You rest your best against anybody but Everton

Here we are again, at the point where there is genuinely something to lose. When “at least they didn’t get beat” doesn’t cut it any more. Not against ‘them’ anyway…

Getting into the Champions League knockout was however easier than a tediously morose glum-bucket like me expected.

Maybe Spartak (and Maribor) weren’t the best sides but any large Liverpool win automatically becomes about worthless opposition.

All a bit paranoid perhaps, but you wonder how other teams rack up big scores and become admired for their ruthless efficiency. Maybe we need a few jammy wins for contrast?

It feels like it’s either feast or famine with us. The draw’s today so avoiding an in-form giant is essential. Remember when we came second in the group and fluked Leverkusen next round?

Season after that we topped the group, drew Benfica, felt equally blessed – and lost both games. Then we got the holders Barcelona the year after that, and beat them.

But that’s ancient history apparently, all 11 years of it ago. What’s important is we’re through.

At least we’ve filled in nicely for Arsenal before screwing up the knockout like they do.

Klopp went for it against Spartak, triggering more dreary Beatles clichés re the Fab Four. This usurping of Mersey memories wasn’t an attempt to wind up our neighbours, surely?

You wonder if Liverpool can get away with such a positive line-up when the going gets tougher, but knowing Klopp he’ll go to the other extreme.

Play Barcelona at their own game and make a cheeky winter bid for Suarez and Messi, ditch Henderson and Can. Who needs a midfield, anyway? Who needs a defence, for that matter? Klopp’s like one of those mad scientists in horror films. He’s already got the cackle.

I see he immediately shook hands with Spartak’s boss after Chris Hughton’s hissy fit last week. I know you all claim him as Irish but it typified the Brexiteerian reaction to foreign coaches with their fancy ways, their plethora of victories and their Big Six appointments. Spurious etiquette’s the only thing we get to teach them nowadays.

That brings us with serendipitous accuracy to Allardyce, Billy Brit himself; the cartoon mascot on a pork pie well past its sell-by date.

As a young chap in the 1970’s I heard more than I ever wanted to hear about Everton’s school of science, how winning matches and trophies was beneath them. That they couldn’t do either anyway was merely a coincidence.

Any port in a storm I suppose, they were in choppy waters. Like Joe Royle’s bruisers in the mid-90’s; as needs must.

Allardyce is so Brexit he couldn’t resist taunting the foreign coach Everton actually wanted even after they’d reluctantly given him the job. With them waiting so long for any derby win, never mind at Anfield, every game plays havoc with the nerves. You become even less cocky as the run lengthens. Every dog of war must have its day, logic dictates.

Klopp got light-headed after Brighton, thinking he could pick any old 11 and emerge smelling of lavender. You rest your best against anybody but Everton. It doesn’t matter how wretched they are (that might be the worst I’ve seen and I’m not exactly spoilt for choice). You treat it like the most important fixture. Always.

Maybe it wasn’t a pen but Lovren’s an emptyhead who never learns. The game wasn’t put to bed and those are the risks you take.

The jubilant away end told its tale, one that’s decades long. It’s funny. They’ll claim anything as a moral victory – even an immoral draw.

What is galling is the caveman passing it off as a strategy, planned. Maybe Klopp thought this derby lark was a doddle and we didn’t need our best.

The unbeaten runs go on; against Everton at Anfield, against Everton full stop. It’s 10 games since anyone beat us but the mood’s still bleak.

That’s progress, I suppose.