Watching Liverpool play these days must surely be an excruciating experience for their fans. There's the hope that this season's start is just a glitch and things will soon click again, then, amidst all that hope for better days, there's the sad realisation that maybe Liverpool should just brace for a challenging season ahead.
In a rather unusual late kickoff for the EPL on Saturday night, we were treated to a wonderful spectacle of football. This game had everything, from the intense build up where both managers found themselves under a heap of pressure going into the game, to a fast paced end to end delectable medley of footballing splendour as Rory Jennings would say. It was great for a neutral, nerve wrecking for the Leeds fans and a nightmare for Liverpool fans.
The match brought out another unusual formation from Jurgen Klopp, this time playing a traditional 4-4-2, which was different from the 4-2-3-1 they played last weekend against Nottingham Forest and nothing close to their intense 4-3-3 which saw them compete and play every available match in their calendar last season culminating with two domestic trophies. It seems that Klopp has run out of ideas on how to get the best from his team or he simply doesn't have the quality of players to execute his instructions anymore. The pressure is telling on Jurgen and he is struggling to come up with answers. Jesse Marsch also came into this game under immense pressure having lost his last four matches in a row, the longest losing streak of his managerial career. The most recent defeat had to have hurt the most with the Leeds fans singing former manager Marcelo Bielsa's name as Jesse watched his team fall at the hands of newly promoted Fulham at home. Leeds needed a change of attitude and to build up some resilience. They were not being outplayed by their opponents, they simply made costly errors and those errors had eaten away their confidence.
Saturday night was different though, Leeds came out to play in Anfield, they started with high energy and got their reward 3 minutes into the game when Joe Gomez made a costly mistake of passing the ball towards his keeper without checking where Allison was and as a result the ball was intercepted and then rolled into an empty net by Leeds' forward Rodrigo for his 6th goal of the season. That was not the start that Liverpool were hoping for. The front duo of Darwin Nunez and Roberto Firminho supported out wide by Mo Salah and Harvey Elliot tried their best to bring Liverpool back into the game and rightfully equalised on the 14th minute through Mo Salah. It took numerous brave saves from man of the match and Leeds young goalkeeper Illan Meslier to keep Leeds in the game, most notably being the two one on one saves he made against Liverpool's record signing Nunez. Meslier finished the game having made a total of 9 saves, the most by any goalkeeper in a single game so far this season and the most number of saves in one game in all of his young footballing career.
Leeds played their hearts out for their manager who was under tremendous pressure heading into this game with talks of his job security being in doubt. So, it was nothing less than poetic for Leeds to snatch a late 90th minute winner through Crysencio Summerton's well taken strike in the box. Liverpool had failed to deal with a low cross from their right hand side after having replaced Trent with Milner during the second half. The ball then fell kindly for the Leeds man who took two good touches before dispatching the ball past Allison. This was a deserved victory for Leeds, great entertainment for football lovers and a head scratcher for the Liverpool team who simply look toothless upfront and wobbly at the back. Leeds climbed out of the relegation zone albeit by just 3 points into 16th and Liverpool lost more ground on Leaders Manchester City and raised questions over their chances for next season's Champions League qualification.
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