Liverpool's Stuttering Start To The Season Continues

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer lost the ability to do it. Ralf Rangnick rarely managed it.

- Richard Jolly

Erik ten Hag certainly hadn't come remotely close in his first two games in charge. Then Liverpool came along and, within minutes, made Manchester United look a good team. And then a seriously good one. If Ten Hag and his relentless group of players were the architects of one of the most surprising home wins in decades at Old Trafford, Liverpool ensured that, as in both games last season, one of these sides left the pitch embarrassed.

Then it was United, 5-0 and 4-0 thrashings providing perhaps the worst days in a campaign littered with humiliations. Now it was Liverpool. A new regime at United was kickstarted by the ineptitude of the tormentors of the old. A first league defeat of 2022 leaves them below United in the table. A stuttering start to the season has become a sorry one.

There were emblematic moments, snapshots of an awful evening. Roberto Firmino missed the ball completely when he could have directed a volley at goal. Trent Alexander-Arnold, often the supplier supreme, volleyed a crossway over everyone waiting in the penalty area. James Milner and Virgil van Dijk, normally unflappable characters, seemed to be conducting a running argument. When Jadon Sancho opened the scoring, a feint immediately before sent Milner sliding and Alisson diving in the wrong direction. It rather summed up how Liverpool lost their compass. This was a role reversal.