Wow, from the highs of a 4-0 win against Arsenal to a 5-0 tonking at the hands of Manchester City, Jurgen Klopp’s boys have been thrown back into reality. Liverpool were very much in the game till Kun Aguero put City ahead much against the run of play. They were well and truly out of it after Sadio Mane’s reckless actions resulted in him being given the marching orders by referee Jon Moss. From that point onwards, it was more a matter of how many City were going to score, as opposed to whether or not Liverpool were going to find a way back into the contest. Here’s what we’ve learnt from City’s 5-0 win against the Reds from Merseyside.

Klavan and Moreno not good enough

It would be an understatement to say Liverpool struggle to defend. It has reached a point now where a few of their defenders have stopped resembling footballers. At the Etihad on Saturday, Ragnar Klavan and Alberto Moreno were appaling. Wouldn’t it just have been nice if Klopp decided to bury the hatchet with Sakho? He’s a definite upgrade on both Matip and Klavan, who started against City. Or if they managed to not piss Southampton off? How pretty would Van Dijk look at the heart of that Liverpool defense?

Salah not doing enough to justify his price tag

Salah had a largely ineffective spell at Chelsea, before tearing up the Italian top division with AS Roma. His form in Italy convinced Liverpool to splash around £37m for his services. The boy is clearly quick, but his end product has been lacking so far this season. It has admittedly been only 4 games and Salah could make us look silly. But on the evidence of what we’ve seen so far, Salah is not doing enough to justify his price tag. He should have put Liverpool ahead on Saturday, but hit his shot straight at Ederson in the City goal. It wasn’t the first time Salah has been guilty of missing a clean chance on goal so far this season. If he wants his second coming in England to be any better than his first, a man of the match performance next week against Burnley would be a good place to start.

Kun Aguero is far from done

It seems a little unfair that a man who scored 33 goals last season for City is having to prove his worth all over again. Aguero has scored goals ever since he arrived at English shores, and has gone on to become one of the most underrated goal scorers in all of Europe. The little Argentenian scored a couple, and even linked up beautifully with Jesus on Saturday. There has been talk in some quarters about Aguero and Jesus not being able to play with each other. On the evidence of what we saw earlier, they very much can. In fact, they have all the makings of a deadly strike partnership, which is a rarity in today’s age of lone strikers and false 9s. And bloody exciting.