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Jurgen Klopp said that his side was to blame after a late defeat in Naples. Napoli dominated in the second half after the introduction of Dries Mertens. Liverpool should thank their keeper Allison for keeping them in the game for so long as he stopped shots from Fabian Ruiz and Arkadiusz Milik.
The Merseysiders took blow after blow in the second half but somehow managed to stay in the game. Mane and Salah were the pressure release outlets for Liverpool but the introduction of Mertens and Piotr Zielinski with 20 minutes to go gave the advantage to Napoli.
Liverpool’s willingness to look for the winner created space on the right side which was exploited by Napoli to create Insigne’s winner.
Klopp had an early setback when Naby Keita had to be taken off on a stretcher after he complained of lower back pain in the 19th minute.
The English club made a record which they might want to forget soon as they failed to muster a single shot on target in a Champions League game for the first time since February 2006
Here we take a look at some Hits and Flops of the game.
#Hit - David Ospina
Though Liverpool didn’t have any shot on target, some credit for that goes to Ospina as he came running down the line to prevent two important shots. He dived down to take the ball away from Mane’s feet. And in another great attempt he cleared a close ball before it was to reach Mohamed Salah.
#Hit - Lorenzo Insigne
He came narrowly close in the first half. Though he had a quieter first half he was still the best Napoli player on the pitch. But in the second half he played with more freedom. Taking Alexander-Arnold in one on one situation and also running down the channels. His hard work paid in the end when he managed to get the three points in the last minute of the match.
#Hit - Joe Gomez
On a night when his teammates let him down, Joe kept composure. He tackled, dived, cleared ball of the line and did everything expected of a central defender. Gomez has been the chosen defender over Lovren and Matip and yesterday he showed why Klopp rates him so highly.
One can argue that he could have done more to prevent the last minute goal but then the mistake that led to the goal was not something he could have done anything about.
#Flop - Trent Alexander-Arnold
Looked lost throughout the game. In the first round, he had an amazing game and stopped Neymar from causing problems. Also his ability to go up the field when required was missing yesterday. He was outdone by the trickery of Insigne and Milik who took turns to play on the left and kept rotating throughout the game.
#Flop - James Milner
He has been Liverpool’s most consistent player over the weeks and his selection at this age for all matches shows Klopp’s trust in him. But he looked average yesterday. It was a big surprise that he kept playing till the 76th minute. It would be highly unlikely that Milner plays all the matches like he is doing at present, because he doesn’t have that extra edge to unlock defences or pace to run at opposing midfielders. Oxlade Chamberlain’s return might give Liverpool another option to try on right side of the midfield.
#Flop - Mohamed Salah
Some might say that there were players who were worse than Salah on the pitch, but then the standards that the Egyptian has set for himself makes yesterday’s performance average.
The one-on-one in the last 5 minutes was an example of the same. Few months back Salah would have drilled that into the bottom corner but not yesterday. He tried and tried but his final product, which made him the star last season, was missing.
