Liverpool 4 - 1 Leicester

Liverpool 4 - 1 Leicester

Happy homecoming for Liverpool as Roberto Firmino double sinks Leicester

Home team scorers
Roberto Firmino 13
Sadio Mane 31
Adam Lallana 56
Roberto Firmino 89

Away team scorers
Jamie Vardy 38

Anfield is open for business. After all the hype surrounding the new £114m main stand at Anfield it was always dependent on Liverpool’s players to follow Jürgen Klopp’s instruction and “fill it with life”. They duly obliged, filling it with goals, quality and hope as Leicester City were condemned to a comprehensive defeat.

For the Premier League champions it was an inauspicious start to a week in which they make their debut on the Champions League stage against Club Brugge. Claudio Ranieri’s side were made to appear pedestrian at times by the quick thinking of Daniel Sturridge, Robert Firmino and Adam Lallana and the quick feet of Sadio Mané. Liverpool’s superiority over last season’s champions was reflected in the excellence of two Firmino finishes, a superb team goal from Mané and an emphatic strike by Lallana.

Initial impressions of the new main stand at Anfield were positive – particularly in terms of noise, view and space – yet of an incident-packed contest they proved misleading. Klopp’s squad may have trained at their refurbished home on Thursday but it was Leicester who made the more confident, purposeful start. Liverpool were initially encamped in their own half and careless in possession, with the exception of the assured Georginio Wijnaldum, one of three home debutants. Then they clicked and sliced apart the champions with an exhibition of movement, accuracy and vision. Ranieri cut a perplexed figure on the sideline.

Firmino claimed Liverpool’s first goal of the campaign at home after an intelligent run and finish, though the contribution of Sturridge, arguably only playing because of Philippe Coutinho’s international exertions for Brazil, was not lost on Anfield’s largest attendance since 1977. The England international tracked back diligently to halt a Leicester attack and took the safe option of a pass back to Simon Mignolet. Lucas Leiva, deputising for Dejan Lovren, who picked up a monstrous shiner after a clash of heads in training this week, found James Milner on the left and that was the signal for Firmino to lose Daniel Amartey with a piercing run through the middle. Milner delivered on cue, the Brazilian cut inside Robert Huth and beat Kasper Schmeichel with a reverse finish. The mood and flow of the game were transformed.

Sturridge almost made it two when Mané exchanged passes with Lallana and teed up the striker for a close-range effort that Schmeichel saved well. The Dane was powerless, however, to prevent Sturridge and Mané combining once more to double Liverpool’s advantage with a superb team goal. Lucas, Firmino and Jordan Henderson were all involved as the Liverpool captain sent Sturridge sprinting clear with a measured chip over the top. The striker’s control was excellent, his second touch even better as he back-heeled inside for the unmarked Mané to scoop the ball over the Leicester goalkeeper’s despairing grasp and slowly down over the line.

Anfield audibly purred over the comfortable lead but was soon left aghast by not one but two errors from their makeshift centre-half Lucas. Collecting a routine goal-kick from Mignolet, the Brazilian invited danger with a careless touch that almost let in Shinji Okazaki. His attempts to clear merely compounded the error as Lucas prodded the ball straight to the unmarked Jamie Vardy, who converted the gift into an empty goal. Leicester went close to an equaliser when Mignolet missed a long throw by Luis Hernández, a replacement for the hamstrung Danny Simpson, and Huth’s looping header landed on the top of the Liverpool bar.

Ranieri tried to sharpen his attack for the second half with the introduction of Ahmed Musa, the £17m summer signing from CSKA Moscow, but his defence remained static against Liverpool’s tireless and tricky front three. The home side posed a threat with every foray and restored their two-goal advantage when Lallana struck the 100th goal of Klopp’s Liverpool reign. It was another memorable moment for England’s saviour in Slovakia and a player whose reputation is growing in the eyes of the Kop. Sturridge was again involved, picking out Wijnaldum’s darting run into the penalty area. The £25m midfielder laid the ball square for Lallana, who drove an unstoppable drive into Schmeichel’s top corner and left the keeper, not for the first time, berating his ponderous defenders.

The champions responded well, in fairness. There was a bizarre moment when, with the Kop singing his name, Klopp reacted furiously to the tribute and pointed to his watch to say the serenading was premature. He had a point, albeit an ungrateful one, as Vardy escaped behind the Liverpool defence only to be denied by the legs of Mignolet. Danny Drinkwater also went close on the volley from a Riyad Mahrez corner.

Henderson was guilty of a glaring miss at the opposite end following neat play down the left by Firmino and Lallana before Mané’s pace exposed Leicester once again. Released by his captain, the former Southampton striker easily evaded a needless lunge by Schmeichel to sprint goalwards and invite Firmino to seal victory with a nonchalant finish.

Guardian