Beyond the crisis talk Liverpool go to work and Jota is not there. Why would that not affect them?

A couple of weeks ago, Liverpool were on course to win the Premier League for the second season running and probably the Champions League too.

- Max Rushden

After Manchester City briefly won the title on the opening day when Tijjani Reijnders tore Wolves apart, the Reds' run of winning without being that good made it feel inevitable. Winning when not at your best is, after all, a sign (TM) of a title-winning side, Clive.

But then Liverpool continued playing not particularly well and started losing. At the same time the perennially second-placed high-performance cowards Arsenal have an excellent defence and at least two very good players in every position. Arise Sir Mikel.

It is almost as if things can change during a season. It really would be better all round to wait until it is finished and review everything then. But that would be a very long podcast. Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher might get through a couple of pairs of thick white-soled pundit shoes by the time they had broken everything down on the one episode of Monday Tuesday Wednesday Night Football at the end of May.

Does three defeats in succession constitute a crisis? As with any football debate it depends entirely on your definition of the key word in the sentence. Is Paul Scholes world class? What do you mean by world class? Are Aston Villa a big club? What does big mean? Are Manchester United back? OK, well, we know the answer to that one.