ARNE SLOT knows there will be a few wobbles to come. Probably next month when Liverpool’s fixtures will finally start getting a bit tougher.
Yet Slot can only win what is put in front of him. Equally, while Liverpool’s fans were all dreading life after Jurgen Klopp, few of them would have expected their team to be top after six games.
Although the Dutchman’s team were not exactly convincing here in the West Midlands, Liverpool – with the exception of that odd result at home to Nottingham Forest – have still been decent this season.
In a scrappy battle littered with mistakes, Ibrahima Konate scored his first Premier League goal for Liverpool.
Less than 60 seconds after Rayan Ait-Nouri’s leveller was confirmed by VAR, Wolves gave away a penalty and Mo Salah struck what proved to be the winner.
Incredibly, Wolves have now failed to keep a clean sheet in their last 18 Premier League games with the last one coming in a 1-0 win at Sheffield United in February. Life certainly is not getting any easier for Gary O’Neil.
After just one win in ten at the end of last season, Wolves are stuck with just one point but their fixtures have included matches against Arsenal, Chelsea, Newcastle and Aston Villa.
They definitely need something against Brentford next weekend because after the international break, they play Manchester City and could be in danger of being completely marooned.
In contrast, Liverpool, who beat Milan 3-1 in the Champions League and crushed West Ham 5-1, definitely got a favour from the Premier League fixture computer.
Slot has faced just one side who finished in the top half of the table last term – Manchester United – while the other games were against newly-promoted Ipswich, Brentford, Nottingham Forest, Bournemouth and Wolves.
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So it will be better to judge Liverpool’s progress under the Dutchman at the end of October after they have played Arsenal and Chelsea.
But without a doubt, so far, so good.
Surprisingly, though, Liverpool looked lethargic at times and it was only at the end of the first half that they caused Wolves any problems.
Home keeper Sam Johnstone received an ovation from the home fans for keeping out a close-range strike from Dominik Szoboszlai.
It was a mixture of both a good save and a poor miss, yet in the second minute of stoppage time, Johnstone should have done better when he failed to keep out the header from Konate.
It was a powerful effort but it was helped into the net by Johnstone.
Wolves striker Jorgen Strand Larsen should have stopped Diogo Jota from delivering a cross which was then completely misjudged by Santiago Bueno with Konate then overpowering defender Toti.
Unbelievably, Wolves continued to make silly mistakes and Mario Lemina played a ludicrous, suicidal pass across his area straight to Salah.
With Johnstone out of his position, Salah failed to stick the ball into an empty net and shot wide.
Liverpool decided to copy Wolves with some shambolic defending of their own.
Strand Larsen capitalised on a huge mix-up between Alisson and Konate who left the ball for each other and Wolves sub Carlos Forbs’ attempt fell perfectly for Ait-Nouri to score from close range.
Alisson and Konate argued with each other while there was a VAR check for a Forbs handball.
Yet incredibly, Wolves failed to maintain their composure and they conceded the penalty when Nelson Semedo had his arms all around Jota.
Jota was looking for the penalty but Semedo was stupid to make the contact and Salah sent Johnstone the wrong way.
In what proved to be a topsy-turvy day for Konate, he delivered an absolutely terrific last-minute block to deny Forbs.
At the end, Wolves captain Lemina left the pitch in tears and quite clearly, things are not looking too clever for manager O’Neil, particularly as some of the locals are starting to turn.
But hopefully, the Wolves board will see sense and realise that O’Neil – whose squad had also been hit with a sickness bug – deserves time to sort this out.
But when did football clubs actually have any sense?
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