Liverpool 4-1 Ipswich: Brilliant Reds send out latest Premier League title statement | OneFootball

Reds ease to victory at Anfield as Cody Gakpo shines

Liverpool cruised to victory over Ipswich to maintain their six point lead at the top of the Premier League table.

At one stage, the Merseyside giants extended the lead to eight but Arsenal got the win over Wolves in the end. However, Liverpool are now nine points clear of third-placed Nottingham Forest following their loss away at Bournemouth.

But there was to be no issues with the Premier League strugglers. Inside 11 minutes Liverpool were ahead as Dominik Szoboszlai received a pass from Ibrahima Konate and found himself in acres of space before cutting inside Kalvin Phillips to find the bottom corner with a fine left-footed strike.

The game was halted for a while when Ipswich’s Wes Burns suffered a serious injury when attempting to tackle Cody Gakpo. Unfortunately he was to be stretchered off and replaced by Ben Johnson just before the half hour mark.

Though the stoppage didn’t disrupt Liverpool’s flow.

Not too long after, Mohamed Salah doubled the lead as he controlled Gakpo’s cross before firing an effort past Christian Walton at the near post to bring up his 19th Premier League goal of the campaign.

Mohamed Salah celebrates his goal.

AFP via Getty Images

The Dutchman then turned goalscorer before half-time as he was in the right place at the right time to turn the ball home from close range after Walton had failed to keep hold of Szoboszlai’s effort.

Liverpool’s intensity dropped in the early stages of the second half and Liam Delap felt he should have been awarded a penalty after going down under a challenge from Konate. But despite his protests, nothing was given.

That appeared to spark the hosts back into action and Gakpo put the game to bed just after the hour mark as he headed home a brilliant cross from Trent Alexander-Arnold to bring up his second of the afternoon.

However, there wasn’t to be an opportunity for Gakpo to score a hat-trick as he was substituted immediately afterwards as Arne Slot rung the changes, handing minutes to the likes of Harvey Elliott, Darwin Nunez, Wataru Endo, Jayden Danns and Federico Chiesa.

Alexander-Arnold twice came close to extending Liverpool’s lead but Jacob Greaves netted what proved to be a mere consolation in the 90th minute to deny Liverpool and Alisson - who moments earlier had made a brilliant save from George Hirst - a clean sheet.

A third win in a week for the Reds, though this one wasn’t much of a contest as they move on towards PSV Eindhoven on Wednesday with the aim of sealing top spot in the Champions League league phase.