By the end of Liverpool’s 3-0 defeat at Manchester City on Sunday, it would have been fair to say that on balance based on the performance over the full 90 minutes the Reds didn’t deserve any more than
the nothing they took home following a rather disappointing day at the Etihad.
The route to get to that point, though, was littered with moments that could be called unfortunate at best. There was a penalty awarded to City that seemed, at best, very soft. There was a Liverpool goal ruled out for a player in an offside position blocking the goalkeeper’s view that was no more egregious than an Atletico Madrid goal given versus the Reds a few weeks ago—or one given to City against Wolves last season.
There were City’s first two goals, both scored off deflections. Liverpool, then, weren’t the better side. But they were also very unfortunate in how the game unfolded, and if goals change games it’s easy to imagine even one of those moments going the other way and changing how this one looked by the end of it.
“We could’ve done better,” was captain Virgil van Dijk’s take following the final whistle. “Obviously then the decisions and the penalty, the momentum shifts, then it was more to their side. In the second half we obviously get a little bit more momentum in possession, but our pressing was just not good enough.
“The way we did things as a team should’ve been better. Like I said before the game, it’s about finding consistency and keeping going. Losing hurts always, like it should be for each and every one of us, especially to lose 3-0. But now we go to our countries, stay fit, then we have to be ready.”
Sunday’s defeat drops the Reds right back out of the top four and down to eighth after 11 rounds of play in the Premier League, but that’s a points total shared by five sides filling the five through nine slots in the table and only separated by goal differential—and with Chelsea just two points ahead in third while upstarts Sunderland are currently a point up in fourth.
Which is to say that while the title race may be out of reach—something everyone has had to start to come to grips with over the past month or so—Sunday’s loss shouldn’t be decisive from a top four perspective, and it seems clear that and the Champions League is now the priority for the Reds.
After the November international break Liverpool’s players will return to club action at Anfield when they welcome Nottingham Forest on the 22nd of the month before resuming their increasingly important European campaign on Wednesday, November 26th against PVS Eindhoven.
