Picking up a title challenge that ran out of steam over the winter to secure a spot in the top four and a lucrative place in next season’s Champions League, Liverpool ended the season with a familiar feeling — satisfied, but still feeling short-changed at the prospect of what could have been.
Claiming 76-points to finish in fourth place, the Reds bettered their 8th place finish from the season before, but kept their nagging habit of shifting from one polar opposite to another on a match by match basis. Dazzling at one end en-route to bagging an impressive 78-goals while simultaneously throwing it all away at other by giving up a disappointing 42, it was another strange season for Jurgen Klopp’s side.
Going in to what’s sure to be a busy summer, some of the crew here at Paisley Gates gave their thoughts on the season and their hopes for what’s to come from the men in red — first up, feature writer Steve Carson takes us through his Player of the Season picks and talk trophies.
A lot of people seem to like to narrow it down to single players as their best [enter noun] of the season so here’s mine…
Player of the season: Philippe Coutinho
Our little magician has been nothing short of world class this season and he’s been at the centre of almost everything we’ve done. Sadio Mane probably would be my POTS but being away for AFCON and ending the season with an injury didn’t help.
Youth player of the season: Trent Alexander-Arnold
Trent has shown Jurgen Klopp that, next season, he’ll be a reliable option for rotation and it’s likely you’d see Nathaniel Clyne against Chelsea in the mid-week fixture and Trent in the League Cup at the weekend and you’d not notice a dip in quality.
Most improved player of the season: Adam Lallana
Nobody could have foreseen how much Lallana would improve this season, he was alright last year but now he’s created a problem for Klopp. We’ve got too many good attacking midfielders but what a brilliant problem to have.
Best signing of the season: Sadio Mane
I wasn’t expecting much from Mane, I knew he had ability – I’d seen him play against Liverpool before – but he’s scored 13 goals and registered five assists and is now one of our most important players. I also have to mention Gini Wijnaldum too, he’s been magical.
Goal of the season: Jordan Henderson vs. Chelsea
It very well could have been Emre Can’s goal against Watford – yes, but, besides Gini’s goal against Middlesbrough, I’ve not leapt out of my seat so quickly this season… Maybe for Mane’s goal against Everton but that was just a tap in.
Let’s re-live it… Do pardon the overzealous music.
One thing was missing from our season and that was a trophy – Liverpool fans have been teased since 2012 with a plethora of trophies; we’ve had real chances to win the Premier League, FA Cup, League Cup and Europa League but nothing in the last five years.
Can't even blame United fans for boasting if they win, I'd have loved Liverpool to lift the Europa League last season.
— Steven Carson ? (@redrivoluzione) May 24, 2017
We didn’t win the Europa League last season and, because of that, we didn’t have European football this season – this season however, we’ve played some great football…
Ignore January and February. Please.
It’s because of that great football we’re going into a Champions League qualifier.
A lot of fans would want to swap our season with Manchester United’s but I’d not go that far. This season, we have dominated the ‘top six’ in the Premier League; we had a decent run in both domestic cups and finished inside the top four.
We may not have a trophy yet but Jurgen Klopp is building a bastion of a team and I’d back him, one he’s splashed a bit of cash this summer, to deliver Liverpool fans the trophies they crave.
Next season we will finally see Klopp’s Reds. He’s had long enough now – the players on the field next season will, 100%, be his players and I can’t wait to see how we do.
Be sure to follow Steve on Twitter at @redrivoluzione
And, to close things off with some whinging, long-time staff writer Steven McMillan revisits the trip to the Emirates Stadium on the opening day as a frame for the entire campaign.
The old cliché is that football is game of two halves and if that stands up to scrutiny then on a larger scale, Liverpool’s season will do the same. Dominant right through to Christmas only to falter following the turn of the year, the Reds somehow managed to look like very much the finished article and a team going through a massive transition all at the same time — a paradox in equal parts frustrating as entertaining.
If you want to boil it down, we saw everything we needed to see in the very first match; sublime skill from a front-three of Philippe Coutinho, Roberto Firmino and Sadio Mane, comical defending across the entire back-line and the lukewarm goalkeeping of Simon Mignolet all coalesced as Jurgen Klopp’s side ran out 4-3 winners over Arsenal on the opening day of the season.
I might be hyperbole to say we took that same match at stretched it out over our next 37-games, but I’ll say it regardless. Our unbeaten record against the teams that finished in the top-six — including a convincing win over eventual champions Chelsea at Stamford Bridge and a easy does it victory over runners-up Tottenham Hotpsur at home — juxtaposed just nicely with our abysmal record against those propping up the bottom half as a draw with relegated Sunderland and a loss to Swansea City stunted any chances of a real title challenge.
It was Mignolet saving a penalty, only to have him concede to the same player minutes later. It was Coutinho’s spectacular free-kick setting in motion the three that would follow, only to have silly errors give the Gunners a chance to bring it all crashing down. It was a spot in the Champions League, but with a caveat of a potentially tricky qualifier before getting our name in the hat. It was everything and more than I would have taken had you offered it to me after that win at the Emirates, but still well short of what our early season form hinted at.
Was it still a successful campaign? Absolutely. A springboard for better things to come? Almost certainly. Proof that we’ve got what it takes to go the distance? If injuries and international commitments hadn’t upset the flow, you this could have been a moot point, but seeing a the match day squad packed with teenagers at the end of the season only highlighted just how shallow things got when you looked to the bench. When you’re playing for top spot, all the pieces matter; it’s obvious now we’re lacking a few.
If nothing else, qualifying for the Champions League will give us a fighting shot at plugging those gaps and making sure we don’t have to have this same conversation next May. And, hopefully, we’ll have something shiny and silver to parade around.
Steven’s not very sociable, but you can find him talking nonsense on Twitter now and again over at @SometimesSteven
