How did the slips help Real beat Liverpool

With a game of the world's top strategists, sometimes football is decided by silly situations, the article in The Athletic (UK) emphasized.

Liverpool and Real may have top-notch coaching staff and qualified data scientists, hunting talent around the world. But a game, a season or even a dynasty can be just the result of a certain player falling in an embarrassing way.

Tactical analysts will be able to dissect the game and tell a thrilling story about every detail. They can draw a diagram of how Liverpool dominated the right with triangles of players, or Real Madrid responded by pulling Karim Benzema to the left to create space for Vinicius Junior to dribble through the home defence. . They can create a short clip of how the two teams put pressure on their opponents, blocking each of their passing options, or whatever.

Those details on tactics are all reasonable, but will not describe the game completely. The key point of this great war is the slip and fall of many players.

In the 90th second, Cody Gakpo put pressure on Eduardo Camavinga to lose the ball at the edge of the penalty area. The Dutch striker could stretch to clear Salah's deck, but slipped before he could pass the ball, as if someone had slipped.

In the 14th minute, the audience witnessed a series of falls from Jordan Henderson, to Camavinga and Thibaut Courtois, in just about 10 seconds. As a result, the goal raised the score to 2-0 for Liverpool, which coach Jurgen Klopp called a "comedy". Why did he say that?

In the 20th minute, Liverpool's 4-1-4-1 diagram was penetrated, when midfielder Stefan Bajcetic slipped and fell. Fabinho had to move to cover for his teammates, so that Camavinga had a big space to pass to Vinicius. The Brazilian striker then dribbled and then shot dangerously into the far corner, making the audience forget the invisible impact that caused Bajcetic to fall.

Bajcetic's slip may not be the direct cause of Liverpool conceding. But Vinicius could not have scored without that confusing situation.

A few minutes later, Real almost suffered a disaster when midfielder Eder Militao slipped right in the penalty area from the goalkeeper's pass. Darwin Nunez just needed to be a beat faster to capitalize on his opponent's mistakes.

Right after that, Vinicius also fell on his back to the field as he leaned over and tried to cut his heart with the inside of his right foot.

The pitch looks harder and the grass is a bit drier after halftime, or it looks like the players have changed their shoes as well. Therefore, the situations of falling, crying and laughing are also sparse. But at the goal of Real Madrid's 5-2 victory, goalkeeper Alisson rushed out and did not know which direction to turn to block Benzema, then he fell in vain. That ball summed up the image of Liverpool in the whole game.

Gravity seems to be a little stronger at Anfield, where the specter of Steven Gerrard's fall still lurks. Pep Guardiola drew attention when he mentioned Gerrard's decisive slip in the match against Chelsea, which gave Man City the title in 2014. He also mentioned a fall by Mario Balotelli, bringing good luck to the team. Man City. Slippers are normal, and unavoidable.

However modern football can be dictated by the smallest details. A team can look to exploit that detail to their advantage. Even the Anfield pitch is also an expensive and complex hybrid grass, to match the way the team plays.

"The Anfield pitch is finely tuned to accommodate the players," a pitch expert told Athletic. "They check the grass regularly, and everything is data-driven."

This expert is not joking, when the grass also has a lot of data.

There are coaches who will never worry about such small details, like Carlo Ancelotti. "We got lucky," said coach Ancelotti. "We still get lucky all the time, so the key is to stay calm and find a way to get back into the game."

In his post-match press conference, Klopp tried to find excuses. "For the most part, the player didn't slip," he said. "I don't know exactly why some players slip. We'll find out."

The statistics do not clearly show which team plays better, as important parameters such as expected goals, shots, possession percentage or corners are all quite equal, except for the score.

Liverpool did not really lose badly, but the score showed. They still create positive things, like spontaneous moments from young players like Nunez, Gakpo or Bajcetic.

The season is not over for Klopp's teachers and students, when the bookies still offer a rate of about 40% for the possibility of them finishing in the Top 4. But in the Champions League, their chances are gone.

In that arena, year after year, Real stood firm when the opponents alternately slipped and fell.