Another narrow 2-1 victory came the path of Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool FC, as it was Diogo Jota again whose goal sealed all three points for the defending champions upon West Ham United’s visit to Anfield.
Despite going behind in the opening third of the game, the Reds held out against a well-stocked defensive unit of the Hammers and left it late to clinch an important win going up against an in-form opposition.
TEAM NEWS
With the Reds finding themselves in an injury-plagued period to first-team regulars in the centre-back spot, Nathan Phillips was called upon by Jurgen Klopp to fill in for the recently injured Fabinho.
Curtis Jones was handed a second start of the new season in the midfield alongside Henderson and Wijnaldum, as Trent Alexander Arnold made his 100th Premier League appearance for Liverpool FC.
MATCH PROCEEDINGS
It was Liverpool FC who had to hold out a fiery looking West Ham United frontline in the opening minutes of the game, as Nat Phillips was involved in a number of on-the-ball tussles with the opposition attackers, most notably Sebastian Haller.
The Reds debutant showed impressive quality in dealing with Haller in a couple of ariel duels and showed great composure in his ball distribution from the back.
However, Joe Gomez’s attempted headed clearance being way off his usual standards, came back to punish the hosts as the in-form Pablo Fornals collected the ball and struck a low driving finish past the helpless Alisson Becker.
With West Ham United’s opening goal, the Reds carried on their recent trend of going behind to opposition sides, despite accounting for a much greater share of possession on the pitch.
David Moyes’ men maintained a well-disciplined defensive unit to keep the Liverpool FC front trio at bay over the course of the first half, but a clever play from Mohammad Salah allowed him to set up Jordan Henderson, whose first-time finish was just wide from the Hammers goal.
Liverpool FC looked geared up to turn the tide of the game back into their favour, as an ambitious volleyed effort by Andy Roberton was not too shabby a chance to level the scoreline, with a great link-up between Firmino and Mane allowing the left-back to dart forward with a chance to score.
As the opening 45 minutes at Anfield neared its end, West Ham’s Masuaku brought down Salah in the penalty box with a lunging challenge, and the referee wasted no time in awarding Jurgen Klopp’s side a spot-kick.
Salah stepped up and duly converted the resulting spot-kick, and putting his side back in the game with another half to play for against the Hammers.
A moment of great defensive awareness by Roberton allowed the Scotsman to block Fornal’s attempt on goal after the Spaniard had got clear from the Liverpool FC backline.
The Liverpool FC full-back again found himself in action, however, this time on the other end of the pitch when he latched on to a fantastic defence-splitting pass from Jordan Henderson and sought to trouble Łukasz Fabiański, only for the West Ham United No.1 to thwart his effort on goal.
Klopp’s men now had renewed energy while going forward, which was further given a boost upon the duo of Diogo Jota and Xherdan Shaqiri being brought off the bench in the place of Firmino and Curtis Jones.
Jota, as the new Liverpool FC man has done so often in recent weeks, found the back of the net merely minutes after his introduction on the pitch, but VAR again turned a villain for the Premier League champions as Sadio Mane’s foul in the buildup to the goal disallowed Jota’s strike.
Sheffield United ⚽️
Midtjylland ⚽️
West Ham ⚽️Not a bad week for Diogo 🤩 pic.twitter.com/BlWXVCwVfE
— Liverpool FC (@LFC) October 31, 2020
But the 23-year-old Portuguese international looked in no mood to dampen his spirits following the earlier incident as Shaqiri’s visionary pass through the Hammers’ backline was followed up with a cool finish past Fabiański from Jota, putting Liverpool FC 2-1 ahead with just five more minutes of normal time remaining on the clock.
The Reds’ saw out the match, despite the Hammers’ being given a minor respite of an additional five minutes as stoppage time, and go on top of the Premier League standings, leapfrogging Everton into first place, with the Toffees set to play Newcastle United on Sunday.
