Bolton Wanderers 2 Liverpool 3

Let’s not talk about title challenges. Let’s not discuss zonal-marking, dodgy Greek debutants, under-performing big-name stars, injuries or arse-hole Americans. Let’s just savour the fact that Liverpool won a game of football that they thoroughly deserved to win despite twice falling behind against the run of play.

That feeling as Steven Gerrard smashed in the winning goal is why we keep coming back to watch the Reds despite being made to feel utterly drained by the previous result and despite the frustration, anger and despair felt when Bolton took the lead in a first half in which they had been played off the park.

If we wanted to, we could worry that Liverpool have conceded 6 goals from set-pieces in 4 games and look extremely vulnerable at the back – a consequence of a general lack of height and experience in the team and some individual defensive errors rather than an indictment of the defensive system employed. We could concern ourselves that, having lost half our opening 4 games, we look incapable of challenging for the title this season and may have a fight on our hands to stay in the top four. We could concern ourselves with the below-par performances of Gerrard and Mascherano or any of the wide midfield players (Babel, Kuyt, Benayoun and Riera) or with the increasingly despondent body language of Torres. But let’s not.

Let’s instead focus on the fact that Liverpool won a tense game. Bolton’s undeserved goals made the contest more absorbing as a spectacle. Liverpool got three very presentable goals to come back and win. Johnson, Torres and Gerrard scored. We won. That’s all that matters today and that is reason to smile for the next couple of weeks as another stupid international break (they’re all stupid in my opinion) disrupts the season.