Jan Molby: Winning Ugly Is Still Winning, and Liverpool Are Doing Just Fine
The Burnley narrative was wrong, and the system will take time, but we are top for a reason.
Burnley were never unlucky
Let me start by saying this clearly. Burnley were not unlucky. That’s not my opinion. That’s what the numbers tell you: 27 shots to 3 with 81% possession and 13 corners to 1. That’s not unlucky. That’s a team hanging on.
So when I heard people from Sky Sports and other outlets pushing this “plucky Burnley” narrative, I couldn’t get my head around it. Jamie Carragher said it, Micah Richards joined in, and then the story just ran from there. But I watched that game closely, and I watched the stats again. Liverpool dominated. Completely.
Burnley did what they had to do. I respect that. They came to defend. They sat deep. And they made it difficult. But don’t tell me they were robbed. If anything, they were lucky to hold on as long as they did.
I wasn’t at the game. I was at the Etihad for the Manchester derby. I remember walking through the concourse, seeing the penalty go in on the screen, and even the City fans reacted. It tells you everything about what that result meant. Not just to us, but to them. You could hear the grumbling. "Typical Scousers", they said. I heard it. But it made me laugh. Because it was probably the only thing we weren’t that day, lucky.
Fans stay emotional, players don’t
Here’s something supporters sometimes forget. The game is over when the whistle blows. For fans, the emotion lingers. They talk about it for days. They dissect it. But for players, it ends on the bus home.
That’s not a lack of passion. That’s how you move on. If you get stuck in feelings and headlines, you lose focus. And I can promise you, none of the lads will be losing sleep over a narrow win at Burnley. What they’ll be thinking about is twelve points from four games. That’s it.
Now, was the performance perfect? No. Did we struggle at times? Yes. But we still won. We kept another clean sheet. And when you are not playing well and still winning, that’s a strength, not a weakness.
Supporters want every win to look like 1988. It’s not realistic. Sometimes you just get through it. One goal. Job done.
Attack still finding rhythm
There’s no point hiding it. Our front line has not clicked yet. That’s obvious. Mo Salah looks a little isolated. Florian Wirtz is struggling to find pockets of space where he can do damage. Gakpo looks limited in games like that. You can see defenders know what he is going to do, drop the shoulder, cut inside. It is predictable at times.