Chris Hatterhall looks at what we learned as Liverpool were knocked out of the Champions League.

Mikel Arteta believes Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang does not need to win titles with the Gunners to be considered a world-class striker.

I’ll bite the bullet and boldly predict it’s inevitable; we are going to be playing in next season’s Champions League — and that’s as much as you’re going to get.

A pointless cup tie turned into a pointless replay, all of our own making. If the manager wasn’t peeling paint off the walls after that he never will, yet it summed up perfectly the entire club’s attitude to domestic knockout.

Get your thinking cap on. Can you remember a more negative build-up to any United game in your life? I can’t. Try as I might, I couldn’t find anyone sensible who thought the result would be anything other than a defeat. Pressed for a further opinion, most of the lads I know offered various estimates of the size of the new bodily aperture we would be acquiring — “be it torn, punched, or drilled,” helpfully expanded a colleague.

Good things come to those who wait.

A year to the day since Liverpool last tasted defeat, in a reverse to Manchester City that effectively cost them the league title, Mohamed Salah helped ensure his team remained firmly on course to put that matter right in 2020.

Yes, there was a degree of bitterness over the decisions and, obviously, these were the same petty snarks who’d revelled in our discomfort at the end of last season (so why sympathise?) But they’re right aren’t they?

These are the standout quotes from the world of punditry in 2019...

Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool juggernaut is rolling inexorably towards footballing immortality.

It was all over social media; hashtag LiVARpool. You’ve got to laugh, really. It was a push, wasn’t it? My eyesight isn’t giving way just yet, surely.

Leafing through the Bumper Book of City Swear Words, it is sometimes easy to forget how those well-thumbed pages, with their dubious-looking smudges and deeply ingrained tearstains, got so grubby. It is a body of work that has, on the whole, not been needed much of late, as City have cantered through season after season of gentle trophy gathering.

Sadio Mane rescued Liverpool as the Reds’ late show at Aston Villa maintained their title charge.

Liverpool finally laid one of the Champions League’s more bizarre statistical shortcomings to rest, but it was the performance of Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain that will have most pleased manager Jurgen Klopp.

Forget the long winning run. We will now bore you endlessly about the long unbeaten run.

To paraphrase Brando, “Stick with us baby, we’re the fellas you came in with”.

Daniel Storey Liverpool walk on, but Salah form will cause Klopp some concern

We must be doing something right. The word ‘luck’ seems to find a new lease of life every week, where Liverpool is concerned anyway.

Liverpool began the defence of their Champions League crown on a losing note as Dries Mertens’ penalty and Fernando Llorente’s injury-time strike handed Napoli a 2-0 victory.

Until 2019, I’d never seen Liverpool win a European tie after losing the first leg 3-0. That it was against Barcelona, and the world’s greatest ever player, only embellishes the miracle.

Perfect? Not really. In terms of points, perhaps, yet grumbling seems futile and ungracious when you bear witness to what this team is capable of.

Upbeat Emery sees some signs of hope amid the destruction at Anfield

Jurgen Klopp spent the summer preaching the need to jump out of the blocks with the reflexes of an Olympic sprinter when the new Premier League season kicked off against newly-promoted Norwich at Anfield.

In an unprecedented development, it has been widely accepted the Premier League has returned at roughly the correct time.

Last season’s top two look set to dominate but there’ll be plenty of thrills and spills along the way. There’ll also be plenty of betting opportunities and these five wagers should help keep punters engaged throughout the season.

Meh. As European Cup triumphs go, I’ve seen better… OK, I’ll stop being an unbearable gobshite. For now.

So there was not to be one last comeback, another dramatic late goal to keep Tottenham in the cup, which did not have their name written on it after all.

Liverpool's final performance never hit the heights of earlier in the competition, but few Reds fans will care after an early Mo Salah penalty and late Divock Origi strike saw Tottenham beaten 2-0 in Saturday evening’s far from classico Champions League final at the Wanda Metropolitano stadium in Madrid.

With a front three featuring Sane, Salah and Firmino, it sounds ludicrous to suggest Liverpool’s most potent attacking threat will come from the full-backs

Sadio Mane, arguably one of Europe’s most feared strike threats, heads to Madrid on Saturday with Liverpool supporters hoping his next return to the Spanish capital is not of a more permanent variety.

Here’s a quote from Monday’s Irish Examiner: “There’s a mental scrapbook of past experiences that may half-convince some to fantasise, but realism will strike tomorrow whether you want it to or not.”

A modest proposal: Uefa should now do the decent thing and cancel this year’s Champions League final.

Liverpool are through to the Champions League final after beating Barcelona 4-0 in the semi-final second leg at Anfield to win 4-3 on aggregate.

We’re almost there, although we still don’t know where “there” is yet. It’s been whittled down to heaven or hell, with nothing in between.

Roberto Firmino’s absence from Liverpool’s starting line-up forced an alteration to the Premier League side’s usual shape.

Easter Sunday, upstairs in Cashman’s Bar, Academy Street, Cork. Liverpool are one up against Cardiff and on their way back to the top of the Premier League.

It’s bad enough going through this with Liverpool, now we do it for someone else’s games. I can’t take this much longer. Thankfully I don’t have to.

Liverpool's Mohamed Salah has been named as one of TIME magazines 100 most influential people.

There has been plenty of talk of Liverpool ‘bottling’ this title race, largely from those who wish ill upon them. But we can put that to one side for now. Facing Chelsea at Anfield, five years after Steven Gerrard’s fateful slip and on the eve of the 30th anniversary of Hillsborough, created a pressure that would make many teams crumble. But not them.

It was Ian Dury who sang “the hope that springs eternal springs right up your behind”.

We’re going to need a catchphrase. How about “We go again”? Okay, okay — no need to bite my head off.

All the main parties in Israel’s election are playing a game of hawkish one-upmanship that spells trouble for any hope for a peace in the divided country says Daoud Kuttab.

Don’t ask how I’m feeling. You’re reading this, so I’m alive anyway. Weekly updates forthcoming.

The 24th change in top place in the Premier League did not come without the predictable healthy dose of nerve-shredding drama as Mohamed Salah’s 90th minute header forced Toby Alderweireld to turn the ball into his own goal, gifting Liverpool a sorely-needed victory.