A week that represented a trial of mind matching matter for Liverpool, it was all about paying too much heed to the voice at the back of the head on Sunday, writes Steven Scragg.
The lessons learned across the last few days will be massively valuable to Arne Slot and his players.
With ten changes from the team that had stepped out to brush Tottenham aside in the second leg of the League Cup semi-final, defeat at Plymouth in the FA Cup could be reasonably viewed as a standalone event, a bit like when The Fall get it together for one last tour, except with a band line-up that bears no relation whatsoever to even the last one to take to the road under their banner, let alone the original collective.
It was that old question of if you change the broom head three times, and the stick twice, is it really the same brush?
Three days later, two points dropped in the Merseyside Derby, in what, to be fair, was a fittingly chaotic end to the last playing of the fixture at Goodison, and a Chinese burn effect was at play, as a projected nine-point lead as we climbed under the duvet on Wednesday night, had been condensed to four points by kick off time against Wolves.
An unnecessary nervousness
Within this, an unnecessary nervousness was in the air at Anfield on Sunday, at least during the last quarter of the game, one which for even the most Zen-like supporters in attendance was difficult not to get caught up in.
On one hand, it was entirely understandable. A Premier League fixture that we had led 2-0, rolling toward its endgame minutes, it all had an exceptionally pronounced sense of a very recent DeJa’Vu situation. It was as if many in the stands, and perhaps on the pitch and the touchline too, could see a repeat unfolding in the slow-motion period of another elongated stretch of stoppage time.
A comfortable 2-0 lead embraced at half time, the temporarily soothing sight of a third goal being scored, before VAR made the mirage evaporate, a second penalty awarded, then swiped away via the same means, only for us to see a prospective three-goal advantage reduced to one, by a fine Matheus Cunha strike, with a painfully significant amount of time still to be played.
Heads spun, fears came to the fore, as relegation threatened opponents suddenly looked capable of world beating feats, yet over the finish line we rolled, clutching three precious points, the 60-point mark reached, a seven-point cushion reestablished over an Arsenal side that had left it pretty late to obtain their own win, 24 hours earlier, at Leicester.
It’s all a bit early in the hunt to be indulging in such a fright-night scenario; with 13 games to go, and over three months left to navigate, we can’t go thinking that Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, or Regan MacNeil is waiting around every corner, primed to pounce.
Self-inflicted vagaries of the mind will need to be defeated by Liverpool if we are to claim our 20th league title, just as much as we will need to beat the teams we go up against, between now and May. On Sunday, we didn’t just stumble into such a potential crevice, we pinched our collective nose with thumb and forefinger and jumped in willingly.
‘One game at a time’ – or meticulous planning?
Such situations as the one Liverpool find themselves in, that of being in the driving seat in a race to the prize of a league title, traditionally calls for dealing with what’s ahead within the blinkered aura of a one game at a time mission statement, yet this has never fully been the genuine picture.
One game at a time as a mantra does indeed apply to a degree, but it tends to be applicable only to the players and the supporters, as for the manager and his coaching staff, you can’t put a team in a position like the one Liverpool currently find themselves without the levels of meticulous planning that can only be achieved by forecasting and pre-empting what is upon the horizon.
For players and supporters alike, it would maybe be an idea to laugh in the face of popular convention, and consider the bigger picture occasionally, rather focus solely upon the task of placing one foot in front of the other for the next three months, before they feel safe enough to take a look around them.
Yes, it would have been wonderful to have ended the week nine points clear, but the target remains the same as it was at the start of the week.
Even if they were to win all 13 of their remaining league games, Arsenal still couldn’t defy the laws of mathematics. As things stand, 93 points wins Liverpool the title, no matter what Mikel Arteta’s side does. Should Arsenal lose just once, Arne Slot’s team will be the only one that can break the 90-point barrier.
In the vast majority of individual sports, it is all about playing the ball, or the target, rather than your opponent, and there is a little bit of that at play in team sports too, when one collective has broken away from the rest of the field at the head of the pack. The blinkers are still handy in such situations, but its okay to reach for the binoculars too, in order to watch the finish line draw ever nearer.
For Liverpool, it is all about maintaining their stride, while Arsenal will need to be faultless. Three more league games will bring us to the end of February, three big tests, and if Liverpool can still hit 93 points as they head into March, then they will be very hard to stop from there.
