The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Salah shines in rout of Roma
Egyptian star scores twice as Liverpool take control
Mohamed Salah savaged his former side Roma with a brilliant individual performance in a superb Champions League semi-final first-leg victory undermined by two late goals for the visitors.
The Egypt international was the star of the show as Serie A’s third-placed team were put to the sword.
However, Roma showed they are still a threat with a late rally which may yet give Jurgen Klopp’s side a nervous 90 minutes at the Stadio Olimpico next week.
Klopp had predicted Salah would face a rough time against the side he left in the summer but, in truth, none of his former team-mates could do anything to stop him.
He scored two brilliant first-half goals – his 42nd and 43rd of an incredible season – with two also for Roberto Firmino and Sadio Mane on target as well as Liverpool made the most of their first Champions League semi-final in a decade.
The downside were goals from Edin Dzeko and Diego Perotti and a knee injury to Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, who left the pitch on a stretcher with his head in his hands and his knee in a brace to put his World Cup in some doubt.
Klopp said: “It was a perfect performance for pretty much 80 minutes or so, then we made one defensive mistake and Dzeko made the most of the situation.
“That’s the rules of the competition, each goal you score helps massively.
“I think we agree the penalty wasn’t even a penalty, it’s not even handball, but that’s the situation and now it’s 5-2.
“I would be much more happy if we had won 5-0 or 5-1 but 5-2 is still a fantastic result.
“I could not even have imagined that was possible, so the boys still did outstandingly good and we go there and try to win again, that’s it.”
Roma almost silenced Anfield when goalkeeper Loris Karius misread the flight of former Manchester City defender Aleksandar Kolarov’s driven shot but managed to get enough of a hand on it to divert it on to the crossbar.
But it was not long before the hosts had one of those passages of play which has become familiar this season.
They blew away City in the quarterfinal with three goals in 19 first-half minutes and they could have put this tie beyond the visitors in the final 17 minutes before the interval.
Mane could have had a hat-trick, hitting two good chances over and
having a sliding effort disallowed for offside, while Alisson palmed away a Salah shot. Roma did not heed the warning and a few minutes later Salah placed a curling shot in the only spot the keeper could not reach it.
It was a goal befitting of the occasion but Salah’s second in first-half added time was equally brilliant.
His exquisite lay-off to Firmino saw the Brazilian storm through midfield before playing a return pass which Salah took one touch to control before dinking over Alisson.
After the break Salah turned provider, racing on to Trent Alexander-Arnold’s ball down the line to cross for Mane to turn home from close range.
When Alexander-Arnold and Salah combined again, Firmino was the beneficiary from a couple of yards out.
Firmino’s header from a corner made it 5-0 but Dzeko’s neat finish and a Perotti penalty after James Milner was ruled to have handled gave Roma hope of repeating their brilliant quarter-final comeback at home to Barcelona when they overturned a 4-1 first leg deficit.