Neil Atkinson’s match report for The Anfield Wrap following Liverpool’s 0-0 draw with Las Palmas in the Reds’ final pre-season game of 2024-2025…
Having written some of this before the final whistle, I fear it will read far angrier than I intended.
I’m not angry; football can’t really make me angry anymore, except for terrible things. It would be better to read the following as a strong feeling of lacking a positive skill.
I believe that football has so much potential for sharing and enjoyment that I want Liverpool to take every opportunity and regret every missed opportunity. After all, we could all die tomorrow.
When Liverpool play at Anfield, I want it to be magic. Or the conditions for magic, and the first condition is a crowd. Laboratory conditions may suit our rivals, but for all intents and purposes they don’t suit us, and they never should.
In this context, I feel like Ben Doak is taking a hard line. We’ve seen him slaloming around the full-backs before. The end product isn’t quite what we saw. But today it felt a little different from both sides.
He’s actually unlucky, and nothing ties up an opposing defense more than a crowd that rises when an attacker gets the ball. That can change a structure. Doak never manages to do that, and instead plays roulette. It’s a little more roulette than greybeards might like, but nothing outrageous.
Curtis Jones and Harvey Elliott are smart, but nobody else really is. That makes the smarts a problem. They match runs that should be made. Wataru Endo, once again, seems like he just doesn’t have it.
Ibou Konate suggests he won’t necessarily be playing at centre-back next weekend, while Andy Robertson looks pretty fit and comes closest to scoring. If the mere existence of the game is enough to please any Liverpool player, then the answer in the long run is Robertson.
The fact that Sepp van den Berg is not contributing is significant. The fact that Trey Nyoni is the only young player to have attracted attention throughout the preseason is also significant. Liverpool will end up with 24 or 25 players, but there will be no alarms and no surprises.
It’s crazy to think like that, but write them down – as it stands, it’s three goalkeepers, eight defenders, four deep-lying midfielders, five for the attacking sections either side of the forwards, not counting Doak, and finally two strikers. Zubimendi would make that 23, and if we needed two more we’d be 25, not counting Nyoni.
The most important thing about the game is that it will always be a social experience. Although nothing about it is unforgettable, I might remember Rob, Steve and I booking hotels, Rob, Laura and Chris talking about folk music, or Robbie and I talking about sausage rolls. That nonsense, that ephemera, is part of football and I don’t regret any of it.
But it just has to get better and more than that and if there is a lot that would lead to that. We know that. And it would help the players, the Liverpool players.
The message to Liverpool, a Liverpool that did so much right this preseason, on and off the pitch. A Liverpool that did not only itself but all of us proud, especially when the fascists were running wild. A Liverpool that understood what the public wanted from it, is: don’t do it again.
A Liverpool game at Anfield is an event. It may be someone’s first game, a whole new adventure or just another day, but it is always something to look forward to, always a pleasure, definitely a privilege.
Don’t joke around. Don’t remind us of COVID and steal our moments. Closed doors are fine, but closed doors really need to be closed.
At the end of the day: screw silent discos. We’ve had enough of them. We’ve had too many. The night after 30 years of not winning the league was a silent disco; the greatest night. The night we’d been waiting for, the night we never left to make sure we could have it. That night, our night, a silent disco.
Not anymore. Never again. I want all my discos to be as loud as possible. I will stand next to the speaker if I have to.
Download the free The Anfield Wrap app to get podcasts, videos and text about Liverpool FC in one place…
Latest posts:
