BY: Osabuohien Imuetinyanosa
Bayer Leverkusen return the winning ways in Champions League after they were beaten 4-0 at Liverpool and drew 1-1 with Brest. Now Providing 5-0 home win over RB Salzburg on Tuesday, with Florian Wirtz and the visitors having goalkeeper Alexander Schlager who denied more goals from the ferocious attacks from Leverkusen. This win has catapulted them to 10 points while Salzburg remain on three points after suffering fourth defeat in five matches.
Xabi Alonso’s side could easily have been further out of sight at halftime as the Germans found it far too easy to find their way into the Salzburg area.
The game was two minutes old when Wirtz signalled the danger, twisting and turning in the area before getting a shot away which the keeper got a hand to.
It took a penalty to open the scoring, with Salzburg’s Samson Baidoo punished for a handball, and Wirtz sending keeper Schlager the wrong way.
Leverkusen doubled their lead when a foul on Wirtz just outside the area led to the free kick and Schlager could only stand and watch as Grimaldo’s strike sailed into the opposite corner.
Wirtz then scored his fifth goal in five games in the competition when he collected Grimaldo’s pass on the edge of the area before dribbling past two defenders and sending his low shot into the far corner.
Schlager pulled off saves from Grimaldo, Jeremie Frimpong, Exequiel Palacios and Granit Xhaka, and Salzburg manager Pep Lijnders probably felt relieved when he took a glance at the scoreboard before walking off at the break.
Leverkusen’s intensity dropped a little after the restart but it was still all too simple to create chances and when Frimpong sent a perfect ball into the area Schick had the simplest of tap-ins.
Alonso began to make changes, and it was one of the substitutes Aleix Garcia who got on the end of a Wirtz cross to send a powerful shot into the net to finish off the scoring.
Wirtz, a constant threat all night, went off to a deserved standing ovation from the home crowd and was awarded the player of the match prize.
“I’m very happy that I was able to reward myself with two goals and become player of the match,” Wirtz said.
“But I know that the guys on the pitch helped me a lot and I’m very grateful for that.”
“We were aggressive from the start, we wanted to start with fireworks,” Leverkusen midfielder Robert Andrich said.
“We showed a sharp performance today.”
