Two Liverpool stars get special praise but TAA was 'poor'; was Raya's 'double save' for Arsenal really that amazing?

Liverpool duo Darwin Nunez and Ryan Gravenberch have received special praise in the Mailbox after the Reds’ 3-0 win against Bournemouth. Plus, was David Raya’s double save really that amazing? And more…

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No Allison, no problem

Wait, did I see hints of tears in Darwin’s eyes when he net for our third ? Either way, that Nunez strike gave the feels today, he’ll have needed that one so, so badly. Prior to that I was knives out on him for being switched off and clueless (as so often he is) when Konate went over the top of a sleeping Bournemouth backline / wandering Kepa for Luis Diaz to open, but the Uruguayan certainly acquit himself, and gloriously. Just a scintillating first half of footy today.

Gravenberch though. He needs his own terrace chant now surely. If we’d have succeeded bringing in a Basque loyalist who put in these performances across a first half-dozen games, I reckon this fan base would have been made up. This is possibly the biggest career turnaround in a red shirt I can remember, and I can still taste my own foot off of what I’d said about him last season. Now the lad has even added my favorite Wijnaldum attribute from Klopp’s prime era, that turnkey ability to become a human-cage around the ball while wiggling, wriggling and grappling his way through to emerge from any scrum with enough momentum and the ball at feet to glide forward. He’s been revelatory.

Despite his assist, Alexander-Arnold was poor today throughout, and when Diaz hit quickly for two I worried Salah would go into greedy me-first mode, which he duly obliged in several instances. But those nits would be the smallest to pick on a rather nice afternoon at Anfield.

Eric, Los Angeles CA

Knee jerks

I do enjoy just how often people want to make something more dramatic than it was said.

Quote “It always baffled me how saliba looks average for France but looks great for arsenal and now I know, for France he’s not defending a back 8 all the time. He’s still a good player don’t get me wrong but would he be good in teams that play a bit more adventurously? I’m not convinced.”

You’ll notice there i said he *looks* average when playing for France , which quite a lot of people agree is true. And I also said he’s still a good player. I didn’t call him average or bad at any point yet that’s how everyone read that comment. If you’re gonna argue, at least do so against points I’m actually making and not a hyperbolised version of what I’m saying. In case you’re not sure what those points are –

Saliba looks average for France

Arsenal are defensive

Feel free to argue those points.

Next I see people being annoyed because of my comments about arsenal defending with a back 8 because arsenal scored a lot of goals…they did…against weaker teams. And again just to be clear it doesn’t make you a free scoring team if you can bang in 5 goals against weaker teams. If Liverpool win 9 games 10 – 0 but then lose every game they will have a terrible season while also scoring 90 goals. Goals scored doesn’t tell you very much by itself. With the exception of one game against Liverpool I don’t think they beat top 6 opposition by more than a goal last year.

My defending with a back 8 comment is based on the fact that I only watched them against top 6 opposition where they tried not to lose instead of trying to win – a strategy which cost them a title.

Finally my comments about sterling are accurate. If they’re not then why have three big premier league clubs all decided he’s surplus? If you need someone for a back post tap in he’s not bad. But his decision making is poor, he doesn’t track back, he can’t pass more than a few yards and he has attitude problems. All reasons why he’s not trusted at any of the clubs he’s played for. Arsenal fans will end up with the same impression because we you see him week in week out you notice it far more.

Anyway, here’s hoping for a draw today with both sides getting 6 red cards and three injuries.

Lee

Rayally?

Nothing against Arsenal, nothing against Raya, but was the ‘double save’ really that amazing?

Point 1: Yes, he gets up quickly but that’s sort of the job (as Roy Keane might say).

Point 2: The penalty taker opts to head the loose ball into the centre of the goal, thereby halving the distance that Raya might otherwise have had to make up.

Point 3: It’s a header, not a shot, so it won’t be going anywhere near the speed at which Raya is travelling

In summary, it’s a decent bit of goalkeeping but quite why it’s the leading football story of the last 24 hours, I’m not sure.

Matt Pitt

A few weeks ago I had one too many beers after the Arsenal vs Villa game and proclaimed that “David Raya is the best Arsenal Keeper since Seaman” in the boys group chat. They told me that I was disrespecting Lehmann”s achievements and to go to bed.

I would now like to re-open this can of worms of a statement for the mailbox. Was I on to something here?

Henry “Kneejerk opinion” Innes

How many times am I going to write in singing Raya’s praises. World class saves when facing that dubiois penalty. Brilliant.

Chris, Croydon

READ MORE: Phil Jones obviously features in list of ten ‘what was he doing?’ own goals

New Champions League format

Hi Ed,

I’m a Manchester United supporter, so I have no skin in the game. It occurs to me that UEFA have managed to get a sort of super league competition in by stealth. They get the small(er) teams fans money in early on, but the end result will be one of the big teams winning. I don’t like Villa in particular, but I hope that they win the inaugural travesty to poke the assholes in the eye,

Rearguards,

Liam

Jude Bellingham’s Ballon D’Or chances

Before he was pretending to design flop-sweat coloured tees for ubiquitous sport-washing football clubs, Noel Gallagher – guitarist from pressure-selling Lancastrian beat-pop combo Oasis – opined that his band would really have done a lot better had their career been back to front.

I don’t buy this, as the youthful high points of Definitely Maybe and Morning Glory would sound a bit odd coming from middle-aged men scraping around for a record deal after a couple of decades of monotonous pub rock.

But if you apply this recency bias to Jude Bellingham’s Ballon D’Or chances instead, it makes a lot of sense. Consensus seems to be that the Ballon D’Or should go to Rodri, which seems to be a relatively solid conclusion and good footballing karma as the like of Busquets, Kante and Makelele have been historically overlooked for flashier, more Brazilian, forward players.

Yet everyone seems to have been written off Bellingham, who gets played out of position out of necessity and basically drags an injury-ravaged Real Madrid to win La Liga in spectacular fashion, while making some notable contributions for England.

The Bellingham as a ‘moments’ player school of thought seems to have taken off during the euros (whoscored actually rated him higher than Rodri in that comp), but let’s not forget that a visibly knackered Bellingham scored two huge goals in that competition and assisted in the final (one of four finals in the last year he assisted in) and only lost in competitive football to Atletico Madrid and Spain last season.

Maybe it’s time to revive the Belling D’Or campaign?

Quarantino, ITFC, Chairman of the Bored

Worcester Sauce…!

Hendersons Relish.👏👏👏

Well played.

I hadnt even heard of it a few years ago.. but my now wife’s father is half Danish, half Sheffield…

Al – LFC.. back to normal with Arne. Well played all round.

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