Origi the supersub bites brave Wolves
Liverpool’s cult hero strikes a dramatic late winner
LIVERPOOL have the best forward line in club football, even without Roberto Firmino in the team, so it seems rather unfair that they should have the best supersub to dig them out of trouble on the rare occasions they need him, too.
Divock Origi, a cult hero at Anfield, does not get many chances to play for Jurgen Klopp’s side but when he does, he shines as brightly as a shooting star.
Origi, the greatest supersub since David Fairclough trod the turf for Liverpool in the Seventies and Eighties, acts as the habitual understudy to Mo Salah, Sadio Mane, Firmino and Diogo Jota.
But he has scored critical late goals in the Merseyside derby, Liverpool’s astonishing Champions League semi-final comeback against Barcelona and the final itself, against Tottenham.
He veers from being the man that time forgot to the man of the hour. Yesterday, brought on as a second-half substitute for Jordan Henderson, he did it again.
For 94 minutes of an increasingly fractious game, Wolves withstood everything that Liverpool could throw at them. Conor Coady was inspirational at the heart of the home defence, played for most of the game with his ankle heavily strapped and made a miraculous and bizarre goal-line clearance from Jota when goalkeeper Jose Sa was stranded in no man’s land. And still he lost.
Liverpool had been denied time after time by a combination of their own profligacy and Wolves’ obstinacy but with the game deep in injury time, they produced a move of such quality that even the stingy Wolves defence, which had conceded only 12 goals all season, could not prevent Origi scoring and sending Liverpool to the top of the Premier League until they were supplanted a couple of hours later by Manchester City.
The move started with a brilliant, diagonal ball out of defence from Virgil van Dijk into the path of Salah on the right. Salah took the ball perfectly in his stride at full pelt and pulled it back from the byline to Origi, who was lurking in the six-yard box. The Belgian took a touch, turned to face goal and lashed his shot past Sa. After the match, Klopp praised Origi’s character and his skill.
‘I hope one day he finds a manager who plays him more than me,’ he said. ‘When you don’t score you just have to keep going and that’s what we did. Divock Origi, the legend, came and finished it off for us.’
Liverpool, so imperious in their derby victory over Everton last week, deserved the win for their pressure, Wolves deserved a point for their defiance.
But when the goal went in, the scale of the celebrations on the Liverpool bench made it clear how important they believed this victory was.
The first chance of any note came after 30 minutes when Wolves halfcleared a ball to the edge of their own area. Thiago was waiting for it as it dropped and he lobbed a cushioned volley into the path of Trent Alexander-Arnold, who had timed his run into the box perfectly.
The full-back took it first time and tried to volley it past Sa but the ball flew high over the crossbar.
Two minutes later, Liverpool came close again. This time, after clever work from Salah on the edge of the box, Alexander-Arnold drifted a cross to the back post. Jota rose above his marker and the crowd held its breath but the Portuguese steered his header just wide.
The Wolves fans jeered their former favourite lustily.
Liverpool’s attempts to score soon took a bizarre turn. An hour had gone when Jota and Romain Saiss gave chase to a long ball over the top of the Wolves defence. Saiss got ahead but as he was about to clear the ball, he collided with Sa, who had rushed out of his goal.
The ball fell to Jota near the right touchline and he raced towards goal with Sa stranded. Coady and Max Kilman retreated desperately to the goalline but as Jota got closer and closer, it seemed he was bound to score. When he was a few yards out, he lashed the ball towards the net but it hit Coady amidships and bounced to safety.
Coady was poleaxed, Jota was horrified and the crowd was exultant. No one could quite believe what had happened.
Adama Traore was being singled out for some rough treatment by Liverpool and both Fabinho and Andy Robertson were booked for challenges on him.
The tackling and the sense of resentment it fed in the crowd raised the temperature of the game and propelled Wolves deeper into the contest.
But then, as the clock ticked down, the ball fell to Origi and all Coady’s defiance was in vain.
Deflated Wolves boss Bruno Lage said: ‘We are disappointed. It’s hard to lose the point but, when you look at what we did, the fans and I should be proud of our players.’