Salah stars in Liverpool's victory over West Ham and is eight points ahead in the Premier League | first division

In the 54th minute at the London Stadium, Trent Alexander-Arnold received a pass from Ryan Gravenberch with time to wait and look up, the lack of pressure from the West Ham players almost a public snub, before unleashing a shot deflected past Alphonse Areola to score. it's 4-0 Liverpool and once again end a game that had already been dead for a long time.

In the process, Alexander-Arnold at least provided a moment of cartoon drama, performing a slightly embarrassed celebration of silencing the chatter, one hand raised to his ear. Perhaps this was a reference to overnight stories about a move to Real Madrid, something some Spanish media have suggested is almost formalised.

It was at least a note of rare second-half interest on a night when Liverpool remained 5-0 up, Diogo Jota adding another near the end after the entire West Ham defense and midfield watched closely as Mohamed Salah was doing some dribbles. .

The result means Liverpool will now enter 2025 at the top of the Premier League with at least seven points and with at least one game less than those in their slipstream. Arne Slot's team was once again coherent, energetic and well balancedthe goals shared between those three revitalized forwards. The weather can change, teams can stumble, force majeure can intervene. The rest of the league will need the help of all three to prevent the five months from becoming a prolonged procession.

On the other hand, Liverpool won't be able to play West Ham every week, which is probably best for everyone involved. It would be wrong to say that West Ham collapsed in the first half. This would imply some type of initial resistance. Instead, Julen Lopetegui's team came out prepared and ready to dissolve like an overly wet digestive biscuit.

The London Stadium had been a dank, dark place at the end of days at the time of the start, surrounded by dying Olympic towers and inherited megaliths, looming in the fog of east London like crashed imperial cruisers.

There was a confusing and hungover start, with both teams cautiously following their patterns. Five minutes later, West Ham had their first breath. Bad idea. Almost immediately Liverpool woke up and should have scored, Cody Gakpo sliding in and pushing a beautiful diagonal pass to Salah near goal, only for Areola to make a good diving block.

It all looked alarmingly easy for Liverpool. Curtis Jones had started in his advanced passing and pressing attacking role, with Gakpo on the left and Luis Diaz moving mischievously from the centre. West Ham never managed to master their movement. This is not so much a poor West Ham team at the moment as a totally disconnected one, a collection of shirts loosely piled up, as if washed on a clothesline.

Liverpool counterattacked well in that period, although stealing the ball is easier when your opponent seems horrified to find it at their feet in the first place. Diaz skated in and made another excellent save, the precarious force field around West Ham's six-yard box continuing to spit and fizzle.

The goal finally came in the 29th minute. Diaz dropped deep and received a short pass from Alexander-Arnold, then tried to give a nice pass to Jones. At that point, West Ham produced their most incisive one-touch combination of the half, Konstantinos Mavropanos blocking the ball against Vladimir Coufal, who deflected it straight into the path of Diaz, who raced in to calmly finish.

Joe Gomez went off injured and was replaced by Jarell Quansah. Almost immediately, Quansah took a while to close down Mohammed Kudus, who shot low and hard and hit the outside of the post.

It doesn't matter. Two minutes later the score was 2-0. This time it came from a Diaz break, an inside pass to Salah and an improvised turn in which he heeled the ball between Mavropanos' legs, then passed to retrieve it as the defender stumbled like a diplodocus threatened by a velociraptor. The ball passed to Gakpo, who scored.

Did Salah mean it? Probably not. But he was definitely smart, poised, and physically creative enough to tailor it into a lovely little tailor-made moment of skill. And before the break it was three o'clock. Of course it was. This time Carlos Soler gave the ball away. Jones passed it to Salah and he fired with embarrassing ease into the corner.

This game basically ended at the halfway point, as seemed inevitable from the early slow-speed exchanges. And so the new era advances without, so far, the slightest friction.

Liverpool Football Club have fallen hard for Slot over the last four months. There has been a dreamlike quality to that journey from the August sunshine to the December chill, an unexpected sensation of drowning in honey.

It seems logical that the world will interfere at some point. You will have to look down to feel a little vertigo. Success always comes accompanied by inconveniences and difficult moments. But it seems like a distant hope for the rest of the field. This was a skilled and ruthless form of champion, a victory with strength in reserve.