Footy365's
16 conclusions:
[article]Had it not been for the utter madness of the final seconds, this would have been the best nil-nil of the season: both sides had chances, and both sides kept each other out through a combination of good goalkeeping, good defending and good luck, rather than one side smothering the other to the point that we wished we ourselves could also be smothered, as happened last year.
And then there was a final, horrible, ridiculous, exhilarating twist: a goal from the unlikeliest source, in the strangest circumstances, in the 96th minute. Who needs six goals when you get that one?[/article]
[article]Liverpool got away with it a number of times in the first half. Everton had four fantastic chances in the first 35 minutes that left the adjacent Kop holding its collective breath.
Yerry Mina headed just wide from a crossed free-kick after three minutes; Richarlison tripped over his own feet in the box when he would have been one-on-one with Alisson off Gomes’s wonderful through-ball; Gomes himself had a diving header denied by the double-whammy of an Alisson save and a Joe Gomez goal-line clearance; and the slightest of Alisson touches at Theo Walcott’s feet stopped the winger from rounding him and slotting into the empty net from Sigurdsson’s pass.[/article]
[article]This was the second game in a row that Liverpool were opened up by a combination of speed and well-timed through balls, perhaps revealing a weakness that more clinical sides could exploit down the line.
But it is still a positive that they aren’t conceding as freely as last season even after giving up those chances. It is certainly harder to identify individual errors, and the fact that Alisson played such a huge part in keeping out two of those opportunities shows why he was worth such an enormous amount of money.[/article]
[article]For Liverpool, it is a confidence-boosting victory to carry them into successive away trips to Burnley and Bournemouth, before a big week in which they host both Napoli – with their continued progress in the Champions League at stake – and Manchester United.
It’s worth noting that in that same period, City will visit Watford and, more intriguingly, Chelsea. So it’s entirely possible that Liverpool’s next home league game, against their fiercest enemies, could give them a chance to go top of the table; it’s also entirely possible they will go into Christmas out of the Champions League and with the title race all but dead.
It’s all getting very exciting, isn’t it?[/article]