A late VAR controversy forced Liverpool to settle for a point against Brighton.

The hosts were gifted a chance to take the lead when Neco Williams fouled Aaron Connolly in the penalty area but Neal Maupay missed from the spot.

Jurgen Klopp’s side thought they had gone ahead themselves when Mohamed Salah met Roberto Firmino’s through ball before firing comfortably home.

But technology deemed the Egyptian had strayed fractionally offside while Sadio Mane suffered a similar feat with his own late header chalked off.

Diogo Jota eventually broke the deadlock on the hour for the visitors, shifting past three defenders before delivering a composed finish past Mat Ryan.

In added time, Brighton were awarded their second penalty of the match after the technology picked up on a kick by Andy Robertson on Danny Welbeck.

Pascal Gross made no mistake from 12 yards to deny the reigning Premier League champions maximum points from the last two domestic games.

Here were the key talking points from the Amex Stadium:

Jota curbs his travel sickness

 

It’s fair to say Liverpool’s £45 million summer acquisition of Diogo Jota from Wolves raised a fair few eyebrows.

On paper, it seemed an eye-watering amount of money for a player ostensibly brought in as back-up to Jurgen Klopp’s already electric front three.

But the Portuguese continued to repay his price tag and the faith shown in him by Klopp with his ninth goal – yet this one felt particularly significant.

Jota had netted a hat-trick at Atalanta in the Champions League, but prior to this clash, he had netted only once in his last 13 away league outings.

This was his first Premier League goal on the road for Liverpool, so to break that duck is another feather in the cap of one of the signings of the season.

Room for improvement on the road

 

Unfair as it may seem to be critical of a team occupying the Premier League’s top spot but Liverpool are now win-less in their last four away games.

The last time they endured such struggles was a run of five matches between January and March 2017, when questions were being asked of Jurgen Klopp.

Klopp weathered the storm and, granted, this current streak involved trips to Everton and Manchester City. But the sequence will still concern the German.

His side are seven points worse off than at this stage last term and despite being denied by VAR repeatedly, they were sluggish for much of this game.

They lacked that ruthlessness that epitomised in the last two seasons and with this draw, they have already dropped six points from winning positions.

Put into context, that is one more than they threw away in all of last season.

Anfield may remain an impenetrable fortress, but there is still no denying that, away from home, the Reds are becoming much easier to get at.

Mismatched defence remains an issue

 

To their credit, Liverpool’s defence has coped extremely well since losing Virgil van Dijk to injury last month for potentially most of this campaign.

In the nine games since he sustained that setback at Everton, they have won six and conceded as many, despite constant rotation among the back line.

But their defending will remain a headache for Klopp, who fielded an 11th different pairing in central defence this season of Fabinho and Nat Phillips.

Aaron Connolly caused them constant early problems, repeatedly breaking the line of defence, only for Alisson to bail them out by booting away loose balls.

Missing the pace of Van Dijk and Joe Gomez, they were far easier to break through while Neco Williams’ inexperience showed by conceding that early penalty.

This was Fabinho’s fifth start in a row at centre-half but it is evident he is not a natural fit for that role, with Joel Matip rested after two games in four days.

As a result of the late equaliser, Liverpool remain without successive league clean sheets since June. The sooner Klopp can find some continuity and consistency in defence, the better.

Reds paying for a lack of recovery

 

Klopp is far from the only manager to have complained about unnecessary fixture congestion in recent weeks but he is within his rights to do so.

A Saturday lunchtime kick-off on the South Coast, following a Wednesday night Champions League clash with Atalanta, looked a tall order for Liverpool.

They started sharply at Brighton, with more than 75 per cent possession in the first ten minutes, but faded quickly as fatigue perhaps began to creep in.

Indeed, despite being packed with incident, this game involved just five shots on target, which may point to a lack of quality in the final third of the game.

And with James Milner the latest Liverpool player to be forced out by injury, limping off with a hamstring issue, this will only irk Klopp further.

He may have arguably the strongest squad in the league, but it’s easy to sympathise with him given some of the fixture pile-up feels totally avoidable.