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MILAN, Italy — Rarely has a throw-in been celebrated with so much fervor. When Alexis Mac Allister went to ground to see the ball out of play in the dying seconds of stoppage time at San Siro, the traveling Liverpool fans greeted the tackle with the same sense of elation that would normally be reserved for a goal.
It was a moment that perfectly encapsulated the quiet, battling brilliance of the Reds’ UEFA Champions League 1-0 victory over Internazionale, with the mood on the pitch and in the stands one of defiance following a turbulent few days for head coach Arne Slot and his players. That the win was secured via a penalty — dispatched emphatically by the relentless Dominik Szoboszlai in the 88th minute — carried a certain sense of irony.
Certainly, nobody will have been watching on with more interest than the absent Mohamed Salah when referee Felix Zwayer was sent to the monitor to review Alessandro Bastoni’s challenge on Florian Wirtz inside the area. Salah — who was omitted from the matchday squad in Milan following his incendiary post-match interview at the weekend — has been Liverpool’s regular penalty taker for the past eight years and could perhaps have added another goal to his extraordinary tally had he not opted to aim at both Slot and the club at Elland Road on Saturday night.
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Ordinarily, a trip to Inter’s iconic home is a momentous occasion in its own right. However, the football has been somewhat of an afterthought in the build-up to this game. Instead, much of the pre-match discourse has centred on Salah’s claims he has been “thrown under the bus” by Liverpool, and his suggestion that next weekend’s Premier League clash with Brighton & Hove Albion might be his last in the club’s colors.
But after so much external noise, Tuesday night was the time for Liverpool to do their talking on the pitch, and that’s exactly what they did with a hard-fought victory that moved them — for now, at least — up to eighth in the Champions League table.
With Salah temporarily removed from selection and Cody Gakpo sidelined with injury, Slot was forced to shuffle his pack against Inter, starting Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike alongside each other up front for just the second time since they signed for a combined £204 million in the summer.
If it was hoped the pair would prove that Liverpool’s attack no longer needs Salah’s excellence to thrive, Isak’s lack of efficacy meant the experiment did not quite have the desired effect. The Sweden international has struggled for both form and fitness since his acrimonious move from Newcastle United and failed to catch the eye again against Inter, having just 25 touches before being substituted midway through the second half.
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Still, Liverpool looked far more solid and structured than they have done in recent months, reducing the hosts to very little, with their only real opportunity coming when Alisson Becker was forced to tip Lautaro Martínez’s first-half header to safety. Slot’s side thought they had taken the lead after 32 minutes, when Ibrahima Konaté powered his header beyond Yann Sommer in the Inter net, only for to the goal to be ruled out following a lengthy VAR check which adjudged Ekitike to have handled the ball in the build-up.
Perhaps the most pleasing thing for Slot, though, will be the manner in which his team — and, in particular, Konaté — responded to the setback, with the France international much-improved at San Siro after his torrid recent run of personal form.
Liverpool’s newfound robustness provided the platform for the visitors to snatch a late victory after Bastoni was punished for grabbing a fistful of Wirtz’s shirt. And, while Slot admitted after the game that a penalty would likely not have been awarded for a similar incident in the Premier League, the spot-kick — and the victory — felt like a meritorious reward for Liverpool’s immense efforts on the night.
“All I could ask for,” Slot said when asked to sum up his team’s performance.
“I think it was the fourth game in 10 days, that is not what you see a lot with only 13 outfield players available with Premier League or Champions League experience. After the blow we had conceding the 3-3 in Leeds, then in this stadium against such a strong Inter team, we hardly gave away a chance, the biggest was just before half-time, after a referee decision we had to accept as well. Great mentality second half. We got better and better.”
It was significant, too, that the biggest show of appreciation after the game was directed at Slot himself. The fans had made a point of singing his name even before their team had taken the lead and did so with renewed gusto at the full-time whistle, something Slot later said “meant a lot.”
If the Dutchman’s authority had been undermined by Salah’s impromptu outburst, it was restored here as Liverpool ended Inter’s run of 18 European home games unbeaten; a sequence stretching back to September 2022. Of course, Slot will know better than anyone that the victory is not a cure for all of his team’s ills.
When the Liverpool squad land back on Merseyside on Wednesday afternoon, Slot will need to turn his attention to brokering some kind of peace deal with Salah, who departs for the Africa Cup of Nations at the weekend. Tuesday marked the Reds’ first away Champions League victory without the Egypt international since November 2009.
Slot may well hope that this is a statistic that strengthens his hand.
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