Fenerbahce Beat Liverpool 3-2 as Set Pieces Hurt Iraola's Side
Liverpool went to Istanbul with a 100% Champions League record and came home with a 3-2 defeat. They led twice, and all three Fenerbahce goals came from dead balls.
Three goals from dead balls
Fenerbahce scored from a free-kick, from a corner and from a long throw-in. Head coach Andoni Iraola was blunt about it afterwards. "Cheap goals, messy goals," he said.
He said the club knew set pieces were a Fenerbahce strength. Liverpool had handled them well this season and had worked on them since pre-season, but they cost the team on the night. The last goal, he allowed, may have come because Fenerbahce are strong and tall. The other two, in his words, Liverpool had to control better.
The free-kick came after Dominik Szoboszlai was penalised for a foul on N'Golo Kante. Mason Greenwood's effort took a huge deflection off Jeremy Jacquet's stomach and sailed past Alisson. The Liverpool keeper showed his anger that Jacquet had turned away from the kick, which left a costly hole in the wall.
The corner led to the second equaliser. Kante swept a cross in, Gakpo tried to head it clear and only glanced it away from Alisson, and Archie Brown had a simple tap-in at the back post.
For the winner, Brown looped a cross into the Liverpool box. Vedat Muriqi, on as a second-half replacement for Romelu Lukaku, held off Jacquet, Alexis Mac Allister and Trey Nyoni and headed into the bottom corner.
Twice in front
Nyoni gave Liverpool the lead with a low volley, the first goal of his career at the highest level. Ngumoha ran at the defence and shot, the block fell to Szoboszlai, and his cross was cleared by Brown, pressed by Van Dijk, but only as far as Nyoni. A slight deflection off Kojo Peprah Oppong helped the ball beyond Ederson.
The second lead came after the break. Substitutes Cody Gakpo and Alexander Isak had been on the pitch for three minutes when Isak headed in Gakpo's cross from the left.
Fenerbahce answered quickly each time. The second half mirrored the first: Liverpool in control until they scored, then a reaction from the Turkish side.
Noise and judgement calls
Turkish supporters whistled whenever Liverpool had the ball. Liverpool tried to take the sting out of the atmosphere by keeping possession. Iraola said the noise got in the way of the team's talk. "In the stadium it was almost impossible to communicate," he said.
Referee Clement Turpin was lenient with both sides. Neither he nor the video assistant referee gave a penalty when Greenwood was pushed over by Kostas Tsimikas. Kante was not booked for leaping on Ngumoha's back to halt a promising run.
Open questions at the back
This was Liverpool's second successive defeat, after the loss to Arsenal on Sunday. That loss left Iraola exasperated for different reasons. This time the blame was found only in his own team.
Ronald Araujo was on the bench, which accounts for some of the weakness in defence but not every fault. Liverpool had long spells of control, even with Bradley Barcola leading the line as the central striker. The result opened Dirk Kuyt's interim spell at Fenerbahce.
Source: The Guardian