Liverpool title legit, others not so much

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/06/2020 (2254 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It will come with an asterisk.

Given the Premier League’s unprecedented pause as COVID-19 forced a comprehensive, multi-industry shutdown in mid-March, it was always going to. The final table of top-flight English football will be no different than those of Germany, Italy and Spain, and countless others in Europe, around the world and in almost every sport.

But not all asterisks are the same.

In France, the mark will indicate a season ended with a quarter of its matches still to play; in The Netherlands, it will denote a campaign abandoned and the championship unawarded. Across the major sports of North America, it won’t even be sufficient to imply the triviality of making it up as you go along. For them, a smaller font might be necessary to represent the absurdity of the achievement.

England, however, already has a champion, and a fair one at that. Deserving, even. Perhaps more deserving than any team that has ever been fielded in the Premier League era. For as far back as November, when the gap was eight points, Liverpool were already champions presumptive. By January, when they led by 16, title winners in all but mathematics.

It was an eventuality seven months in observance. Indeed, having commenced the schedule as overwhelming favourites after winning the Champions League in June 2019, there wasn’t a more reasonably expected outcome for more than a year.

And what a year. Exactly 390 days passed between the parading of the European Cup through the city’s streets and Chelsea’s 2-1 win over Manchester City that sealed the title for Liverpool. Seventy-nine of them were spent in quarantine before full training resumed, and a gap of 110 days separated a 2-1 win at home to Bournemouth and the 4-0 trouncing of Crystal Palace that produced an unmatchable number of points.

Naturally, this has been a schedule that is, and will forever be, linked to coronavirus. But it could also be record-breaking. With five wins from their final seven games, the Reds will go down as the most dominant outfit in Premier League history. Officially, that is. Because the eye test has already determined that this most comprehensive of romps outdoes those of City, Chelsea, Manchester United and Arsenal of previous years. If anything, the wait has only made the accomplishment that more exceptional.

It was quite the wait. Far more than the 322 days from the start of this most unusual of campaigns to the realization of its champions was the agonizing, tumultuous, disheartening period between titles— time more relatably measured in decades, in generations, than in days or even years. A Liverpool fan born any later than the mid-1980s won’t recollect the Ian Rush and John Barnes goals that clinched the old First Division in April 1990, nor would they recognize a league in which Aston Villa finished runners-up or that included Nottingham Forest, Norwich City and Derby County in the top five the season before.

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What they’ll never forget, however, is the Trent Alexander-Arnold free-kick that proved the winner against Palace and the Mohamed Salah, Fabinho and Sadio Mane tallies that ran up the score. They’ll tell their children and grandkids about Virgil van Dijk, the world’s finest defender, as well as the linking play of Roberto Firmino, the crosses of Andrew Robertson, the assurance of Alisson and a captain in Jordan Henderson who was never rightly rated off Merseyside but who kept the midfield tight, delivered when it mattered and led in word and deed.

They’ll recall their manager, Jurgen Klopp, under whose guidance they ascended from eighth in the table to fourth, to second to first, that bespectacled, smoking German who brought the fun back to Anfield, who restored a long-lost swagger, who delivered the most prestigious trophies in the sport.

Yes, this season and this triumph, their triumph, Liverpool’s triumph, will come with an asterisk. It will signify a campaign and a champion forever memorable, eminently special and never, ever in doubt.

jerradpeters@gmail.com

Twitter @JerradPeters