before halftime, Liverpool paid for that profligacy. They gave the ball away and Villa worked it forward to McGinn. McGinn slipped a pass to Watkins 15 yards out, Kabak gave him too much time to control the ball and when Watkins lashed the ball goalwards, Alisson let the shot squirm past his right hand and into the net.
Liverpool thought they had equalised in added time at the end of the first half when Firmino lifted a shot into the net from close range after some goalmouth pinball but VAR decided that Jota had strayed fractionally offside in the build-up. So much for LiVARpool. The days when Liverpool made their own luck are a distant memory now.
Half-time brought widespread evisceration of VAR and a blizzard of statistics about Liverpool’s appalling home form. Liverpool, the figures said, had not scored with any of their last 139 shots in Premier League home matches. Maybe Firmino’s disallowed goal made it 140.
Ten minutes after half-time, though, Liverpool finally forced a breakthrough. Jota helped a pass on to Andrew Robertson and the Scotland left-back unleashed a fierce drive towards the corner of the goal. Martinez did well to palm it away but it looped up into the path of Salah as he bore down on goal and he nodded it over the line.
Liverpool deserved to be level but a
few minutes later they were nearly behind again. Watkins took the ball towards the goal-line and then laid it back into the path of Mahmoud Trezeguet. Trezeguet hit it first time with the outside of his right boot past Alisson but the ball cannoned off the inside of the post and Trezeguet could only head the rebound wide.
The game opened up now and substitute Anwar El Ghazi should have done better with a flying header he put wide.
In the end, though, it was that moment of class, and redemption, from Alexander-Arnold that settled it, to end Liverpool’s cursed run.