How do you write something to encapsulate what we just saw? There’s a lot of hyperbole about modern footy where everything that’s pretty good will be labelled “the best ever” but what we witnessed at Anfield on Sunday is a genuine once in a lifetime occurrence. It’s literally never happened before.
I don’t know if it’s fully sunk in yet and I can’t really process how I’m feeling about it. Beating them 7-0 wouldn’t have been a massive shock a year ago when we were flying and they were pathetic. We could have beaten them by more than that at Old Trafford if we hadn’t stopped playing at 5-0. We could have done it in the Anfield fixture too if the ball had broken a bit more kindly at times.
This time the breaks did go our way. We’ve have won the game regardless, but you don’t get seven goals without some things bouncing the right way for you and a couple of the goals were like that. The other goals though? Fucking hell, this was us back to our best.
The recent signs have been promising but I don’t think anybody other than maybe Graeme Souness saw this coming. He wasn’t thinking 7-0 but to his credit he did say that he believed we’d win well and that Anfield would drive us on to a performance. Keane and (especially) Neville were laughing at him but he was right and at full time it was Souey, Carra and Kelly who were laughing at Neville as he tied himself in knots trying to say Liverpool weren’t even any good. Keane was laughing at him too in fairness.
Whenever there’s a result like this there are two stories to be told and usually the bigger story is just how shit the battered team was. And that’s fair. I’m fine if the wider football world wants to focus on them being a disgrace more so than us being outstanding. I don’t really care. The story for me is how good we were, but I don’t begrudge anyone who wants to put the boot in on Bruno Fernandes and co.
We should not be able to beat any ‘top’ team 7-0 if they play the way they should but equally we know that if we play at our best then the only teams who can potentially live with it are City and Real Madrid. Everyone else is going to get blown away, even if they play well. Not 7-0, but they’re going to lose.
But what we didn’t know is whether we were capable of hitting that top form anymore. It’s not been there all season except in flashes. The first half against Madrid was as good as anything we’ve produced in a long time, so despite what happened afterwards there was something to take from that. And it looks like we have taken something from it because this was like rolling back the clock.
There’s so much to get into here that it’s going to be tough to keep any structure to it so I’m going to say whatever comes into my head and let it flow. Make yourself a brew or something, or if you’re reading it after work this evening get yourself a nice cold beer and strap yourself in as this is going to be a long one.
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