In a title race, only winning is good enough
Football is all about narratives. As viewers, we clamour to attach deeper meaning to everything: results, patches of form, a manager’s body language, even substitutions.
Right now, the talk of the town is Liverpool feeling the pressure at the top of the table. Are they getting vertigo, looking at the teams breathing down their neck? Are they flying too high? Are they going to BOTTLE the title race? These are the questions on everyone’s lips after the Reds drew two games in a row – to Leicester last week and West Ham on Monday night.
Under other circumstances, for other teams, it would be a non-story, but considering their aspirations of winning their first ever Premier League title, many see it as cause for concern.
Fabinho, Liverpool’s defensive midfielder who gradually played himself into the starting line-up after signing from Monaco last summer, believes it is much simpler than that, as is normally the case.
“We have confidence. We enjoyed a brilliant December, which was almost perfect, but now we have had this dip,” he told ESPN.
Trying to explain why Liverpool had suffered a slight dip in form, the Brazilian put it down to teams altering their approach to combat Liverpool’s pace in attack.
“It is difficult to explain why this has happened. I believe that now teams who play against us sit very deep. We need to do things a little differently and maybe we aren’t doing this – we are unable to find the spaces.
“Often, we want to go through the middle and it is difficult against physically strong and defensive teams,” he explained.
“We need to find solutions and in these past few games we haven’t.”
Jurgen Klopp’s side are of course also suffering from an injury crisis in defence; James Milner had to fill in at right-back last night with Joel Matip at centre-back while Trent Alexander-Arnold and Joe Gomez remain on the sidelines.
It emerged recently that Gomez required surgery on his fractured leg. The operation went smoothly but it was not welcome news at Anfield, where his absence has been felt.
Liverpool’s next game comes against Bournemouth, who may leaves themselves more open for Liverpool than West Ham did.
Fabinho believes “beating Bournemouth is important to continue with a three-point gap [over Manchester City] at the top of the table.”
We will have to wait and see whether the league leaders manage to find those illusive ‘solutions’. Another draw could see a ‘dip in form’ turn into a full on wobble.
