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Liverpool vs Napoli, Champions League: live score and latest updates
Liverpool's bid for at least one midweek off in December was scuppered by Napoli as the Italians gained a measure of revenge for their Anfield exit a year ago.
The spirit of Jurgen Klopp's side was in evidence again as Dejan Lovren's equaliser secured a 1-1 draw. Dries Mertens had earlier threatened to ensure Carlo Ancelotti became the first visiting coach to win at Anfield in Europe since Klopp's appointment.
But the draw is not enough to erase Salzburg's chances of sending Liverpool into the Europa League next month. The Austrians will prepare for the biggest night in their history after giving Klopp's side a fright on Merseyside earlier in the competition.
There was much to admire about Ancelotti's side as they avoided the barrage expected following Lovren's 65th minute header. It never materialised when it seemed another late winner would come for Klopp's side, especially as lively substitute Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain led the charge.
Liverpool were seeking the victory not only to guarantee top spot, but also give their coach the luxury of making wholesale changes for the final game of the group. There is no prospect of that now. Napoli will meet the whipping boys of the group, Genk, while Liverpool must ensure they do not become part of a rival's European history. It was a headache Klopp could do without although he will keep perspective with his side still only needing a draw.
There was a three minute spell when an anxious hush fell upon Anfield, the likes of which Klopp may never have heard in this stadium before - certainly not on a European night.
Virgil Van Dijk was lying in agony in the centre-circle, his team mates urging medical staff to come to his attention.
Only three minute earlier Fabinho - the imperious centre midfielder who has probably been Liverpool’s player of the season so far - had departed after requiring similarly lengthy treatment on his ankle.
Around them, Mohamed Salah had been hunting without much joy for his confidence, first touch and goal compass; Andy Robertson kept giving the ball away when trying to send Sadio Mane down the left wing; and Joe Gomez, preferred to Trent Alexander-Arnold, was struggling to replicate the crossing ability of the man he replaced.
Of more pertinence, as Van Dijk was treated, the Napoli players were celebrating a goal by Dries Mertens, who had taken advantage of the space vacated by the centre-half to pounce on Giovanni Di Lorenzo’s pass and beat Alisson from a tight angle.
The Kop silently awaited two verdicts. The first, courtesy of VAR, was negative. The TV pictures declared a valid goal despite the initial appearance of a foul and then an offside.
The second bulletin about Van Dijk was received more enthusiastically, as he dusted himself down and tried to lead the charge back into the game. For those moments in the 21st minute, Liverpool were not only considering the implication of their Champions League group potentially heading to a final game shoot-out in Austria, but their domestic ambitions.
To lose one influential player ahead of the most hectic schedule of the campaign would have been considered an accident, two downright careless.
It was a reminder of the jeopardy in this fixture for Liverpool. Group E had a comfortable look prior to kick-off, but Klopp did not want to head to Salzburg with work still needed to qualify. Only a victory against the Italians could avoid that. A scrappy, interrupted first half in which the hosts found their tempo in the closing stages did not bode well.
Napoli may have been embroiled in a civil war in their own city, but Klopp’s prediction they would be freed on foreign soil was prophetic, Carlo Ancelotti offering a timely reminder he is not the busted flush many still presume.
His side was as well organised as any to come to Merseyside this season, doubling up on Liverpool’s wide men and pouncing on every midfield error. Even without Lorenzo Insigne they carried a threat to extend the discomfort of Klopp’s back four which has lingered despite a prolonged winning run.
A year ago, this fixture was the catalyst for Liverpool’s eventual European conquest, Alisson Becker’s last minute save redirecting the course of history. It was worth around £60 million given what followed in the knockout stage.
Napoli played as if they were invigorated rather than scarred by the experience, vengeance in every tackle.
The surest sign of mounting concern when Klopp was shown a yellow card after one animated protest too many at Spanish referee Carlos Del Cerro Grande.
His biggest frustration may have been directed at Kalidou Koulibaly’s ability to rival Van Dijk as one of the most impressive centre-backs to play in this stadium in recent years. He was ideally placed to clear every cross. When Roberto Firmino pounced on goalkeeper Alex Meret’s 55th minutes fumble and directed a volley goal bound, Koulibaly was inevitably in place to clear.
The only surprise is a Premier League club bereft of a world class centre-half has not already made an offer that Napoli cannot refuse.
Gomez’s unhappy return was cut short before the hour when Klopp sent on Oxlade-Chamberlain and asked Jordan Henderson to fill in at right back.
Oxlade-Chamberlain was immediately into action as the game opened up, crossing for Firmino to head wide. Liverpool were exposed defensively by the ambitious formation but it made a thrilling finish inevitable.
Lovren’s header from Henderson’s corner levelled on 65 minutes and Anfield was experiencing one of those European nights again.
With news filtering through of Salzburg’s dominance in Genk, this increasingly felt more like a knockout fixture and Klopp went for the winner when finally sending on Alexander-Arnold with 12 minutes remaining.
Liverpool have made a habit of finding late winners in the Premier League. It was not to be this time. They remain top of the group, but nothing is guaranteed before their final matchday.
There was generous applause for both teams at full-time, but it was Ancelotti's night.
Chris Bascombe's match report
coming up. Goodnight from me.
Full time: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
That's it. Enjoyable game in places, Liverpool a bit flat in the first half and against a decent Napoli defence with plenty about them, it was always going to be hard. The Reds did indeed get the goal, but Napoli held on for the point.
Liverpool will need something against Salzburg in a fortnight.
90+ mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
Three of the four minutes of injury time are up, Liverpool have a freekick 35 yards out... but it is dead central and this is hard to get any sort of angle for a header. Trent AA dutifully chips it in but that's an easy clearance and we are chalking this up as a draw.
90 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
Bit of handbags ends with Robertson booked, and Koulibaly also has his name taken.
88 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
... and back in yet again, Firmino getting a head on it this time, but sending it wide.
85 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
The Ox wins a corner. Trent plays it in. Danger here! Cleared. just. Koulibaly fighting to the last. Trent AA does some incredible skill to keep it in. They go again. Cleared again by Koulibaly....
85 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
Napoli with a, ahem, masterclass in time management. Rui goes for a run, but goes nowhere. Ball into the Napoli box, keeper gathers. Lights a small cigar, settles down in his chair, and eventually kicks.
79 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
Elmas comes on, Mertens comes off. Dries Mertens had a quiet game apart from the goal. He takes as long as is humanly possible to exit the playing area.
79 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
Alexander-Arnold comes on for Milner. Gini W has a go from distance.
Napli have given up on the idea of attacking or even really going forward since the half.
75 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
Henderson gets to a ball he had no right to reach, and wraps his foot around it for a cross. Gathered by the keeper. Napoli in no hurry. Draw suits them fine.
73 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
Aw, dear old Fernando Llorente is coming on. A shame he never quite got it together in England. A mighty force in his pomp. Hirving Lozano is the man who makes way.
71 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
Football really is just a game of opinions, and those opinions are largely expressed on the field by footballers to the referee. Salah receives the ball in the area. Koulibaly has him in a full nelson from behind.
Ffrom the BBC: "James Milner has 11 assists in the Champions League since the start of 2017-18 - no player has provided more."
Lionel Who?
68 mins: Liverpool 1 Napoli 1
Amazing atmosphere now.
GOAL! Liverpool 1 Napoli 1 (Lovren 65)
There it is! A corner. Lovren has met it with a thundering header after a mighty leap. A little bit of joy is sucked from the world as VAR is used to check the goal. The goal stands. The Napoli lads complaining bitterly: they feel that Lovren put his hand on Mertens (which he did) but the officials, I guess, feel that it was incidental to the play rather than integral in Lovren getting the run on Mertens.
"Big defender getting the run on a small forward, that's all," says Steve McMan, who is having a good game for me.
62 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Brilliant from Liverpool. Mane carries the ball at top speed, feeds it the the Ox on the right. The England man stands the ball up in the box, lovely cross, and here's Roberto Firmino timing his run perfectly. He meets the ball with a bullet header.... oh it's just wide. Great play. Napoli filleted there.
60 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Liverpool continue to knock on the door, Milner with his corners looking as good a route as any back into this,
57 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Gomez, who hasn't had his best game tonight, is getting the hook. Here comes Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain. Henderson will play right back, The Ox right midfield.
54 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Cleared off the line by the titan Koulibaly! Henderson dinks a ball in and the keeper really makes a pig's ear of this. Flaps at the ball pitifully. Firmino hooks the ball at the goal, Meret the custodian is nowhere... but there is skipper to step into the breach and hook it away.
50 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Good corner again from Liverpool and an even better punch clear.
47 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Klopp got the "are you KIDDING me? And now THIS?????" vibes going as some minor infraction or other doesn't go in Liverpool's favour.
"I don't get it, I think the referee's been okay," says Steve McManaman.
Right then
Second half. Will it be the Liverpool of the first 40? Or the last five (plus extras)? We are about to find out.
Half time: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
The game really came to life in the last few minutes there. Liverpool had been a bit flat, narrow, and quiet, but gave Napoli a roasting there. But the Italians were defending with all 11 players and were in no mood to relinquish the advantage that they've gotten from Mertens's smart finish on the counter attack.
In the group's other game, Red Bull Salzburg are 2-0 up in Genk.
That means Liverpool are going to need a point in Austria in a fortnight (if things stay the same).
Not saying they won't do that, but they'd have preferred to rest some of the big boys in a dead rubber.
Anyway, 45 minutes of this left before all that!
45+ mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
The referee has already spoken to Carlo Ancelotti - and now he's booked Jurgen Klopp! The Liverpool boss is doing his crunch because one of his players was fouled when going up for a header.
We're having four minutes added on because of that VAR rubbish. Liverpool having their best moments of the match.
Milner worms and bustles his way through a crowded penalty area, and manages to get the shot away from a narrow angle. This one too is straight at the keeper.
The ref blows for half time with Liverpool battering Napoli and there are lots of boos in a feisty atmosphere.
45+ mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Salah has it down the right, ghosts pas full back Rui but hits his shot at the onrushing keeper.
44 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Liverpool have woken up now. Mane with the run, the atmosphere goes up a notch, not least because Di Lorenzo put a hand on him as he got to the edge of the box.
Mane drives at the goal. Half cleared. The ball is drilled back in. Corner.
Excellent corner from Milner but a really good clearing header.
40 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Liverpool's best moment! Gomez with the run, Mane gets the ball and plays it to Firmino who, with a lovely improvised flick, returns it. Mane crosses and Gomez meets it - denied by Koulibaly.
39 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Salah gives it away. Napoli come on the break. Mertens in and around the situation. Liverpool manage to squeeze the attack and the moment passes.
Now they themselves break, but this is not the Liverpool we are used to: narrow, and pedestrian, looking short of fizz, the attack peters out.
35 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
They do eventually get a chance to deliver the ball in. Virgil VD meets the ball and heads it squarely at the keeper. That is Liverpool's first effort on target of the half.
34 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
But plenty of the ball for Liverpool. Albeit that they are playing it around sideways.
Liverpool try to take a quick freekick but the ref is being a fusspot.
30 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Milner gets a good bite of Di Lorenzo (not in the literal Suarez sense; I mean that he kicked him). But the ref lets it slide. Ole Carlo A on the touchline is going tonto.
This is not, so far, a particularly good game. Liverpool haven't really turned it on yet. They miss Trent AA, for mine.
25 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 1
Anyway. So Mertens got up for the header, Di Lorenzo played it on, Mertens ran onto it and applied a brilliant finish.
Virgil VD seems to be ok and is up.
Goal stands
What a dismal, joy-sucker of a system.
It was not
offside
They are now checking
if it was offside.
No wait
we need to have more VAR.
The referee
gestures that it is a goal and points at the spot.
There is a VAR check
I understand re the foul in the build up. Or rather, the not a foul.
GOAL! Liverpool 0 Napoli 1 (Mertens 22)
And from that challenge, the ball is knocked on, Dries Mertens has broken clear and lashed the ball across the keeper and into the goal!
20 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 0
More injury worries for Liverpool, with Van Dijk going down on the floor after going up for a header.
17 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 0
Liverpool awarded a corner on a refereeing error. Cleared well. Fabinho tried to carry on but has thought better of it. Wijnaldum.
14 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 0
Fabinho is down after a knock and he looks like he might have to go off.
More on Napoli: so the president ordered the team to a training camp, they refused. The club have fined captain Lorenzo Insigne 50% of his months wages and the rest 25%. Amounts to millions. Doesn't seem like any way to run a railroad.
12 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 0
Spotting Liverpool's keeper off his line, Mário Rui has tried a shot from inside his half. Erm, no. Weirdly, Henderson also tried from a mile away just now.
10 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 0
Napoli sitting back and looking to hit on the break, and an opportunity for the same presents itself when Salah gives the ball away. The visitors break. Ruiz has a not very good shot.
5 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 0
Koulibaly directing operations from the back. He is a class act, that guy. Di Lorenzo crosses wildly. And a minute or so later, he jumps and lands heavily on his shoulder. Ouch.
3 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 0
Robertson gives the ball away and Manolas tidies up with some authority.
But Manolas has it again, and this time, Liverpool's front line is pressuring and harrying him. He hacks it out!
2 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 0
Early potential opportunity for the Italians, they have a chance to play a freekick in, but the delivery is poor and easily cleared.
1 mins: Liverpool 0 Napoli 0
The blues kick off, but it is the Reds who soon have the ball.
Napoli
have made four changes since their last match. They are missing skipper Insigne.
Three changes for Liverpool
Salah back, and the Ox misses out. Trent AA and Wijnaldum are the other ones to step down.
The other game in this group
is Genk against Salzburg. Salzburg can still go through but Genk are out of this competition. Still the Uefa Cup, or whatever it is called these days, to play for.
The other English
side in action tonight were Chelsea, they have finished 2-2 in Valencia.
A good walk spoiled
Large group of Napoli fans currently walking around Liverpool city centre, armed with what looks like - golf clubs.. pic.twitter.com/9kgp8HEqRq
— Chris Williams (@Chris78Williams) November 27, 2019
Napoli fans
Merseyside Police is aware of social media posts saying Napoli fans are armed with golf clubs in the city centre. Officers have responded and confiscated a number of flags attached to flag poles. No golf clubs have been found.
— Merseyside Police (@MerseyPolice) November 27, 2019
Rio on Roberto Firmino
"The hardest sort of player to play against, because you don't know where he is going to be. A player I can get alongside, know where they are, that's easier. But with Firmino, he'll come deep and ask you 'are you going to come with me?' but then you leave a lovely big space in behind. A thinker, an intelligent person's player."
Des Kelly
interviews Steve McMananannananaman on the Napoli players and their board. "Being fined would certainly motivate me!"
Klopp says that he is happy
to keep fighting on all fronts.
Europe has been special for us so far and hopefully it will stay like this for ever. So far, whenever we played in Europe, we were in the final, so we should keep that going. It’s very difficult.
You have to go back to 2014
to find a Liverpool defeat at Anfield in Europe. Real Madrid the winners then, and the manager that day was Carlo Ancelotti.
Teams for Liverpool vs Napoli
Liverpool: Alisson, Gomez, Lovren, van Dijk, Robertson, Henderson, Fabinho, Milner, Salah, Firmino, Mane. Subs: Wijnaldum, Adrian, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Lallana, Shaqiri, Origi, Alexander-Arnold.
Napoli: Meret, Maksimovic, Manolas, Koulibaly, Di Lorenzo, Fabian, Allan, Zielinski, Rui, Lozano, Mertens. Subs: Callejon, Llorente, Elmas, Luperto, Ospina, Younes, Gaetano.
Referee: Carlos Del Cerro (Spain)
Good evening!
Prime European football cuts for you this evening, as Liverpool welcome Napoli to Anfield. The visitors have been one of the stories of Serie A in recent seasons, they have been the closest challengers, and runners-up, to Juventus last season and the season before. It is not going so well this term, however: they have drawn five and lost one of their last six games.
There is trouble at mill, by the sounds of it: earlier this month, the club president Aurelio de Laurentiis told the team to come to a week-long training camp. I don't know what the Neapolitan slang is for "Naught Boy Nets" but this is what that all sounds like. (Also, my knowledge of Neapolitan slang comes only from watching the Sky television series Gomorrah, and they don't talk about cricket much in that. There was a brief mention of Napoli ledge Marek Hamšík in the first season, but I see that he's now offski to China.)
Anyway that's enough gangster dramas. So, yes: so the top man told the lads to assemble for a training camp but it sounds very much like Carlo Ancelotti and his players gave that the swerve. Who knows? It is said that the club has even frozen players' wages....
What is going reasonably well is their European campaign, they have got eight points from four games, including of course a win over Liverpool in Italy. Liverpool have nine points so there is every chance that this pair will be the two who go through. If there's a winner tonight, that side's definitely through to the last 16.
Turning belatedly to Liverpool, then, the good times continue to roll with the marvellous Herr Klopp in charge. They might not be quite at their brilliant best domestically, but they keep wining, and there's every reason to suspect that they'll put it up to the Italians tonight at Anfield. Should be a good match.
Incidentally, sounds like Napoli have brought a few herberts with them, so we'll keep a reluctant eye on that side of things as well....
