Two games, two 2-2s: Iraola's Liverpool can't stop drawing

Andoni Iraola has a line he likes: “I’d rather be good than entertaining. I want a team that wins matches.” Two games into his Liverpool tenure, he has a team that does neither with any conviction — but it can absolutely, reliably, draw 2-2.

That’s now the score twice in a row. Newcastle away on the opening day: 2-2. Nottingham Forest at Anfield today: 2-2. Identical. If Iraola wanted consistency, he’s got it; it’s just wearing the wrong number. Two matches, four points dropped from winning-ish positions, and a manager who wants results watching his side hand them back with a smile.

Today had everything you don’t want if you’re a Liverpool supporter. Forest, who’d turned up on the back of two defeats to Leeds, went ahead through Dan Ndoye and had the temerity to look comfortable doing it. Florian Wirtz thought he’d levelled, only for VAR to lean in and quietly delete it for offside. Alexander Isak — the marquee striker, the one signed to win exactly these games — did drag Liverpool back level with the kind of finish he’s paid a fortune for. And then Alisson, of all people, conceded the penalty that let Morgan Gibbs-White restore Forest’s lead, before the Reds had to scramble it back to 2-2.

Here’s the number that should worry Anfield more than any single moment: this is a Liverpool side that has now led the dance in both games and still hasn’t won either. The talent is obvious — Isak scoring, Wirtz busy enough to get chalked off, chances everywhere. The result is a shrug. Under a coach whose whole pitch was “I win matches, I don’t entertain,” Liverpool are managing to entertain and not win, which is impressively the worst of both his worlds.

The Iraola quote will follow him until he fixes this. You can say you want a team that wins matches. Your team, meanwhile, keeps looking at a winning position and deciding a point is plenty. Smell the coffee, Andoni — twice in a week is a pattern, not a blip. ☕️

None of this is a crisis yet; it’s August, Isak looks the part, and Forest are a nastier watch than their Leeds defeats suggested. But “we drew again” is not the sentence a new Liverpool manager wants trending, and two 2-2s from two is exactly how honeymoons end early.

Iraola wanted winning, not entertaining. Right now he’s got neither — just the draw specialists.