David James believes Liverpool would have comfortably beaten Leeds United if it weren't for Illan Meslier.
The Reds lost their 18-month unbeaten home run in the Premier League on Saturday evening, losing 2-1 against the relegation-threatened Whites thanks to Crysencio Summerville's late winner. Mohamed Salah was able to cancel out an early Rodrigo opener inside 15 minutes, but a lacklustre Liverpool side were condemned to a second straight defeat against a team in the bottom three when Dutch winger Summerville stabbed home on 89 minutes.
While Jurgen Klopp's side were far from their electric best, they managed to carve out a number of brilliant chances during the second half and should have put the game to bed long before Leeds nicked it. Whites goalkeeper Meslier produced a man-of-the-match performance with nine brilliant saves denying Darwin Nunez, Roberto Firmino and Salah to name a few.
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And despite James admitting that many fans will be 'steaming' with the performance and result, the former Reds stopper acknowledged that the scoreline would have been different, were it not for Meslier.
“There will be fans across the world right now that will be steaming because they’ve lost to Leeds United,” James told Premier League productions. “But in the cold light of day if you analyse that game of football, Liverpool bossed it for most of, especially the second half.
“But for an outstanding performance by Meslier, then Liverpool would have won 3-1 or 2-1 and you’d have said that’s what we expect. You can only control the controllables and what they did was find a goalkeeper in top form and then a superb finish to win it.
“In the end it’s a results business and it’s not good enough in that sense. You would like to think that the talent and the quality Liverpool have got, they convert those irrespective of who is in goal.
“But I think it’s even more frustrating when it’s a last minute winner, when Liverpool are pressing, pressing and pressing and Meslier just pulling off blocks and saves left right and centre.”
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