‘It was the best game of football I was ever involved in’: Arne Slot after Liverpool get knocked out of Champions League PSG | Football News
Liverpool manager Arne Slot took his side’s loss to Paris Saint Germain in the 2nd leg of their Champions League Round of 16 clash on his chin, saying that ‘it was the best game of football I was ever involved in.’ The Reds who finished at the top of the league in its the revamped format was dumped out on penalties on Tuesday night after the tie ended 1-1 on aggregate.
“That’s the format we are in and we have to accept it,” he said. “We go out in a way that I think we’ve impressed Europe. But it is something now to take into consideration how much worth it is to end up first in the league table if you can face Paris Saint-Germain in the next round,” Slot said. “But in the end, if you want to win the tournament, you have to beat teams like Paris Saint-Germain and that’s what we didn’t do today.”
The round-of-16 contest finished 1-1 on aggregate after Ousmane Dembele’s first-half goal on Tuesday cancelled out Liverpool’s 1-0 win in Paris in the first leg. The PSG performance that triumphed at Anfield looked markedly different to the one that struggled in the early stages of the competition – when the team lost to Arsenal, Atletico Madrid and Bayern Munich, as well dropping points against PSV Eindhoven.
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Liverpool, meanwhile, had defeated Real Madrid, Borussia Dortmund and AC Milan in the league stage on their way to top it.
The French champion showed it was a threat beating Manchester City 4-2 in January and had dominated Liverpool in Paris before falling to a late sucker punch from Harvey Elliott.
It had to ride a storm at times in the second leg — including surviving a Jarrell Quansah header that hit the post — but Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson also had to pull off a string of saves to keep the home team in contention.
(With agency inputs)
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