Luis Diaz debuted while Harvey Elliott marked his return from injury with a goal as Liverpool beat Cardiff City 3-1 in the fourth round of the Emirates FA Cup.
Follow Us
Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool FC eased past Cardiff City 3-1 in the home fixture of the FA Cup fourth round on Sunday. Diogo Jota (53′), Takumi Minamino (68′) and Harvey Elliott (76′) were on target for the Merseyside club while Rubin Colwill (80′) netted the consolation for Cardiff City. A quick turn and hit by Jota forced Cardiff goalkeeper Dillon Phillips into an impressive reaction save in the opening minutes, and Minamino then saw a goal ruled out for offside against Kostas Tsimikas in the build-up while the visitors were content to sit back and defend for most part of the first-half.
Debutant Luis Diaz and Elliott proved to be influential in the second-half proceedings at Anfield. The former proved his determination by keeping the ball inside the byline as the home club looked on top of their game.
Klopp was delighted with the performance from Elliott and said after the match, “I am! I am, absolutely. With the goal it became obviously a proper fairy tale to be honest. In my mind I had the situation, it’s not nice but it came up, in Leeds when we lost him with this horrible injury.
“All the way through he was very patient and our medical department did obviously an incredible job with him, but he was patient enough to do all the necessary steps. Coming then on is already a great step back, but scoring this nice goal makes it a proper fairy tale so I am really happy for him. He was over the moon! It was properly touching. So, all good,” he added.
He, however, hopes that Diaz’s scar is not too serious. “We all said to him, ‘Welcome to England!’ Now he has his first assist and his first little scar. That’s absolutely OK. I don’t think it will be any more serious – maybe tomorrow he feels it more and we have to react to that, but it’s nothing serious,” Klopp mentioned.
Liverpool will now face Norwich City at home in round five. It has been summed up as another easy outing for the Reds who are far from their title chase behind league leader Manchester City but could well challenge the FA Cup and the Champions League.
READ MORE: ‘An honour’: Alisson Becker describes captaining Liverpool against FC Porto
