Out they come. Bournemouth payers are hugging and stuff; in the studio, Graeme Souness is doubtless stroking his thighs as though Gennaro Gattuso has just offered out Joe Jordan.
The players are tunnelled; Jordan Henderson is modelling his gameface.
So how do you defend Salah? On the ball, by forcing him outside, but what do you do once he’s on the move? Have his full-back follow him? Detail a midfielder to be on the look out? A centre-back? What we’re seeing with him is why Cristiano Ronaldo was so prolific once he moved to the left wing; the game isn’t really set up to stop players who move from out to in like they do.
Apparently Mohamed Salah likes to score goals and run into the middle. More news as I get it.
Liverpool, meanwhile, have Sadio Mane on the bench, so will start Philippe Coutinho from the left. That’s not his best position – I wonder if, in the end, he’ll be a number 8 not a number 10, or maybe even a number 8.42 – and also if Liverpool will miss Alberto Moreno outside him, who’s better going forward than Andy Robertson.
I imagine that Eddie Howe decided thay the sharpness of Jermain Defoe would have greater effect against Liverpool’s defence than Manchester United’s. Though Defoe came very close to an equaliser in midweek, one brilliant first touch setting him for a snap-shot foiled only by the uncanny brilliance of David de Gea. Hell be fancying himself to skip in and out of Lovren and Klavan, I shouldn’t wonder.
Anyway, back to the less crucial news of which players we’ll be watching this afternoon,Bournemouth make five changes and Liverpool four, respectively:
For Bournemouth, out go Fraser, Arter, Gosling, Stanislas and Wilson, left out altogther; in come Pugh, Cook, Surman, Ibe and Defoe.
And for Liverpool, Karius, Alexander-Arnold nd Mane are left out, while Can is suspended – Mignolet, Gomez, Henderson and Oxlade-Chamberlain replace them.
“So Adam, how did you spend your time off?”
“Well I thought about learning a language, but in the end decided to focus on growing my hair.”
I wandered lonely as an: Andre Marriner (Sheldon, West Midlands)
Adam Lallana is in an awkward hair phase of his own, and on the bench today. Photograph: Hunt/ProSports/Rex/Shutterstock
We’ve all tried growing our hair and faced the horror of awkward in-between stage; roughly, it comes just after the awkward short stage and just before the awkward long stage. Who can know if where we were isn’t as good as we’re getting, and if we can even get to where we think we’re going?
Bournemouth and Liverpool are there. Bournemouth are more or less established in the Premier League now, or at least, they’ve stayed up twice with no serious alarms, and really ought to again. So the question is what they do next: do they accept the short back and sides as their lot, or do they embrace the stupidity of a lush, attention-seeking mane?
Liverpool, meanwhile, are experiencing a version of the same at the other end of the table. Twice in the last ten years they’ve made it nearly all the way, only to attack themselves with a set of garden shears at the very last moment. This time, they’ve assiduously cultivated a hair metal thatch, only to run out of finasteride just as the richer cats around them are bussing their wads on transplants.
This game last season was a belter, two bald men fighting over a can of Brasso or somesuch, and we should get something decent this afternoon. Bournemouth were excellent at Old Trafford in midweek, while Liverpool are too good not to improve on their effort against West Brom. Neither side will sit back, both sides could use a win, and whatever happens and depending on our bent, we get to appreciate their ambition or snigger at their naïveté.
AFC Bournemouth 🍒
