Injury time is Arne time. Liverpool marked Arne Slot’s 47th birthday in what has become trademark fashion: with another decisive late goal. The specialists in drama at the death conjured a victory they seemed to have tossed away. Virgil van Dijk planted a 92nd-minute header into the Atletico Madrid net. Like Federico Chiesa and Rio Ngumoha, like Dominik Szoboszlai and Mohamed Salah before him, he got Liverpool a win from the jaws of a draw. “We found a way to win,” said Van Dijk. They have done it four times in the Premier League, now once in the Champions League.
Logically it cannot carry on like this. But, somehow, it did carry on like this. When Marcos Llorente seemed to have capped an Atletico comeback, his brace taking them from 2-0 down to the brink of a point, up popped Van Dijk, Liverpool winning another game of brinkmanship, looking flawed but finding a way.
