What did anyone really expect from two midtable teams that can’t buy a goal? Liverpool and Chelsea played to stale, boring 0-0 draw as both sides are really struggling to consistently put the ball in the back of the net.
The mighty really have fallen far this season.
Only a year ago, Liverpool was battling it out for a chance at the Quadruple and Chelsea was in the process of easily cementing its place in the Top-4 and was in the midst of FA Cup and Carabao Cup Final runs. Look at these two teams now.
I hope young strikers coming up the ranks tuned this game out as it was a masterclass in how NOT to shoot. Out of the combined 26 shots between Chelsea and Liverpool, only 5 made it on target with Liverpool accounting for 3 and Chelsea the other 2. And, to be honest, I’m surprised they even got that many on Kepa and Alisson’s, respective, nets as the number of wayward shots was ridiculous.
Cody Gakpo had at least 3 decent chances he sent skying into the top rows of Anfield, Hakim Ziyech was a master of getting his shots blocked, Mohamed Salah is better at whiffing his shots than getting them on target these days, Darwin Nunez still can’t hit the broadside of a barn, and Kai Havertz can only score offside goals.
In fact, the only highlight of the game was Havertz’s offside goal in the 3rd minute, which shows how boring this game ended up being.
So, in other words, both Liverpool and Chelsea are in desperate need of a clinical striker in the January market if they have any hope of making the Top-4.
It’s no secret that Liverpool and Chelsea have been the two most disappointing “traditional Big-6” clubs this year as Liverpool currently sits in 8th place and is already out of the Carabao Cup, while Chelsea sits in 10th place and has already sacked a manager.
Plus, these two have whiffed badly in the transfer window as Liverpool’s €75m fee for Darwin Nunez looks like an extreme overpay, and Chelsea have spent over €350M on players but still find themselves just breaching into the top half of the table.
It’s clearly been a terrible season for both clubs as they are undergoing painful transitions. Liverpool’s is a changing of the guard as the Premier League and Champions League winning side is showing its age in the Jurgen Klopp pressing system, while Chelsea is learning a new style of play under new manager Graham Potter and owner Todd Boehly.
However, a light for Chelsea is how great €100M+ signing Mykhailo Mudryk looked.
Despite being a second half sub, he was easily the Man of the Match as he brought a spark that the Chelsea attack has not had since the Champions League win over Manchester City in 2021. The way he was able to skip past very good (if not a little old) Liverpool defenders like they weren’t even there was extremely impressive, which should excite the Chelsea fans beyond belief.
To have such a fantastic debut in his first introduction to English football against one of the best teams in England proves that Boehly was right to hijack the deal between Shakhtar Donetsk and Arsenal, while it might also prove to be the move that changes the fortune of Boehly regime.
I guess only time will tell as right now, Chelsea (10th-29 PTS) and Liverpool (8th-29 PTS) are looking at a long season that will inevitably end their run in the Champions League.
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