Liverpool sealed a comfortable 2-0 win at Ipswich Town on Friday night as they landed a first league win under new boss Andoni Iraola.
Ample aspects about the victory will have pleased the Spaniard, most notably his star striker Alexander Isak notching twice.
It didn’t take long for Liverpool to deflate the feelgood factor among the home fans in Portman Road. Isak had scored twice before the clock had hit the 10-minute mark to give the hosts an absolute mountain to climb.
Both goals were well worked and a welcome reminder of the type of finishing that persuaded Liverpool to shell out a British record fee for Isak just over a year ago. As well as being laced with quality in how they were taken, each was assisted by Cody Gakpo, who may well have been lining up for a Premier League rival this weekend had negotiations panned out differently prior to the transfer deadline.
The Dutchman had been heavily linked with a late move in the window to Manchester City but ultimately it came to nothing. Many players might well have downed tools but if Gakpo’s first half showing was anything to go by then he’s quickly brushed off the episode.
The first goal, after just six minutes, saw Liverpool employ an aggressive press that saw it run to Gakpo who played in a lovely, piercing through-ball to Isak. The Swede then applied a thunderous strike albeit home stopper Kjell Scherpen will have been disappointed not to get a firmer hand on it.
Barely three minutes later Isak had doubled his tally for the evening and again a huge slice of it was down to the brilliance of Gakpo. This time it was a stupendous, outside-of-the-foot pass to Isak who showed excellent composure to find the net although he was massively aided by Scherpen’s strange positioning as he raced out of his goal far too briskly.
Iraola’s flash new signing, £123m summer buy Bradley Barcola, remained on the bench in Suffolk until just after the hour mark and there were flashes of his quality, most notably when he put in a fine centre to pick out Gakpo, whose effort was well blocked.
Prior to that there was a penalty shout for the Reds when Leif Davis felled Dominik Szoboszlai in the box but after a VAR intervention it was chalked off due to the Hungarian straying offside.
To be fair to Ipswich, they toiled plenty in the second half and the likes of Julio Enciso and Abdul Fatawu showed glimpses of quality but ultimately there was no way past a stern Liverpool defence.
O’Neil knows that his side’s season be defined by such results as this. They already have a win under their belts and there’s been ample encouraging signs from their three opening games to suggest they won’t necessarily have to endure as tough a season as they experienced two years ago.
As for the Reds, the resurgence of Isak was lapped up by the jubilant away end post-match. He’ll be keen to now make up for lost time after a wretched debut season and build on this brace going forward.
