Football is a Random Joke Played on Liverpool
Liverpool's loss at Old Trafford was as frustrating as it was unsurprising. The Reds have been better than you think at some things this season, worse than you know at others.
Football is a deeply random sport. We see that almost every week. We certainly saw evidence during Liverpool’s 3-2 loss at Manchester United.
Arne Slot’s side were two goals down before they’d taken a shot or a third touch in the opposition penalty box. There seemed no way they’d score once, never mind twice, in response. No Ekitike, no Isak, no Salah, no chance.
Or so we thought. The Reds scored twice quicker in the second half than United had in the first. Dominik Szoboszlai had recorded just eight league shots after carrying the ball at least five metres this season, only half as many as Ryan Gravenberch.
Yet he was able to run from the Old Trafford centre circle into the box in close to a straight line before slotting the ball home. If nobody could have expected that, what followed was maybe even stranger.
The source for the second goal was something you probably didn’t realise has been a strength for Liverpool in 2025/26. Not just in relative terms either but against almost all of the other 95 teams in Europe’s big five leagues.
It being the season that it has been for the Reds, they also suffered with a couple of negative outliers in the match too. Here are some of the reasons why this has been such a strange campaign.
Positive: High Turnovers
Liverpool’s pressing has been criticised throughout the season. They have been far too easy to play through (though Josh Williams’ analysis of how they have chosen to defend is well worth a read).
Pressuring opponents can be used offensively as well as defensively. Szoboszlai was the Reds’ leading presser for volume at Old Trafford. Twelve of his 31 pressures saw Liverpool regain possession, with the former figure the highest by anybody in a Premier League game this weekend.
One of them forced Senne Lammens to cede possession cheaply to Alexis Mac Allister in the ‘D’ of the Red Devils’ box. In a heartbeat, Szoboszlai had become just the fourth different Liverpool player to score and assist away to United in the modern era. No Ekitike, no Isak, no Salah, no problem.
The Reds had recorded what Opta define as a high turnover: a possession that starts in open play beginning 40 metres or less from the opponent’s goal. It was their 10th of the league campaign that led to them scoring.
Only Paris Saint-Germain and Bayern Munich have more such goals in the big leagues. Leverkusen are the sole side that has converted a higher proportion of their shots that have been fashioned in this way. Liverpool have been elite.
Whether by accident or design, this has proved unusually profitable for the 2025/26 Reds. Their 10 is only one fewer than Jürgen Klopp’s side mustered across his final two seasons. Now who’s heavy metal?
