Where to even begin…

After a season you couldn’t even describe as full of highs and lows, given it’s been dominated by lows with the occasional high, this might just be the worst yet…

You wouldn’t think it looking at the scoreline but we actually started brightly for once and for the first half hour, we were on the front foot and playing some nice stuff. Wirtz looked on it, Ekitike looked sharp and there was the hope that the international break may have allowed the team something of a mental reset. Oh, how it’s the hope that kills you….

A clumsy challenge from Van Dijk saw City awarded a penalty which Haaland subsequently scored from. Not the end of the world so early in the game though right? Wrong!! What followed from going a goal down might just be the most biscuit-arsed capitulation that I’ve ever seen from a Liverpool side. Van Dijk said afterwards that we “gave up” and that’s exactly what happened.

Seconds before halftime, we concede the second from our own throw in, as a lack of closing down was followed by Konate allowing Haaland to run across him and it was 2-0… Ok, reset at halftime and come out ready to go right at them second half right? Wrong again, as 5 minutes after the restart and once again from our own throw in, two passes later it was 3-0 and game over.

We were afforded a brief glimmer of hope when we were awarded a penalty of our own, however it was quickly extinguished as the latest pathetically weak Salah penalty was saved and our day went from bad to worse. It was another terrible display from the Egyptian, who last season would’ve had a hat trick in this game. Anyone who thought that after announcing he’d be leaving at the end of the season, we may have seen Salah playing with more freedom and a little more like himself, will have received a harsh reality check as Mo continues to resemble a washed up boxer who’s got old overnight.

Ekitike fluffed a good chance as well but he and Wirtz who had looked so full of promise in the first half hour, disappeared into themselves and were anonymous after we fell behind.

One of the biggest indignations of yesterday was that after City scored their fourth, they basically just declared at that and were happy to just knock the ball about and ring the changes. It almost felt like an act of mercy and mark of respect for their once great foes, who have fallen so badly. The oles were ringing around the stadium from their fans with only an hour played and I can’t ever remember seeing our fans streaming out of a game so early.

I’m not going to rip into Slot, there’s no need to as the results and even more so the performances, speak for themselves. Everyone knows I don’t rate the manager and it’s not revisionism as I wasn’t a fan last season either. It wasn’t and isn’t a popular view but I always felt we weren’t all that convincing last season and that we won a one horse race. I do accept you can only beat what’s in front of you and we did that but I was never fully convinced we were all that.

So where do we go from here? We have the terrifying prospect of PSG on Wednesday and if we play like we have in recent weeks, we’ll likely be humiliated in that game and the return leg will be effectively a dead rubber. You’re never quite sure with this team as they’ve pulled the occasional performance out the hat this season but confidence must be rock bottom after yesterday and I doubt even the most optimistic of Liverpool fans will be expecting much from that game.

I don’t think I’ve ever wanted a season to end so badly and we’ve got a huge summer ahead of us with some big decisions for the club to make, both on the pitch and off it. Whether we get that right will determine if this season is just a blip, or the start of a slump. Walk on!