Tim Howard says 24-year-old player really ‘stepped up’ for Liverpool against Luton last night

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Liverpool needed to use the full strength of their squad against Luton Town last night.

With injuries depleting them of some really key players, the Reds were counting on some of their less-heralded names to do the business. Thankfully, they came up trumps.

It hadn’t looked as though they would at half-time, mind you. The fan that Jurgen Klopp argued with in the Main Stand won’t have been the only one upset with some of the performances on display in the opening 45 minutes. As the game wore on though, Liverpool’s quality came to the fore. Bayed on by a ferocious atmosphere at Anfield, the Reds plundered four second-half goals.

One of those to score was Cody Gakpo. Yesterday was only Gakpo’s 11th Premier League start of the season, but as Liverpool’s nominated centre-forward, the Dutchman carried a goal-scoring burden. He needed to step up.

And according to former Manchester United goalkeeper Tim Howard, that’s exactly what he did. Speaking to NBC Sports after the game, Howard praised Gakpo’s display.

“Today players needed to step up. For me, Gakpo needed to step up and he did it,” said the pundit.

Gakpo steps up for Liverpool

On a night where Liverpool were missing Darwin Nunez, Mohamed Salah and Diogo Jota, they were desperate for another to carry the can.

Between them, that trio have scored 46 goals this season. They are not easily replaceable. Over the opening half at Anfield, it looked like Liverpool would find it impossible to do so.

It wasn’t necessarily that the Reds couldn’t create the chances. They had a number of really good sights of goal throughout the first 45. But neither Luis Diaz, Gakpo nor Harvey Elliott had their shooting boots on.

Gakpo was not the most culpable of that trio – it was surely Diaz – although he didn’t exactly look dangerous himself.

The Dutchman has suffered from not really having a fixed position in the forward line this season. Asked to play through the middle yesterday, he didn’t have the pace and explosiveness of Nunez or the smartness and doggedness of Jota.

But the beauty of this Liverpool team is that they never really know when they’re finished. They keep on going and going and create chances as a result of that.

Eventually that pressure paid and when Gakpo got his chance, he got on the end of Alexis Mac Allister’s volleyed ball in. 2-1 to Liverpool and they never looked back.

In the sense that he got his goal, you’d have to say that Gakpo did indeed step up. After Klopp’s post-game fitness update ahead of Sunday’s Carabao Cup final, he may have to do so again this weekend.