Arne Slot suffered a crushing defeat with Liverpool in Saturday’s FA Cup quarter-final. Away to Manchester City, the Reds were beaten 4-0 without a chance, partly due to a hat-trick from top scorer Erling Haaland. To make matters worse for Liverpool, Mohamed Salah missed a penalty, although the match had already been more or less decided by then. With this victory, Manchester City have broken a record dating back to 1881 (!): Pep Guardiola’s side (who was watching from the stands due to a suspension) have now won eighteen consecutive FA Cup matches, the most consecutive victories ever in the English cup competition.
At the Etihad Stadium, there were ‘only’ two Dutch players in the starting line-up. Arne Slot had handed starting places to Virgil van Dijk and Ryan Gravenberch. Cody Gakpo and Jeremie Frimpong, who was ruled out through injury with the Dutch national team just this week, started on the bench and came on as substitutes in the second half. For Manchester City, led by assistant coach Pepijn Lijnders, Tijjani Reijnders came on after seventy minutes, whilst Nathan Aké remained on the bench.
In a thrilling opening phase, Liverpool had the better of the play. This led to a huge chance after fifteen minutes: Giorgi Mamardashvili played a long ball to put Mohamed Salah through one-on-one with the goalkeeper, but the Egyptian took far too long and allowed Abdukodir Khusanov to close him down.
After Ekitiké had missed another golden opportunity, City rallied. It gave the home side the lead after 39 minutes: Van Dijk brought down Nico O’Reilly in the box, after which Erling Haaland coolly opened the scoring from the spot. City struck again before half-time, when Haaland brilliantly converted a cross into a goal: 2-0. A heavy blow for Slot, who had some damage control to do at half-time.
Immediately after the break, City sealed the deal. In the 50th minute, Cherki sent Semenyo through on goal, and he finished coolly to make it 3-0. Liverpool were completely out of their depth and could no longer get a grip on the home side’s play.
Shortly afterwards, Haaland completed his hat-trick following a fine attack down the left flank. Via Doku and O’Reilly, the ball reached the striker, who fired it in off the crossbar: 4-0. That settled the match once and for all, and the Etihad Stadium could look forward to a relaxed closing stage.
Little of note happened in the final half-hour, although Liverpool did have a golden opportunity to score a consolation goal. Salah stepped up to take a penalty from 11 metres, but saw his effort saved by James Trafford. City then saw out the match comfortably and secured a convincing victory.