Liverpool star Sadio Mane was full of praise for new boy Thiago Alcantara after the Spaniard’s debut in his side’s 2-0 win against Chelsea.
The 29-year-old joined the Reds this week in a £25million deal from Bayern Munich but he’s only had one full training session with his new team-mates and had to settle for a place on the bench at Stamford Bridge.
However, after Andreas Christensen’s red card, Jurgen Klopp called for Thiago to come on and the Spaniard controlled the game in an impressive second half performance.
A look at the stats showed Thiago had more touches in the second half than any Chelsea player managed in the entire game and his pass percentage was 90.4%.
Liverpool’s recent philosophy has been to groom world stars rather than buy them but they bucked the trend through the acquisition of Thiago.
And, while it was Mane that was the match-winner, the Senegalese forward hailed Thiago.
‘I think not only me but all of the world knows what he’s capable of,’ said Mane.
‘He’s one of the best players in the world so we are lucky to have Thiago in our team.
‘I think today he showed that he is a great player.’
After a shaky defensive display against Leeds United last weekend, the Reds looked more assured against Frank Lampard’s side.
However, the Reds’ clean sheet was threatened when Thiago tripped Timo Werner in the box to give Jorginho a chance to half the deficit from 12 yards.
But Alisson Becker was equal to the Italian’s spot kick to ensure that Liverpool kept their first clean sheet of the season.
