The Mailbox reacts to a derby mauling on Merseyside…

Send your thoughts on the derby, the title race, Ralfy’s Reds, or any other subject to theeditor@football365.com…

Same city, different league
Two or more goals in 18 successive games, more league goals than any other team in Europe’s big five leagues, one defeat all season and quite frankly, just about the most impressive Liverpool team I’ve seen in my lifetime. And we’re *third*. The top 3 have a level of quality that defies belief and with the addition of Bayern , it’s three out of the four best teams in Europe as well. Anyone placing bets on who’s going to win the league is more confident of who’s favourite than I am.

Everton weren’t just in a different league to us – though they may literally be if this continues – they were practically playing a different sport. Rafa isn’t responsible for this mess, but he’s scarcely over achieving either and he’ll do well to be in situ by Xmas. It doesn’t take all that huge a leap of the imagination to see a bottom three of Newcastle, Norwich and Everton come the business end of the season.

And Newcastle shouldn’t bank on being able to spend their way out of trouble in January either. No team in history has spent more money to less effect than Everton . Not only would none of their players make a combined eleven, they’d do well to get any in a combined twenty-two.

The best of which , of course, was Mo Salah. Who, rather amusingly, is only the 7th best player in the world- officially at any rate. No disrespect to Jorginho in particular, but is there seriously a football fan in the world who’d take him over Salah right now? I wouldn’t even take Messi.

He’s the best player in the best version of this country’s most successful ever club and that really is saying something. And again, we’re only third. One out of ourselves, City and Chelsea could very conceivably end up empty handed.

Which says something even more. Ever since the dawn of the Premiership, TVs hype masters have been selling this league as the best in the world.

Right now, it’s not even in question.
James, Liverpool

…The most important things first; Richarlison with his white hair looks weirdly like Jonjo Shelvey from the long distance cameras.

Beyond the tactic of diving at every opportunity I am not strictly sure what Everton were trying to do. Credit to their fans because when they did score it was the fans that reminded the Ev that they were in a derby and the players finally started to press and show a bit of energy. Before that they were sleep walking towards a very easy 0-3 loss to their most bitter rivals.

Early in the game I wondered if Liverpool had identified some weakness in Everton because a few times we were cutting back to the top of the box. Maybe we thought their defence stayed in line with the ball and the midfield wasn’t switched on enough? Eventually it was more clear that Everton are just dreadful and could be cut apart in any way we fancied.

Delighted for Henderson to score today. He’s just a top bloke, great player and it’s nice as he gets a bit older that everyone finally sees what a lot of Liverpool fans have known for about 6 years; he’s a top player. He also strikes me as an excellent leader and I think he sets an example that so many others around him follow.

Salah is just in a class of his own, unless you’re one of the vote holders for the Balon D’or. His two goals today were as close to the corner as possible without hitting the post.

Overall a good day to exercise some demons from last season at Goodison. Wolves is going to be a much tougher challenge at the weekend and in that respect I’m surprised Klopp didn’t make more changes once it was 1-3. He probably knows more about the player’s fitness than I do though…
Minty, LFC

…Gordon dives to win a fk. Everton get a corner from the fk. Liverpool score from the corner. Poetic justice.
Ian

Nice to be nice
I have to say, I thoroughly enjoyed Match Of The Day tonight. I’ve nothing much to add beyond that. Football is something to enjoy.
Nice to be reminded every now and then.

Take care of each other, be kind.
Jon (Spurs are on Thursday though), Lincoln

Dirty City
Watched the Villa vs City game last night. I’ve got no vested interest per say as I’m a Spurs fan, but felt it needed bringing up that despite hogging 64% of possession, City still felt the need to commit 11 fouls.

Despite this, Mike Dean – who is the most card happy ref there is – didn’t book a single one of their players.

Surely more people must be sick of their tactical fouling at this stage? I hate to come across all Jose but if I’m a PL manager coming up against them at this stage I’d spend the whole week building to the game by complaining about this in the media (planting the seed in the ref’s head) and instruct my players that as soon as a City player fouls, you swarm the ref waving imaginary cards.

It’s time to call a spade a spade and recognise that they’re probably the dirtiest side in the league.
Scott, COYS

Ranganation
I’m confused as to where United are going with this interim appointment. My knowledge of Rangnick is confined to what has appeared in this mailbox and other UK mainstream sports media outlets which, I suppose, means I know truly little. The one constant I am reading however, is his apparent devotion to the gegenpress system.

So, is it the contention that he will, in his six-month tenure, apply this system to the current United squad?

I ask as, when Pep took over in 2016, he clearly had the philosophy and the intent to make the pressing system work. What he didn’t have though, were the players to implement it and he won b*gger all in that first season.

Accordingly, out went the likes of Hart, Zabaleta, Kolarov, Clichy and Sagna. In came Gundogan, Leroy Sane, Walker, Stones, (ahem) Mendy and Bernardo Silva. There were others but you get the point.

Second season? Centurion winning double.

I can’t speak with any confidence about Klopp’s Liverpool (I don’t watch or read about them enough to do so), but it’s my recollection that he/they also went through a similar transition of players that could eventually implement what Jurgen intended. I stand to be corrected.

The pressing system, as I understand it, in the first place requires a ‘keeper that can facilitate it. Secondly, that the other ten outfield players have both the ability and the will as well as, crucially, the required skill to gegenpress for 96 minutes of every game without respite.

Is that, respectfully, De Gea and Pogba, CR7 and Cavani? Is it McFred, or any of United’s back line? Is it any of the current MUFC squad?

They certainly pressed Chelsea last weekend and, arguably, got a favourable result accordingly.

My clumsy question, and a January window aside, is what exactly do Mailboxers, and especially Utd fans, think this guy will achieve in 6 months?

If instead for example, it was the club’s intention, long term, to hire him to reform the club’s backroom root and branch as well as the first team’s ethos (which, seemingly. he has previous for), then for me (Clive) it would’ve been nothing short of a genius appointment.
Mark (But it’s not, is it? It’s just Woodward tripping over a potential diamond whilst waiting to appoint another “sexy” manager/player. Sigh). MCFC.

Brexit Britain
So ManYoo appoint a German director of football and his start is delayed because he needs to get a work permit.

AT LAST – a benefit of Brexit!
Andrew (Told you so, Brextards) Warmington

Lucky Chelsea
Well what a dreadful game of football from Chelsea that was, after the opening 10 or so minutes you couldn’t tell who was meant to be battling relegation or for the title, Chelsea were certainly off the pace before and after the delay of game, hopefully that fan who needed the urgent medical attention is in a stable condition and makes a full recovery, always scary to hear and see such scenes at anytime.

Overall it felt like we didnt even play with a midfield, it was awful, the one standout point from the game was when Saul came off, we started to play and look better which is quite telling and it leads to the fact that this Saul loan experiment has been a complete disaster for everyone, if he was to be sent back to Madrid today i would not be unhappy he just is not cut out for the Premier League and it is a real shame.

In the second half it did get better, but then again it was still shocking when you look at our previous performances and our usual standards, tactically we were able to stop Watford’s Dennis in that second half as in the first everything went through him, in the end it was a truly shocking performance, but important to come away with 3 points and considering Liverpool and Manchester City also picked up wins that’s all that matters.
The Admin @ At The Bridge Pod

Winning versus not losing
Graham suggests that football is boring now. That city (a team who hasn’t scored less than 80 goals a season since pep arrived) and Liverpool (a team that has chased them most of the time and also been free scoring) are boring to watch.

That the invincibles are the greatest thing ever, unsurprising really that an arsenal fan would class the last great achievement of his own team as also being the best period in recent history.

So it’s apparently more exciting to watch a team draw 12 matches than it is to watch Man city score 100 goals in a season or to watch city and Liverpool race towards a title right down to the wire. Football is definitely a better more competitive game than it was back then when arsenal drew their way to not losing, their only competition was united and a patchy Liverpool (they beat Liverpool but never managed a win Vs United that year).

I get Graham is an arsenal fan so his balls are gonna tingle a bit at the nostalgia of the time arsenal desperately fought their way to one heroic draw against mid table teams after another but city blitzing everyone and scoring 100 goals is definitely more exciting and fun.

I don’t want to say it wasn’t an achievement because it was something but ultimately being the team that tried not to lose isn’t nearly as ambitious as being the team that always tried to win spectacularly like city did during their 100 point season. City went into every match that season asking the question – how do we score more goals? Whereas arsenal as invincibles went into matches asking the question – how do we make sure we don’t lose?

There’s a subtle but important difference there.
Lee

Women’s football and rugby
Women’s football reminds me very much of Rugby Union, though slightly more widespread in its professionalism. Rugby has a few nations that have the sport massively ingrained in the culture, have professionalised, or both. The likes of New Zealand and South Africa aren’t financial powerhouses, but culture means these teams always compete at the top. England and France, are competitive in many other top class sports like football and athletics, but have the finances to throw around so that those in rugby have the resources to compete.
Then you have other nations like Uruguay, Russia, Canada, Romania, who have taken to rugby and rank in the top 25 nations in the world, but just are nowhere near the level required to even compete against “tier 1 nations.”

These traditional powerhouses almost never have to go through qualifying, as a top 3/5 group finish at the World Cup qualifies you for the following tournament. Putting these teams in qualifying would be pointless, and would just result in England v Latvia as we have seen recently in the football.

I suggest the same in the women’s game (of football that is).

The 2023 World Cup will have 32 teams – just let everyone who qualifies from their group qualify for the next one. Don’t go round battering non-pros for “character building.” Let these 16 teams forge their calendar for the betterment of womens football with more showcases, visiting other countries on tours etc, free from the shackles of a boring qualifying campaign.

The remaining teams get their qualifying, and do it in a manner that allows them to play teams a little more comparable, with more opportunities to win points, even if there are fewer spots available. As the quality of the game becomes more evenly distributed, you can pare back the 16 automatic slots to 8, then do away with them altogether. Hopefully at this point as well womens’ football is taken more seriously and brings more money in through more fans.
KC (womens’ rugby suffers from this twofold)

Storm brewing
Maybe I’m late to this, or maybe I missed it, so apologies if I did but; if you’re going to celebrate HARD with each of your goals when you win 20-0 you don’t deserve to get snippy when the yanks do a tea celebration.
The Flan, Norf London