A look at some of the moments missed from Wednesday’s 3-1 win over Leicester in the League Cup
Liverpool booked their place in the fourth round of the League Cup with yet another 3-1 win on Wednesday night, this time against Leicester City.
After falling behind to the Championship leaders through Kasey McAteer’as third-minute opener, the Reds responded through Cody Gakpo shortly after half time before Dominik Szoboszlai scored one of the goals of the season so far on 70 minutes.
Diogo Jota wrapped up the game with a clever back-heel in the closing stages before Liverpool were drawn away to Bournemouth in the fourth road later that night.
But you knew all of that, of course. What you might have missed were a series of intriguing subplots at Anfield. Here are our ‘moments missed’ from Wednesday’s action.
For a 17-year-old trying to make the grade long-term at Liverpool, it would have been wholly understandable if Ben Doak was feeling some nervous energy just before kick-off.
The Scottish teenager was making his first start at Anfield on Wednesday night and while Doak has become known as something of a fearless winger who is always ready to try and take on his marker, some trepidation would have been natural.
Harvey Elliott knows exactly what that is like having come through at the Reds as a 16-year-old following his 2019 move from Fulham. The midfielder, now 20, made a beeline for his less experienced colleague while the crowd were going through a rendition of You’ll Never Walk Alone to offer some last-minute morsels of advice to Doak.
There was a cuff around the head, a hug and a few words that will no doubt have helped Doak ahead of one of the biggest nights of his fledgling career to date.
Elliott has spoken lately of taking on more responsibility in what is now a younger, new-look squad and his gentle encouragement to Doak just before the game got going is evidence of the quiet way the midfielder is choosing to step up alongside his more established colleagues.
Jones reaction says it all
Such was Dominik Szoboszlai’s incredible strike to make it 2-1 on the night that even his Liverpool team-mates were in disbelief.
While the Reds fans around the ground celebrated the effort – one that pinged into the back of the net via the underside of the bar – Jones could scarcely believe what he had just seen from the £60m midfielder.
As the players celebrated, Jones could only shake his head in amazement of the goal from Szoboszlai and the captain-for-the-night, who sported a smile as wide as the Mersey tunnel, was clearly impressed as Liverpool took the lead 20 minutes from time.
Who could blame him either? The Hungary captain’s thunderbolt will take some beating in the club’s Goal of the Season competition.
Szoboszlai’s secret outed?
Perhaps the secret behind Szoboszlai’s strike has been an off-the-field decision inspired, apparently, by Alexis Mac Allister and the rest of Liverpool’s South American contingent?
Szoboszlai has recently taken to drinking the South American beverage Yerba Mate, which has become a staple of footballers from that continent in recent years at Liverpool.
“Yerba Mate drinkers experience a state of alert wakefulness similar to that of coffee, but for a much longer period of time and without coffee’s crash (i.e. payback time),” says Mission.co.uk. “It rarely interferes with sleep and doesn’t cause caffeine jitters. This makes it perfect to take before or during performance in the gym or at your desk, producing long lasting, sustained energy.”
While the likes of Lucas Leiva and Luis Suarez put the brew on the Merseyside map in the last 10 years, it has been a tradition continued by Alisson Becker, Darwin Nunez and more recently Mac Allister.
And now it seems Liverpool can add Hungary captain Dominik Szoboszlai to their list of Mate drinkers going off a comment from Mac Allister on Szoboszlai’s Instagram.
After Szoboszlai posted a picture of his celebration of Wednesday’s wonder-goal, Mac Allister offered a simple “keep drinking mate” alongside the apparent emoji for the South American ‘super-brew’ as a small piece of advice. Maybe the entire team should start drinking it?
Klopp furious at Tsimikas decision
But it wouldn’t be a ‘moments missed’ without the spotting of some Jurgen Klopp frustration and this time it came midway through the first half with his Liverpool team trailing.
As the two teams battled for possession near the halfway line, Klopp was left incensed at the decision not to award Kostas Tsimikas a foul after the Greek left-back was caught in the face and left in a heap.
Klopp was clearly aggrieved at the call to allow play to continue and made it known to whoever was in the general vicinity as Leicester continued with an attack down the nearside by the managers’ technical areas.
The anger from the German was perhaps brought on by the fact Tsimikas had also wanted a foul earlier in the game after being caught in the build-up to Leicester’s opener. Fortunately for the Reds manager, this attack on 25 minutes came to little.