NOW FOR THE TITLE!
Klopp’s Liverpool are kings of Europe and champions of the world...
title they really want, of course, is the one they used to claim as a matter of routine and have rea- sons to believe might actually be Anfield’s once more, after 30 long years. But ‘champions of the world’ is an achievement which will more than do for now. It is an outcome you have to feel will fuel their drive for domestic supremacy.
A winning mentality indeed. Liverpool become the first club to hold the Champions League, Super Cup and the Club World Cup. Yet it was a fight beyond anything the Premier League has thrown at them this season: a difficult, frustrating, attritional night against a steely Flamengo side operating to the relentless drumbeat of their rumbustious supporters.
Despite Jurgen Klopp’s side dominating and playing the better football, the game was in its 86th minute before they had a shot on target.
And then, after 99 minutes, the breakthrough. Liverpool’s first ever goal in a final of this competition — that’s 369 minutes of football in all — and though Roberto Firmino will take the plaudits today, it should be said that its architect, Jordan Henderson, had been delivering through the eye of a needle all night. A slip from Pablo Mari, the Brazilian full-back, allowed Henderson’s pass to travel forward through open space to Sadio Mane, who turned and laid back a ball which Firmino showed the composure to take across the retreating Mari to score.
This fixture was nothing like this the last time the two sides played. Zico has always remembered Flamengo’s 1981 win over Bob Paisley’s side being the only outcome the Brazilian team could ever foresee. ‘We knew we would win. Yes they had conquered Europe, but failing did not come into our heads,’ he said a few years back.
But it was a different kind of Liverpool this time; a team led by a manager whose imagination for what this trophy might represent has transmitted such a powerful image of the club to a world audience more captivated by this trophy than British fans.
To hear Klopp speak on Friday of the Apollo II mission — ‘something that has never been done before, like landing on the moon’ — was to appreciate what he brings. The balance of power in football has shifted since that December day in Tokyo. Liverpool were the showmen this time. In their best moments, they commanded the pitch with a pace of football which seemed entirely alien to the Brazilian team,
It was a game in which Mo Salah and Firmino proved a clear and constant danger, yet two criminal misses in the first five minutes began to look as if they would be very costly indeed as the night wore on.
They would certainly have scrambled the minds of more fragile sides. Both chances exposed Flamengo’s vulnerability to a ball played at pace. But after Firmino took down Trent AlexanderArnold’s 30-yard pass from deep on his chest, he despatched a half volley over the bar.
Henderson’s own imperious long ball over the top to Salah seemed to have unlocked another chance immediately when the Egyptian shrugged off defenders and laid back into space but Naby Keita, struggling to make an impression all night, fired over.
The Brazilians did find greater possession as the first half wore on, yet Fabinho, the right back, looked overwhelmed. There was occasional opportunism from Flamengo — they twice exploited Alisson’s attempts to clear to fashion chances for the lively forward Bruno Henrique — but no material danger.
It didn’t help Liverpool’s attempt to put this game away that Mane struggled for so long to make an impression. The frustration was clear in the first half’s dying moments when the Senegalese was held back by Fabinho at the outset of a counter attack late in the first half, wrestled the defender to the ground and was booked. It was a dubious decision. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain’s departure on 75 minutes, clutching his right leg after it was caught by Everton Ribeiro, was also damaging. He was on crutches later. Gabriel Barbosa managed to shoot from under Virgil van Dijk’s attentions, drawing a fine save from Alisson diving to his right. But Salah fastened on to a sharp Alexander-Arnold cross to the near post to fire narrowly wide and it began to look as if Liverpool might fashion another of the late winners which have proved their indefati
gability. Henderson latched on to Salah’s lay-back and unravelled a right-foot shot from 20 yards which Diego Alves touched over.
A penalty was given but then overruled — correctly so — by VAR. Mane, sent through by Henderson, was fouled by Fabinho as he struck a right-foot shot on the white line of the area, not inside it. In the ensuing chaos, the referee rescinded a yellow card.
But with the spirit which has come to define this side, Liverpool required nine minutes of extratime to make the breakthrough.
Salah then curled a shot from the edge of the box which came close to wrapping up the night, though it was a measure of the ask that substitute Lincoln shot over when he could have equalised at the death.
‘I think it’s time for me and you to take over the world,’ stated one of the Liverpool banners last night, a line from The Courteeners. Now for the Premier League.
LIVERPOOL (4-3-3): Alisson 7; Alexander-Arnold 6.5, Gomez 6.5, Van Dijk 7.5, Robertson 6; Oxlade-Chamberlain 6.5 (Lallana 76min, 6), Henderson 8, Keita 5.5 (Miner 100); Salah 6.5 (Shaqiri 120), Firmino 7 (Origi 105), Mane 6.
Booked: Milner, Salah, Firmino, Mane. Subs (not used): Wijnaldum, Adrian, Lonergan, Jones, Hoever, Elliott, Van den Berg, Williams.
FLamengo (4-2-3-1): Diego Alves 7; Rafinha 5.5, Caio 7, Mari 7.5, Luis 5.5; Arao 6.5, Arrascaeta 6 (Coelho Santos 77); Gerson 6 (Correa dos Santos 102), Everton 6.5 (Diego 82), Henrique 7; Barbosa 6.5. Booked:
Coelho Santos, Ribas da Cunha. Subs (not used): De Almeida, Rodrigues Martins, Carvalho, Batista de Souza, Piris da Motta, Soares Thuler, Berrio, Dutra, Dini Gaioto.
referee: A Al Jassim (Qatar) 7.