Prior to Sunday’s Premier League matchup between Liverpool and Manchester City, MO SALAH made a triumphant comeback to the pitch.
Darwin Nunez scored twice as Liverpool romped to victory over Sparta Prague
Mo Salah also made his return from injury for the Reds
With just three Liverpool games played in 2024, the Egyptian international—who had not played since February 18 owing to a recurrence of a hamstring issue—replaced Luis Diaz in the 74th minute.
Ten minutes after coming in, Salah appeared to have scored a fifth goal, but VAR disqualified it for being offside.
By then, goals from Darwin Nunez twice, Luis Diaz for the fourth, and a penalty from Alexis Mac Allister had practically put Liverpool’s foot in the Europa League quarterfinals.
Dominik Szoboszlai scored five goals in injury time, meaning that the second leg on Thursday is now just a formality.
Conor Bradley’s own goal in the first minute of the second half gave Sparta, who trailed 3-0 at the time, a one-goal lead.
The Czechs did, however, waste a few of opportunities, but Liverpool never lost control.
The only concern ahead of Sunday’s match was Ibrahima Konate’s injury, and Joe Gomez was also changed at the half.
Liverpool did not have to play well against a subpar Czech team, even though they were not at their best.
After five minutes, Mac Allister was sent down by Asger Sorensen and the Liverpool midfielder sent custodian Peter Vindahl the wrong way, causing Sparta to hit the self-destruct button.
As home keeper Vindahl made a mistake and dove past the shot, Nunez celebrated his 50th Liverpool start by producing something out of nothing with a dipping effort from outside the box.
It was Liverpool’s 1000th goal under manager Jurgen Klopp.
With the final kick of the first half, Nunez scored his second goal of the game, beating Veljko Birmancevic’s open goal for Sparta into the far corner.
Bradley replaced Gomez at halftime, and 39 seconds into the second half, the youthful right-back hammered the ball into his own net—something Klopp would not have predicted.
With a deflected drive, Diaz scored the fourth, and when VAR denied Salah, midfielder Szoboszlai made it 5-1 from the edge of the area, though the keeper was again at fault.