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The best songwriter / musician of our generation penned a classic called “the more things change the more they stay the same”. Pretty apt whenever Klopp rotates his line up really. Nine changes to the side that started the cup final but this still looked just like Liverpool. Not identical of course, we don’t have clones we can bring in when the main players are out. You can’t replicate what Salah, Mané and Diaz do. Or Thiago or Van Dijk. Or Trent. Especially Trent, who is thoroughly unique in world football. So it’s not identical, but individual traits aside the team just played the same way and dominated the game in exactly the same way you’d expect from the first choice line up. It’s one of the more incredible aspects of Klopp’s tenure here really, and there are many of them. Imagine just being able to pick whoever you like and still be able to get the result you need. We went on a mad winning run at the back end of last season with Nat Phillips and Rhys Williams at centre back. It’s the Klopp effect. Him and his staff. They’ve instilled this belief in the entire squad and they’re so well coached that everyone knows how to play the role required of them. I saw the line up and wasn’t worried. It helped that it was more or less what I expected it to be so I wasn’t shocked or concerned by it, but I didn’t look at that team and think we’d be in trouble. I looked at it and was excited at what we might see from a midfield with both Curtis and Harvey in it. I looked at the defence and thought “Southampton aren’t scoring past those lads” and I looked at the forwards and thought there was opportunity for them to get back in the goals. Diogo and Bobby really need a goal, whereas Taki just scores every time he plays. And if something did go wrong then look at the bench. Granted, we only had three options rather than five, but when you’ve got that kind of talent to call upon you always feel confident. I also looked at the Southampton line up and there was nothing to fear from that whatsoever. Some of their regulars were left out and other than Ward-Prowse and his set-pieces there was nothing there to worry about. And I’d say all of what I just said above came to pass. The defence were brilliant (although Southampton had one chance early one when Ali made a smart save), the midfield functioned well and the frontline posed a threat and Taki delivered his customary goal. Southampton caused us no problems. The only thing I got wrong was them not scoring, but their goal only happened because of a dereliction of duty from Martin Atkinson and especially Stuart Atwell on VAR. I may as well start with that. It looked like a foul on Jota on first viewing but you can’t always tell. I was prepared to accept the possibility that the defender got man and ball and that Atkinson let it go because he was trying to let them play. He refereed like that all night in fairness, he wasn’t overly fussy and allowed a lot of contact. That’s good, I applaud that as the game is better for it. He got that decision badly wrong though as the defender got none of the ball and a lot of Jota. I’m not pointing the finger at Atkinson there though. Yeah, he’s in a great position and should get that right, but mistakes happen and I could accept that from the angle he was viewing it from it may have looked like the defender has got the ball. I don’t know if that’s the case but I’m open to the possibility as he got most things right on the night other than that. But seriously, it’s mind boggling that VAR didn’t help him out there. I assumed that the procedure must have changed and they weren’t allowed to go back that far, but that’s not the case. VAR can go back to the start of the attack and indeed Atwell did look at it. And then decided it wasn’t a clear and obvious error. Fuck me. It doesn’t get more clear and obvious because at no point does the defender get any touch on the ball. Jota controls the ball and the defender boots him. There is no great area there, you have to tell Atkinson he’s missed a foul and to go and check. They scored a fucking goal from that foul. How can that be allowed to stand? This is the second to last game of the season and we had to win to keep the title alive, and the officials allow that to happen?? I didn’t want VAR, I still don’t want VAR but the fact is we’re stuck with it. So fucking use it then. This is the exact scenario why it exists. Imagine if we’d dropped points in this game because of that. Incompetence or something else, I don’t know what Atwell’s reasons were but you seriously have to wonder how someone who does this for a living can not award a free-kick for that after seeing all the necessary replay angles. He should be made to explain himself. The goal itself was jammy as fuck too, as Redmond’s shot was going straight at Alisson before it nicked off Milner and looped up into the top corner. It was the only way they were ever going to score. Thankfully it’s just a footnote on yet another Liverpool victory. The lads responded as they always do. We took control of the game again and thought we’d equalised straight away when Bobby headed in a Kostas free-kick. The offside flag curtailed his celebrations, sadly. We were playing well though and the goal wasn’t too long in arriving. Nice football, good ball by Jota and a clever run and superb finish by Taki. Such a lovely goal that. He’s scored 10 goals this season now and he’s made a massive impact on this quadruple bid. I don’t know how much longer he’ll be here, but I hope he doesn’t leave this summer as he’s such a valuable asset to have. Much has been made of Martin Tyler’s commentary on that goal. I commented on it on twitter too, because it really was something wasn’t it? Some of you will say he’s like this on every game he does and his lack of enthusiasm isn’t just reserved for when we score. That’s as may be, but there’s a large body of evidence now that the cunt sounds genuinely fucking gutted any time we score. I’d love to know why, as it wasn’t always like that. Who could forget the iconic “Collymore closing iiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnn” line. There’s just no way you can tell me he isn’t gutted when we score though. He didn’t exactly go nuts when Redmond scored, but compare that with how he was when Taki scored. It couldn’t be more obvious. And here’s the thing, I know people will say he’s going to be more excited when the underdog scores as the neutrals all love an upset, but this is different. Southampton weren’t the story here. Them scoring wasn’t any kind of a big deal to be celebrated, unless you specifically wanted us to get beat and ergo for the title race to be over. That’s not what Sky want. Sky want this going to the final day and Minamino’s goal was therefore the big story here. Any other commentator working on this game will have given Taki’s goal the excited commentary it warranted. It’s just Tyler. He needs fucking off, either for his bias or just his plain old lack of enthusiasm. A commentator is supposed to add to the moment or to let the moment speak for itself. This cunt just tries to suck all of the joy and excitement out of it. Even on Matip’s winning goal his first thought was to desperately wonder if the ball had gone out from the corner. What a sour, miserable, bitter old fucking turd. Hopefully he’s nowhere near Anfield on Sunday. I expect he’ll be at the Etihad desperately hoping for another “Aguerrrooooooooooo” moment. Twat. Anyway, I’ve jumped ahead a bit there by skipping to Joel’s header. I’ll come back to that in a bit. The equaliser was no more than we deserved and the rest of the half was basically total domination from us. I think at half time we’d had 11 shots to their one or something. It may have been even more. They weren’t exactly clear chances but we were knocking on the door and at half time I wasn’t worried at all. Well I was a little worried for poor Joe who went over on an ankle and had to go off to be replaced by Hendo, but I wasn’t worrying about the outcome of the game. I just expected us to go out and find the goal we needed to get the points. We almost did it immediately when Jota collected a Tsimikas cross and fired a snapshot inches wide. It summed up his last month really. It’s just not going in for him, although I thought his form was decent enough in this one and he was pretty unlucky. He had a great effort blocked in the first half when he brought a ball down on his chest and unleashed an acrobatic volley that would have burst the net. He played the pass for the goal and generally looked quite lively, which was good to see with the two massive games we have coming up. We might need him off the bench, although frankly there’s no way I’d be overlooking Divock if the situation required an extra forward. We were enjoying almost total domination of the ball and Southampton couldn’t get out. They didn’t actually look like they even wanted to. Usually we come up against rabid opponents and crowds desperate to be the ones to stop us winning the league, but Southampton really didn’t seem that arsed. The fans weren’t particularly boisterous and the players looked like they were just waiting for the season to end. The coast coast is home to Peter Shilton and Matt Le Tissier so naturally their crowd sang the national anthem and then booed when the away end belted out YNWA at the end. If the season wasn’t about to end we’d be subjected to this bollocks at 90% of the stadiums we go to. Next season it might be like that, but chances are the banter merchants will all have forgotten and will have some other shit songs to amuse themselves. Really though, it was fairly tame. Maybe they were disheartened by how our second string completely dominated the game. Most of the noise was coming from the away end though as our boys pressed for the goal that would get them ahead. We continued knocking on the door and Jones was becoming more and more influential as the game wore on. He had a quiet start but grew into the game and I thought he was really fucking good in the second half. Great on the ball, positive, mature in his decision making and the only criticism was his shooting was shite. It used to be a strength but it’s been rubbish for a while now. Harvey was really good too. He nearly scored when he shot into the side netting and this was a nice little reminder of what he can do. We’ve barely seen him for weeks but he’s such a massive talent. I thought he was unlucky to be brought off but we needed to win the game and Klopp wanted to get a fourth forward on. Cometh the hour, cometh the man. Origi time. We scored straight away. You might say he had nothing to do with it but I could argue that Southampton shit their pants when he came on and our lads all got a lift. There’s a feeling of inevitability when he comes on that a goal is coming. The goal was a fluke as Matip and Diallo both headed the ball at the same time and it looped into the top corner leaving the keeper helpless. Maybe that’s what Joel needs to do all the time now to keep his headers on target? Konate went close from an identical position soon after, but for the most part we weren’t too bothered about trying to force another goal and the performance after we went 2-1 was very much safety first. Lots of possession but very sensible. We saw the game out with no drama and ensured that if City are going to win the league they’ll need to do it on the pitch because we aren’t making anything easy for them. That’s one of the most satisfying things about this. City’s players will have been gathered somewhere, watching, social media team at the ready waiting to capture all the footage of us not winning and handing them the title. When we fell behind you can be sure there will have been celebrations. It’s just a shame we’ll never see any of it, or their reactions when Taki and Joel scored. Actually we don’t need to see that, just play Tyler’s commentary as that will capture their mood perfectly. So a big three points from a team that just refuses to go away. It’s still highly unlikely that we will win the title, but it’s more likely than it was a week ago so that’s something to cling to I suppose. I’m not even dwelling on it too much. If Villa do something at the Etihad then great, but I’m not holding out much hope for it and I’m not even really thinking about it much. I’m just looking forward to going to Anfield and seeing us do our thing. Just beat Wolves and then see how the chips fall. If City win there won’t be any sulking at Anfield, we’re having a party at full time no matter what this Sunday. Two cups to celebrate and the opportunity to show our appreciation to the lads for all they’ve done this season. And the small matter of seeing them off before their date with Real Madrid. Note to any mischief making African journalists reading this. I did not just call the Champions League final “small”. Star man is difficult because there are half a dozen strong contenders. Bobby got it on Sky and I did think he was very good, especially in the second half. I think we had better though. Milner was so fucking good in the first half in that number six role. He had to go to right back when Gomez went off and he was solid there too. Harvey was really good, Curtis was even better and Kostas was quality again. I think I’m going for Konate though. I probably didn’t think that at the time but having slept on it and thought a bit more about the game, the big lad was just so fucking dominant. His form has been unreal since the turn of the year and he’s had much more of an impact on this season than I thought he would. There’s no bigger Joel Matip fan than me (other than Virgil) but it’s really hard to even contemplate not picking Konate now isn’t it? Klopp is often asked about how hard it is picking a team and he says that’s the easy part. The hard thing is leaving lads out of the squad completely. Taki might not even make the bench this Sunday, and if he does then it might be at the expense of Origi. Harvey probably won’t make it either, or if he does then it will be Ox missing out. The depth is just unprecedented, along with a lot of other things we’ve seen this season. Not least this; we might actually win the fucking lot! Team: Alisson; Gomez (Henderson), Matip, Konate, Tsimikas; Milner, Elliott (Origi), Jones; Minamino, Firmino (Keita), Jota: