Had they won, we could have saluted the dark arts. You don’t win a title by making friends and Arsenal’s fondness for breaking up play with prolonged stoppages might have worked had it been anywhere other than Merseyside.
Liverpool tried to build up a head of steam in the first half but there were three incidents that really irked the locals.
It was started by Aaron Ramsdale going down for 30 seconds, then shortly afterwards, Gabriel followed his example. Most important of all was when Gabriel Martinelli stayed down, writhing a minute after Liverpool had halved the deficit.