Cucumber Season
Back where I come from, we have a term for where Liverpool is now, albeit early: Cucumber Season. With nothing serious to play for, it’s hard to come up with meaningful commentary, even though the Premier League is still in full swing. Take this game, for example. What are the headliners, from a Liverpool perspective? Let me see if I can do this extrablatt style:
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LIVERPOOL MAINTAINS ITS STREAK! The Merseysiders extend their run of scoring to 31 league games in a row, and only need to score once more in their next away game to set a record for scoring in every away game in a season!
Or maybe this one:
CHIESA EARNS HIS WINNER’S MEDAL! Celebrated Italian winger Federico Chiesa notches his fifth Premier League appearance to guarantee his name will forever be in the history books as part of this title winning Liverpool squad!
You see the problem.
AMERICAN SCOUSER TAKES ANFIELD
There were some goals and stuff, a couple of silly yellows befitting the lack of seriousness, but really, as a Reds fan, you could have easily skipped this game and lost nothing of value. I admittedly almost forgot there was a game today and tuned in a few minutes late, only to be greeted with a 1-0 to Chelsea scoreline. Which made me laugh…and think of cucumbers.
Still, a couple of useful observations can be made.
First, I think Slot is doing the right thing. These last few games present a golden opportunity for benchers to prove themselves. It would be hard to expect the team to maintain its intensity when they’ve already won, but by bringing on those players who want to carve out a role for themselves next season, one hopes that individual performances might at least partly offset an expected loosening of standards.
Well, Endo played well, even showing some ball control tricks I never knew he had up his sleeve. Anyone besides him? Not so much. Perhaps most obviously, I expected a far more energetic performance from the likes of Curtis and Harvey. They have a couple more opportunities ahead, but this is their time, and they need to seize it. In the meantime, it served to show why Arne Slot had so little rotation in his squad this season. The drop in quality was painful to observe, and while being rusty can excuse it to some degree, the lack of drive was disheartening.
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Second, even with all that, Liverpool somehow still dominated for most of the game. Had anything been on the line for the Reds, I daresay we’d have destroyed today’s opposition – who, one must keep in mind, still have everything to play for. I found that rather encouraging. Oh, and Macca, again, made a big impact on the game when he came on; what a player he is, and how lucky we are to have the midfield we do with him, Szobo, and Grav.
That’s a solid foundation, but it’s going to be a busy season next year with many more games to play, and we clearly, definitely need to enhance the squad. It is starting to look like five senior signings will not be too many, which is a difficult task to manage. If they go for it, Liverpool will have to act quickly in the transfer window to have a prayer of successfully integrating so much new blood.
In the meantime, looks like the salad days are upon us. As such, this may be my last column for the season, unless the mood strikes me following a particular notable performance. Like the traveling Kop today who were clearly enjoying themselves while needling the Chelsea fans (and Enzo), let us simply enjoy being champions; it doesn’t happen all that often. Adieu.