Curtis Jones is embarrassing two of the greatest Liverpool players ever with his actions and words | OneFootball

It felt like a nadir for Liverpool, a rock bottom from which they could excavate no further. That miserable home defeat to PSV endangered their Champions League prospects, bruised egos both individual and collective, and caused this stutter and stumble of a season to spiral.

Victory over West Ham in their next game tentatively teased a revival built on the quicksand of, well, beating West Ham, before consecutive draws with newly-promoted opposition allowed those briefly dormant problems to resurface but also multiply.

The PSV loss was supposed to trigger a turning point. It was a watershed moment; that late Leeds equaliser at Elland Road was the equivalent of Phil Mitchell dropping a C-bomb.

By the time of their return to European competition, the Salah circus had taken over. The Egyptian king was not invited on the trip to Milan but his omnipresence meant that the result and performance could only be viewed through the prism of what he brings to this team – and what he takes away.

An accomplished, understated, defiant victory in the name of the collective, at the home of the Champions League runners-up and Serie A title chasers, rather undermined the idea that Liverpool need him more than he does them.

But that situation, the struggles of Virgil van Dijk, the phasing out of Andy Robertson and the absurd injury-proneness of Alisson has created an on-pitch power vacuum at a time of significant change for Liverpool. And one man is stepping up to fill in.

“Right now, we’re in the sh*t and it needs to change,” said Curtis Jones after that PSV game. He stressed the non-negotiable for he and his teammates to “be a dog out there”, to “just go and smash someone” instead of simply being “nice on the ball”.

Above all else, he summed up his unique role of “playing from a player and a fan” by lamenting: “I’m past being angry inside. I’m at the point now where I just don’t have the words.”

Actions fortunately speak louder, and a quiet but authoritative statement echoed throughout the San Siro on Tuesday night. Jones had the most touches, passes, carries and fouls, as Liverpool’s third-youngest starter against Inter led by the example of his own words.

Jamie Carragher said at the time that he’d “love to have seen Mo Salah speaking there, rather than Curtis Jones coming out”. But really it doesn’t matter who makes like Joe Hart at Euro 2016 and Fronts Up for the cameras, who casually ventures into the mixed zone to trigger a civil war. It’s about shouldering the responsibility for what happens on the field.

Jones embraced that against Inter as the club’s new emblem of homegrown excellence.

As much as Liverpool need leaders, one demand is arguably more pressing. Trent Alexander-Arnold is too distinct to be replaced as a player, but there was always some room for improvement in his role as local hero.

Jones, a more openly passionate, connected and frankly relatable talent, is a better fit as the voice of the voiceless who could not feel further from joining Real Madrid on a Bosman after nailing Duolingo for three months straight.

It helps that he is a very good player, too, one with a more obvious and effective place in this system if Arne Slot persists with it. But fundamentally, in the grips of an identity crisis, Liverpool could do worse than keeping up with the Joneses of this world.