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Liverpool visited London to play against Crystal Palace this week at Selhurst Park. The league leaders went into the match as favourites after beating defending champions Manchester City in match week 12 . Liverpool won the game 2-1, in the end, Sadio Mane and Roberto Firmino scored the goals for Liverpool, with the latter scoring the winning goal.
The first half largely belonged to the hosts. They were pressing the visitors smartly. Liverpool had Patches of good play in the first half similar to the game against Manchester United. Mohammad Salah was absentee from the starting eleven for Liverpool. He was replaced by Alex-Oxlade Chamberlain.
Liverpool started better in the second half. The passing was quicker and the away side finally opened the scoring in the 49th minute. Sadio Mane scored the goal after carefully controlling a cross from Andrew Robertson. The home side equalized though, thanks to a lovely goal from Wilfried Zaha. And quite typically, the Reds scored the winner later on through Roberto Firmino.
Here, we take a look at the talking points from the game:
#3 Typical off day win for Liverpool
It was another one of those performances from the Reds where they were not brilliant throughout the game, but still found a way to win the match. Before the match, it was expected that Liverpool would have most of the ball while Palace will sit back. On the contrary, Liverpool had to earn the right to have the ball with constant pressure from Palace.
A number of players were probably not fully invested in the game. Trent Alexander-Arnold made many of passing errors in the first half and gave the ball away. Crystal Palace also scored in the first half from a free-kick awarded due to a foul by Alexander-Arnold. The goal was later disallowed after VAR intervened and spotted a foul on Dejan Lovren just before the goal was scored. Liverpool should consider themselves fortunate that they did not concede in the first half.
Although Liverpool scored the breakthrough goal in the second half, they were not as clinical and ruthless as they would've probably wanted. But again, finding a way to win is the most important trait that champions should have and Liverpool have that.
#2 Crystal Palace weren't clinical enough
Crystal Palace had a fair amount of chances which if they had taken, they would've been the winners of the game. Palace were winners of almost all of the second ball situations in the match. Long shots, close finishing chances and set-piece opportunities weren't enough for this Palace side.
They executed their plans pretty well though; Zaha was exciting from the left-wing taking on almost 2-3 Liverpool defenders at one time. He gave both Dejan Lovren and Trent Alexander-Arnold a hard time and he scored a deserved goal on the day, although he should have had two.
Towards the very end of the game, Zaha found himself in a lot of space down that left-hand side but he scuffed his effort. To be honest, the Eagles should have got something from this game, at least a point. But it is what it is at the end of the day and Roy Hodgson should be proud of his team.
#1 A great start to a tough December ahead for the Reds
Liverpool have a very tough run of 12 matches in the festive period. January is the time where Jurgen Klopp's Liverpool lost the title last season. They drew too many matches and lost their only game to Manchester City at the Etihad. It will again be a matter of concern for Liverpool this January.
They have the Club World Cup lined up in Qatar along with Champions League, Premier League and League cup in December 2019. A successful festive period is key to Liverpool's title bid.
A tough win against Crystal Palace was important for the Reds. They need to find the right balance in the starting eleven. Using fringe players like Shaqiri, Gomez and Lallana throughout the remaining period of the season is key to the squad's healthiness and competitiveness if they are to compete on all fronts including the Champions League, FA Cup, Premier League and League Cup.
