'No belief in the stands, no belief on the pitch'

[BBC]

[Getty Images]

Saturday afternoon like so many this season, ended with the team in red being outworked, outfought and outthought by the opposition. Chelsea, on a six-game losing streak, outrun in almost all of their Premier League games, turned up to Anfield and found it easy.

Anfield isn't supposed to be easy. It's supposed to be the hardest place. Home of the champions and all that. There aren't supposed to be gaps metres wide in the midfield for Chelsea's moody bunch of hundred million pound midfielders to stroll through. To allow this means they can gain confidence and remember why they cost one hundred million in the first place.

Anfield is supposed to be a place where price tags don't matter. Where opponents are humbled by the sheer collective will of 61,287 people — unified in a shared ambition. But that isn't what Chelsea encountered on Saturday afternoon. It isn't what Tottenham, on a five-game losing run of their own, found when they showed up to L4 in similarly downtrodden condition.

At a certain point it ceases to be coincidence or luck that Liverpool have so often accommodated a weak opponent desperately needing encouragement. Chelsea's players visibly grew through the contest.