SWEPTASIDE BY A RED TIDE
Jota and Mane pounce for Liverpool as Atletico are made to suffer after Felipe’s crazy dismissal
LIVERPOOL 2 Jota 13, Mane 21
AT MADRID 0
ATLETICO Madrid and Diego Simeone will take a sense of injustice away from Anfield. His team do not usually need an excuse and the first-half sendingoff of their Brazilian defender Felipe was frankly as bizarre as anything we’ve witnessed on a football field for quite some time.
His trip on Sadio Mane ten minutes before half-time was a yellow-card offence at best.
Instead Dutch referee Danny Makkelie, after some delay and considerations, sent him off. A police inspector from Rotterdam, heaven knows what Makkelie does when he sees a double-parked car.
The truth is, though, that Atletico looked well out of this game by the time Felipe walked.
Yes, Liverpool had conceded a two-goal lead when these teams met in Spain last month before eventually winning 3-2.
Here, though, that never looked likely. Jurgen Klopp’s 2019 European champions have a spirit and lustre about them this season in their favourite competition.
A fourth straight win that qualifies them two games early for the last 16 looked assured once Diogo Jota and Mane blew them into another early lead at a raucous Anfield.
Addressing the fact his team could have scored more, Klopp told BT Sport: ‘People want to see more goals but we did create more chances. I think the game was nearly perfect.
‘We scored the goals in the right moments. They (Atletico) were much more on the front foot with how they started than the home game but we started well. They were fantastic finishes as well, especially Sadio Mane.
‘With the red card, well, you don’t like that, you don’t want to play against ten men but in the end it’s 2-0 and it was a great night.
‘The referee was (in control) but I really hate the moment when I had to take off Sadio Mane. You could see that every challenge in the air, you don’t know what could happen. I didn’t like it but, in the end, you have to do it.
‘You earn a lot of money to win Champions League games! The first target was to get through this group.
‘But we did it with two games to go. What can we do? We will have to see. I didn’t expect we would be through after four games but the boys did it and it’s really well deserved.’
Liverpool were not at their most clinical and Atletico have a doughty keeper in Jan Oblak of
Slovenia. Even so, the weight of Liverpool’s possession and chances — both before and after the red card — was such that a greater margin seemed inevitable.
Not that they will worry. Liverpool are into the knockout stages as group winners and that is saying something given the other two teams — AC Milan and Porto — sit joint top of their domestic leagues.
Atletico may argue they would have won last month’s game had it not been for the sending-off of Antoine Griezmann with the score at 2-2. They were the better team at that moment, certainly.
Here, Simeone’s team were already in a whole load of trouble well before Felipe’s strange dismissal.
Aware that an early passage to the next stage was on the table, Liverpool were not at full strength but very much at full throttle.
Atletico were busy initially. Liverpool’s former striker Luis Suarez — sadly booed by a home crowd that would appear to have forgotten all he did here — carried a sense of lurking mischief as his team looked to find space in wide areas.
It did not seem inconceivable they would find a way through but before that could happen, Liverpool struck twice to change the whole mood of the game.
In Madrid two weeks ago, Liverpool’s early goals arrived in the eighth and 13th minutes. Here, they had to wait a little longer but the blows were felt just as deeply by the Spanish team.
Jota was first to prosper just before the quarter-hour. Trent Alexander-Arnold’s cross from the right was good, but Jota’s movement was key, the Portuguese outwitting three defenders to head in from six yards.
Liverpool were finding progressive passage down the right and it was from there that goal number two arrived.
Mane started the move, muscling a defender out of the way before funnelling the ball to Jordan Henderson in a central area. The captain was then able to feed Alexander-Arnold and his low cross-shot was anticipated by Mane and rammed home.
After the events of the first game, Liverpool knew better than to presume their work was done. They could have stretched the lead as Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain whipped a shot wide and then Mo Salah shot when he really should have played Jota in through the middle.
Then came madness. Felipe’s trip on Mane in the 36th minute was