Díaz and Núñez blow away the Hammers bubbles
Liverpool 3 West Ham United 1, 24th September 2023.
Liverpool 3 West Ham United 1, 24th September 2023.
LIVERPOOL 3 (Salah 16, Núñez 60, Jota 85)
WEST HAM UNITED 1 (Bowen 42)
John Toshack and Kevin Keegan
Ian Rush and Kenny Dalglish
Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard
OK the numbers and the strict position(s) in the teams may have changed in today’s all singing, all dancing world of modern football, but let’s not allow cold hearted realism to get in the way of footballing romance here, and a burgeoning romance between a Colombian wizard and a Uruguayan force of nature.
I was too young to fully appreciate the Toshack/Keegan partnership, strictly a number 10 and a number 7 in the Mighty Red shirt of Liverpool but as we’ve already agreed, let’s allow ourselves a little football romanticism which, when combined with dusty VHS tapes and childhood scrapbook cuttings, evoke memories and moving images of a towering Welshman battling for the football or “knocking down” a precise header into the path of his striking partner, and a waspish Kevin Keegan doing the rest.
My childhood memories as well as my earliest match going memories centre around THE partnership and THE number 7 and number 9 of my footballing dreams. We could all regenerate like Dr Who ten lifetimes over and Ian Rush’s club record goals tally of 346 will still be standing the tallest of all. Scored with both feet, fantastic in the air and was the very dictionary definition of “defending from the front”, Rush just found a shard of space that his pace turned into a chasm, and Dalglish’s through ball soon saw the ball dispatched into the corner of the opposition’s net. “The King” was sheer poetry in motion with goals from all angles, improbable ones too, with the widest of smiles joined by his equally wide backside he’d back into defenders, keeping control of that precious football with eyes darting for the impudent pass forward for Rush or the marauding midfield runs of Graeme Souness or Ronnie Whelan, Steve McMahon or Jan Mølby.
Cold hearted reality dictates that our relationship with Fernando Torres ended on more than a sour note but the footballing romantic remembers the kid from Fuenlabrada near Madrid who for two seasons or so enchanted us all with centre forward displays from the Gods. His partnership wasn’t with a number 7 but with a local lad in the number 8 shirt who’d risen to be captain of the city of his birth, and Steven Gerrard and Fernando Torres were the spearhead of an incredible team under Rafa Benítez that could and damn well should have won the lot.
Cold hearted reality eh?
“Chasing the Impossible and a Sword of Damocles” — Out Now!
The un-holy trinity is complete!medium.com
So my Red heart sang with joy yesterday when an hour before kick-off the team announcements confirmed that the starting XI would contain a kid from Colombia who’s grown into a young man before our very eyes and the tall Uruguayan who creates chaos magic wherever he goes. A diminutive “baller” in the number 7 shirt of Liverpool, always wanting the ball, willing to take on opponents and a real eye for a spectacular goal. A tall striker wearing the number 9 of Liverpool, and of Ian Rush and Robbie Fowler, Fernando Torres and Roberto Firmino, and a rough diamond who’s shining brighter with every passing game.
Last weekend at Wolves, Luis Díaz and Darwin Núñez were introduced from the substitutes bench to change the game and boy did they accomplish their mission. Yesterday, they were the guiding lights alongside a scarily impressive Dominik Szoboszlai (and can someone please wrap this kid in cotton wool between games as he looks the real deal and then some, as well as playing with the weight of the number 8 on his back) in a lacklustre first half display in which the Reds could have easily trailed 0–2 after just 7 minutes, and despite leading through Mo Salah’s thunderbolt of a penalty on 16 minutes were pegged level at half-time through an exquisite diving header from the ever impressive Jarrod Bowen.
Before being substituted with 10 minutes remaining, Luis Díaz never stopped running or “showing” for the ball in progressive and transitional areas of the pitch and Darwin Núñez, that creator of chaos magic, missed a “sitter” of a chance on 52 minutes before scoring an outrageously difficult over the head stabbed volley on the hour mark to restore the Reds one goal lead. So typical of the 24 year old from Artigas in Uruguay, he missed the easier goal scoring chance of the two but he scored, again, and this time from what I believe to be Alexis Mac Allister’s first “assist” for the Reds in a much more assured performance from the Argentinian World Cup winner.
Cold hearted reality dictates that the Reds were lucky not to be 0–2 down so early in the game and Jarrod Bowen should have put West Ham 2–1 in front on 52 minutes when he headed straight and tamely at Alisson Becker in the Reds goal when it was easier to score than miss. As with Núñez above, he scored with his outrageously difficult goal scoring chance but missed the ridiculously easy one.
But we’re not here for the realities of a coldly detached heart. We’re here for the romance of the Mighty Reds, in a season of transition and upheaval, evolution and the re-shaping of a team to challenge for future major honours remember, and a team sitting proudly in 2nd place in the Premier League, 2 points adrift from a perfect Manchester City team who are almost certainly going to post in excess of 90 points in defence of their title yet again.
A long season lies ahead but for now and for the present, the Reds of Liverpool have a magician with the number 7 on his back and a hard working goal scoring centre forward wearing the number 9.
Be still, my beating heart.
A final word from The Boss
“Yeah, it was as expected: a difficult, difficult game. There were very good moments in the first half but we were not enough in control to deny them completely, which is anyway super-difficult. But I really thought again we played good in different phases. Lost some balls we shouldn’t have lost, that’s clear, but around [that] we scored our goal — which was a super counter-attack. Especially counter-attacks we had really good ones, and then we were asking a little bit for the equaliser, if you want. When they scored I was not completely surprised, it was not like, ‘How can that happen?’ We should have defended it better, that’s clear. But most important is that you stay in the game and that’s what we did in the second half obviously. We controlled it much better, we gave them a proper challenge, we really caused them some problems and scored super goals”.
“Of course, that’s now a really special one the second one. Incredible. Everybody is looking at me when talking about the goal with wide eyes but I saw it only once yet. So I can’t wait to see it properly back. Third goal, again a top set-piece, we all know how important they are”.
“Ali with an unbelievable save in a pretty important moment. I don’t want to forget anybody. Curtis good, Virg, Robbo. And the most important thing, the boys who came on had again a super-positive impact. Yes, it’s a goal of Diogo but I really thought Cody came on and that looked really, really good”.
Thanks for reading. For a wealth of articles past and present on the Mighty Reds, please see my “Liverpool FC” library here or alternatively, my three most recently published articles are linked below:
Díaz lights the way in Linz
LASK 1 Liverpool 3, 21st September 2023.medium.com
Robertson leads Reds to comeback victory in the Black Country
Wolves 1 Liverpool 3, 16th September 2023.medium.com
Trent Alexander-Arnold and a stroll in the Liverpool sunshine
Liverpool 3 Aston Villa 0, 3rd September 2023.medium.com