Keeping things in Perspective: Liverpool and Manchester City
Liverpool need some perspective on Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane.
Liverpool have arrived. They are now a destination on the player transfer superhighway. Not a mere way station stop or layover any longer.
There was a time when they were in danger of becoming just another feeder club, but no longer.
Because of that drubbing at the Etihad, it will be far easier for Liverpool to keep Sadio Mane, Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk at home.
They now have something more to play for than just more silverware. Their pride and reputation has been impugned.
These are not the type of players to shrink from this type of challenge; and lets be clear here, they have been challenged.
Think about this. If they were to decide to jump ship now, it would be seen as running scared from the top contenders in the Premier League.
But this is not a guaranteed situation as we’ve seen in the past. They must continuously keep their pedigree intact, or they can fall back into that way station or layover territory.
This is Jurgen Klopp’s great gift to Liverpool and their legacy and it is on him and his back room staff to insure that their place is seen as a destination club is secure for the future.
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He did the very same thing at Dortmund. Finally, after years of losing their best talent to their arch rivals from Bavaria. Dortmund won a couple of leagues and a Champions League and now Dortmund are in a far better position to keep their talent.
As to City and Pep Guardiola, they have over a 1,000 more completed passes this season than the Reds, and yet they are 20 points behind. How can this be? They have scored more goals.
Well, think back to after City beat Liverpool in the Community shield and Virgil van Dijk had just been named candidate for FIFA POTY. Remember Pep said at the time that van Dijk isn’t the best defender in the world. I have one right here that is just as good: Aymeric Laporte
Now Laporte gets injured in late August or early Sept. last fall and is out for virtually the entire campaign. Only returning now during this restart. City would lose eight fixtures in his absence.
So, I ask you, if Virgil had gone down to injury for a similar period of time, do you really believe Liverpool would be 20 points beyond City? Would we even be polishing off our newly engraved name on the Premier League trophy. I highly doubt it.
City at this point in time are the better squad on paper, at least. Just by the simple yet obvious depth on their bench. Hell, City’s second string alone could play and win against 15 or 16 of the EPL sides currently.
So let’s keep things in perspective here Reds fans.
The Reds are a very good side, none better in the past two and a half seasons or so. But listen to how the gaffer talks about this. We still have room to improve; we can and must get even better.
Why would he say this? Because Jurgen is an honest man, (as mystifying as this might be in these strange times and trying days we are living in).
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He knows that City are the stronger side because of squad depth alone. He is trying to get folks to manage expectations as these two giants of the game, play three dimensional chess with each other using live players as chess pieces on the pitch.
This makes what his Reds have accomplished even more impressive when you give it a thorough and unbiased assessment. They have accomplished more with less. And this is definitely something to build upon going forward.