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One of the biggest wins of the season under the circumstances. A nice four or five goal stroll would have been preferable of course, but it was somewhat fitting that we did it this way, as we are where we are this season based on this kind of ultra professional, ballsy win. Losing against City shouldn’t have had any negative impact on the confidence of the players as it was a tight game that could have gone either way. In isolation that loss wasn’t going to do too much damage to our title chances either, providing of course that we just picked right up where we’d left off before that defeat. This game was huge in terms of that. It was as big a test as we've had all season. Anything other than three points would have been utterly soul destroying and probably season changing. We can’t give City any encouragement as they’re capable of going unbeaten between now and the end of the season. So are we though. You can’t always smack lesser teams about and on those difficult days when it becomes a slog, the only thing that counts is winning. We’ve had loads of these grind it out wins and it must be doing City’s head in. When we were chasing them it was their close wins that got to me more than the beatdowns. They’ll have hated this, as right until the very end there was the hope for them that we might drop points. But we didn’t drop points. We did what we’ve done all season and took care of business. We haven’t had to do it like this very often in recent weeks but earlier in the season these kind of wins were becoming the norm. We’re becoming machine-like and it’s great. More often than not you’ll beat the weaker sides with plenty to spare, but not always. Sometimes it’s tight and tense. Teams that don’t win the title can usually point to these scrappy games as the reason why. It’s so easy to drop points in these games but so far we’ve got a 100% record against sides outside of the top five. Incredible. To do that you can’t afford any mistakes at the back and you have to find a way to get the breakthrough at the other end. Brighton didn’t have a single shot on target (and they only had a couple off target) and although we only managed the one goal when you defend like we do now, that’s usually enough. I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to saying that after all these years of keystone cops defending and 4-3 wins, but this is where we are now. Big Virgil has transformed the culture. It’s all about the clean sheets. The big man was imperious again in this game. Fabinho did well alongside him too, but Virgil is so good, so dominant and so much of a leader that Klopp could have probably dragged someone out of the away end and Van Dijk would have been able to carry them through the game. That’s doing Fabinho a bit of a dis-service, but you get the point. Seeing him yelling and pointing and making sure everyone is doing their jobs just makes you feel safe, doesn't it? The game is in the balance, but you think "it's fine, Virgil's got this". Brighton had no interest in anything other than trying to fluke a goalless draw. Even when we went a goal up they still played conservatively. It’s understandable because we’re so good. Brighton don’t play like this against everyone - they’re actually one of the better home teams in the league - but as I wrote in a recent report, we’re now a absolute nightmare for rival managers to prepare for. I mean seriously, what do you do? If you attack us you’ve basically got no chance. Adopting a blanket defensive strategy probably won’t work either, but it might be the best hope you have if we have a bit of an off day up front. The lack of a recognised centre back alongside Van Dijk offered them a glimmer of hope and something they might be able to target, but all out defence was clearly their best chance of getting anything. Chris Hughton puts all his eggs in that basket and it almost worked for him. Brighton made it very difficult for us but I thought we made it more difficult for ourselves with the way we played, especially in the first half. Defensively we were spot on and it was almost complete and total domination of the ball. It’s just that we weren’t doing much with it. At times it almost looked like we’d never been faced with this kind of approach before, which is frustrating because we come up against it probably 75% of the time. Maybe Brighton are just better at it than most? It is hard when the opposition are as well drilled as Hughton’s men, but I didn’t like the way we went about trying to break them down. The build up was too slow and ponderous, the passing in midfield was too safe and what was with all those attempted long balls over the top? You can’t play balls over the top when the centre halves are massive and are usually standing around 30 yards from their own goal. There’s no space for a ball like that, yet we kept trying it. I sound like a broken record here, but fucking hell lads, get round the back and get some low crosses in. That’s how you break these teams down; overload out wide, move the ball quickly and get to the byline. Instead, we had Mané playing miles inside, meaning Robbo had nowhere to go and usually had to just play it back to Van Dijk. Meanwhile, over on the other side Shaqiri was nowhere to be seen and Trent was clearly troubled by an injury he picked up in the warm up. Robbo did give us a bit of production from his flank when possible, but generally he had too little support to be able to do much. We never looked like scoring in that first half at all, but the thing with this team, this year, is that they usually find a way. The second half wasn’t vintage but it was definitely better. The tempo was quicker and there was more zip up front. The main reason for that was Salah seemed to just decide he was going to take over the game. He did nothing in the first half but after the break he was much more involved, coming deep to get on the ball and generally just looking a lot livelier. He won the penalty with some great play in the box that left poor Pascal Gross in a terrible spot. You can’t expect an attacking player to be able to deal with Mo in that situation. Hell, most defenders wouldn’t be able to. Had it not been for the foul he might have scored anyway as he had worked a good shooting opportunity for himself before he was completely mugged by Gross. I’m the first to admit when Mo has gone down easily but anyone suggesting this was anything other than a 100% stonewall pen clearly has their own agenda. If you think that isn’t a penalty or it was a dive, go and watch another sport because clearly you have no idea about football or your perspective is so warped by a hatred of the Reds that it’s probably better for your health to spend your weekends doing something else. I mean bloody hell, how this is even up for discussion is baffling. The funniest thing is seeing Brighton fans accusing Kevin Friend of being a scouser. KEVIN FRIEND!!! Fucking hell. In terms of screwing over the Reds, he's Poundland Howard Webb. I’m going to say something I’ve never said before and probably never will again though. Kevin Friend had a flawless game. Not just good. Flawless. I think Friend actually got every single decision right, big and small. Maybe there was one foul on Robertson he should have given, but Robbo wasn’t going to reach the ball and I can see why Friend chose not to give it. Everything else he absolutely nailed, and he wasn’t being a twat with his cards either. This merely confirms the view I’ve always had of him that he’s not a terrible referee, he’s just a a biased one. When he’s not being a Chelsea-enabling twat he’s one of the better refs out there. This notion that he was doing us a favour though, it’s beyond fantasy. If that wasn’t a stonewall pen then Friend wouldn’t have given it. Not to us. Brighton might want to think about the three pens he didn’t give us last season when we played them at Anfield. Of course ol’ hairy hands Richard Keys has chimed in with his “does Salah go down to easily?” shite, but his opinion is completely worthless at this point (was it ever worth anything?). The man’s a complete joke, the TV equivalent of click bait. He’s a boil on the arse of sports broadcasting, and his Tefal headed sidekick is little better. But I digress. Mo picked himself up and buried the spot kick, but again it just wasn’t convincing and it’s only a matter of time before he misses a costly one. I’m not saying he shouldn’t be taking them, just that I know that miss is coming as I don’t think he’s particularly good at them. Hopefully it’s not in a close game. Hopefully not at Old Trafford. *shudders* After we went ahead I thought we’d pick them off and add a second, but it’s not easy to pick off a team that isn’t really trying to attack. Brighton had a bit more of a go than before, especially late on, but they never really overcommitted and we didn’t create too many more chances. Mo did miss an absolute sitter after substitute Milner put one on a plate for him. How did that come about? A nice one two out wide and Milner cutting one back. That’s what I mean. That’s how you do it. Just do it more, Reds. Do it more. I’m not sure how much more of these close games my heart can take. We’ve got 16 more games and I reckon half of them are going to go down something like this one. At the other end Brighton only threatened a couple of times. Alisson turned a shot round the post but it was going wide anyway. The most dangerous moment they had was when Keita gave the ball away and Trent needed to get something on a cross to prevent a Brighton player having a back post tap in. Keita is prone to that type of thing. It’s happened too many times where he’s given the ball away cheaply and put us under pressure. He’s not a great sub to bring on. Not at this moment in time anyway. So now we sit and watch to see what City do. They’ll probably win, but it’s fine because we won so the gap isn’t going to be anything less than four. Any dropped points is a bonus. The pressure is back on them and we’ll see how they respond. Playing first helps us, as does City’s involvement in cups that could see them fall further behind us if we’re playing league games when they’re on cup duty. Just have to keep turning that screw and winning the games we’re supposed to win. Star man is Virgil, but Robbo was great too and one pass he volleyed out wide late on after Brighton had cleared a corner was magnificent. He’s like what Marcelo would be like if he knew how to defend. Team: Alisson; Alexander-Arnold, Fabinho, Van Dijk, Robertson; Henderson, Wijnaldum; Shaqiri (Milner), Firmino, Mané (Keita); Salah: