TOMKINS: SLOW START IS NEVER THE END
Paul Tomkins 17 August 2009
Liverpoolfc.tv columnist Paul Tomkins explains why our opening day defeat doesn't spell disaster for Rafa Benitez and his title hopefuls.
I had a strange reaction this close-season; the exact opposite of usual, in fact.
By May, I'm usually glad to see the back of the domestic season, with disappointment or acceptance long-since set in stone (although European runs had become a welcome bonus). But then the new season would bring with it fresh optimism. It can only be better, right?
However, I didn't want last season to end. I could have watched Liverpool in that form for another few months, as they finished the season as the most in-form side in the land, and possibly only second to Barcelona in the world at that precise time, scoring three or more goals most weeks, and with four against Real Madrid, Man Utd, Chelsea and Arsenal.
When it did end, I wanted the new season to start there and then. Bring it on! Even by the middle of the summer, I still felt that this was going to be Liverpool's year.
But in the weeks leading up to the season I started to dip. Just as with half-time in a game you're dominating but not yet winning, the break came at the wrong time. Would Liverpool emerge in the same shape when the football resumed?
The more I thought about it, the more I concluded that it was unlikely. I fully expected that form to be found again before too long, but the momentum had to be rebuilt. Pre-season proved that; everyone is now starting again in terms of fitness and sharpness – and individual confidence, while carried over to some degree, is, three months after the team last played together, back to a more neutral setting.
To complicate matters, yet again Liverpool had several key players arriving back for pre-season training later than the others, with Spain's success last summer leading to further complications this year, in terms of being 100 per cent on the opening day.
I guess it occurred to me that, while what was achieved last season will aid this current challenge in a number of ways, it would not automatically follow from the first minute of the first game. That was the reality check.
And it also occurred that the performances at the end of last season would actually be a peak for many teams; it's not that they couldn't be reproduced, simply that such a concentrated set of results is very rare. After all, six consecutive games with three or more scored was a 117-year club record.
But of course, Liverpool don't need to take 31 points out of every 33, or win by three or four goals every week. A title is built on little bits here and there, that add up to something more significant than their rivals can muster.
Last week it also hit home that, with quite a few injuries, we weren't going to see Rafa Benitez's strongest XI right away. That, combined with the nature of the opening fixture, made me more anxious than usual. And obviously Liverpool's squad would look thinner with a number of players out injured; five or six players missing makes a difference to any team.
Injuries are part and parcel of football, and have to be dealt with, and in the case of Alberto Aquilani, there was little option but to accept it.
Once Xabi Alonso asked to leave it was always going to cause a problem in the short term, and Aquilani was one of the few players capable of replacing him – such quality hardly abounds. But for obvious reasons, neither would be available at White Hart Lane.
Rafa summed it up perfectly by saying that Aquilani was signed for five years, not five games. Better to get the right player and wait a few weeks, than buy someone less gifted just for the sake of numbers. That then demands patience on our part.
In theory, Aquilani actually offers a more exciting style of play than his predecessor, as does Glen Johnson at right-back. We just don't get to experience that instant gratification in the case of the Italian, the kind that lifts fans. A great debut, and we'd have been buzzing. But that boost awaits.
So it'd be very wrong to judge Liverpool definitively before Aquilani is fit, and several others too. The long-term picture also applies to Gerrard and Torres, who can only get sharper; both looked rusty at White Hart Lane, but that is fairly natural, especially as they both missed parts of pre-season.
And I was also dreading this season because in the past I've found it hard at times to try and get some fans to get a bad result in perspective. This season I sense that every single dropped point will be met with total and widespread despair.
That is because more is expected. And rightly so. But this will not be a 'perfect' season. The conclusion in May could well be what we consider perfect, but the road to get there won't. It just can't be.
No champions have ever dropped fewer than 19 points in a season, and yet the end of the world will be nigh every time a game isn't won.
Last season commenced with Manchester United totally underwhelming in drawing at home to Newcastle who, by contrast, looked in fine fettle. The season before, it was Reading who drew at Old Trafford; nine months later they too, like Newcastle, were relegated and United crowned champions. So early games are not indicative of the season ahead, even if it's obviously nicer to start with a win.
I've debunked several of Liverpool's supposed crises in recent years, so it was great to read comedian (and Arsenal fan) Dara O'Briain's piece in The Guardian last week about the ever-increasing speed of a crisis being decreed.
He mocked the 'supposed' crises at every top four club last season, and to that I'd like to add that the following is true: Arsenal went on a 23-game unbeaten run; Liverpool broke numerous club records and one all-time league record (fewest-ever defeats for runners-up); Chelsea broke the all-time English record for most consecutive away wins; and United broke the all-time English record for longest period without conceding a goal.
All four were European Cup quarter-finalists, three were semi-finalists, and three finished with 83 league points or more. Yet each was supposedly in crisis at some point; indeed, at numerous points. That's how people react to football, and it can drive you insane.
As ever, I'm mentally prepared for the ups and downs that come with any given season, good or bad. In my own mind I'm prepared for what happens with the team.
But am I prepared for the hysteria of others? The caterwauling, the giving up on the team, the over-the-top criticism? Am I prepared for the myopic media reaction, and general overreaction to every setback?
I'm not so sure.
There's no denying that at White Hart Lane the Reds were second best. Then again, Spurs weren't even as good as second best in this fixture last season, and somehow won (in added time), so Liverpool were due a bit of fortune in this fixture.
Instead, they encountered what I felt to be poor refereeing, and a deepening injury list at centre-back. The clash between Carragher and Skrtel summed up the day.
The positives, if I dare list them, included Lucas in midfield, with an excellent display in the second half, while Benayoun also made a very positive impact as a sub. In goal, Reina made a number of top-class saves.
Another big plus was the assurance of Daniel Ayala, who had been left exposed in the Youth Cup final when an older and much more experienced Arsenal midfield overran the Reds' and bore down on him in numbers. At 18 he's still just a baby in terms of a centre-back, but he handled the occasion at White Hart Lane brilliantly.
But the biggest plus was Glen Johnson, whose defending was excellent, and whose crossing and running with the ball were first rate. His run to win the penalty showed precisely why he was bought, and highlights what he can add to the side going forward.
Not many teams will get points at Spurs, and Liverpool still enjoyed an excellent season last time out despite losing there. However, Stoke provide an immediate chance to improve on last year's haul of points.
It's not a must-win game in terms of claiming the title (sorry, but 'must-win', in its most definitive sense, is vastly overused), but it's clearly crucial to getting this season on the right tracks, and to suggest improvements on last season are distinctly possible.
