Fenerbahce beat Liverpool 3-2 in Istanbul to end the visitors' perfect Champions League start, with Vedat Muriqi's header the winner after a late collapse.
Fenerbahce beat Liverpool 3-2 in Istanbul on Wednesday to end Liverpool's 100% start in the Champions League. Liverpool led twice and still lost, undone by a late defensive collapse, according to the Guardian.
It was also a winning start for Dirk Kuyt, whose interim spell as Fenerbahce manager began with a victory the Guardian called "tumultuous".
How Liverpool lost two leads
Liverpool had the first word. Trey Nyoni scored with a low volley that took a slight deflection off Kojo Peprah Oppong, the first senior goal of his career. The Guardian called it "a memorable milestone in the continued rise of Nyoni".
Fenerbahce levelled through Mason Greenwood. His 25-yard free-kick hit Jérémy Jacquet's stomach on the way through, and the deflection wrongfooted Alisson. It was a good strike that became an unstoppable one.
Liverpool's substitutes made a quick impact. Alexander Isak and Cody Gakpo came on, and three minutes later Isak headed in from close range from a Gakpo cross. That is a substitution doing exactly what the manager drew up.
Then the match turned. N'Golo Kante crossed, Gakpo inadvertently flicked it away from Alisson, and Archie Brown tapped in at the back post to make it 2-2. Brown then supplied the cross for the winner, which Vedat Muriqi headed in while holding off Jacquet, Alexis Mac Allister and Nyoni. Muriqi had come on for Romelu Lukaku in the second half.
The Guardian's verdict on the sequence is clear enough: Fenerbahce "capitalised on a late defensive collapse".
The numbers behind the night
Two of Fenerbahce's three goals needed help from a Liverpool player. Greenwood's free-kick took a significant deflection off Jacquet, and the equaliser came after Gakpo's flick took Kante's cross away from Alisson. The third was a header won against three Liverpool players.
That is not an excuse. Those deflections do not erase Liverpool's defensive mistakes. Liverpool conceded three times after leading twice, which is a problem of game management, not luck.
The experience count was closer than the result suggests:
- Liverpool's starting lineup: 1,241 Premier League appearances
- Fenerbahce's starting lineup, counting Lukaku, Ederson, Kante, Nelson Semedo, Matteo Guendouzi and Greenwood: 1,086 between those six
The Guardian noted Kuyt's side had "almost as much Premier League experience as Liverpool's". The gap was 155 appearances. A shortage of collective experience is a hard excuse to sell.
What it means for Liverpool
This was Liverpool's second successive defeat, following the loss to Arsenal on Sunday. The Guardian wrote that it "will infuriate Iraola as much as the manner of Sunday's loss to Arsenal". Andoni Iraola, Liverpool's head coach, now has a pattern to explain, not a single bad night.
The concern is how Liverpool's perfect Champions League start ended: ahead, then not, with the decisive goals coming from a flicked cross and a header won in a crowd.
For Fenerbahce, the picture is simpler. A new interim manager has a result that buys him time and belief, and a late substitute who changed the match. Clément Turpin refereed.
What to watch
Watch Iraola's lineup and substitutions next. Isak's goal showed his changes could work, so the question is whether the same side can keep a lead for 90 minutes. Watch Kuyt's side too: one win is a start, not a plan.
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Sources
Meanwhile at the desk
Isak and Gakpo came on, combined for a goal within three minutes, and Liverpool still went home with nothing. That is the most expensive cameo of the night.
Two defeats in four days is the point where a head coach hears the word 'pattern', and where someone else starts rehearsing the word 'interim'. Kuyt, for one, already has it on the shirt.
