Every time the ball fell on Haaland's or Hwang's feet - remember their names for a not too distant future - a shiver ran through Jürgen Klopp's frozen body. Liverpool flirted again and again with the catastrophe, installed for 57 minutes on the edge of the Champions precipice. A Salzburg victory would have meant the final push towards the deep chasm of the Europa League, an exciting competition for many teams, but not for the best Liverpool of the century.

The risk was much more real than the final result suggests, a 0-2 that hides the troubles that the champion experienced before Keita and Salah solved the ballot in just two minutes at the beginning of the second half. Again, a Liverpool b series was seen in the Champions League, far from the outstanding level he is exhibiting in the Premier League. In fact, in the league he has missed two points in 16 games while in Europe he has yielded five in just six games.

Their irregularity in this group stage, however, has not been an obstacle for the networks to qualify for the round of 16 and to do so as first of the group, ahead of a Naples that gave no option to the already eliminated Genk ( 4-0), with three Milik goals. The stroll of the Italians - in the 26th minute they already had two goals - forced Liverpool to add at least a draw in Salzburg to qualify. He was never virtually eliminated, but he felt very close to the abyss.

Salah's sentence

Because Salzburg, forced to win to stay alive, raised a fast-paced first part at a dizzying pace. A scenario in which Liverpool is usually comfortable, but to which on this occasion he was forced to pause. Anything could have happened in that first half, although nothing really happened and the 0-0 remained unchanged.

The second part dawned with the same dynamics until Keita sang bingo. Mané delved into his band, pulled Stankovic out of the goal and focused on the Guinean to head the ball. A few seconds later, Salah took advantage of a serious mistake by Onguéné in the transfer to his goalkeeper to mark the second with an empty door and almost no angle. After receiving two goals in one minute, Salzburg felt already without strength to score the three he needed and allowed a very comfortable final half hour for the current European champion.

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