Liverpool was playing against nine men for the final few minutes of its win over Tottenham, but Arne Slot's team didn't really make it look like that — which needs to be improved
If you wanted to be kind to Liverpool, you could say that Arne Slot’s side might have dropped points in these circumstances earlier in the campaign. That they didn't was clearly a positive.
In reality, though, while the Reds did hold on against Tottenham after Richarlison's goal cut the deficit in half, they gave themselves an unnecessary scare. Liverpool was playing against nine men by the end, but you would never have known.
There was a sense of panic and uncertainty among the Liverpool ranks. Alisson Becker seemed to want to hold onto the ball at one stage — a sensible choice — but was tempted into an attempted counter.
When it broke down far too easily because Florian Wirtz didn’t win an aerial challenge, it could have been costly.
Richarlison had netted with 16 minutes to play, including stoppage time, and Liverpool clung on, but the buzzword of last season for Slot was ‘calm’. Here, his team was anything but.
Not everything went its way. Liverpool needed to respond to setbacks and just about did.
Alexander Isak’s injury could prove to be a nightmare if he is absent for any sustained period of time. In a parallel universe where he wasn’t clattered into, that could have been the ignition he needed in his Liverpool career.
Dominik Szoboszlai must serve a suspension for his fifth booking of the campaign, while the Conor Bradley injury — the latest in a series of issues for him — is another blow.
"The thing in football is you always remember the last few minutes and they were the worst minutes of our total game," Slot told Sky Sports at the final whistle.
"If I can calm down a little bit and erase that from my memory I think there is a lot to like in our performance. I've stood here many, many times and liked the performance a lot and we were unable to get the three points.
"Now, for a large part, I liked the performance and we have the three points. [But then] we didn't keep the ball when we had the ball. We kicked it away, they got a few free-kicks, a few throw-ins, corners. It became very chaotic and hectic.
"Overall, we had good control over the game. Six games unbeaten, four wins and two draws. We are definitely not perfect yet but both of our number nines scored. Again, positives to take from the game.
"In the Premier League there is never a game that is boring. If the other team goes down to 10 then wingers are very important. Jeremie (Frimpong) is the one who created 2-0 with his actions."
Much of that is fair, but with a mixed performance (at best) and injury problems mounting, things are not all rosy again despite the result. It should have been an easy game to see out.
In some ways, there were more questions created than answers provided here. At least this time, Slot can ponder them having secured the three points.