Sadio Mane, Mohamed Salah and Luis Diaz cost Liverpool their Champions League title on Saturday.
That’s the view of ESPN pundit Steve Nicol, who slammed the Reds’ trio for failing to produce on the big stage in Paris last night.
Liverpool lost 1-0 to Real Madrid on a night where goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois was Man of the Match by a distance – and he was.
That’s illustrative of the sort of pressure Jurgen Klopp’s troops applied to the Blancos, with BBC Sport claiming that the Premier League outfit had 24 shots in comparison to the Spaniard’s four.
And it was a dominant performance by Liverpool and they could – and would – have won comfortably if not for Courtois.
However, club legend Nicol also believes that as good as the Belgian goalkeeper was, Klopp’s triumvirate of Mane, Salah and Diaz simply didn’t do enough to inspire the Anfield side to victory.
He told ESPN: “The front three that we’re always talking about how good they are, well when it mattered most they didn’t produce. And that’s why Liverpool have lost because they spent 45 minutes in the Real Madrid half and if you do that, you expect your playmakers, goalscorers, they have to perform – and they didn’t.”
Alan Shearer saw it a little differently, pointing the finger of blame at Trent Alexander-Arnold for his defending prior to the Vinicius Junior goal which ultimately downed Klopp’s boys.
However, Nicol does have a point.
Diaz, in particular, has been in sensational form since joining Liverpool from Porto in January, but Dani Carvajal barely gave the Colombia international a sniff throughout his time on the field, whereas Mane was dominated by the likes of Eder Militao.
Salah is a game-changer for the Reds and often bails them out but, with the exception of one effort in the second half well saved by Courtois, the Egypt international didn’t do much either.
These are the players Klopp would’ve been expecting to win the game for Liverpool and unfortunately, they couldn’t.
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