No pause for thought as Villarreal run into relentless Red hurricane

Van Dijk to Konaté back to Van Dijk to Thiago and in a flash Thiago’s gone and he gives it to Fabinho Fabinho to Robertson and he’s running oh God he’s running and Díaz is making the run Henderson is making the run you see Salah out of the corner of your eye but Robertson is cutting inside and there’s a big space between Juan and Pau so you close it but now Mané is free and Robertson crosses Díaz goes for it plus some other red shirt is that Mané and the ball runs out for a goal-kick and breathe you can finally breathe. Oh Christ, is that Jota getting ready to come on?

This, insofar as you can even express it, is the experience of facing Liverpool at their best: football without punctuation marks or pause for thought, a dizzying stream of consciousness, a quickfire interrogation that you can barely process, let alone begin to follow. It took 16 years for Villarreal to reach their second Champions League semi-final and a little over two minutes for them to lose it. In all likelihood it may have felt even quicker than that: just a concussive blur of red streaks, the sound of triumphant songs and the taste of blood rising from your lungs, the sensation of being a long way from home and completely out of place.

Unai Emery’s team did almost everything right here. They were physical, disciplined, organised and clear in their strategy. Against an ordinary team, it would probably have been good enough. And for 45 minutes here, Liverpool were pretty ordinary. But then came the cloudburst, the rumble of thunder and the flashes of lightning, a torrent that few sides on the planet are capable of living with.

The talk before this game was of the need for a solid, workmanlike, professional Liverpool performance. Perhaps too much so.