Terrace Talk: Liverpool - If we click for 10 minutes, it’ll beat most teams

Since all the attention is focused on somebody else, Liverpool can just plough their own furrow.

We haven’t started this well since Barnes and Beardsley tore it up, and no-one’s giving us even the flimsiest chance of winning the league. Think about that.

Exasperating, right? Maybe, maybe not. After an international break which seemed even more interminable somehow, returning to the same old plotline was rather comforting.

We may not be the star of this movie but at least we’ve a key role. After numerous bit-part years, it’ll serve us well to be more than content with the fare on offer.

How Liverpool manage to carry on without ever mentioning City is going to be the major sophistry of the age, by the looks of things. So be it.

At least we’re putting Pep off his reading, and even managed to swipe their head physio. When they give out trophies for that, watch us go.

There were other feelgood straw clutching moments in the fortnight off. Lovren giving Ramos a good crack across the skull, although it felt like he was only avenging Karius (and we’ve all forgotten about him…haven’t we?) Then there was the usual vomit over Sadio Mane’s longer contract.

“This clearly means” — let me stop you there. It means very little. If you think it blocks any future move away, you haven’t been paying attention this century.

There was a story that if Barca want to snaffle anybody else, they’d have to pay €100m just to begin talks. Who negotiated that? Get them to Brexit talks, pronto.

As the wave of disgust with Abu Dhabi rises still higher, the C-word just get stronger. They’re the Palpatines of football.

After 30 minutes of gruelling struggle in Hertfordshire, the Reds were further disillusioned by relayed news of West Ham’s abject surrender. Not that anyone expected anything different.

For us there was only the usual post-break lethargy. The magical front three have been tampered with, sparking numerous grumbles about Salah playing central and Firmino dropping ever deeper. What’s good about this side though is that even if it just clicks for 10 minutes that will be enough to wipe the floor with most teams.

There were a few scares at the other end but another clean sheet. Numerous whinges about the penalty Watford should have had, but it looked a blatant dive to me.

There seems to be a growing media misconception that Liverpool are done for once VAR comes in, which is baffling. They can’t all be Evertonians, surely?

Once Salah made the breakthrough, there was only going to be one winner. That hasn’t always been the case with this team, not even when they were three goals ahead.

The only blemish was Henderson’s early exit for two yellow cards. I like him, always have, but must confess part of that is down to how much he exasperates others. It was a curiously tetchy incident, so unlike him, but there’s a sense (like with Lallana) that a team is moving on beyond them.

We got a third goal without him anyway, so of course, the C-word had to immediately go and get a fourth in East London, just because they can.

It might well be hard to focus on what’s good about Liverpool right now, due to the perception of it not being enough.

In a month that saw Joe Cole retire, from what I’m not entirely certain, best to ponder on how things once were and how far we’ve come.

It’s not Klopp’s fault, nor these players’ fault, that Liverpool haven’t won the title for three decades. For them to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous (mis)fortune which have accumulated in that time would be, well, outrageous.