Liverpool are giving their rivals no encouragement and that's how Jurgen Klopp likes it as the Premier League leaders move 13 points clear again with victory over Wolves
Monday 30 December 2019 13:42, UK
After the glory of their performance at Leicester, came the grind of Liverpool's display against Wolves.
The result was the same though. It almost always is for this Liverpool team. Champions of Europe. Champions of the world. Soon, surely, champions of England.
Wolves stayed in the game. They had their chances and they had their complaints after a couple of VAR decisions went against them, but they left Anfield just as every other visitor to this stadium has left there this season - without a single point to their name.
It is 10 home wins from 10 for Liverpool in the Premier League this season. Fifty unbeaten in the competition at Anfield. Jurgen Klopp's team are unbeaten anywhere this season. Avoid defeat against Sheffield United next time out and Liverpool will go an entire year without being beaten in a Premier League game. This is what dominance looks like.
"If it were easy to win that number of games, a lot more teams would have done it," said Klopp afterwards. "It's just not easy. You have to fight with all you have. Sometimes you have more, sometimes you have less. The boys do that all the time so I could not be more proud of what they did again to get that result over the line. It was just impressive."
They had to do it a bit differently against Wolves. There was plenty of possession in the first half with sporadic moments of incision as the tempo was increased. But it brought only the one goal and after the interval, they had to show the other side of their game - resilience.
Klopp will have found that every bit as satisfying as what he saw against Leicester on Boxing Day because it spoke of the mental strength of this group of players. Would they allow the hectic schedule to derail their bid for a first league title in 30 years? Was this a window of opportunity for their rivals? It was something he had addressed in his programme notes.
"We won't allow it," he explained. "This group of players know they set their own agenda and their own benchmarks. They know they have the capacity to decide if going into a game we allow ourselves to feel fatigue or we choose to be fresh in body and mind. It's a choice we can make - we have the power to decide our own approach."
That attitude informed his team selection. Despite the exertions against Leicester, there was only one change to the starting line-up with Adam Lallana coming in for Naby Keita. The rest were not rested but asked to go again and that's just what they did. Sadio Mane scored the only goal of the game after an assist from the shoulder - not the arm - of Lallana.
Liverpool's level did drop a little after that.
"I saw immediately this kind of relief for a second," acknowledged Klopp. "We are all human beings, that's normal. The next long ball we were not there. We were not fresh enough of mind to adapt to that immediately and caused ourselves some problems."
Crucially, they came through it. Again.
These are the margins that Liverpool are turning in their favour. Manchester City had led Wolves by two goals on Friday not one. But as the momentum of that game shifted away from them, the reigning champions could not hold on. They wilted. Here, as Wolves pushed for that equaliser, Liverpool managed to find a way through it once more.
Wolves were deflated at the end. But it is Manchester City whose spirit they have broken with their sheer relentlessness this season. There will be no route back into this title race.
What makes this so impressive is that Liverpool were the team who could have cracked after last season's hard-fought battle. Instead, just as they always have under Klopp, they used the disappointment of missing out on the title by a single point as their fuel.
Back in 2016, after being beaten by City in the League Cup final, Klopp said: "Only silly idiots stay on the floor and wait for the next defeat."
It continues to be the mantra. Relentlessness has been the theme. There are no missed opportunities, only heightened desire to ensure that the next chance comes quickly.
The 2018 Champions League defeat in Kiev could have floored them. It could have been an ending in the way it soon appeared to be for Mauricio Pochettino's Tottenham. But that was never the mood at Melwood and they managed to make amends in Madrid one year on.
"I was pretty much the only one that was not crying from all my family," said Klopp of the disappointment following the loss in Kiev. "Even my agent was crying because he felt so much for me. They were only that sad and disappointed because they thought I was. I was of course but I didn't think it was the end of something. It's only another step."
The same mentality has galvanised Liverpool in this bid for the Premier League title. Winning the last nine games and still coming up short last season would have been tough. But the response to racking up the biggest points total ever by a team not to win the title - 97 - has been to set about bettering it this time around. They are on course.
No other club can get to 97 points now.
So can Liverpool be stopped? The logical conclusion is that they cannot. The banner that is passed along the seats in the Sir Kenny Dalglish Stand has already had to have a sixth European Cup added. The words that read '18 times' are likely to require an update too.
Title number 19 feels imminent.
But nobody is ready to think like that just yet. What was obvious at Anfield on Sunday, as they ended 2019 as they have lived it - victorious - was that these supporters are right there with the players and their manager. They are in the moment. Ceaselessly and single-mindedly pursuing a dream that has eluded this famous old club for far too long.
"I think our fans are exactly like the team is," said Klopp. "They are not interested at the moment. They do not want to celebrate now. I liked how the fans were today. Really in the game. This was a game where the crowd can be nervous. They weren't. That is good. We are a unit. We fight until somebody says we have enough points."
That time might be some months away yet. But for this extraordinary, relentless, brilliant Liverpool team, it will surely come.
