CAN LIGHTNING STRIKE TWICE? (A match thread)

They've gone to the laws of the game, and picked the only excuse for the decision that they gave that could possibly apply. It's unfortunate that it didn't actually hit his arm, but thems the breaks. It's all they've got.

HANDLING THE BALL

For the purposes of determining handball offences, the upper boundary of the arm is in line with the bottom of the armpit. Not every touch of a player’s hand/arm with the ball is an offence.

It is an offence if a player: 

• deliberately touches the ball with their hand/arm, for example moving the hand/arm towards the ball
• touches the ball with their hand/arm when it has made their body unnaturally bigger. A player is considered to have made their body unnaturally bigger when the position of their hand/arm is not a consequence of, or justifiable by, the player’s body movement for that specific situation. By having their hand/arm in such a position, the player takes a risk of their hand/arm being hit by the ball and being penalised
• scores in the opponents' goal:
  • directly from their hand/arm, even if accidental, including by the goalkeeper
  • immediately after the ball has touched their hand/arm, even if accidental

The goalkeeper has the same restrictions on handling the ball as any other player outside the penalty area. If the goalkeeper handles the ball inside their penalty area when not permitted to do so, an indirect free kick is awarded but there is no disciplinary sanction.  However, if the offence is playing the ball a second time (with or without the hand/arm) after a restart before it touches another player, the goalkeeper must be sanctioned if the offence stops a promising attack or denies an opponent or the opposing team a goal or an obvious goal-scoring opportunity.  

.....ooh, and to mitigate us getting caught up in the web of shambles that the game has been turned into through the interpretation of the laws and statistics, Jesus put in a great finish as the ball dropped. Get's a 'can kick' in the eye test marks.

Indeed, lengthy description of what you can see, interspersed with the odd wishy-washy "had six players in the six-yard box including goalkeeper Alisson, while the visitors smartly only placed two in there" (no news on what either side was trying to achieve, or why one was smart...excepting the obvious 'outcome'), "The visitors found themselves with three players on the left flank." (Teleport? Invisible cloak?), "These situations are incredibly difficult to defend against" (oh no! football is broken, there's nothing that can be done! Why don't people do this more?), "Defenders could step out more proactively to block shots, chances could be stopped at source, or a more positionally aware defensive midfielder could focus on defending this zone." (Summary: A different bunch of players, could play a completely different game, with the possibility of a different outcome).

Lots and lots of say what you see, fuck all actual analysis. No word on how the teams set up, and why that leads to a different game dynamic and outcome. Nothing on what the teams were doing to get players into specific areas, or where they were running. Nothing on how either teams were managing the space on the pitch. No word on movements and strategies to expose weaknesses, or to manage the ball and minimise weaknesses. Nothing on why liverpool could have kept playing until now and not have scored, and how we would have probably gone on to pick them off at a rate of approximately once every half an hour.

So yeah, not really 'analysis'. more catchphrase "just say what you see".