Brighton dent Liverpool's UCL hopes
by Kickoff Reporter · KickOffLiverpool’s top-four hopes in the Premier League suffered a blow following a 2-1 loss over Brighton & Hove Albion on Saturday afternoon.
The Reds named two changes to the eleven that started against Galatasaray, with goalkeeper Giorgio Mamardashvili coming in for Alisson while Coady Gakpo replaced the injured Mohamed Salah.
In light of a delayed start, Liverpool were then forced to make a substitute eight minutes in when Hugo Ekitike picked up a knock and limped off for Curtis Jones to come on in his place.
To add insult, the Reds trailed six minutes later when a knock-back across the area by Diego Gomez found Danny Welbeck who outjumped Ibrahima Konate to head home.
However, the Merseyside giants clawed themselves back on level terms right on the half-hour mark as Milos Kerkez feed on a back-pass and lobbed over the advancing Bart Verbruggen to make it 1-1.
Floran Wirtz came very close to giving the visitors the lead a minute to halftime with a hard and low shot towards goal, but Verbruggen made the stop to deny the Germany international.
Welbeck haunted the visitors again ten minutes after halftime when he capitalised on a delivery across goal by Jack Hinshelwood to tap in for his brace, with the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) confirming the goal.
In-form Dominik Szoboszlai looked to inspire the Reds to a comeback with a cross to the head of Alexis Mac Allister, but the midfielder went well wide of the net.
Liverpool went to the bench to change personnel and decided to go on the attack as Andy Robertson came on for Kerkez before Federico Chiesa replaced Konate.
The Seagulls nearly put the clash to bed five minutes from time with a close-range header by substitute Georginio Rutter from a corner, but it was scrambled off the goal-line by Jones.
With time running out, the Reds failed to engineer a response as the defeat denied them a return to the top-four on the table.