As is often the case, journalists filing their post-match copy in the Anfield press room on Tuesday evening did so to the soundtrack of Sky Sports News playing out on the enormous televisions adorning the walls.
And anyone who had a moment to listen during that typically frantic period will have heard a fairly scathing assessment of the thrilling win over Villarreal they had just witnessed in which the phrase “unconvincing” was used.
This was the second time in four days that a comeback victory for the Reds was being discussed in such withering terms, with Match of the Day’s Danny Murphy being similarly unimpressed by their efforts at Brentford on Saturday.
It seems that Liverpool are winning under Andoni Iraola, but not quite well enough to have convinced anyone that they are heading in the right direction.
And in truth, that doesn’t seem quite fair.
Clearly, the Reds aren’t perfect, but it is slightly baffling that anyone expected them to be so after just 11 matches under Iraola.
What’s more, the criticisms aimed at them do not appear to tally with the fact they have won seven, drawn three and lost just one of those games all while battling challenges far beyond simply embedding a new style of play.
Take Murphy’s evisceration of the Brentford performance, which seemed to ignore that the Bees had suffered just their third home defeat in the last 12 months.
It was also only the third time they had been outperformed on xG at home in 2026, with Sunderland (thanks to a penalty) and Crystal Palace (also thanks to a penalty and by just 0.01xG) the others to have managed it.
Yes, the first red card was hugely influential, but what more could Liverpool have done to make the most of that than both comfortably outshoot their opponent (21-10) and win the xG (1.64-0.88) en route to victory?
Well, in explaining his key gripe, Murphy said: “Liverpool are too easy to play through, they really are. Although Liverpool show moments when they go forward, they are conceding far too many chances to be competitive at the top of the table at the minute.”
Yet this suggestion is somewhat undermined by Liverpool having conceded the third-lowest xG in the Premier League this season (8.3) and the fourth-fewest big chances (15).
