Ipswich vs. Liverpool: *Bumper* Post-Match Analysis (Updated)

Paul Tomkins, Andrew Beasley, Daniel Rhodes and other TTT regulars will give their thoughts on the match for 24 hours after the game, so the article received via email is unlikely to be the final version. There's statistics from the match and videos too.

Post-Match Thoughts

Paul Tomkins

A slow first half on a super-slow pitch, but the second half was like a blood-red Ferrari opening up on a racetrack. Ipswich were made to look as insipid as an Ed Sheeran ballad after the break.

By the end, Ryan Gravenberch had run the show, Mo Salah had run Ipswich ragged, and Liverpool were cutting the home team (with the men in blue helped by yet another awful refereeing display) to pieces.

It took less than a half for Liverpool to suffer their first horrific Big Decision failure by the ref (after I promised to go easier on them, but come on!). You won’t see a more deliberate handball beyond Luis Suarez at the 2010 World Cup. No second yellow card, when the first yellow was also a nasty achilles-raker. It’s just not good enough. It’s basic, when a player scoops the ball up and away with his forearm! Later, Luis Díaz was taken out by the keeper, with nothing given. (Naturally.)

Good swift non-decision by the VAR, which is apparently what Sky, TNT and the PGMOL also now want.

More mistakes, but made more quickly.

While I don’t want to talk about officials as much, it’s not easy having to beat them as well; but welcome to Liverpool, Arne.

Thankfully the Reds won comfortably in the end, and but it’s like the refs are as determined as the commentators to back the underdog. (And the VAR, Stuart Attwell, is statistically the biggest homer and also the biggest fudger in all my data.) Anyway, thankfully they couldn’t stop Slot’s men.

The greatest joy, as well as the midfield three all starring after the break as Trent Alexander-Arnold play-made like a dream from wide right, was the mobility and zip of Mo Salah, and how the new system made the most of his intelligence.

**Note: this season, post-match reviews will not be rushed, and for evening games, may appear the next day. Rather than hot-takes, I generally want slower, cooler reviews, unless all seems fairly simple. I will write my part when I’m ready (and publish), and the others will add theirs as and when. I may also revisit and add to what I’ve written, once I’ve had more time to think (and more time to calm down).**

The majority of my analysis and the analysis of the others follows for subscribers only.