Liverpool defeated Yokohama Marinos 3-1 at the “Nissan Stadium” in the third pre-season match, sportal.bg reported.
Merseysiders missed several chances in the first half and found themselves behind in the 55th minute when Asahi Wenaka gave the hosts the lead. However, Florian Wirtz's first goal (62’) for Liverpool set the stage for a turnaround that was completed within five minutes. The English champions' second goal came from Trey Nyoni after an assist from another new signing, Jeremy Frimpong, and 16-year-old Rio Ngumoa scored the final goal.
Liverpool's newest signing, Yugo Ekitike, started as a starter at the top of the attack for his debut. Mohamed Salah and Kodi Gakpo started on both flanks. Giorgi Mamardashvili, Milos Kerkez and Florian Wirtz also started, while Jeremy Frimpong remained on the bench for the start. Alisson Becker has returned to Brazil and will only join the team after his return to England.
Before the match, another tribute was paid to the memory of Diogo Jota. Liverpool club legend Ian Rush laid a wreath of flowers, and nearly 70,000 spectators in the stadium turned on the lights and sang the song dedicated to the Portuguese.
Liverpool started a little unfocused and in the first minutes the hosts had two shots that went dangerously close. After that, however, the “Reds” adapted to the poor terrain and began to attack much more dangerously. Gakpo missed two chances, in the first case his shot hit the post, and then he received a through pass from Salah, but shot straight at the goalkeeper. A little later, Soboslay was also brought out perfectly by the Egyptian and tried to pass past the goalkeeper, but the ball bounced badly and he was unable to land a finishing shot.
In the 25th minute, Ekitike was close to his first goal, after receiving a pass from Bradley at the near post and technically blocking it with his heel, but the home team's goalkeeper managed to intervene.
In the 40th minute, the home team organized a very good counterattack, which ended with a cross to Din David, who blocked it from close range with his head, but Mamardashvili reacted brilliantly and cleared it.
For the start of the second half, Darwin Nunes and Curtis Jones came in for Ekitike and Gravenberh.
In the 52nd minute, Nunes made a serious miss from close range, after receiving a pass from Salah, but shot inaccurately from three meters. Two minutes later, Yokohama took the lead. With a very clever pass on the ground, he found Wenaka from the left, who fired the ball past Mamardashvili into the far corner of the goal.
In the 59th minute, local favorite Wataru Endo replaced Virgil van Dijk and directly took the captain's armband, greeted by the stormy ovations of the Japanese supporters.
Three minutes later, Florian Wirtz scored his first goal for Liverpool, equalizing the score. Curtis Jones took the ball in the center of the field and quickly advanced, then passed it to the right to Salah, who returned it to him. Jones tried to free himself from the defender next to him with one touch and thus assisted with his heel to Wirtz, who shot into the corner from about ten meters.
Immediately after that, Slott made seven substitutions at once and the German was one of the players who left. Robertson, Frimpong, Nyoni, Elliot, Tsimikas, Mc Allister and Numoa came into the game.
In the 68th minute, it was two of the new players who created the second goal for Liverpool. Frimpong crossed perfectly from the right to the far post, where Nyoni intercepted from the air, creating the turnaround.
Ngumoa made another good breakthrough during pre-season and in the 74th minute he came close to scoring a third goal for Liverpool, but Kimura intervened well. However, the 16-year-old talent managed to score in the 87th minute. He received a pass from Robertson around the central area and broke through to the penalty area himself, then fired a low shot for the final 1:3.