Liverpool did not get the dream Champions league return they bargained for after a costly 2-2 draw with Sevilla. Jurgen Klopp was forced to call upon wantaway star, Phillipe Coutinho, as his Liverpool side found themselves one goal short of
victory in a Champions League game they had once seemed certain to win.
The Brazilian who had his heart set on Barcelona for much of the
summer dusted himself down and tried to cast a spell over Sevilla, a
team who had emerged from a disorientating first half to claim a point
that even they seemed to accept with a degree of surprise. It was not
simply that Roberto Firmino missed a penalty, although that did not
help, it was that a Liverpool attack that had threatened to slice the
visitors into pieces gradually ground to a halt.
In the first half, Sadio Mane and Mohamed Salah, scorer of
Liverpool’s second, looked like one of Europe’s great emergent attacking
forces and the futile attempts of Nicolas Pareja in conceding a penalty
before the break showcased it perfectly. First, he tried to dispossess
Mane by handling the ball and when that did not work he wrapped a hand
around the winger’s waist.
Having previously scored the first, Firmino clipped the post with his
penalty just minutes before half-time. It was a game in which Liverpool
finished with 24 attempts on goal, seven on target and just the two
goals to show for it. Sevilla managed just two on target and scored them
both, the 72nd minute equaliser from Joaquin Correa a beautifully
executed finish, before Klopp unleashed Coutinho, Daniel Sturridge and
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain from the bench in quick succession.
By then
Sevilla’s coach Eduardo Berizzo had already been sent to the stands by
the Dutch referee, having proffered the ball to Joe Gomez for a throw-in
and then tossed it away as the full-back reached for it, the second
time the Argentine coach had committed the offence. Berizzo offered
the excuse that he did it the second time to even up his earlier mistake
– an excuse that was hard to believe.
“I did throw the ball away and I was trying to waste time to stop the
advantage [enjoyed by Liverpool],” Berizzo said. “When a similar thing
took place and we were chasing the game I still decided to throw the
ball away and make up for what I had done [even though Sevilla were
losing]. I wanted to do the sportsmanlike thing. I explained that to my
counterpart.”
His counterpart Klopp had ended
the game in something of an emotional state, with Gomez also dismissed
in the last few seconds for a second yellow card. The Liverpool manager
said he was invited into the Sevilla dressing room afterwards to have a
discussion with the opposition following a game in which both benches
sniped at each other, and generally speaking the German was
philosophical about the chances his team had missed.
Credit- Telegraph
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