Multi-Causal Complexity: You Can’t Make Sense of Individual “Problems” For Liverpool (But Luck = Bad)

You ride out the bad times when the data remains good, and your luck is plain bad

I wrote the list further down the page before the Notts Forest game, and it fit the pattern perfectly.

But I also predicted something else with an eery perfection.

Before the game, I said on the site to watch out for Andy Madley – as he’s twice as bad as any ref on Foul Balance (averages -3 against LFC per game) and today despite 75% possession against a very aggressive opponent, it was bang-on -3. (Madley also doesn’t like to give Liverpool free-kicks in the first 35 minutes of games which allows the opponent to set a more aggressive stance.)

(Note: only outed-Liverpool-hater and due-to-be-sentenced criminal David Coote has a worse Foul Balance per game for Liverpool, but he only did three games, so isn’t on the graph. All games Premier League only. BTW, I called out Coote’s hatred of Liverpool based on data and eye-test before any revelations were made.)

I suggested on here that people, if so inclined, should bet on such an outcome, as crazily, there are betting markets for such things.

At some point it stops feeling like coincidence, no?

Before getting onto the list I wrote, a brief explanation.

A Clusterfuck

You will often do things well and less well in games. Outcomes of shots and decisions and results vary.

Confounding variables make it hard to make sense when all kinds of things are not falling your way.

One thing that bugs me is when someone says the problem is one single, often simple thing.

Equally, I find it hard to talk about something like ‘tactics’ when so many other things are going on. Every game, won or lost, managers make good and bad calls, but people then react on outcome bias. But that’s not what we do here; that’s not what I’ve done in decades doing this.

Seasons are often clusterfucks of colliding luck, randomness and fine margins. See Jürgen Klopp’s final season at Dortmund, and how Ian Graham and Michael Edwards looked past results, and looked at data and context.

You can take them in order, but the order blurs as the season unfolds. These are 13 things I thought of before the game, and that can make it hard to make judgements on results:

1. The horrific death of Diogo Jota. The emotional effects of grief can be long-lasting, and physical as well as psychological.

2. Preseason disrupted by Diogo dying the weekend preseason was due to resume (he was heading to Liverpool), delaying proper training starting, and players weren’t right for a long time after, while new players must have struggled to arrive at such a difficult time. (All things I’ve noted all season.) A disrupted preseason is a nightmare for any team, and this was beyond the norm.

3. Loss of certain other top-quality players, and the normal process of lacking cohesion when bringing in a larger number of new players (but this is a long-term plan). But those players wanted out, so you have to replace them.

4. Injuries and fitness issues that further caused preseason disruption (Alexander Isak, Alexis Mac Allister, Conor Bradley and others).

5. Injuries since then (every team gets them, but a lack of continuity as a result). Alisson, and now Florian Wirtz, Bradley again and Jeremie Frimpong.

6. Shitball. Teams have gone back to the randomness of long-ball football, which is a leveller; as well as taking a minute with every throw, goalkick and free-kick. The games are terrible for flow; refs are weak and enable this type of cheating. TV companies don’t care if the underdog is winning.

7. Opposition quality has been super-high all season based on European Elo rankings, leading to dropping points in a more condensed manner, that then leads to pressure. (Now the hitherto struggling teams have changed managers and are in better form!)

8. The officiating has seen the refs and VARs make some huge errors or harsh judgements, and penalties and disallowed goals often cost games. Goals change games, and the PGMOL change games. It’s been beyond awful, the officiating, especially on Big Decisions.

9. Insane opposition hot-streak on finishing. Prior to the Nottingham Forest game, Liverpool had finished their chances to the exact xG, but the opposition had scored +3.7 more goals than expected. Given that the goalkeeping has not been at fault, it’s more like freakish super-hot streaks against the Reds, plus lucky goals deflections, in off someone’s face, etc. [Today, Forest got three goals from half that xG, and Liverpool got none from over 2xG. In the winter of 2019/20, the opposition had a long streak of missing all their chances against Liverpool. Finishing will always be streaky, to varying degrees.]

10. The timing of those opposition goals, and how many of the freakish ones were early, or the opening goal; or both and due to PGMOL bullshit. So many opening goals have come from officiating errors, which compound any mistakes made by players. You can’t play the opposition and the officials.

11. ‘League table pressure’, and how that makes everyone anxious, including the crowd. Players take too many touches, don’t move the ball quickly enough, snatch at shots.

12. Pressure of defending the title, and being an extra level of ‘scalp’. All the various pressures lead to a drop in confidence, and confidence is vital in sport (and it comes and goes).

13. Set-piece ‘luck’, with a failure to convert enough – made far worse by the perfection of the ‘equaliser’ against City being ruled out. So even when the Reds get it right, the PGMOL get it wrong.

Of these, I think every one was a factor is losing 3-0 to Forest. (I didn’t include Foul Balance of ref in my list, but that’s another factor, especially since c.2022 and especially when the ref is someone like Andy Madley.)

There will be more factors; indeed, all manner of things can be at play. It all bleeds into a mix, that can become a mess, until your luck turns. These aren’t excuses, but the reality of football, and the realities of these particular officials.

In fairness to Forest, some of their desperate blocks denied Liverpool goals today, and then every rebound in both boxes fell their way (maybe they were also sharper, but their luck was massively in, too).

Today, Liverpool had a load of corners, but the ball wouldn’t quite go in and those remarkable blocks were made; Forest then get their first corner and it leads to a goal that changes the game, going past Alisson via an offside player who is “not interfering” according to the Ministry of Bullshit but is far more in Alisson’s view than Andy Robertson was in Gianluigi Donnarumma’s two weeks ago.

The rules are flipped to whatever hurts Liverpool, it seems. Certainly the outcomes are factually correct in those terms. It’s almost comical, if it wasn’t so serious in terms of the sport we love. Whatever happens after these decisions occurs in a reality altered by the refs.

Once that’s allowed, the game is set on a course of being ‘up against it’, instead of being level; two games running. And it’s been a theme all season. (The change coincides with Newcastle and Burnley fans singing “Premier League, corrupt as fuck” when Liverpool got absolutely stonewall calls; since when, it’s been beyond awful. I’d also complain about the selection of referees and VARs, but on average, compared to the averages/norms, they’re all terrible for Liverpool, bar Craig Pawson.)

The data on officials and Liverpool for pretty much every metric is one of outlying harshness, and even if neutrals don’t give a shit (and I don’t care what they think), then fellow Reds should.

But this is a site for rational positivity about the team, unless the underlying numbers are bad or the atmosphere is toxic. I stick behind title-winning managers. I expect the same of subscribers.

Klopp had some really bad runs as Liverpool manager, but we rode them out, and got back to winning ways.

Ditto to all the other great managers in the club’s history.

If you’re only here for the glory, then, please, fuck the fuck right off. That’s not being a fan but an entitled arsehole.