Jurgen Klopp’s “Mentality Monsters” triumph again
Luis “The Kid” Diaz lights up Wembley as the Reds win their 8th FA Cup
Luis “The Kid” Diaz lights up Wembley as the Reds win their 8th FA Cup
Regular readers of my football column for Sports Unillustrated will attest that during my lengthy preview of this, the 150th anniversarialy playing of the FA Cup, I alluded very firmly that today’s annual Wembley showpiece event could be a tight, tense affair with barely a goal to show between the teams. And so it proved. Now, I’m not positioning myself as a footballing sage though I am equally immodest to confirm the beginning of this particular sentence to be very firmly true. After three tight drawn games this season (2–2, 1–1 and 0–0), it was relatively easy to predict a similar outcome. But we watched an incredible match befitting a FA Cup Final, a game that saw nearly 30 total shots on goal (but according to the dreaded statisticians only 4 were on target — a fact I dispute), both teams combined to hit the frame of the goal(s) 3 times, a total of 10 corners were shared, and all within the confines of a pulsating match that swayed with the oceans of time with “wave” after dominating wave for each side as they kept their oppositional prey penned into their own defensive half of the field. Add in the heroics of arguably the best two goalkeepers in the world and the scoreless 0–0 stalemate across the entirety of normal and extra-time, and you’d be forgiven for thinking that this old footballing sage was onto something all along.
What couldn’t be predicted however, even by your humble football correspondent, was that the team I adore would win yet another penalty shoot-out in yet another prestigious cup final, and that Kostas Tsimikas, Liverpool’s affectionately known “Greek Scouser”, would score the winning goal and thus ensuring himself a place in our Red hearts forever more. What also couldn’t have been predicted prior to kick off was that Tsimikas would be on the field at all, Joel Matip and Roberto Firmino too, and that the 36 years old (soon to be 37) ageing beauty that is James Milner would be haring around every blade of Wembley grass for nearly an hour, and dragging his team with him. The lovable rogue that is Kostas Tsimikas barely features for the starting XI as he has to displace the Scotland captain and world class wing back, Andy Robertson. But Robertson, like Virgil van Dijk (replaced by Joel Matip) and Mo Salah (an early first half casualty and substituted for Diogo Jota) all heard the injury bell toll as this unprecedented of seasons continues its spectacular ride. Milner, like Firmino, has barely featured this season either due to injury or inability to force their collective way into the starting XI, but when called upon today they were both magnificent.
Add in Fabinho’s injury at Aston Villa in midweek and the energy sapping sunshine mixed with a heavy looking Wembley pitch, and the Reds are wobbling. It’s the price of success. 63 games will be played by the final shrill of a referee’s whistle in the Stade de France, Paris in 14 nights time, and thus ending a football season in which the Mighty Reds of Liverpool will have fulfilled every single possible fixture on their August 2021 calendar. But they are wobbling. The extent of the injuries to Messrs Salah, van Dijk and Robertson are unknown at the time of writing, and one can only hope their individual prognoses are as positive as their Brazilian colleague and team lynchpin Fabinho, who it is hoped will be fit for the Champions League final in 2 weeks. But the almighty schedule is showing: Salah, van Dijk and Robertson rarely if ever get substituted and are a trio of beating hearts for this amazing team who never wish to be replaced mid-game. All were: Mo Salah in just over half an hour, Virgil van Dijk at full-time and Andy Robertson during the energy draining suck of extra-time.
But the magnificent Alisson Becker saved Chelsea’s 7th penalty from Mason Mount, Kostas Tsimikas wrote his name in the history of Liverpool Football Club forever more, and Jurgen Klopp’s “Mentality Monsters” had gloriously done it again.
I wrote the word “waves” in my match notebook in big, bold, capitalised letters, and so I had better explain my rationale. The first 15 minutes were all Liverpool as the Reds caught the Blues of Chelsea cold. Wave after wave of attacks rained in on the goal of Chelsea goalkeeper Edouard Mendy and it led both a charmed life at times, as well as being brilliantly defended by the huge Senegalese gloveman for the Blues. One move in particular highlighted the early Reds dominance. Alisson Becker’s insouciant yet beautiful clearance with the outside of his boot was not only matched but spectacularly bettered by wing back Trent Alexander-Arnold as he raked a glorious cross field pass with the outside of his right boot, beautifully arching into the path of Luis Diaz. The Colombian forced a brilliant near post save from the Chelsea goalkeeping custodian Edouard Mendy and with the ball desperately cleared from the goal line, Naby Keita drilled his shot wide when in truth he should have scored. The opening quarter was all Liverpool, typified by the first of a hat-trick of chances, maybe four, that the little Colombian wizard Luis Diaz carved open for himself in a performance rightly acclaimed as a “Man of the Match” effort. Luis Diaz was almost mystical today, and I was already head over heels in love with the beautiful magician long before today. As his second half efforts either smacked a post, left Edouard Mendy helpless and hoping his shots would inch past the post rather than nestle in the back of his net, Diaz was imploring the Red hordes behind that goal to give more and get behind the team, as well as throwing his head and hands skyward as yet another beautiful piece of footballing artistry had failed to end with the ultimate pun inducing goal.
The game’s next wave was all Chelsea Blue as their Manager Thomas Tuchel changed the tactics of his pre-game quoted team of “walking wounded” and urged them to play long balls from defence and play in the Liverpool half of the field. The tactical change worked as (a) it created the battle of Romelu Lukaku (Chelsea Blue) versus Ibrahima Konate (Liverpool Red) and (b) created the second balls and space afforded to American International Christian Pulisic. He ran the show for the majority of the rest of the first half and everything positive from a Chelsea team now fully in the game came through their annoyingly brilliant American attacking midfielder. The Blues first chance of the game came on 23 minutes when Mason Mount’s inch perfect cross found Pulisic but he scuffed his relatively easy chance inches wide of Alisson Becker’s goal. But the American was now finding space inside Liverpool’s midfield and his flicks, touches and forward passes were dominating the game. He instigated the sharp move on half-time that saw Lukaku escape the clutches of Konate for perhaps the only time today before blazing high and wide and he saw a threatening shot 10 minutes earlier snuffed out by the imperious Konate again. But on 28 minutes it was Pulisic’s insightful and precise pass that threaded through a retreating Reds defence and into the path of Spanish wing back Marcos Alonso. This would be both the first of a hat-trick of chances for Alonso (like Diaz for Liverpool), he would also hit the frame of the goal (like Diaz) and on another day and if the lottery of the penalty shoot-out had gone the way of Chelsea, he too could have laid claim to the vaunted “Man of the Match” award. But Alonso’s first touch was heavy, Alisson Becker brilliantly smothered his shot (a carbon copy of Mendy for Diaz’s early chance for Liverpool), and an evenly matched two teams of equally walking wounded retreated for half-time at 0–0.
The Blue wave continued with an immediate onslaught in the second half and for the opening 10 minutes or so threatened to blow the Reds away. In a reverse of the opening of the first half, now it was Chelsea fully on top and the game taking place exclusively in the Liverpool half of the field. The Reds defence literally stopped playing (due to the abject absurdity of the modern VAR game), leaving Alonso to drill his second effort of the game whistling past the post. The goal would have stood had it gone in, thus ridiculing the ever present debate on the offside rule and how it highlights the ridiculousness of “correct football”, but rather than picking at an old sore, let’s marvel at the fierce Pulisic shot that demanded a brilliant save from Alisson Becker and the curling free kick from an acute angle from Marcos Alonso that rattled the Liverpool bar. The Blue wave deserved a goal and Christian Pulisic had resumed mastering this FA Cup final show.
Sadio Mane was his usual sportingly aggressive self all game and it was he who was instrumental in instigating the next wave of this pulsating final. On the hour mark he was boxed in 2, maybe 3 times but fought his way out of every heavily outnumbered situation with the ball at his feet, feeding Naby Keita who released Diogo Jota who flashed his shot well wide. The Reds revised attacking front 3 of Mane, Jota and Diaz all physically took the fight to Chelsea, eking out spaces in which to play and influence the game, but with 20 minutes left to play in normal time the Blues of Chelsea were again riding a dominant wave and again Christian Pulisic was at the heart of the final. Released by England International Reece James, he flashed another shot inches past Alisson Becker’s post, but the Blues, in their alternative and “lucky” change strip of all yellow, were completely on top and should have been in front.
The game’s final 3 waves were all Red as Liverpool were agonisingly a post’s width away from winning the game in normal time, all Blue as Chelsea threatened the win the game with their energy in the first period of extra-time before the Reds edged an exhausted last 15 minutes of nervous pre-penalties extra-time. The final itself petered out in the last 15 minutes due to sheer exhaustion and a rigid determination from two tired teams not to venture forward and break position. It was walking football at times. What wasn’t was the glorious football played by Jurgen Klopp’s very own “walking wounded” in the game’s final 20 minutes of normal time. Here, Sadio Mane was boxed in again before freeing himself with a pass to his captain Jordan Henderson who cycled it via the marauding Andy Robertson to Luis Diaz to curl his shot mere inches wide again. With 7 minutes remaining, the brilliantly erratic (today) and sexy (always) Thiago Alcantara released Mane who flicked a pass into the path of Diogo Jota to feed Luis Diaz who saw his shot cannon off a Chelsea post. 60 seconds or so later, a brilliant move started by Trent Alexander-Arnold found James Milner on the right wing via Thiago Alcantara. Milner’s brilliant curling cross evaded everyone except a marauding again Andy Robertson and though he should have scored, he crashed his close in shot against the other post of the Chelsea goal, and a goal leading a charmed life once more. As the game clock hit the exact 90 minute mark, Luis Diaz physically shrugged off the challenge of veteran Brazilian all time great defender Thiago Silva on the halfway line and determinedly beat him in a foot race to the edge of the penalty area before unleashing another curling shot mere inches wide of the Chelsea goal.
The Blues would dominate for 15, the Reds (kind of) for the final 15 minutes of extra-time before at 0–0, in that sage suggestion of earlier, a tight, tense and goalless FA Cup final would be decided via the lottery of penalty kicks. Edouard Mendy got his fingertips to 2 penalty kicks and should have saved Roberto Firmino’s strike but he didn’t. He firmly saved his great friend’s penalty (Sadio Mane), forced the extension of the lottery into sudden death, before his counterpart in the Liverpool goal, Alisson Becker, brilliantly saved from Mason Mount and Kostas Tsimikas, that loveable “Greek Scouser” defied expectations, ala Alan Kennedy in Rome in 1984, and beautifully placed his left footed winning goal into an opposition’s net before leaping around like a man possessed!
It was Alan “Barney Rubble” Kennedy in Rome all over again.
Or perhaps it was the tears in my eyes and the football mind playing tricks again?
A sage man from strong socialist roots was once famously quoted as saying “people believe that football is a matter of life and death. I can assure you it’s much more important than that” and that footballing genius from that small, remote mining village of Glenbuck in Scotland was probably only half joking when he said it. Who knows for sure? But the beautiful game isn’t a matter of life and death as anyone who has had a brush with the eternal fate that awaits us all will testify. Your humble football correspondent has had an emotional “Cup Final Weekend” to say the very least and he didn’t celebrate when that madcap adopted Liverpudlian scored the winning goal.
He just cried.
I expected to see some tears of joy from Luis Diaz as his heart on the sleeve endeavour and sheer joy of playing winning football always seems to have the little magician on the brink of tears. Instead he, and Ibrahima Konate and others larked around on the sapping Wembley turf wearing the FA Cup trophy’s lid as a temporary Salvador Daliesque hatted accoutrement. Thiago Alcantara, the object of my sexy socks rolled down affections, removed his playing jersey to wave manically above his head, Sadio Mane (now all smiles after his penalty miss and in a ginormous loving bearhug from his Manager) also embraced his disconsolate and injured mate Mo Salah and the entire defensive line of a hobbling Andy Robertson and Virgil van Dijk, Joel Matip and the immovable objects that are Ibrahima Konate and Alisson Becker all jigged with ridiculous and unbridled delight in front of the mass of Reds at their “End” of Wembley Stadium.
Longer term readers will also attest that I started my reports this season on Liverpool Football Club by repeatedly stating that I had a “feeling” about this team and this season. Two domestic trophies in the bag, one more still to play for as well as the biggest honour in European football and the sweetest and most pleasing trophy of them all. Before that showpiece event in Paris in 14 days, Jurgen Klopp has to raise his “mentality monsters” not once but twice more, and two crucial league games in five days that will end a remarkable enough domestic season, let alone whatever sporting fate unfolds in the city of lights in a fortnight.
Jordan Henderson, the under appreciated water carrier and doggedly determined heartbeat of this beautiful Liverpool team completed his trophy lift “dance” with wild and childhood sporting fantasy abandon.
And I cried just a little harder once more.
FA Cup Final Preview
Star Date: 14th May 2022. Venue: Wembley Stadium, Londonmedium.com
Aston Villa 1 Liverpool 2
Ugly win keeps the Reds in the Premier League title chasemedium.com
Liverpool 1 Tottenham Hotspur 1
The Reds go back to the top of the League but it’s advantage Manchester City.medium.com