Qarabag boss makes Anfield atmosphere admission and vow after Liverpool beating

Qarabag boss Gurban Gurbanov

Qarabag boss Gurban Gurbanov admits his players were overawed by the Anfield atmosphere as they suffered a Champions League beating by Liverpool.

The Reds romped to a 6-0 triumph on Wednesday evening to secure third place in the table and direct qualification to the last 16.

Alexis Mac Allister scored twice while Florian Wirtz, Mohamed Salah, Hugo Ekitike and substitute Federico Chiesa all netted.

It was the first time the Azerbaijan champions had played at Anfield and they were on the receiving end of the biggest margin of victory under Arne Slot’s reign.

And Gurbanov said: “The Liverpool stadium affected our players but if we play here again we will be better. After the game we had a talk and the players admitted they can play better.

“The players weren’t happy because they understood they didn’t play well enough.

“We are sorry that we lost the game. I congratulate Liverpool. If you look at the eight games we have had, we have taken a lot of risks and we did that again here. But we could have played better.”

Despite the heavy loss, Qarabag finished inside the top 24 and will now play either Paris Saint-Germain or Newcastle United in the play-off round next month.

Gurbanov added: “We were trying the best we could to get higher up the 24 but the opponents have been getting stronger and there are bigger games ahead. Hopefully we’ll be ready for the play-offs and prepare better.

“Every team has their way of playing. If we had to learn a lesson from this game, it’s not to play like this – we have to play better.

“Among the eight opponents we had in this opening stage, we didn’t have any easy opponents and the players had the courage to play.”

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