Leaving Liverpool is usually a chastening experience. Invariably beaten, usually heavily and that nasty feeling that the red machine has just rumbled all over us again. And you are expected to smile nicely and be grateful it was by less than five goals.
An awful lot of us have seen it all before. My first visit there was in 1967 when Peter Thompson scored twice in a regulation 2-0 home win and a Scouse copper stopped a naive Cockney teenager from walking onto the Kop wearing a West Ham scarf. Not that these things leave a scar.We’ve only managed to win there once since 1963, that was the 3-0 victory under Slaven Bilic in 2015. I somehow managed to miss that, can’t recall why.
So Sunday was more of a day out with the lads with no expectation. Hell, Liverpool were nine points off the title, news was that Mo Salah and Virgil van Dijk had agreed new contracts and it was the weekend of the anniversary of the Hillsborough disaster. Always a very emotional occasion.
But first things first. I was proud of our fans for the perfect respect shown during the minute's silence to remember the 97 who lost their lives that day. Total silence. As it should be, but you can never tell these days, can you.
West Ham had earlier given Liverpool-born Aaron Cresswell the task of laying a wreath on the memorial at Anfield.
I live in the north west, have worked in and around the city for nearly 40 years and the first job I had when moving there was to establish a relationship with the Hillsborough families support group. So maybe I’ve got a different attitude to the disaster than many across the country have had.
As I’ve said, you don’t expect anything from visits to Anfield, but just for a change I left feeling we had been robbed. We deserved a draw at least from that second-half display, superbly orchestrated by Lucas Paqueta.
It’s strange that our best displays under Graham Potter have been at Aston Villa, twice, Chelsea and Arsenal. And now, somewhat surprisingly, at Liverpool.
You have to look for the positives at the moment, during these early days of the Potter regime. The constant uncertainty of which players will be jettisoned, where the money will come from and how do we produced a 20-plus transformation of a squad that is now fourth from bottom, in the summer months ahead.
Three wins in 13 is not good; just 12 points gained under the former Brighton and Chelsea boss. But the annoying campaign to undermine him largely because David Sullivan has had his doubts, is counterproductive.
I agree that Sunday’s first-half was a hard watch as Liverpool poured all over us in front of our contingent in the Anfield Road end. Did Potter send the team out to play that deep, to be overrun at times?
I struggle to understand why we select Carlos Soler, he’s going back to PSG at the end of his loan, and we can’t afford his fee or wages. So why are we giving him minutes?
I assume the advanced role of Aaron Wan-Bissaka, with JC Todibo covering across, was to counter the known left wing attacks by Liverpool. It seemed to work though because Kostas Tsimikas and Andy Robinson, when he came on, were not as effective as usual.
And then there was Ollie Scarles, on the other flank, facing Salah, one of the best wing men in the world. The kid suffered an daunting ordeal at times and lost the Liverpool man when he raced away to set-up the first goal.
It would have been easy to have hooked Scarles, but maybe Potter took the view that the experience will do the kid good. Scarles bravely stuck at it, was clearly annoyed with himself at times, and probably learnt more in that hour than a whole season on loan in the Championship, or lower, as some irrational fans have suggested on social media.
But after we withstood that initial onslaught, the game changed. Wan-Bissaka was switched to left back, Vladimir Coufal came on at right back and Paqueta started to control midfield, to the point that Arne Slot reckoned afterwards that Paqueta and Mo Kudus were good enough to get into his side. A little patronising that, I felt.
But as our second half pressure mounted, you saw the lesser appealing tactics of Liverpool. Some of it was blatant cheating, time wasting, feigning injury and diving. It’s not a pretty sight and Liverpool fans will not agree, but they are getting a reputation for this sort of stuff.
Van Dijk even deliberately rolled a second ball onto the pitch to waste even more time.
And this is nothing like the best Liverpool side many have seen. From the Ian Rush team, to great sides involving Graeme Souness, Kevin Keegan, Jan Molby, John Barnes and Steven Gerrard, there are many in Slot’s squad that would not get near those great Liverpool sides of old.
Maybe I’m looking through claret and blue eyes, but we could have won this. Even the sometimes red-eyed Jamie Carragher thought we were unlucky. Kudus and Niclas Fullkrug hit the woodwork, Dino Mavropanos should have scored with that header and only a blinding save from Alisson stopped Jarrod Bowen when he was clear.
And one of the worst refereeing performances from Andy Madley didn’t help. I don’t believe referees are corrupt, but displays like this do nothing to dispel the argument.
Referees do get effected by the Anfield atmosphere and a string of decisions went against us. Paqueta was fouled by Alexis MacAllister in the build-up to Liverpool’s winner, and Van Dijk did push Fullkrug in the back as he scored the winning header.
But you don’t get those decisions at Anfield, and it’s a long time since I saw our side so collectively upset by a referee.
So we lost there again and I know I was not alone in leaving Anfield feeling annoyed and robbed. I must say though that we all enjoyed another Fullkrug cameo. Watching him smash Liverpool defenders around was very pleasing.
And what might have been? This was the transfer that should never have happened. It seems clear that Tim Steidten was fully aware of Fullkrug's injury history but insisted on the deal going through, despite plenty of advice to the contrary.
In effect this transfer and the resulting, predictable, long-term injury has had a major impact on our season. A fully fit Fullkrug is a very good player, as we can all see.
So we enter a week of anniversaries. A year ago this week saw us finally exit Europe after a brave performance in the Europa Cup quarter finals against Beyer Leverkusen. Three years ago this week many will recall the wonderful away win in Lyon, also in the Europa League.
And those with longer memories will note that it was 49 years ago that we beat Frankfurt in that memorable Cup Winners Cup semi-final at Upton Park, for many the greatest game they witnessed at the old ground.
Europe though is a long way away now. Since that second-leg against Leverkusen last April, we have won just 11 of 40 matches, seen two managers and a Technical Director leave and with another manager already under pressure. How we have fallen.
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