Mo Salah hat-trick helped Liverpool beat Leeds in an amazing 7-goal thriller at Anfield.

Stuart Irvine reports on the Liverpool first Premier League of the New Season where Liverpool take on newly-promoted Leeds United at Anfield. Will the Reds get their title defence off with a win, or will Leeds produce a shock on their Premier League return?

Mo Salah hat-trick helped Liverpool beat Leeds in an amazing 7-goal thriller at Anfield.

Liverpool hit the ground running when on three minutes after Salah shot hit the arm of Koch in the box, Mo Salah stepped up and smacked the penalty straight down the middle to make it 1-0.

But this didn’t deter Leeds and 9 minutes later the game was level when a lovely long ball found Harrison on the left whose brilliant first touch took it past Alexander-Arnold and his second touch missed Gomez’s challenge and he hit a powerful low strike outside the ball and past Allison who had no chance.

With it being a very open back and forth contest, you had a feeling that there was going to be more goals. Indeed there was when on 20 minutes Liverpool retook the lead when from Robertson’s corner found Van Dijk who lost his marker Koch and leapt up to head past Mesiler who got a hand on it but was unable to keep it out. The game was still end to end with no stop in sign and Leeds were looking lightly and looking like they could level the game up again at any time. On the half-hour mark, they did when another long ball tried to find Bamford, which Van Dijk thought he had it covered but a terrible pass to clear when to Bamford clipped the ball past Alisson to level the game once again. But before Leeds had any time to celebrate Liverpool retook the lead again when a free-kick from Robertson which was headed away from Struijk found an unmarked Mo Salah and he hit a brilliant shot which found the top corner and gave Meslier no chance to make it 3-2. Leeds could have had a penalty just before half time when Costa when down from a challenge by Salah, but Michael Oliver waved it away and ended a crazy first half of football.

A slower tempo in the second half but still very open with you still watching expecting to see more goals. On 58 minutes Leeds thought they levelled once again when Harrison ran in behind and clipped the ball over Allisson and Alexander-Arnolds headed it into his own net after trying to stop it from going in.

But the flag was up after it was shown that he was just offside and was a let-off for Liverpool. But on 66 minutes it was 3-3 when Costa crossed on the right and found Klich, who was able to run-in behind Van Dijk and his volley when into the far corner and levelled the game for the Yorkshire side. Liverpool should have been back in the lead when Van Dijk was able to lose Koch from a corner then he smacked it into the back of the net, but after it was shown that Jones fouled Koch in the build-up and the goal was disallowed and the game was still level.

But 3 minutes before time, Liverpool were rewarded a penalty after substitute Rodrigo clip Fabinho in the box after a good build-up play by the Reds. Mo Salah ended the game where he started and stepped up to send Meslier the wrong way and to get his hat-trick and give Liverpool 3 points in a very entertaining opening day Premier League showdown.