After playing six matches over the course of 19 days, the 2022 preseason for Liverpool that kicked off on July 12th has concluded.
The preseason began with a 4-0 loss to Manchester United in Bangkok, Thailand. Although the amount of non-first team players that were played in this match made the result somewhat negligible, losing to one of your biggest rivals is never fun.
However, Jurgen Klopp’s squad managed to get over this loss just three days later when they traveled to Singapore and beat Crystal Palace 2-0. The goals came courtesy of Jordan Henderson and Mohamed Salah, and the squad as a whole looked much more controlled and polished than in their previous match, getting nine shots on target and maintaining 68% possession.
The next match was July 21st against Bundesliga club RB Leipzig. After a routine first half that saw Liverpool leading 1-0, the Reds’ new striker Darwin Nunez became the story of the game in the second half.
The 22-year-old from Benfica went ballistic, scoring four goals in just 45 minutes of play. It was an incredible performance after a slow start to the preseason for Nunez, and Liverpool went on to win 5-0.
https://twitter.com/brfootball/status/1550215123431837696?s=20&t=l2TZtE1R4GJHJjdLsP-JGA
Liverpool then took a trip to Austria for their final international preseason game against RB Salzburg. Compared to the beatdown they had put on RB Leipzig the previous week, this was a fairly pedestrian game that ended in a 1-0 defeat.
Then came by far the most anticipated game of the preseason, the Community Shield against Premier League champions Manchester City. Trent Alexander-Arnold started the scoring with a searing strike from outside the penalty box, but City equalized in the second half, threatening to send the match to penalty kicks.
However, a penalty from Salah in the 83rd minute, followed by a tap-in header from Nunez in stoppage time made Liverpool the 2022 Community Shield winners. It was another enthralling edition in the budding rivalry between the current two best teams in England.
https://twitter.com/ESPNFC/status/1553440167049842688?s=20&t=l2TZtE1R4GJHJjdLsP-JGA
Sadly for Liverpool, their preseason did not end on this high note, because they had to turn right around and play against Ligue 1 club RC Strasbourg the very next day. Most of the players who played in the Community Shield didn’t play at all in this match, and Strasbourg came out of Anfield with a 3-0 win. It seems highly likely that Liverpool fans will choose to forget this game and instead think of the Community Shield as the de facto ending to their preseason.
At this point, the only thing left for Liverpool to do is wait for their real season to start on August 6th, when they’ll take on Fulham in the opening weekend of the EPL. The Reds had some ups and downs in the preseason but ultimately showed enough promise to ensure the fans that this will be yet another exciting year.