On Saturday 11 January Liverpool beat Mourinho’s Tottenham in the Premier League with a goal from striker Firmino. A dry 1-0 that confirmed the dominance of the team coached by Klopp who, in the current English championship, scored 20 victories and only one draw out of 21 games played (1-1 against Manchester United on 20 October).
If we broaden our gaze, going beyond what Liverpool is already doing, the unbeaten streak of the Reds is even wider if we also include the 2018-2019 Premier League games in which they scored . Almost a whole calendar year without running into a defeat, 38 consecutive useful results : to findthe last knockout, in fact, we have to go back to the dawn of 2019, it was January 3 and Liverpool lost 2-1 against Manchester City, then crowned champion.
Of course, in the all-time standings, considering the five main European leagues, Liverpool are far from Milan’s 58 unbeaten games between 1991 and 1993 , a record still unmatched. But victory number 38 allows the English team to enter the top-10 and to reach a team capable of achieving a unique and all-Italian feat, Perugia at the end of the seventies.
The Perugia of the 1978-1979 season is still remembered today for the season unbeaten record in Serie A, an event never before achieved by any team in the history of single-group tournaments. In their fourth championship in the top flight, the griffins finished the tournament undefeated thanks to a streak of 30 unbeaten games, also reaching the final 2nd place in the standings with 41 points, 11 wins and 19 draws, and just three points behind AC Milan. winner of the Scudetto, the tenth in its history.
Malizia, Nappi, Ceccarini, Frosio, Della Martita, Dal Fiume, Bagni, Butti, Casarsa, Vannini, Speggiorin, this was the ideal eleven trained by Ilario Castagner . And epic matches, as heroic as the victory at Juventus on 22 October 1978, a 2-1 with goals from Speggiorin and Vannini and with the bianconeri who had only lost one derby at the Stadio Comunale since 1970; or the 2-2 comeback against Inter with a goal of equalization when the match is almost over, scored by full-back Antonio Ceccarini, to the only goal in his career in Serie A.
The record was rather surprising, there is still talk of the “Perugia of miracles ” As achieved by a so-called provincial of Italian football: in fact, in the following decades, Milan in 1991-1992 and Juventus in 2011-2012 were the only clubs capable of equaling the record of the Umbrians.
At 30 unbeaten games in the 1978-1979 season, the Perugia team played another 7 matches in the following league without losing, before folding on 28 October 1979 in the presence of Torino who won 2-0 away with goals from Salvatore Vullo and Paolo Pulici. The positive streak, in reality, starts from the season prior to the “miraculous” one with the 2-1 win over Pescara on 7 May 1978 . And it is incredible if you think that the 1977-1978 Serie A was marred by the death of Renato Curi , due to a heart attack, on October 30, 1977 during a Perugia – Juventus match, in that stadium which from November 26 was dedicated to memory of the 24-year-old footballer.
