Luis Díaz’s Liverpool: in crisis, the stars no longer weigh in national teams, they are substitutes | premier league

Liverpool looks at the Premier League standings and looks eighth, not only 9 points behind Arsenal but 4 -which is a lot- of Manchester United, owner of the last place in European competitions. And what’s worse: Manchester City, which will attack the leadership any day now, has scored 23 goals, 8 more (eight!) than the ‘reds’.

And he is going to seek consolation in the Champions League but he does not see himself riding, as before, but three points from the top, with the burden of having debuted with a win (4-1) and without the usual offensive panic, since he only has 3 goals scored while Napoli already has 7. And it’s Napoli, with all due respect.

What does that say to Liverpool? That their figures have descended a step, lowered a change in their performance and that is not only being noticed in England and in Europe but, from now on in the national teams, where they are no longer indisputable and few have the illusion of playing the Qatar World Cup.

Eye to the list: Thiago Alcántara was sacrificed by Luis Enrique not because he was bad but because he was old; Ibrahima Konate is waiting for a miracle to count again in France and Fabinho played 27 total minutes with Brazil, Roberto Firmino not a single one in his return after injuries from Copa América (2021) and Arthur Melo was not even called up.

And if you look at the England team it gets better… or worse: Jordan Henderson is a change to close games with Southgate who prefers Declan Rice and Jude Bellingham; Harvey Elliot doesn’t count even though he’s still young; Joe Gomez hasn’t been called up since October 2020 and Trent Alexander-Arnold, the winger half the world would like to have beyond his current moment, is fourth option behind Reece James, Kieran Trippier and Kyle Walker. To top it off, Mohamed Salah and Luis Díaz, Liverpool’s starting attackers, did not qualify for the World Cup with their teams.

So Virgil van Dijk, Diogo Jota and Darwin Núñez, who scored for the Netherlands, Portugal and Uruguay in the recent international break, as well as Alisson Becker, goalkeeper for Brazil, will be the only World Cup players on a roster accustomed to being more of a protagonist.

Is it good or bad news?

In terms of price and image there is no better showcase than a World Cup and without a doubt that for those who see it on TV it will be a great disappointment.

But that bad news for them is an opportunity for Jürgen Klopp: he has 13 games in 6 weeks to help those who have little chance of reaching Qatar to raise their level and give their coaches a concern, a way that Liverpool It will allow us to get out of the crisis of results that it is dragging on.

But for the ‘losers’ who are left without the Cup, like Diaz, he has prepared a mid-season training camp in Dubai so as not to lose rhythm and distract them from grief. Win with heads and tails? He will think so, but the hearts of the excluded players are treacherous… therein lies the real challenge.