Soccer / liverpool vs burnley

Liverpool were all out in the lunch time kickoff on Saturday as they looked to revenge their defeat against Burnley at home last season. The Clarets ended The Reds' 68-game unbeaten record at Anfield courtesy of a 1-0 victory in January 2021. Sean Dyche's men looked like they were there to cwreakanother havoc as they got on the front foot and almost took the lead within the first four minutes. A Jack Cork pass released Chris Wood into a one-on-one situation with Liverpool goalkeeper, Alisson Becker. The Brazilian stopper was able to divert the strike away from goal, who then released the ball to Dwight McNeil. McNeil's effort on goal was saved on the line by Trent Alexander-Arnold before the offside flag went up against Wood. Perceiving the looming trouble, Liverpool had to react quickly and truly, opened scoring on the 18th minute. Konstantinos Tsimikas doing fine work down the left side, lifted an inch-perfect cross into the box, beating the Burnley defence and onto the head of Diogo Jota for a well guided effort into the bottom corner. The Portugese has now scored in the opening two games of the season. Needing an instant response, Cork won the ball back for Burnley on the edge of the Liverpool area, allowing Barnes to release McNeil on the left side of the box, who powered a well-driven left-footed shot into the near post, but Alisson did well to parry behind for a corner. Repaying the gesture, Liverpool hit their visitors on the counter and the final ball at Mohammed Salah's feet. The Egyptian bends a curling effort into left corner, Nick Pope had enough on it to avert the chance. Just three minutes before the half hour mark, Liverpool found the back of the net through Salah for the second time on the afternoon, but his effort was chalked off after VAR review showed Salah was a foot offside while receiving Harvey Eliott's pass. There was a bit of scare for the hosts on the stroke of half time as the Liverpool defence failed to track the run of James Tarkowski at the back post from a Matthew Lowton free kick. Alisson was quick off his life, but was beaten to the ball by the English defender, whose header was just a bit wide off the goal. The visitors almost responded immediately after the interval when Ashley Barnes finished from close range, after good work from Lowton to beat Jordan Henderson on the right. The goal was rightly ruled out for offside against Barnes. A glorious chance fell to Sadio Mane just before the hour mark when Virgil van Dijk headed a Salah cross goalward and the ball fell at the foot of the Senegalese who could only find the side netting. A flurry of chances followed with Liverpool looking to deal the knockout blow and kill off any hope of a comeback. McNeil first denied Salah on the line, before Pope made a reflex save to deny Mane from his low effort. Mane would not be denied on the 69th minute as another fine combination between Elliott and Alexander-Arnold released the former Southampton man, who fired in first time on half volley to double the hosts' lead. It was a stream of attack after attack afterwards as Liverpool ran the show to grab a convincing win. Alisson was not ready to gift Burnley a consolation goal as he denied Chris Wood at the death with a fine save. Concluding Thoughts Another convincing win for the Kops, who have now managed to ring four consecutive clean sheets in the Premier League for the fist time since January 2020. Although it may be too early to say Burnley are beginning to toe the same line as last season, where they escaped relegation by 11 points, largely due to the poor performances of the teams below them, they would need more than luck this time to stay up and need to start picking up points.