Reds two wins from the Promised Land
Liverpool 2 West Ham 1, 13th April 2025
LIVERPOOL 2 (Díaz 18, van Dijk 89)
WEST HAM 1 (Robertson (own goal) 86)
180 seconds defined yesterday’s nervous tightrope walk towards another title winning 3 points and 7 equally nervous injury time minutes later, the skipper was saluting all four corners of Liverpool’s very own Coliseum as his manager, the Cool Hand Luke from Bergentheim, proudly fist pumped his delight at the worshippers on the Kop End who had sucked in his captain’s winning goal mere minutes before. Proud Dutchmen both, Arne Slot and Virgil van Dijk were born 13 years and 200KM apart and both share a quiet, thoughtful and reserved approach to footballing matters yet yesterday, momentarily, their respective masks slipped. The skipper, at fault for West Ham’s deserved equaliser, promptly scored the winning goal 3 minutes later before screaming his delight at The Kop and kissing and pointing at the Liverbird upon his chest we all hope he wears for the rest of his illustrious career. The boss, normally so calm and placid, roared his approval for Luis Díaz and his nerve settling opening goal before trumping this with his delight at his skipper’s invaluable winning goal before thanking his players, his captain especially, and then like a certain Jürgen Klopp before him, joyously saluted The Kop with a victory fist pump.
13 points clear with 6 games to go, yesterday was still a huge win for the Reds and boy did a nervous and quiet Anfield crowd know it. Sublime and supremely in control for 45 minutes, West Ham were passively second best in a game that had an air of a practice match for long periods of a first half where the Reds continually spread the ball wide to goal scorer Luis Díaz and Mo Salah, and with the visitors dug in deep in their own defensive third, Ibrahima Konaté and Virgil van Dijk had all the time they wished to spray balls wide to Díaz or Salah, and through the midfield channel to Curtis Jones or Ryan Gravenberch. West Ham threatened only once on a counter-attack on 20 minutes, and Alisson Becker denied both Carlos Soler and Mohammed Kudus with a brilliant double save that saw his fingertips diverting Kudus’ chip onto his crossbar. But the visitors were slowly growing into the game as the half-time break came and went and with the Reds posing no attacking intent in the second half whatsoever and the twin wide threat of Díaz and Salah completely nullified, a quiet Anfield counted down the minutes to a 1–0 victory as Alisson Becker once more repelled the albeit sporadic threats on his goal from Jarrod Bowen’s run and shot on 66 minutes (brilliant, trademark, close-in smothering save) and a sprawling save that denied Mohammed Kudus again 5 minutes later.
A goal was coming: the trigger for 180 seconds that shook a quiet Anfield into life so late in the game, and if some or indeed many of us were happy with a really poor second half showing but valuable 1–0 win, 3 minutes of madness transformed this into a roar of relief for a 2–1 win. An innocuous cross from West Ham’s Aaron Wan-Bissaka flicked a hesitant Virgil van Dijk before cannoning past Alisson Becker from a helpless Andy Robertson, and the carnival of the bizarre had truly begun. West Ham’s Lucas Paquetá fell to the ground expecting a free-kick that wasn’t warranted nor duly arriving, Alexis Mac Allister shot from long range in frustration and with his shot clearly going wide, Hammers goalkeeper Alphonse Areola still made sure by tipping it around his post for a corner, a corner taken by Mac Allister seconds later and met by the head of the skipper for a last minute winning goal from absolutely nowhere. There was still time for Hammers substitute Niclas Füllkrug to rattle the Reds crossbar 3 minutes into injury time but 4 minutes later still, a dull 1–0 victory had become a relief filled 2–1 win, Virgil van Dijk ushered his team to all four corners of Anfield, miracle worker Arne Slot showed his real feelings to the true believers on The Kop, and his Reds are 2 wins from the promised land.
Or maybe even one win. If relegation bound Ipswich Town can beat Arsenal in the early game on Sunday, then the Reds almost certain win against a truly dreadful Leicester City will not only wrap up the Premier League title, but also send the midlands team through the trapdoor and back into The Championship. Failing this, if Arsenal cannot defeat Crystal Palace on the following Wednesday evening (and thankfully for all concerned they can’t buy a Premier League win at the moment and are completely distracted by their Champions League adventures) then the title could be wrapped up by the last Sunday in April and a defeat of Tottenham at Anfield.
I’ve been convinced that Liverpool would win “The League” (not the Premier League) since the end of January, but this was bravado and more in hope than in expectation. But it’s happening, and Arne Slot is taking the Mighty Reds to the Promised Land after just ten months in charge.
Bravo.
Arne’s Afterword
“It was a big relief. Ali made sure that they didn’t score earlier. They had multiple chances to score the 1–1 in the second half and unfortunately they scored one which they didn’t score but we scored. To be completely honest, I was expecting two minutes with three or four minutes of added time but all of a sudden seven minutes were added on with no time-wasting at all from both teams, which was a bit of a surprise for me. But OK, it helped because we scored a goal just before the extra-time and, of course, that was a relief because to me it felt after West Ham scored and the way the second half went, it was maybe more that you could expect them scoring”.
“But our fans and our players thought differently because from the moment they scored the 1–1, we started playing again, we started pressing again, the fans were really loud at that moment of time. Already the chance from Lucho, some counter-press moments which led to the corner kick and then we saved a big set-piece for a very important moment because in the modern game of football set-pieces are that important, and that’s what we saw today again as well”.
Thanks for reading. I pen my thoughts on every Liverpool game and in recent seasons, with the addition of numerous pieces of retro writing on Reds games of the past, I’ve curated and created the following two self-published books:
"A final word from The Boss" - link to Amazon
"Chasing the Impossible and a Sword of Damocles" - link to Amazon
Whilst you’re here I may as well brag about the release of my trilogy of recently self-published books too. Beautiful covers eh! As the title(s) would suggest, this is my life at the movies or at least from 1980 to 2024, and in volume 1 you’ll find 80 spoiler free appraisals of movies from debut filmmakers, 91 of the very best films appraised with love and absent of spoilers from 1990–2024 in volume 2, and in volume 3 you’ll find career “specials” on Paul Thomas Anderson and Quentin Tarantino together with the very best of the rest and another 87 spoiler free film reviews from 2001–2024.
All available in hardback and paperback and here are some handy links:
"A Life at the Movies Vol.1" - link to Amazon
"A Life at the Movies Vol.2" - link to Amazon
"A Life at the Movies Vol.3" - link to Amazon