Origi adds final flourish to Liverpool Show of depth
Is Belgian striker’s scorpion kick the cheekiest goal of the season?
Jurgen Klopp may have never placed great store in the League Cup, despite Liverpool’s proud history in the competition, but goals from Takumi Minamino and Divock Origi at Deepdale last night were enough finally to kill off Preston and help carry his team through to its quarter-finals.
The Japan international finally broke through a dogged home backline after 62 minutes and Origi sent the large travelling contingent home with a goal to remember.
He scored with an audacious overhead back-heel after Kostas Tsimikas’s cross had struck the bar and Neco Williams’s shot had been deflected into the air via a defender.
But it was the Japan international’s opening goal, his fifth in his past five EFL Cup appearances, that finally broke Preston’s resistance, just seconds after Adrian had saved a volley from Tom Barkhuizen.
“Takumi is high quality,” Klopp said. “There’s no problem for him, apart from the other players in his position who are really, really good and, thankfully for us, not injured.
“Takumi is in an outstanding moment, training well, and tonight he was the most dangerous player out there and he really understands our game as well. Divock’s goal was just Divock Origi!”
Origi, like Minamino, has made the Carabao Cup a competition for personal target practice, with 11 goals now in 10 ties, although, like his partner last night, first-team opportunities look severely limited unless Klopp maintains his policy of using shadow teams in the cup.
Klopp had, predictably, changed his entire line-up from the one that swept to that spectacular Old Trafford victory on Sunday.
It is part of his understandable selection policy in domestic cup competitions and one of the reasons why, apart from an EFL Cup final defeat to Manchester City in his first season, he has never come close to winning one. Now in the quarterfinals, Wembley is just two victories away for a club who have won the League Cup eight times.
However, Klopp would not be drawn on whether he would start integrating more frontline players into the team for the latter stages of the competition.
“It depends on the specific situations,” he said. “Obviously I don’t think we could have lined up any differently tonight, but we have to see. I really don’t make those decisions two or three weeks before we play the next round.”
By the Liverpool manager’s admission, his team of unfamiliar youngsters and fringe seniors did not play particularly well, and could have been trailing long before their opening goal.
Preston manager Frankie Mcavoy, with an eye on his team’s lowly Championship position and an important game with Luton looming, had made nine changes of his own. But, having weathered early Liverpool pressure, Ryan Ledson then volleyed over from the edge of the area after a neat, headed assist from Brad Potts to signal a change in the game’s momentum.
Preston missed the best chance of the night so far at the 26-minute mark after Sean Maguire’s superblytimed through ball played Potts clear. The midfielder raced away before unleashing a shot from the edge of the area which Adrian, rather unconvincingly, pushed away from his goal two-handed.
Three minutes later, Preston were even more wasteful after Joe Gomez gave the ball away cheaply in his own half, sparking an attack which should have seen Maguire convert from close range from Ali Mccann’s cross, only for Adrian to block brilliantly.
The rebound fell to Ledson, whose effort was similarly blocked by Williams, before Potts ballooned a third chance over from the resulting ricochet.
“It smashed me in the mouth and I didn’t remember much,” Williams said. “I was there on the line and I thought I would have a good chance of blocking it. Luckily it has smashed me in the face and stopped a goal.”
Klopp allowed Williams to play further upfield after the interval, after bringing on yet another teenager in Conor Bradley, paving the way for a much-improved second half from the Premier League side.
Alex Oxlade-chamberlain set the tone, the midfielder exchanging passes with Jones, before turning and sending a violent shot flying just off target. After the opening goal,
Jones himself then came close with a long-range shot that was gathered by Declan Rudd.
“The best opportunities fell to us in the first half; they are big moments and you have to take them,” Mcavoy said.
“If you don’t take them. You see
the difference when Liverpool get an opportunity. But I cannot fault the desire and commitment, everything the players gave. Unfortunately we were done by a top team.”
Preston (3-4-1-2) Rudd 7; van den Berg 6, Lindsay 7, Hughes 6; Rafferty 6, Mccann 8 (Johnson 79), Ledson 7