ReactionArne Slot press conference: Rio Ngumoha impact and Liverpool 2-0 Fulham

Teenager Ngumoha was named in the starting line-up for the Premier League clash and broke the deadlock 36 minutes in with a precise, curled finish.

A Player of the Match display from Ngumoha at Anfield also included involvement in the Reds’ second goal of a 2-0 win, dispatched clinically by Mohamed Salah.

Read head coach Slot’s assessment of the evening at his post-match press conference below…

• Curtis Jones and Alisson Becker injury update

On Ngumoha’s performance and goal, and if it’s ‘another glimpse of what he can do in the future’…

Yeah, but not only the long future, also the near future. I think I’ve said a few weeks, maybe months ago, one or two months ago, that his playing time would increase because he got stronger and stronger, showed more and more when he came in, but also in training sessions, that it wasn’t only a nice trick, but there was more and more end product to what he did. There was more and more power to what he did, which is needed if you play against the best defenders in the world. And I don’t think anyone is surprised that at this moment of time he scored his first goal [of the season].

He has such a special quality which you don’t see a lot in football anymore: dominating the one-v-one situation. And that’s exactly what he did when he scored his goal, making the ball free by twisting and turning and then hitting it in like a Mo Salah finish, I would say. It’s something I’m not surprised to see because in training sessions during the last month we saw more and more that he got more and more power to hit the ball as powerful as he did today. And yeah, that’s why he had now three starts in the last seven or eight games, I think. I don’t know exactly, but Wolves and Tottenham and this one. Pleasing to see that he did what we know makes him special, that’s dominating one-v-one situations.

• Read our match report from Anfield here

On whether Ngumoha is ready to start a game of the magnitude of Paris Saint-Germain on Tuesday night…

Yeah, I think he’s ready. Now the question, of course, is: can he do this two days later again? That’s another question. But would he be able to play and perform at that level? Yeah. I play him because I see him as one of the players we are having. It’s not like he’s less or in the beginning of the season he was a young player getting some experience with the first team. But now he’s just someone I can pick for any game. So, also the one on Tuesday.

But I think in general, that’s not to say about Tuesday, but in general expecting from a 17-year-old that he can play three games in six days, you could question if that’s realistic, especially for the ones that have been there in Paris and saw that intensity. That’s almost for every player too much, as you noticed today in my line-up, that I was aware of how intense two days ago was and how intense two days from today will be again.

On a moment of individual skill making the difference for the opener...

That’s something different than what we’ve usually seen with us. I think we started off really well, first 20 to 25 minutes we were creating not the biggest chances but we had a few good moments in and around their penalty box. Then there were indeed five to 10 minutes where I felt like, ‘OK, Fulham is now coming into the game’ and we all know, because you guys, I see always the same faces [in the press conferences], we all know what’s going to happen then with us: we concede. That has happened every single game almost. Not that we were outplayed [today]. We were outplayed two days ago, but we were not outplayed in that 10 minutes, but they were coming a little bit, just as Nottingham Forest came a little bit, got a corner kick and scored immediately.

Today, at last, exactly at that moment Rio had his moment and that tells you how crucial goals are and how crucial momentum is. Because what if we, in the same game today, would have conceded in that 10 minutes? It would have been a completely different game. Now, because we scored, we had the momentum and five minutes later we scored the 2-0, which has happened so many times here at Liverpool. When you get the momentum, you can score another one. That’s why a goal is very important, but that quality he has is also very important and hopefully he can show this many more times in the stadium.