Arne Slot earned his first win as Liverpool manager with a 1-0 victory over Real Betis courtesy of an excellent Dominik Szoboszlai finish in Pittsburgh.
The Reds were beaten 1-0 by Preston, external in a behind-closed-doors friendly at their training ground earlier this month but the post-Jurgen Klopp era is now up and running with their first win on their US tour.
Hungarian midfielder Szoboszlai opened the scoring after 34 minutes by sweeping in Mohamed Salah’s through ball, while Betis striker Juanmi missed two chances in front of 42,679 fans.
Liverpool lost midfielder Curtis Jones on the half hour mark with Slot saying it was too early to say how bad the injury was.
The Reds face Arsenal in Philadelphia on Thursday and then take on Manchester United in Columbia on Sunday, 4 August.
How did Liverpool play?
Slot has taken over from Klopp, who was in charge for nine years, and the German’s often dubbed ‘heavy metal football’ looked a little more soft rock under their new Dutch manager.
The changes in the style of play came in a fluid 4-2-4 formation and the Reds played without a striker.
Again, it was partly down to the limited personnel, but Klopp’s gegenpressing style turned into a slower possession-based approach, typically favoured by Johan Cruyff-influenced Dutch coaches.
Slot delivered his instructions at the Pittsburgh Steelers’s Acrisure Stadium while constantly stood in the technical area and moved players into position with hand gestures and measured shouts.
Harvey Elliot and Szoboszlai took turns playing in the attacking midfielder number 10 role, so Liverpool were effectively without a striker for the majority of the game.
“I think during the season you will see us playing with a real striker but at this moment we have no-one with Darwin [Nunez] unavailable,” Slot said.
“We played with two number 10s and put them in the position they will play during the season. That was maybe out of necessity.
“But for the rest of the style of play, we tried to build from the back, that is our style to control the game, not concede constant counter attacks.
“That will hopefully be our style during the season and there were also many things we can improve but that’s normal after two weeks.”
It looked similar to the unenforced but successful tactical approach taken by Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag in the FA Cup final, with Bruno Fernandes up front in the win against Manchester City.
For Liverpool, it worked well given they had so few senior players. They dominated early on with shots from Fabio Carvalho, Salah and Wataru Endo, albeit from difficult positions. Elliot then scuffed the first real chance from a good Conor Bradley cutback, before Szoboszlai’s goal.
The second half was more of a non-event for the spectators as a host of youngsters disrupted the rhythm. Nabil Fekir hit the side netting from a good free-kick position and Carvalho had a shot saved by former Liverpool goalkeeper Adrian before coming off.
But it was an important exercise in fitness building, and introducing Slot’s style to his players, the supporters and football world before the new Premier League season starts.
