Arsenal lose but promise better things to come in Liverpool match that sees Reds close on Man City - The Warm-Up

It probably says something not particularly pleasant about the Premier League, but last night's game between Arsenal and Liverpool was, somehow, much more about the former than the latter. The team in second rolling up and dismissing the team in fourth was what we all expected. The question was: could Arsenal not get hammered? And then, to follow: what would Arsenal not getting hammered mean?

The answers? Yes, just about; and it's unclear, but likely nothing too bad. Given the Premier League, this is about as much as 18 sides can hope for from the visit of Liverpool. Given Arsenal's habit of melting down and giving up in the big games, you could understand an open-top bus parade. Just a small one. A quick pootle up the Holloway Road, traffic allowing.

There were creaky moments, of course. Arsenal still lost. But after weathering an early feisty spell from Liverpool, the home team were able to muscle themselves back into the game, and it hung suspended in that weird balance that modern elite football sometimes delivers. A game at once frantic and empty, busy and chanceless, as both teams stand there poking each other and saying "no you make a mistake, no you make a mistake, no you make a mistake." One thing you can be sure of: somebody will make a mistake.

Although you'd probably have got long odds on Thiago misplacing a pass. In the space of a few minutes, Liverpool's no.8 played two perfect through balls. The first, unfortunately for him, was back through his own defence, to the feet of Alexander Lacazette. Out came Alisson, waving his arms. Across went the ball, inside to Martin Odegaard. Over slid Alisson, waving his arms again. And you can file what happened next under Good Save, yes, but you'll need to cross reference with Bad Miss.

It was at this point that fear and foreboding gripped Arsenal's fans and, we're guessing, Arsenal's players, staff and tube station as well. Thiago's second perfect pass sent Diogo Jota scurrying free through the inside left channel. His shot was firm but the angle was tight, and you can file it under Decent Finish if you want, but there'll need to be a little note in Soft Ones Let In At The Near Post as well.

What does it all mean? For the Champions League spots, not a huge amount: Arsenal still hold the advantage over Tottenham and Manchester United, in points, in games, and in not playing like clowns all that often. That in itself marks progress. So too the sense that this game, even though Liverpool weren't quite at their best and Arsenal didn't create too many chances, was played at least in part on Arsenal's terms. They were competing, not surviving. Or panicking. Or getting sent off for uncontrolled sneezing.

That sounds like faint praise, and it is. But the Premier League is a stretched thing and the top is way, way off in the clouds. Last night's result leaves Arsenal in fourth, 18 points behind Liverpool in second. That's a massive gap. It's not an unfair gap, on the balance of the season. But last night's performance suggested that next season, with a new striker and with the kids a little bit more established, that gap should be smaller. Should be. This weekend's game against Aston Villa is suddenly vital, not just for points but for a statement: an assertion that all that bad old Arsenal flakiness is behind them. Or, perhaps, not.

As for Liverpool, that win puts them one point behind Manchester City. (More on their credentials here.) There are many ways to define a title race, but perhaps the purest is two teams knowing that if they win all the rest of their games, they win the title. That's where we are now. Heads down, nine games left, charge for the line. A title six-pointer on April 10th. Is a title six-pointer even a thing? It is now.

What do Villarreal, Porto, Lyon and Ajax have in common? If you said "They are the last four teams to have knocked Juventus out of the Champions League in the last four seasons," you may have one point. If you said "None of them was invited to the Super League," you may also have one point. And if the conjunction of those two facts makes you a little bit amused and a little bit angry, you're not alone. You've got two points and the Warm-Up to keep you company.

But then, this is precisely what the Super League was designed to prevent. Juventus, a big club with lots of money, have had their chance of winning a big trophy ended by some Europa League side from the Spanish mid-table. Some well-coached nobodies that hardly cost anything, playing for a club that couldn't even dream of dropping 70 million euros on a new striker just because it's January and it's a bit cold. And what kind of a nickname is Yellow Submarine, anyway? Real teams have proper nicknames like The Old Lady.

Fundamentally, there are two ways to avoid getting done 3-0 at home by Unai Emery and his band of dogged try-hards. One way is to score more goals over two legs, and also to avoid giving away stupid penalties. Oops! The other? Oh, much simpler. Simply legislate the very possibility out of existence.

Or to put it another way: as a footballing project, the Super League wasn't designed to make the big teams better. That might have been a happy side-effect; it might not. It was designed to ensure that they wouldn't always have to be any good. To ensure the biggest games aren't contingent on the medium-sized ones; to deliver Real Madrid and Barcelona to Turin, without the need for any of them to earn it by beating anybody else. Like, say, Villarreal. Or Porto. Or Lyon. Or Ajax. The Champions League isn't perfect. But it's a damn sight better than some of the alternatives.

Delightful scenes here, as Nottingham Forest's fans ask Djed Spence to shoot and then get precisely what they wanted. Half the crowd are cheering, while the other half are saying "I told him to do that. I get the assist."

For a while there, back in the early noughties, if you'd asked the Warm-Up to name our favourite footballer we'd have said "Álvaro Recoba". Partly this was a desperately uncool, not very interesting person's attempt to sound cool and interesting, but it was also true; a certain kind of true.

Not having the capacity to watch Inter play every week, Recoba existed largely as an idea. A player constructed from highlights and match reports, computer games and World Cup previews, with the gaps all filled in by daydreams. The Recoba that played for Inter was excellent, obviously, but the Recoba that existed largely in our head was a different kind of excellent: motley, unverifiable, aspirational, personal. How we imagined football might be played. How we felt it could be. How we felt it should be. Happy birthday, then, to both of those Recobas.

Over to the Athletic today, where Nick Miller, formerly of this parish, has been taking a long hard look at Galatasaray's miserable season. They are currently languishing — that's right, languishing — in mid-table, a mind-bending 32 points behind league leaders Trabzonspor. Also they have less than no money. But they do have one thing: a plan.

The last Italian side in Europe, Atalanta, travel to Leverkusen tonight to defend their nation's honour. They bring with them a 3-2 lead from the first leg. Other nicely poised Europa ties include Galatasaray vs. Barcelona, goalless after the first leg, and West Ham against Sevilla. David Moyes' Happy Hammers are just a single goal down on aggregate.

Trying to steal the limelight from all of that is the Premier League, which has delivered up crisis-laden Everton at home to Newcastle. A relegation million-pointer. Now that's definitely a thing.