Fans returned at the Anfield as Liverpool welcomed them back with a comfortable 4-0 win against Wolves in a Premier League match on Sunday. Goals from Mohamed Salah, Georginio Wijnaldum and Joel Matip with an own goal from Nelson Semedo helped Liverpool to draw level on points with leaders Tottenham Hotspur.
While the margin of win may indicate a dominance from the hosts but it wasn’t the case. Rather, Wolves kept Liverpool at bay while launching attacks of their own till the 24th minute when a mistake from their captain Conor Coady set up Salah for a left-footed finish.
Few minutes later Coady seemed to have made up for his error when he won a penalty but replays confirmed he went down without any contact from Sadia Mane. The first half ended with Liverpool leading by a solitary goal.
Wijnaldum then doubled the lead two minutes before the hour mark and Matip adding the third nine minutes later.
Semedo then ended up directing the ball into his own goal during an attempt to block Mane in the 78th minute to the joy of the 2,000 supporters gathered at the Anfield for the first time this season.
Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp got emotional seeing fans making their return to live matches.
“The game, the atmosphere, it was so nice. I had goosebumps. They started ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ – really nice. I never knew it could feel that good,” Klopp told the BBC post-match.
“This started in February and we were waiting to get normality back. Normality is good – I don’t think we appreciated it as much. It was very very touching. Wasn’t it a perfect night? Whatever the weather was like outside, it was sunshine inside the stadium,” he added.
Wijnaldum said their performance was aided by the cheering fans. “The fans helped the performance a lot because they cheered during the game and before we only had the bench for support,” he said.