Liverpool made it two wins from two in the UEFA Champions League by bringing up a historic milestone, but were left facing an anxious wait after Fabinho suffered a hamstring injury.
With Liverpool’s vaunted front three all handed a rare rest, expectations were high of seeing breakout performances from their stand-ins.
It was Midtjylland who threatened the break the deadlock first, however, with a simple lofted through ball splitting The Reds’ defence wide open.
Anders Dreyer raced away on goal, but Alisson Becker stood tall to force the forward wide before making a smart save.
Liverpool quickly took a stranglehold on posession in the clash, but chances in the final third were proving difficult to come by.
A flowing run by Trent Alexander-Arnold left several Midtjylland defenders in his wake, but his final pass to the unmarked Takumi Minamino was superbly cut out to prevent an almost certain goal.
With the game not going as Liverpool would have hoped, a further spanner was thrown in to the works when emergency centre-half Fabinho succumbed to injury.
Worrying times for Liverpool, as Fabinho goes off through injury…
pic.twitter.com/hfjJIDffmB
— Football on BT Sport (@btsportfootball) October 27, 2020
Liverpool took no chances with what was predicted to be a hamstring injury, with Rhys Williams brought on to replace the Brazilian.
As half-time neared, Alexander-Arnold’s sublime driven cross found Minamino, but the Japanese forward’s glancig header failed to find the target as the sides wet into the break locked at 0-0.
See how all the action unfolded via the TEAMtalk score centre here.
Liverpool finally sparked into life after the break, and took the lead through a superb piece of movement from the vibrant Alexander-Arnold.
The right-back played a neat one-two with Xherdan Shaqiri to ghost in behind the line, before squaring to Diogo Jota to tap home from iside the six-yard box.
The goal was the 10,000th in the club’s illustrious history, and was a delightful team goal deserving of such a milestone.
The
,0⃣0⃣0⃣ th goal in Reds history, netted by @DiogoJota18
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— Liverpool FC (@LFC) October 27, 2020
Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane were introduced from the bench, but it was their Danish opponents who looked likelier to score the game’s next goal.
Substitute Evander put Liverpool hearts in mouths after his low effort drifted narrowly wide as an increasingly exacerbated Klopp brought Roberto Firmino on for added control.
If his introduction was with a view to calming nerves, it had the opposite effect after the Brazilian missed a glorious chance to settle the tie after more fine work down the right from Alexander-Arnold.
Despite their best efforts, Midtjylland could not find the the killer pass, and were finally punished when Mohamed Salah converted a late penalty that he himself won.
Liverpool emerged 2-0 victors and took a firmer grasp on control of their Champions League group after making it two wins from two.
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Steve Pearson
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