Manchester United vs. Liverpool: *Bumper* Post-Match Analysis

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

The message is clear: Liverpool Football Club doesn’t know what it’s doing, focusing on elite management staff to coach, train, and keep fit a cohesive team that plays progressive football with intelligence, verve and heart.

The aim, of course, is always to win the Transfer Window, which is the biggest trophy in all of world sport.

Winning 3-0 away at Man United (when it could have been six) because you have consistency of selection, clever tweaks of tactics, and last summer’s signings coming into their own? No! Despite Ryan Gravenberch being brilliant in all three games, Liverpool need a new no.6; any new no.6. Some crank on Twitter says so.

In fairness, I’m eating a pretty hefty serving of humble pie over Mo Salah, whom I thought was on the wane. And in terms of top speed, he is. But otherwise, he’s looking even more effective (he may even score some penalties if Liverpool get given any).

Instead, Arne Slot has continued with the system that worked early last season, before injuries to both Salah and Dominik Szoboszlai; where the latter does the pressing and makes the overlaps, and Salah finds pockets of space to assist like a magician.

Slot has even apparently ironed out the two main flaws I saw in Salah, beyond the slight loss of pace with age: not previously using his right foot enough, and shooting from too far and wide.

(Edit: I’ve just seen Mo’s post-match comments, and the key thing is that players in their final year of a contract tend to excel, and so this could be the final flaring of the light, as he turns 33 next summer. He should be absolutely driven to go out with a bang, and it’s a season for Federico Chiesa to bed in, and eventually replace him.)

While Liverpool overcooked some good situations trying to make it an even better situation, the shots Salah is scoring from are in the areas where he continued to score from. Add right foot and left foot assists, and this is a player on another level right now; albeit compared to Man United, Liverpool had eleven players on another level.

I’ll say more about Erik ten Hag’s deluded pre-match comments later in the week, as they’re worth a general assessment of what constitutes success as a manager.

For now, along with the TTT team, I’ll focus on the one-sided 3-0 battering at Old Trafford, where the home fans spent more time booing and leaving than cheering.

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