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Neil Atkinson’s post-match review for The Anfield Wrap after West Ham United 2 Liverpool 2 in the 2023-2024 Premier League season…
 
THEY play well.
It is the infuriating factor. They never ever play brilliantly, but brilliantly can’t be the bar. If a 90-minute game has 18 five-minute periods, Liverpool are the better side by some distance for any given 12 of them. Four are shared and two are lost.
The lost two result in West Ham United goals and, more than anything, it is this which needs to be addressed. It’s OK for Liverpool to be second best for a bit, but it isn’t alright for that period to be an amateurish mess. It is this which marks both these periods out which do us in. Had Liverpool got to half time 0-0, had the same half time, then they find themselves 0-2 and West Ham have packed in.
Had Liverpool just dealt with basic situations, up to and including just giving a free kick away, at 1-2 then they see it out.
Instead, we end up chasing one more game after conceding first. We end up needing a goal with 10 to go yet again and playing well chasing it, but time ticking down. We end up with images of Klopp having murder with Salah. We end up with what could have been.
The key point is this – you just can’t keep conceding first. You just can’t. Today is sort of justifiable precisely because they play well, because i...