Liverpool drub Sparta to reach Europa last eight
LIVERPOOL, ENGLAND (AP):
MOHAMED SALAH scored one goal and set up three to help Liverpool demolish Sparta Prague 6-1 and march into the Europa League quarter-finals yesterday.
After winning 5-1 the opening leg of their last 16 tie in Prague, Liverpool scored four in the opening 14 minutes at Anfield to advance on a massive 11-2 aggregate score.
Sparta had no answer to Liverpool’s high pressure.
Salah seized the ball on the right of the area before shooting inside the far post over Sparta goalkeeper Peter Vindahl for his 20th goal of the season, becoming the first Liverpool player to score at least 20 goals in seven straight seasons.
Salah, who injured his hamstring with Egypt at the Africa Cup of Nations in January, started after having been used as a substitute in both the first leg in Prague and a 1-1 draw with Manchester City on Sunday.
Darwin Nunez opened the rout with a clinical low finish seven minutes into the game, after scoring two in Prague.
A minute later, Salah won the ball on the edge of the box to feed 19-year-old Bobby Clark to score his first senior goal for Liverpool to jump 2-0 up.
Salah then scored before finding Cody Gakpo with a cross to make it 4-0.
Dominik Szoboszlai made it 5-1 in the second half with a deflected shot before Gakpo added his second.
Veljko Birmančević had the lone goal for Sparta.
In Germany, Patrik Schick came off the bench against 10-man Qarabag to score two goals in stoppage time to complete Leverkusen’s 3-2 comeback win and secure a quarter-final spot for the Bundesliga leaders.
In a dramatic second half, Abdellah Zoubir and Juninho gave the visitors a 2-0 advantage before Jeremie Frimpong started the comeback.
Leverkusen made the quarters 5-4 on aggregate to extend its unbeaten streak to 37 games across all competitions this season - a German record.
Qarabag’s Elvin Jafarguliyev received a red card in the 62nd when his team was leading 1-0.
AC Milan cruised past 10-man Slavia Prague 3-1 to reach the quarter-finals. Milan advanced 7-3 on aggregate after winning the first leg of the last 16 tie 4-2 at San Siro a week ago.
The seven-time European champions have never won the second-tier Europa League or its predecessor, the UEFA Cup.
Christian Pulisic, Ruben LoftusCheek and Rafael Leão put the result in the second leg beyond doubt with first-half goals in Prague.
Selected results: West Ham 5 Freiburg 0 (aggregate 6-1); Atalanta 2 Sporting 1 (3-2); Brighton 1 Roma 0 (1-4); Villarreal 3 Marseille 1 (3-5).