Reds crumble again at the “Theatre of Nightmares”
Manchester United 2 Liverpool 2, 7th April 2024.
MANCHESTER UNITED 2 (Fernandes 50, Mainoo 67)
LIVERPOOL 2 (Díaz 23, Salah 84)
As is customary I’ll conclude this lament on another humbling and crumbling performance at the home of their fiercest footballing foes with some words from the great man himself, but I thought I’d begin in the same vein with the boss’ own words and a Jürgen Klopp far more at peace post-match than he was on 67 minutes when, in the words of Sky TV commentator Peter Dury, he was “incandescent” (I’d describe it more as apoplectic with rage) at not only his team’s defending for Manchester United’s albeit brilliant second goal, but perhaps moreover that this highly charged Premier League clash was even remotely a contest let alone with 23 minutes to go, his team were slipping to another unthinkable defeat in a rain drenched Mancunian theatre. Whilst he was full of praise for Jarell Quansah despite the error that led to United’s first shot, on or off target, finding the net on 50 minutes, and how proud he was of his “boys” for having 71 Premier League points and in a three way fight for the title sandwiched by an Arsenal team now topping the table on goal difference and Manchester City a point behind, each team having 7 games left on their Premier League calendar. He talked, correctly, of “controlling the game” but the one word he repeated over and over within his post-match press conference was of feeling “fine” and perhaps that’s rather apt considering the “I Feel Fine” Beatles song that has now been bestowed upon the man from Stuttgart by the Red side of the Liverpudlian footballing divide.
He wasn’t, to quote Klopp once more, “over the moon” with the result but he was fine with his team 1–0 up and in total and complete control of the game until Quansah’s thoughtless error. Whilst he wished for more Premier League points (and especially 2 more today) he was fine with a total and weekend ending tally of 71 and although wanting “a very different score line” he was fine with 2–2 and already looking ahead to the challenge of Atalanta on Thursday evening’s footballing horizon.
Continuing on a theme, we had a full house of quotations and heart felt colour commentary from ex Liverpool Red Jamie Carragher and especially so his partner in footballing crime Gary Neville who exclaimed “Let the chaos begin!” soon after his boyhood team’s equalising goal on 50 minutes before 17 minutes later rightly describing a football ground he graced for nearly two decades as Liverpool’s “Theatre of Nightmares” and with 23 minutes remaining, it felt like a ghost of nightmares past was revisiting the Reds of Liverpool and their abject defeat at the hands of Manchester United in this very stadium mere days ago in the FA Cup. Harvey Elliott’s astounding cameo appearance brought the reward of a penalty kick, Mo Salah safely deposited the 84th minute equaliser and so whilst defeat was averted, victory frustratingly still eluded them.
"Chasing the Impossible and a Sword of Damocles"
They say the truth shall set you free and thus, here are some hard truths. For the second occasion in a matter of days, Liverpool bossed their Manchester United opponents on their own home ground to such a degree as to the game itself quickly resembling a training session of attack versus defence. So in control of the game today as to prevent United having any shots whatsoever, either on or off target, for the entire duration of a first 45 minutes of football whereby they’d lead at the break 1–0 in spite of a hat-trick of further chances falling the way of both Dominik Szoboszlai and Mo Salah, Darwin Núñez was inches away from making the score line at least 2–0 (if not 4–0 or 5–0) and then, just as they did mere days ago in the FA Cup, they threw away such an emphatic and dominant position as to be staring down the barrel of defeat with just 6 minutes remaining.
For 50 minutes the Reds of Liverpool were so in control and so dominant as to toy with their Manchester opponents on their own home turf, only to crumble to nothing for 17 second half minutes whereby they created zero goal scoring chances whilst unfathomably conceding twice to trail 2–1. 10 further minutes passed before the Reds resumed their dominance and through the substitute appearances (once again) of Harvey Elliott and Curtis Jones, had the game completely under their control once more. But they never truly threatened to score a winning goal after Salah’s late equaliser and whilst a drawn point at Old Trafford is always a welcome return, two points were thrown away in 17 mad minutes, a repeating pattern set just days ago and their demise in this season’s FA Cup.
I feared a debilitating and season defining defeat today, yet I almost feel worse following the actual result of a draw. It’s no exaggeration as to posit that Liverpool should have been so far clear and with at least a 3 or 4 goal lead that the “Theatre of Dreams” would begin emptying as it did on a famous afternoon a couple of seasons ago, and with 30 minutes of the game still remaining. Instead, the dream turned to a nightmare before a Prince and a King thankfully awakened to fight another day.
You could give me a thousand years to explain to you, and I’d still fail to convince you that today’s nightmare finished 2–2 but alas, it did.
I hope these words come back to haunt me but Liverpool have thrown away two absolute perfect halves of football in two games at Old Trafford to crumble to a cup defeat and the frittering away of two priceless Premier League points and, whilst I hope I’m wrong, I can see these crumbling performances and results defining their season.
The winning of the Premier League title now sits squarely in someone else’s hands. Damn.
A final word from The Boss
“It’s obviously mixed. Happy with a lot of parts of the game. Being 1–0 up at Old Trafford and having a 15–0 shooting stat is incredible. It says to me immediately again there is probably something around the finishing, it was either exceptional goalkeeping — which was the case for one situation for Dom Szoboszlai, which was an incredible save — but besides that we should and could have been calmer and clearer in moments. It’s fine, you are 1–0 up now and so still fine. Come outside and still controlling the game and then we gave the ball away. These mistakes happened before and will happen after today as well, so that is not a problem. First you have to use it like Bruno did, it was a pretty exceptional finish. In this mood lift in the stadium, atmosphere lifted in the stadium, they pretty much scored the second and then we controlled the game again”.
“We got the penalty and scored an equaliser — and could have scored more before or after. We played really good in so many moments and we had a five- or 10-minute period where they score. For the second goal, we don’t push up properly and that’s why they find him between the lines, he can turn and then in the end it ends up with an incredible finish as well. After that, we were again in charge. Now you can say if we had that much of a dominance for long parts we should win the game — yes, that’s true — but you all are long enough in football that it doesn’t mean you will win. It just means you should and that is obviously different very often to the final scoreline. Two-two, I am not over the moon about it, I don’t think it’s the best result I’ve ever seen, but I am fine. Now we recover and play Atalanta in the Europa League”.