Neil Atkinson’s post-match review for The Anfield Wrap after AC Milan 1-3 Liverpool in the 2024-2025 Champions League…
A Liverpool side starts poorly but cruises to victory, showing its class along the way.
The whole thing was very 2023 and that is, when the start doesn’t go as planned, no bad thing.
There is a constant desire to contrast this Liverpool side with a perception of its predecessor but that has done neither version that many favours so far really. Klopp’s sides increasingly played a possession based game and it is reductive to look at, say, the 2021/22 team and view it as a heavy metal team. Slot’s sides will need to press well and show character in adversity because all football teams do – at the weekend just gone, Manchester City conceded early against Brentford and were the poorer side for 20 minutes. But they found a way and expanded.
That’s what you do, what you need to be able to do. The most concerning thing about Liverpool’s game against Nottingham Forest hadn’t been that they had conceded a goal but how poor they had been after it.
Today though, there was none of that. Liverpool were exceptionally good from 10 minutes until 80, showing their sheer class against quality opposition and taking the game away from them with brain and brawn, with guile and desire. The bravest footballer on the pitch was Mike Maignan, then next in line was every Liverpool player – all equal.
Brave because they played and showed and wanted the ball, wanted the responsibility but brave because they’d use their bodies too. For the equaliser, which had been coming, Cody Gakpo puts his leg in a position where he knows he is going to get hit. It was the essence of taking one for the team. He wins the free-kick, Trent Alexander-Arnold plays with simplicity and quality and there isn’t a single Milanese player able to match Ibou Konate and there it is.
Gakpo was the business. All game, he was a livewire and all game he backed himself and his teammates could see that he was more than capable of winning his battle. He was quick, direct and brought his teammates into play. It was a consummate left-wing performance and his only contender for man of the match was Alexis Mac Allister with whom he built a nifty understanding through the game.
If there are interesting questions to be asked or comparisons made with the previous manager, his management of Gakpo and Konate are the two from last season which stand out. For all the world Gakpo looks like a left winger. In fact no, no he doesn’t. He doesn’t look like one but he very much plays like one, very much is one. And one of the most gratifying things about tonight is that Konate backs up Saturday with a tough European away. Last season it felt like he was wrapped in cotton wool. This season it looks like he is made of teak.
Him and his captain were excellent once we got beyond ten minutes. They are such a pair and are the foundation whatever this side does will be built on.
Dominik Szoboszlai whacked a performance in which was as curate’s egg-ish as it gets. What an odd expression but then what an odd player. He excels doing the dirty work but struggles to do the stylish stuff while being good-looking and full of grace. He is young and this is the thing to remember. But he is also in odd positions and that was happening tonight until he was exactly where Cody Gakpo needed him to be tonight and he turned it home and sealed the deal marvellously.
He’s young. He can and will improve and that’s the case for so much of the side but look at what they have already done. It’ll be a season which excites this, both in the moment and for its promise.
On paper this could be Liverpool’s toughest away game in Europe until March, could be the biggest question they will be asked on the road. We’ll see about that but the fact is they have a great deal of European experience. They showed tonight they have their poise when they need it and they have their grit and they have their staggering quality. The latter is summed up when the frame of the goal was hit three times, twice from Mo Salah’s boot and once from Alisson Becker’s fingertips.
There is more to come, there has to be, this season is young. But it is vibrant. Whatever the maths in the final reckoning, winning away in Europe, in Italy, in the San Siro is cause for celebration. Doing it when down early even more so.
They were a good team under the previous manager and they remain a good team under this. More to come, more to do, more to learn, more to develop. Give me more, Liverpool. Give us all more.
Download The Anfield Wrap’s free app for Liverpool FC podcasts, video and writing all in one place…
