Ajax vs Rangers LIVE: Champions League result, final score and reaction as Ajax notch comfortable win
Ajax 4-0 Rangers: Gers lose heavily in their first Champions League match in 12 years
Ajax built a commanding early lead before overwhelming Rangers 4-0 in Champions League Group A at the Johan Cruyff Arena.
Edson Alvarez, Steven Berghuis and Mohammed Kudus scored in a one-sided first half and Steven Bergwijn added the fourth 10 minutes from time to complete the rout.
It was a dominant display from a new-look Ajax, who sold several key players over the summer, and lost head coach Erik ten Hag to Manchester United, but still proved far too strong for the Scottish side - last season’s Europa League runners-up.
Borna Barisic did have a goal disallowed for the Gers after an offside in the build-up but they were largely outclassed.
Relive all the action as Ajax beat Rangers in the Champions League:
Liverpool crushed by rampant Napoli in Champions League opener
As Thomas Tuchel can testify, this was an awful day for Champions League-winning German managers. If Barcelona ranks as Liverpool’s finest and famous European game under Jurgen Klopp, this was surely the worst and the most worrying. Liverpool have touched greatness at times in continental competitions in his reign, but they were gruesome as they were garrotted by Luciano Spalletti’s inspired Napoli team. It is a hat-trick of defeats in Naples in the Klopp era, but this was the heaviest and the most harrowing. Unlike the previous two, this seemed to highlight deeper problems.
There was Liverpool’s now trademark slow start but without the salvation of improvement thereafter. There were a collection of errors, with a shambolic defence found glaringly wanting while the lack of a functioning midfield compounded their problems. There were individual errors and a lack of cohesion among the collective. The side Klopp famously christened ‘mentality monsters’ looked lacking in spirit. Only Luis Diaz, who mounted a one-man attempt at an unlikely rescue job, should escape censure.
In the broader picture, Liverpool have twice lost in Naples before and qualified from Champions League groups but they scarcely resembled the side who almost completed a clean sweep of trophies last season. They were ramshackle and ragged. Four goals could have been seven. Not because of the number of chances as their clarity. There was a shot that hit the woodwork, a missed penalty and a goal-line clearance. Liverpool are rarely opened up as often, as easily; at times, as embarrassingly. Whether Virgil van Dijk or Joe Gomez, James Milner or Trent Alexander-Arnold, this was a terrible night for players who have produced far better time and again.
Liverpool crushed by rampant Napoli in Champions League opener
Napoli 4-1 Liverpool: The Reds’ early-season struggles continued in Naples with a comprehensive defeat in their opening game of the Champions League group stage
FT Napoli 4-1 Liverpool
Contrasting fortunes.
FT Napoli 4-1 Liverpool
This was Liverpool’s joint biggest Champions League defeat. They also lost 3-0 to Real Madrid in 2014 and Barcelona in 2019.
Full-time: Napoli 4-1 Liverpool
90+4 mins: Diogo Jota meets a corner with an effort on the volley but that chance is blocked as well. The full-time whistle goes and Napoli claim their deserved victory!
Jurgen Klopp has to go back to the drawing board once more. His team aren’t meeting their usually high standards. Mo Salah and Virgil van Dijk in particular look like shadows of their former selves.
Is this just a phase or are Liverpool in a slump that they can’t get out of?
Napoli 4-1 Liverpool
90 mins: Four minutes of added time to play. The stadium is still packed with Napoli supporters. This is a huge win for them, Liverpool are the Champions League runners-up from last year and Napoli have battered them tonight.
Napoli 4-1 Liverpool
86 mins: Luis Diaz drifts across two or three Napoli defenders before laying the ball off to Arthur who takes a shot but has it blocked by Mario Rui.
It’s not happening for Liverpool. This is a night to forget.
Napoli 4-1 Liverpool
83 mins: Thiago shoves Anguissa off the ball in midfield and sends the ball out to Alexander-Arnold who fizzes a curling delivery into the box.
Jota flings himself at the pass but there’s too much pace on it and the ball flies past him into the hands of Meret.
Napoli 4-1 Liverpool
80 mins: Alex Meret claims to have hurt himself plucking the ball of the nose of Darwin Nunez. He’s absolutely fine and wants a couple of minutes taken out of the game despite Napoli’s three goal advantage.
10 minutes to play in Naples as the goalkeeper gets back to his feet.
Napoli 4-1 Liverpool
77 mins: Arthur is getting ready in the sidelines for Liverpool and looks set to make his first appearance for the club. Liverpool have finally found some control but they’re lacking a clinical touch in the final third.
Arthur does come on for the Reds with Harvey Elliott replaced.
Napoli 4-1 Liverpool
74 mins: Giovanni Simeone has scored on his Champions League debut, 25 years and 361 days after his father Diego Simeone also scored on his debut in the competition (two goals vs FCSB in 1996).
Liverpool continue to come forward with Nunez swinging a cross into the box. Jota is the closest man to it but he can’t reach the ball and it bobbles out of play.
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