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SALAH AT THE DOUBLE TO LEAVE RAFA IN DEEP, DEEP TROUBLE

NO MERCY ON THE MERSEY AS RAMPANT REDS INFLICT MORE PAIN ON FORMER MANAGER

MARTIN SAMUEL at Goodison Park

The seventh-best player in the world apparently, Mo Salah. So it wasn’t just Bayern Munich striker Robert Lewandowski who got short-changed in Paris on Monday night.

Those other six must be rare talents to push Salah down the rankings. What he did here decided a Merseyside derby that was closer than it deserved to be. Twice, he took advantage of everton errors to speed away and score, one on one, against Jordan Pickford. And that was pretty much the difference between the teams.

On the scoresheet, at least. In real terms there is a widening gulf as Liverpool hit a purple patch and everton find a briar patch, and stumble into it head first.

They haven’t won since mid-September. And while there was a spell in this game in which they scrappily fought their way back into it, by the end the scoreline did not flatter Liverpool one bit. They were much the better team, even if derbies are always ferocious affairs.

Salah rises above the sound and fury, is unaffected by the tension and drama. At 2-1, evertonians were living in hope of another goal against the run of play.

Then Seamus Coleman made a mistake and Salah took that hope away from them. Coleman was trying to recycle the ball when he gifted it to Salah, and after that it was like watching a thoroughbred running against a field of carthorses.

No one could catch him and his finish was exemplary, leaving Pickford no chance again. he had scored a similar one in the first half, too. That is what Salah does. he decides games, and often the biggest ones. he’s not the seventhbest anything. What games are those judges watching? By the end, the visiting fans were loving their supremacy. ‘Rafa’s at the wheel,’ they mocked, once the fourth had gone in.

It was set up by Andy Robertson, finished smartly by Diogo Jota, who’d had a quiet game after his fireworks against Southampton. None of Liverpool’s forwards stay quiet for long. Certainly not that one who’s not quite as good as Cristiano Ronaldo, Karim Benzema or Jorginho.

Jurgen Klopp says he hates the intensity of the derby. After the havoc it wreaked on his season last year, it is not hard to see why. Yet, for the neutral, the noise generated when everton found an unlikely route back into this game was genuinely spine-tingling.

Until that moment, it looked as though Liverpool would have it embarrassingly easy. Suddenly, there was a game on and a cauldron in which it was being played.

Some everton fans had headed for the exits after Liverpool’s second after 19 minutes. Others unfurled a banner critical of the board. Yet, once Demarai Gray scored, the place erupted, all grievances forgotten. It helped that the locals had taken against referee Paul Tierney for booking Andros Townsend for diving and Allan for a tackle that, on close inspection, looked harsh but fair. They had a point. Yet, minor injustices aside at the moment Gray offered hope, everton were largely engaged in damage limitation.

Liverpool had set off like red rockets and only Pickford prevented them turning into specks in the night sky. he made a string of acrobatic, athletic saves as Liverpool threatened to run up a score that would have left Benitez and his side embarrassed. The first minute saw a hopeful ball upfield cause panic in the everton ranks as Sadio Mane harried. A panicked corner was conceded, taken by Trent Alexander-Arnold and headed just wide by Joel Matip. he should have done better. A minute later, Jota picked out Salah, who shot over the bar.

Then it was Mane’s turn as provider, a low cross from the left struck first time on the turn by Salah and forcing the first big save of the night from Pickford. Yet everton could not survive such a relentless onslaught and in the ninth minute Liverpool found a way through.

Mane started it, on the left once more, finding Scotland captain Andy Robertson, who got in a great under-lapping position before taking the less obvious option and cutting the ball back to the edge of the D.

There was Jordan henderson and his finish was a delight. Not just a shot, but one steered with accuracy into the corner that Pickford couldn’t quite reach.

Liverpool celebrated, not provocatively, in a corner populated by home fans, but that was still too much for Klopp. ever mindful of trying to take the sting out of the mood, as much as the game, he screamed at them to get back into their own half.

Little about Liverpool’s play was going to make this a low-key appearance, however. Five minutes later, Alexander-Arnold forced another save from Pickford with a shot from the edge of the area.

everton hadn’t troubled Alisson to that point and, when they lost possession during a rare forward foray, Liverpool’s counter-attacking wit made them pay.

Alexander-Arnold mopped up, saw Salah in a foot race with everton’s defence and immediately fancied his chances. he was proven right, too, Salah out-stripping several blue shirts before sticking the ball smartly past Pickford. It was the 500th goal of the Klopp era, and typical of what he has brought to this club.

Still Liverpool pushed for more. Michael Keane almost turned a corner into his own net — Pickford to the rescue again — and then the england man was on his toes again, keeping out a shot from Salah. Nothing yet from everton, so when they got back into the game four minutes before halftime, the home support were as shocked as anybody.

It was a rare mistake by Liverpool’s back line, Matip and Virgil van Dijk leaving Gray far too much space so that when a move broke down, Richarlison could pick him out easily. Alisson saw the danger and came rushing out to clear, but the former Leicester man finished sharply. Goodison came alive with more than dissent, at last.

Gray then became the second evertonian to be booked for diving — not cool, lads, not cool — before Ben Godfrey headed away a Mane header. Liverpool were still the better team, but those who left early missed a derby, not a surrender.

EVERTON (4-2-3-1): Pickford 6; Coleman 5, Keane 6, Godfrey 6, Digne 5; Allan 6, Doucoure 6; Gray 7 (Tosun 85), Richarlison 5, Townsend 6 (Delph 73min, 5); Rondon 5 (Gordon 59, 6). Subs not used: Kenny, Begovic, Iwobi, Gbamin, Branthwaite, Dobbin. Booked: Townsend, Allan, Digne, Gray. LIVERPOOL (4-3-3): Alisson 7; AlexanderArnold 8, Van Dijk 7, Matip 7, Robertson 8; Henderson 8 (Oxlade-Chamberlain 83), Fabinho 7, Thiago 7 (Milner 75, 6); Salah 9, Jota 8 (Minamino 88), Mane 8. Subs not used: Konaté, Tsimikas, Origi, Kelleher, N Williams, Morton. Booked: Thiago, Robertson, Van Dijk. Man of the match: Mo Salah. Referee: Paul Tierney. Att: 39,000.

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2021-12-02T08:00:00.0000000Z

2021-12-02T08:00:00.0000000Z

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