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If six defeats in seven games is not a crisis, Liverpool must have been mightily impressive beforehand.
The trouble is, they were not.
Even when they won their first five matches, they were not.
They were far from last season’s Rolls-Royce that won the league title by 10 points in second gear.
Nothing to worry about as they were bedding in new players? Many of us thought that, including this column.
And still managing to win while doing so was taken as a positive.
Winning when not playing well is the hallmark of champions, after all.
But not well enough for the positive spin on things to stand up.
And on a wet and windy night on Merseyside, there wasn’t much to be positive about.
More a case of ‘when it rains, it pours.’
The sort of night that Steve McLaren has a lot to answer for – Arne Slot, bald head glistening in the lights, could have used a brolly.
He will now need a thick skin to ward off the vitriol already coming his way from the sewer of social media.
At least the crowd stood by him.
But he would have found scant consolation on the field.
Not among the kids he fielded. Nor could he have taken comfort in the depth of the squad: there was precious little.
Instead, we saw a myriad of high numbers and strange haircuts that only die-hards and parents would have recognised. Plus a few familiar flaws.
On a dire night, only Rio Ngumoha enhanced his prospects.
Indeed, the only other positive may be another ‘if.’
But only if the rest given to the first team helps them beat Aston Villa, Real Madrid and Manchester City in the next three games.
That’s a very tall order. Even two wins out of three may justify the sacrifice of the Carabao Cup.
Slot took a calculated risk.
But, like many managers before him, he has further downgraded a competition that provides a valuable outlet for fringe players.
And treated with disdain a tournament that has been a memorable part of Liverpool’s history – they’ve won it a record 10 times.
No one slams it when it’s part of a Double or a Treble. Or the only trophy of the season.
It has been a springboard for success, a launchpad to bounce back from a poor run. Winning is habit-forming. And so, as they are discovering, is losing.
Liverpool can’t break the latter habit right now.
If they had picked a stronger squad and won, they’d have a bit more confidence to go into these crucial games before the next international break.
But they might also have had more injuries.
Looking back through the fog of a strange season, it’s easy to be wise after the event. But things were not quite right at the start.
Liverpool never looked like a £440m team. Or even a £315m one before Alexander Isak arrived.
Alright, these figures were partly offset by outgoings, but the new boys themselves did not have that game-changing, A-list glitter you’d expect from such lavish spending.
It’s still early, but Kopites can’t conceal the feeling that they’ve overpaid – for Isak, for Florian Wirtz and for Milos Kerkez.
It’s a sobering fact that few fees circa £100m seem to work out.
Kopites know they robbed the Bank of Barcelona for Philippe Coutinho.
Think Paul Pogba, Joao Felix, Ousmane Dembele (to Barcelona), Antoine Griezmann, Eden Hazard (to Real Madrid), Romelu Lukaku (to Chelsea).
An awful lot of euros washed down the continent’s rivers for those misfits.
On the other hand, Hugo Ekitike looks worth the £79m, being the pick of the bunch, while Jeremy Frimpong has shown pace to burn for £29m, if not great defensively.
Also, was it wise to change so much?
It’s almost sacrilege to question Michael Edwards and his recruitment team. But their reputation was also built on extracting top-of-the-range prices for second-hand items.
And £70m was an awful lot for 28-year-old Luis Diaz, who was angling for a move anyway. But he is being badly missed.
As is Jarell Quansah for £30m. Liverpool showed they still value the young England centreback by inserting a buy-back clause in his contract with Bayer Leverkusen, where they hope he’ll polish his defensive skills.
So, the club collected £100m for the pair. But how handy it would be to have both around now.
There was a double whammy of bad luck over Marc Guehi and Giovanni Leoni, whose ACL will keep him out for the season. But Quansah was sold long before that late window drama.
Liverpool were not to know that physicality would be the thing this season. Long balls, long throws and giant-sized central defenders and attackers are in vogue.
Slot’s team are lightweights in a league of heavyweights.
How to get out of this with the money spent?
They may have to pay over the odds for the calming influence of Guehi in January – if he still wants to go there.
An attempt at a back three with Wataru Endo, Joe Gomez and Andy Robertson against Palace betrayed Slot’s anxiety in this area.
But it was undone by nemesis Ismaila Sarr, who now has seven goals in nine games against the Reds.
The Senegal star’s pace and opportunism had already proved a handful for the first-choice defence, to be fair.
Wirtz is too good a player not to click to some degree, but he’s not the game-changer expected.
Kerkez might need the re-education that Robertson received when Jurgen Klopp kept him under wraps for two months after he arrived for £8m from Hull.
Isak? Do they need him with Ekitike? If he doesn’t start scoring, they may have to bite the bullet and sell him off at a massive loss.
As Jamie Carragher said when Newcastle wanted £150m: “You’d want Mbappe for that fee.”
Liverpool certainly needed Guehi more than Isak – and at a third of the fee.
Chelsea might take the Swede off their hands at a cut price.
It’ll be damage limitation soon.
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The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of FMT.

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