The Liverpool hierarchy protected Arne Slot’s authority by axing Mohamed Salah from the Champions League trip to Milan. The Liverpool team followed suit by inflicting a first European home defeat on Internazionale since September 2022 courtesy of Dominik Szoboszlai’s 88th-minute penalty. A brooding superstar with a bruised ego looked on from afar.
Salah would have been on penalty duties had he not talked himself out of a showpiece occasion at San Siro, another legend of the game that is showing its age. Instead it fell to Szoboszlai, the friend he argued should not be playing on the right ahead of him, to give Slot a precious victory after Alessandro Bastoni was penalised for pulling Florian Wirtz’s shirt in the box with minutes remaining.
Liverpool had been resolute and fiercely committed to that point, well worthy of the point that was heading their way until the video assistant referee sent the German official Felix Zwayer to the pitchside monitor to review Bastoni’s foul.
Slot’s name echoed around the famous old stadium as Inter’s 18-match unbeaten European run on home soil came to an unexpected end.
Salah gave Liverpool no option but to leave him out of the trip to Italy. Slot’s authority over the rest of the squad would have been seriously undermined had he travelled. The timing of the interview at Elland Road was bad enough with Slot, Salah and his team-mates all struggling – and supposedly sticking together in adversity – but made worse by the limited options available to Liverpool in Milan. Slot was unable to fill his bench with Cody Gakpo, Federico Chiesa and Wataru Endo also absent. Without the source of 46 Champions League goals for Liverpool the team’s highest goalscorer in the competition on the night was Virgil van Dijk, with five.
