Soccer
Arne Slot accepted Liverpool were second-best but praised his side for rising to an ‘unbelievable challenge’ and beating Paris Saint-Germain 1-0 in their Champions League last-16 first leg.
Substitute Harvey Elliott scored the winner with his first touch in the 87th minute of Wednesday’s game at Parc des Princes.
That secured an unlikely, yet crucial, victory from a contest that was dominated in large parts by PSG, who were thwarted in the main by a near-perfect performance from Alisson Becker, who made nine saves on the night.
The Reds now take a slender advantage into next Tuesday’s second leg, with Slot anticipating another stern test from Luis Enrique’s side at Anfield.
Read the head coach’s post-match reaction below.
On how he would sum up the game…
I think if we had a draw over here we would have already been lucky, that’s clear for everyone. I think they were the much better team today, especially in the first half, they had a lot of open chances – three or four big, big, big chances. In the second half they were still the better team, still had a lot of shots on target, but they were mainly from outside the box. But I knew before the game, and I saw again today, how much quality this team has and these individual players have.
So, all these shots from outside the box were with a certain speed that you only see with top players. We have them as well but you could see it with them as well [and] that’s why Alisson still had to make a lot of big saves. We were lucky in the first half that the goal [Khvicha Kvaratskhelia’s disallowed effort] was fractionally offside… and in the end, we were already in the game three, four or five times. I felt like, ‘We can hurt them in transition,’ but we didn’t. But we waited until the last moment and then we hurt them.
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On Elliott…
A big moment for him. I can understand that he is sometimes frustrated by the playing time he gets because he is a good player, he showed at Liverpool already that he is a good player, but he is in competition for players that I hardly take off. So, Dominik Szoboszlai is always the one that just keeps on going, he also scores goals but he’s so important for us with all the running he does. And yeah, Mo Salah I think is quite key for everyone as well. So, he has to do it with limited playing time but he just keeps on going.
I have to give him big compliments for that and also my staff because they keep working with him and every time come up with great exercises so he stays fit. But it wasn’t only Harvey, it was also the one who assisted, Darwin Nunez, who came from a difficult two games but was absolutely there again tonight because from the moment he came in we were more of a threat than before.
On what tonight tells him about the task ahead at Anfield…
It tells me that we are, of course, [with] a 1-0 win and if you have seen the game it is a very good result for us., But we also felt the quality of Paris Saint-Germain and I knew it before: 10 times in a row they scored goal after goal after goal [and have] incredible pace with the wingers. So, every underlying stat shows you that they are the best team in the Champions League – so, we in the league table won it but they were in the underlying stats the best team, so I wasn’t surprised they were so good. We’re definitely going to need our fans in a week’s time.
On whether PSG are the Reds’ best opponents so far this season and whether his team were ‘under par’ on the night…
No, no – we were not under par. It’s purely the quality of Paris Saint-Germain and the way they’ve played this whole season. I can say it one more time, all of the underlying stats show you that they were the best team in Europe until now – except for the league table, but they’ve had Arsenal, they’ve played Bayern Munich, they’ve played Atletico Madrid and they’ve played Manchester City and they still have the best underlying stats.
They showed today – and I already knew it but the players saw it today as well, and our fans and all of England – that Luis Enrique made an incredible team here after three [transfer] windows. So much pace, so much work-rate, so much quality in the midfield, how they handle the ball. So, it was an unbelievable challenge for us to get away here with a result and we know it’s going to be a hard one in a week.
On whether he made any tactical changes during the game…
We changed a bit the way we pressed in the second half compared to the first half. In the first half they had three or four open chances, so one-on-ones and a cut-back cross that just went over the bar. [There was the] moment they went one-on-one and the ball came back and then two or three chances in a row. In the first half it was almost a miracle that it was 0-0.
The second half, it was more due to their quality that they could create chances because all of their shots were outside of the box, but these players – I’ve said it already and our players have the same – if they get shots from 18 or 20 yards it is still half a chance because they can hit it so hard. That’s why I think you saw two teams that have dominated their leagues – them in France, us in England – playing against each other with so much quality in the game. But they were by far the better team in ball possession than us.
On Trent Alexander-Arnold’s defensive performance…
I see the same thing during the season many more times. There have been games – I think City away was one of them – where he was outplayed a few times but we didn’t concede that many big chances against City, so sometimes stats are not telling you the truth. If he goes past someone in the width of the pitch, it doesn’t tell you that he’s outplayed. The stats that do matter, I just already said a few times, are clear that Paris Saint-Germain are this season incredible in Europe and in their league. Trent, in the first half, one or two times had some difficulties but in general he defended really well, especially also in the second half.
On which team will go into the second leg with more confidence…
If you look at the result, we come away here really positive but if you look at the performance then they are two different things. I think Paris Saint-Germain take a lot of positives towards the game we are going to play in a week. But I can tell you, they’re not only going to play against us, they are also going to play against our fans – and we really need them. Not only next Tuesday, but we need our fans on Saturday against Southampton as well. Like you might know, we don’t have a winter break in England so we just keep on playing for months already and these players are definitely going to need the help of our fans to show up two times as they did in the last few months.
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Read MoreDiego Fetzer