English football giants Liverpool made one of the greatest comebacks in football history after beating Spanish giants Barcelona 4-0 at Anfield winning 4-3 on aggregate to Champions League final for a second consecutive season.
Liverpool came into the game with pressure to overturn a 3-goal deficit against Barcelona and the absence of key players like Mohammad Salah and Roberto Fermino made the much-needed comeback almost look impossible.
But the story started to change early in the game when Belgian striker Divock Origi gave Liverpool an early lead after tapping in the ball when the Barcelona goalkeeper failed to deal with Jordan Henderson’s shot.
The first half ended when Liverpool were still leading 1-0 thanks to the collective teamwork of Liverpool players that denied Lionel Messi and his teammates penetration into their defence to find an equalizer.
Liverpool started the second half on high with substitute Giorginio Wijnaldum who replaced the injured Andrew Roberson at half time converting Trent Alexander Arnold’s cross to put Liverpool 2-0 up.
Liverpool scored their second and third goal in a space of 122 seconds to go level on goal aggregate after Wijnaldum jumped high to head home Xherdan Shaqiri’s cross scoring his second goal of the night and a very crucial one for Liverpool.
Liverpool’s comeback story was completed 11 minutes from time following some intelligent action from Alexander Arnold caught Barcelona defenders off guard to pass a cheeky corner to Divock Origi to tap home the fourth goal which but all sealed the Reds place in the final.
Amazing stats
The incredible comeback saw Liverpool becoming the fourth team in the history of the competition to overturn a 3+ goal deficit from the first leg to progress in knockouts.
Tuesday progress means that Liverpool will be playing in a second consecutive champions league final and this time they will be hoping to triumph having lost last year 3-1 to Real Madrid. Liverpool will face either Ajax or Tottenham in the final that will be played on June 1st in Madrid.
Liverpool will be playing their ninth European Cup/Champions League final with only Real Madrid (16) and Bayern Munich (10) playing more.
Barcelona frustration?
Tuesday’s loss to Liverpool saw Barcelona repeat the same fate like last year when they were knocked out by AS Roma beating them 3-0 having led the first leg 4-1 from Nou Camp.
Since 2015, when the Catalan giants last reached the final, they have been knocked out 3 times out of four semifinal ties.
Tuesday’s loss saw Barcelona suffer their heaviest defeat against an English side in all European competitions.
No Salah no problem
Very few people gave Liverpool a chance to advance past Barcelona given their heavy defeat in the first leg in Spain. The injuries that ruled out Mohammad Salah and Roberto Fermino in this return leg just erased even the little hope of any progress in people’s minds.
However, the impressive teamwork and the charisma shown by the Liverpool players that coach Jurgen Klopp fielded for the mission made many forget the pair’s absentia in the game.
What next?
After Tuesday’s historic victory at Anfield, Liverpool will return to action this Sunday to play their final game of the season at home against Wolves. Liverpool will be hoping that the results in this match and the one between Manchester City and Burnley go in their favor in order to clinch the title ahead of Manchester City who are a point ahead of the Reds.
On Wednesday Liverpool will learn their opponents in the Champions League final after the second leg of the other semifinal between Ajax and Tottenham. Ajax won the first leg in London 1-0.
