By Richard Jolly

Copyright independent

Virgil van Dijk planted a 92nd-minute header into the Atletico Madrid net. Like Federico Chiesa and Rio Ngumoha, like Dominik Szoboszlai and Mohamed Salah before him, he got Liverpool a win from the jaws of a draw. In the Champions League as in the Premier League, they found a way to win.

Logically it cannot carry on like this. But it did carry on like this. When Marcos Llorente seemed to have capped an Atletico comeback, his brace taking them from 2-0 down to the brink of a point, up popped Van Dijk, Liverpool winning another game of brinkmanship, looking flawed but finding a way.

Perhaps it was revenge of sorts for Atletico’s 3-2 win at Anfield in 2020, eliminating the holders. Diego Simeone, the winning manager then, had a rather different finish; sent off for his furious protests after Van Dijk scored.

In the process, he, and Van Dijk, and Llorente, all achieved what had seemed the impossible, consigning the most expensive footballer in the history of the English game to a subplot.

Isak made his debut, had a couple of shots – one wide, the other at Jan Oblak – and produced a neat flick to Florian Wirtz. He tired and was taken off after 58 minutes.

But the drama occurred around him, after him, instead of him. There are different types of record-breaker and while Isak’s £125m fee makes him the biggest buy in the history of English football, Salah has broken a host of records with his goalscoring.

Isak had scored on his Newcastle debut at Anfield, but not his Liverpool now. He now finds himself 248 Liverpool goals behind Salah.

If some of the script stayed the same for Liverpool, with another remarkable finish, they bookended the game with goals. They had never previously been 2-0 up after six minutes of a European game. They were here, with Salah prominent.

After those six minutes, Salah had an assist, albeit a fortunate one, and a goal. His has been a subdued start to the season, despite converting the pressure penalty at Burnley on Sunday, but he seemed transported back towards his best. Perhaps it was a coincidence it came on Isak’s debut. Perhaps, though, a man who is rarely overshadowed was making a point.

Indeed, Liverpool were 2-0 up before Isak had even touched the ball. The first was, in some ways, an impressively bad goal, a poor free kick deflected in by a man who was trying to get out of the way of it. Yet the ball struck Andy Robertson’s heel to wrongfoot Oblak. Sometimes, though, managerial decisions just work.

This was not the reason Slot brought Robertson into the side as he took the flailing Milos Kerkez out of the firing line, looking for defensive solidity which, it transpired, his side still lacked. But, for just the second time, the Scot was a scorer in the Champions League.

Liverpool’s second was altogether more intentional and typical, the type of one-two Salah often plays as he cuts infield. Ryan Gravenberch, who had won the free kick for the opener, returned the ball to him. Salah angled a shot past Oblak.

Salah was electric, close to a spectacular second with a curling shot, denied by the post when he should have extended Liverpool’s lead. There are days when he seems impossible to contain. This was the first such occasion in the current campaign.

And yet his misses, and those of his colleagues, could have come at a cost. Atleti were without the injured Julian Alvarez but found a talisman in Llorente. The midfielder has only scored seven Champions League goals, but four have come at Anfield; they may offer reasons for Liverpool to recruit him.

He halved the deficit when he poked in a shot after a pass from Giacomo Raspadori. Alisson was aggrieved that the offside Antoine Griezmann was in his line of vision; on a day of bemusing officiating, referee Maurizio Maurini had even tried to award a penalty when the ball struck Clement Lenglet’s stomach, so it was not the most contentious choice.

Llorente levelled with a sweetly-struck volley that nevertheless took a sizeable deflection off Alexis Mac Allister. Given the unwitting role Robertson played in the opener, Liverpool could scarcely complain.

But they rallied, as they have before. Ridiculously, Van Dijk’s goal was only their third latest this season – Salah at Burnley and Ngumoha struck even deeper into matches.

Another late, late show. And Isak, watching on from the bench by then, must be wondering what, exactly, he has joined.