'Maybe something much bigger' - National media ask major Liverpool questions after Chelsea loss
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A look at how the national media assessed Liverpool's 2-1 defeat to Chelsea at Stamford Bridge as a bad week for the defending champions gets worseA third successive defeat means Liverpool will enter the international break at a low ebb. Slot’s men did not take theirs, Chelsea did."Jacob Steinberg, of The Guardian, writes: "There has been so much discussion about Chelsea’s youthful indiscipline but in the end it was one of the kids who made a 45-year-old man lose control."It was a wild finale, Liverpool run ragged, and when Estevao Willian delivered the decisive blow deep into stoppage time it was the cue for Enzo Maresca to leave his technical area, charge down the touchline and join the mass of blue shirts as they celebrated in front of the disbelieving supporters in the Matthew Harding Stand."Liverpool were beaten, their knack for late shows turned against them for the second successive weekend, and it is unlikely that Maresca cared when Anthony Taylor showed him a second yellow card.
Do the champions rally after losing top spot to Arsenal or do they fall into a decline reminiscent of Manchester City’s struggles last season?"Over on the Mirror's online pages, Nathan Ridley pens: "Alexander Isak didn't look like a £125million player for the first hour, but his assist for Cody Gakpo's equaliser was of that ilk - if you believe that he meant it, of course. Mo Salah then had a chance to make it 2-1, only for the Egyptian to skew his effort high in what proved to be the Reds' best chance to grab a winner before their focus turned to staving off a Chelsea onslaught in the dying embers."The Independent's Miguel Delaney reflects: "People can of course point to available personnel, and the pattern of the game, but there is maybe something much bigger."This Liverpool don’t yet make sense in the same way.
Liverpool are now suffering the other side, in how they’re starting to concede such moments."And last but by no means least, the ECHO's verdict reads: "Was this the day when a blip turned to a crisis for this new-look Liverpool? Whatever Arne Slot's feeling on that particular debate, he will now have two weeks to stew on it as his side lost their third successive game to bring the curtain down on the week from hell for the Reds boss."Having become masters of late-goal drama in the early weeks of the campaign, the champions have been administered copious amounts of their own medicine in the last two league games as they once more conceded in stoppage-time to lose 2-1."This time it was Chelsea substitute Estevao picking up where Eddie Nketiah left off at Crystal Palace last week, sliding in in the 95th minute to secure a huge victory for Enzo Maresca, whose riotous celebrations saw him pick up the most joyous yellow card of his career to be sent off by referee Anthony Taylor."As this team continues to emerge from a big-spending summer, the burgeoning partnerships all over the pitch are still in their infancy and the Reds, having spent so much money in the window, don't have the luxury of time nor the leeway to label themselves as a team in transition."