Liverpool ‘fragile’ and ‘scared’ as striker-less Arsenal hunt them down in Premier League title race
Liverpool supporters are ‘unbelievably fragile’ and ‘scared’ after going eight points clear at the top of the Premier League table in mid-February.
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Arsenal’s to lose? As if
You’re not fooling anyone Dave, LFC. Its an 8 point gap and we have to go to Anfield with current our first choice front 4 injured, so it’s an 11 point gap. So we have to win every remaining game and for you to drop plenty of points. Give over, you are by far favourites.
If you lose to City, Salah and/or VVD get injured/red carded and we win comfortably against West Ham then we can start having a debate but for now, come on. This is surely a mail just to get responses…ah s*** it worked
Rob A (which defense is meant to stop that Madrid front 3, blimey) AFC
Misery on the Mersey
Normally I’d envy the fans of a team 8 points clear at the top of the table at the end of February, who’d finished top of the new Champions league group format, and into the League cup final.
But good Christ on the cross how miserable it must be to be a Liverpool fan. In despair while they’re winning, what the f**k are they like when they aren’t.
To the fans crying for FSG out, if you’d like a look at the supposed greener grass, take advice from a Chelsea fan, it ain’t f**king great. Yes more money could have been put into the team over the last couple of seasons, but its not like the squad has been left in shambles. Yes they need to buy some big players in the summer, but maybe they will? Even then I’m sure ‘pool fans will find something else to whine about.
Will (All those disparaging Liverpool fans should be banned from celebrating ‘pool winning anything this year)
Fan meltdown
What is in the water in Liverpool?
Probably literal human shit given the state of our privatised water service.
You get my point though. Suddenly the bravado has given way to insane insecurity. I visit some Liverpool forum as well as here and it’s the same in those online spaces too.
Two draws and suddenly they think it’s arsenal title to lose?
Guys…assuming arsenal win their game in hand (which so far this year they have fluffed it when given the chance to catch up and that’s WITH saka) they will still be 5 points behind.
Also February is, for some reason, the bogey month for Liverpool. Under every single manager for as long as I’ve been a fan (91 in case you’re wondering) we have been poor in February, sometimes stretching to march. February has derailed a few title challenges and even got houllier sacked. We suck in February.
Jürgen understood during our title win that we would need a points cushion heading into Feb/march to win a title as our form always suffers.
We have a points cushion (still) and Feb is almost finished. Villa and a rejuvenated Everton playing their final derby at goodison were tough games regardless, wins would be better but two draws aren’t a disaster.
Suck in your guts and act like adults. It’s still Liverpool’s title to lose as we still have a 5 point advantage. I honestly didn’t think fellow Liverpool fans were so unbelievably fragile though I should say I’ve only seen this attitude online the fans I know in real life aren’t reacting that way.
Internet makes us all crazy, as the commenters repeatedly tell me in replies
Lee
Gaps, cushions and games in hand
Liverpool going from being 6 points ahead with a game in hand to 8 points ahead having played a game more in the space of 8 days seems to have confused a lot of people.
Why oh why aren’t we all jumping for joy at being 2 points closer to the title? Is it Darwin Nunez’ (consistent) or Diogo Jota’s (sudden) inability to finish? Is it our apparent unwillingness to hold onto a lead? Is it the perhaps irrational fear of the real Man City turning up on Sunday? Sure, there’s a bit of that going on. But while I can’t speak for all my fellow Reds – and at the risk of outing myself as a borderline lunatic – I’ll try to explain how my mind rationalises games in hand and gaps, and why this past week has been no good thing.
Last Wednesday, Liverpool had a nine point cushion at the top of the table. What? Was I arrogantly assuming Everton away would be a walk in the Goodison Park? No. Nothing of the sort. It’s just that although we were only 6 points ahead, we would have to drop 9 points before Arsenal would have any chance of catching us, mathematically speaking.
Now, 8 days later, we have dropped 4 of those points, and have just a 5 point cushion. If we drop 5 more points, Arsenal will be able to catch up to us. They might not. But they could.
9 point cushion to 5 point cushion = 1 bad week
So you may say we’re 8 points clear. You may point out that our lead has actually grown by 33% in the last week. Both of those things may be factually accurate. But to me, we’re thrown away pretty much half of a commanding lead in the last week, and we have City and Newcastle to play in the next week.
So yeah. I’m scared.
Hodge (this has been bugging me since the ’10 point lead’ we somehow threw away despite only dropping 8 more points than City in 2019)
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Wobble, slip or just normal?
Well, this is why in December, when the lunatics open the asylum windows and scream it’s all over, you are 6 pts clear, it’s done.. It isn’t! It really isnt..
It was never, is going to have been over and done in December. Whether you are a stat person or an eye test person I think I am correct in saying no team ever has won the league by December.. Or January, Or even February…
Its almost like once everyone had played everyone else at home and away and teams have had half a season to adapt to the new tactics and players that some team have (not that Liverpool had new players I guess) .. that it sort of settles down and being so far clear as to make the league irrelevant doesnt seem to be a thing.
Yes there have been some big margins come the end of the season .. and come the end of this season there may be a huge margin or a fine one
Thats why we watch every week – Coz we dont really believe its over, If Arsenal fans had have ‘known’ they were not going to win the league at Christmas they wouldnt have bothered watching any more games.
We cant win, whats the point… but you can win and thats the point
Certainly Liverpool are in a proper shitty run of games and have definitely lost that air of calm control that they seemed to have early on in the season and we seems to be in the middle of a wobble, a full on slip maybe?? but teams and managers have seen us and now have plans to get about us or low block and frustrate us.. it happens so it might just be a normal response to a season that takes in 38 games..
Everton, Goodison etc dropped points.. Probably. Wolves (should have been 3pts really.. Oh it was..). Away to Villa (only arse have won there? is that right blimey and they are flying in the CL.. so a point was most likely outcome).
Away to a very up an down City. – Could be anything. No score would really shock (10 nil would shock yes but you know what I mean). Home to Newcastle.. Would like to think 3pts.. but again, could be dropped points. Home to Soton. – No excuse for not getting 3pts really. Fighting for lives maybe but still…
Cup Final Newcastle – for good measure
Then another Merseyside derby and Fulham away. Potential dropped points all over the place.
But then are we assuming that Arsenal win all they remaining games? Suddenly some crazy person in the mailbox says we have handed it to them? What? Did your mother drop you on your head?
Thi is going to close enough to keep everyone interested and the game 3 from the end between Arsenal and Liverpool at Anfield could be huuuuuuuuge or could be all over by then 1 way or another.. No one KNOWS.. and that is the only point and the joy of why we watch this madness year in and year out.
If we knew what would happen in advance, there would be no point playing any of the games..
Al – LFC – Loving the season so far, how could you not. This is what we dream of.
Good game, good game
Putting all the delicious title narrative aside, what a wonderful game of football that was to watch. Villa seemed to realise that their makeshift defence was never going to keep Liverpool out and the only way to win was to outscore them. To do this by presenting Liverpool with myriad open goals whilst assisting their first goal and deflecting in their second was a rather bold approach though. We all hearing Jason Bateman in Dodgeball now?
Villa got fortunate but could have won. Cash, Konsa, Torres, and Kamara all start for Villa’s first XI. Maybe Onana gets in there as a rotation option too. They were all missing (in part) last night, along with Barkley. That was close to Liverpool’s first XI, so I’ll take a rather fortuitous draw. Once Villa get players back though, they have to push on. It won’t be a disappointing season if they don’t (hi Remi Garde), but it will feel like an opportunity missed to build on last season.
Again though, what a game. More like that please.
Gary AVFC, Oxford
Sorry for taking the apocalypse mailbox chat from assorted LFC Timbuktu readers to heart, but is a draw at Villa Park really that bad? Everyone else who’s come here so far – Bayern, Juve, City, etc – seemed keen enough on a draw. Palace in the milk cup excepted and the Humility Monsters.
Obviously the media and the algorithms that run everything now don’t encourage measured, rounded views on anything. So the narrative is already on the slate that Liverpool should have scored 15 goals, their failure to do so was entirely in their own control, and therefore something is going wrong.
As an example, the F365 report on the game suggests Watkins scored because Van Dijk decided not to mark him. Slot seems to think our fans only come to the stadium when Liverpool are there, and we laid on a fireworks display for him especially.
There was another team on the pitch, just a quick reminder, who exist for their own benefit and did actually start English league football before Liverpool FC were even formed. Who scored twice themselves, without being presented with a goal or scoring via a deflection, missed a couple of very good chances, plus putting the ball in the net twice more after close offside calls.
This does not amount to deserving any more than they got on the pitch – Konsa and Kamara missing has unsurprisingly not lessened the madness at the back. But off the pitch, maybe Villa deserve a bit more respect than being treated as extras expected to just get out of the way in The Liverpool Story?
Neil Raines (RIP Rick Buckler)
Gatekeepers
So let me get this straight….
Because the mighty Liverpool were unable to get a win against plucky underdogs Villa away, they are now going to lose the title to Arsenal despite being 8 points clear having played a game more.
And last season, plucky underdogs Villa beating the indomitable Arsenal on their home turf is what basically cost them the chance to win the league.
Soooooo are we saying that basically Villa are the sole team to determine who gets to win the league title or not???
To quote Harry Enfield: “Calm down, calm down….”
Jeff G, West Brom Villan (Seriously, give your heads a wobble!)
The vanity of transfer windows
I might be a bit late to this debate, but there has been much musing in the Mailbox of late on how and when Man U might get back to the upper reaches of the Prem.
The consensus seems to be that it’ll take upwards of three or four transfer windows. But this is based upon a false premise; i.e. that football teams improve in neat sixth monthly increments. They don’t. Teams tend to improve suddenly and dramatically.
Take, for example, Nottm Forest this season or Villa since Emery took over. Most memorably, Leicester utterly transformed themselves from relegation fodder to League winners in the space of a single season. The catalyst for such sudden change is always a new manager and the effect is usually immediate.
By contrast, I can’t think of any teams that have steadily, ploddingly improved season after season. Most just stay at the same level (whether that’s top four, top six, midtable or whatever) doing slightly better one season, slightly worse the next.
The takeaway for Man U fans is simple: get rid of Amorim. If he was your messiah, you’d know it by now.
Matt Pitt
READ MORE: Ruben Amorim needs way more than ‘two or three transfer windows’ to fix Man Utd
Too many muppets
Hi Ed,
I have to take a break from reading the mailbox again, there are just too many muppets. Will drop back in a few weeks when every team has managed to win every game they have played in the intervening period.
Mel – Dublin, Berlin , Athlone Town