Liverpool vs. Basel: Reds Lessons Learned from Champions League Game
Liverpool’s first return to the Champions League in five years has seen them fall at the first possible hurdle, as the Reds exited the competition following a 1-1 draw with Basel at Anfield.
Fabian Frei’s first-half strike proved crucial for the Swiss side as they earned the point they needed to progress. However, a controversial red card for Lazar Markovic was equally as important, as the Serbian substitute was sent off on the hour mark.
To Liverpool’s credit, they rallied and grabbed an equaliser through a trademark Steven Gerrard free-kick, but despite late domination the Reds couldn’t grab a winner.
Here’s some reaction from a disappointing Anfield night.
Last Season’s Liverpool Has Never Seemed Further Away
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The reason that Liverpool were in this position in the first place was of course due to the efforts of last season’s side, one full of pace, vigour and attacking venom that seemed to want to attack from the moment they saw opponents.
Contrast that with Tuesday's first half, as a ponderous Reds side took far too long to play it out from the back and simply invited a spiky but limited Basel team to press them, and you see that if 2013/14 was chalk then 2014/15 is cheese.
You can talk about individuals who have either left or who aren’t available, but nine of Tuesday's starting XI were at the club last season. They haven’t changed, but the way their manager sets them up has.
The Reds Got What They Deserved
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Ultimately though, this exit hasn’t come about because of one result on one wet Anfield night.
Games with Basel (away) and Real Madrid (at home) in which Liverpool seemed determined to roll the red carpet out for their opponents also played their part and left them with much to do on an evening when pressure was heaped on a team performing below par.
It is somewhat masochistic to keep harping back to last season’s side, but they would have qualified from a group in which all they had to do was be better than Basel and Ludogorets.
This current squad didn’t deserve to.
Brendan Rodgers Needs to Learn from This Experience
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There is a growing sense that—and again, sorry to go back to last season—the Liverpool of the second half of 2013/14 was one operating against the ideals of their manager. They didn’t monopolise possession, instead choosing to hit and hurt with pacey attacks.
In the current campaign—and largely because of who isn’t available—Liverpool have looked a lot more like Brendan Rodgers’ team from 2012/13: one that is happy to keep the ball simply as a means of not letting the other team have it.
It has made for an uneasy transition, and the hope has to be that Rodgers will now use this failure during his first Champions League season as an example of just what not to do.
If he is to have a long career at Anfield—and that is beginning to look doubtful—then he needs to learn from this campaign and not remain stubborn in the face of it.
Markovic’s Send-off Was Wrong, but It Woke Liverpool Up
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The send-off of Lazar Markovic was somewhat laughable, as the Serbian simply threw an arm out to maintain balance and ended up lightly brushing the nose of Behrang Safari.
It looked like it would be a fitting epitaph for Liverpool’s Champions League season, but it actually woke the Reds up and ensured that they would finish the match with the type of madcap crescendo we’ve become used to seeing from them in Europe.
That it needed this sense of injustice is a somewhat-damning indictment on what went before, though.
Steven Gerrard Will Get Fed Up of This Soon
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Playing as the emergency striker following Markovic’s red card, Steven Gerrard typically galloped around the pitch trying to cajole and inspire his teammates before hitting the simply wonderful free-kick that ignited Anfield.
In the end, though, it was a strike that had echoes of the two free-kicks Luis Suarez scored against Zenit St Petersburg in the 2012/13 Europa League, when Liverpool were 3-0 down on aggregate and needed to score four but only managed three.
That was Suarez, though—a player at the peak of his powers.
That Gerrard is still being asked to do this at 34 is a sad example of the players Liverpool have put around him, and he’ll get a bit sick of it one day.
The Liverpool captain was quoted by David Maddock of the Daily Mirror as saying, "I don’t think we deserved better. We have not gone out because of this performance, we weren’t good enough away to Basel and we let in a silly goal away to Ludogorets. You qualify over six games and we have not been good enough."
The Europa League Might Be This Team’s Level
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If the comparisons with Rodgers’ 2012/13 Liverpool are true, then this team’s level is the Europa League, into which they have now dropped.
In straight knockout combat the matches might prove to be a decent opportunity for Liverpool to win a trophy, although the focus will of course be an attempt to claw themselves back toward the top four in the Premier League.
And then they can do this all over again.
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