‘Gets it all wrong’ – Sky pundit calls out Liverpool player over 9th-minute lapse v Palace | OneFootball

Liverpool fell behind in a match for the first time this season in the opening minutes away to Crystal Palace this afternoon, with Ismaila Sarr breaking the deadlock early on.

The Reds arrived at Selhurst Park aiming to avenge their penalty shootout defeat to the Eagles in the Community Shield last month, but the game got off to the worst possible start for the Premier League champions.

From a ninth-minute corner kick (that Virgil van Dijk argued should’ve been given as a goal kick to his side), Ryan Gravenberch rose to get his head on the ball, but succeeded only in knocking it down to Sarr, who gratefully gobbled up the chance by lashing home from close range.

Gravenberch blamed for early Sarr goal

Michael Dawson has been covering the match for Soccer Saturday on Sky Sports, and he singled out Liverpool’s Dutch midfielder for blame over the inadvertent assist for the Crystal Palace forward.

The pundit said: “It [the goal] has gone to Palace! Inswinging corner and Liverpool do not deal with it. Gravenberch gets it all wrong.”

(Photo by Tom Dulat/Getty Images)

Liverpool as a whole have been dreadful in the first half (apart from Alisson)

The opening goal of this afternoon’s match was all too reminiscent of the one for Southampton in midweek, when Wataru Endo’s botched clearance laid the equaliser on a plate.

A team as good as Palace didn’t require such charity from the Reds, but they promptly made the most of it, and only the world-class brilliance of Alisson Becker kept the visitors in the game during a wretched opening half-hour.

It was a rare lapse from Gravenberch to make a hash of his clearance from the corner kick, although the midfielder had Liverpool’s best chance of the first quarter of the match when his powerful shot forced a strong save from Dean Henderson.

The Dutchman won’t want to watch the goal back, but his team as a whole have been thoroughly outplayed by the Eagles in the first half at Selhurst Park.

Hopefully Slot’s men will look more like the champions that they are after that terrible start to the game, but the good news is that they’ve always come up with an answer this season whenever they’ve had to find one.