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ANFIELD, LIVERPOOL // Liverpool beat Athletic Bilbao in its final friendly of the summer, with Hugo Ekitike and Florian Wirtz giving fans an exciting glimpse of what they can produce in the final third.
Egyptian forward Mohamed Salah opened the scoring after good work from Ekitike down the left flank, but Oihan Sancet leveled things up 15 minutes later, smashing the ball past Giorgi Mamardashvili from inside the penalty area.
Cody Gakpo scored at both ends in the second half, twice for the Reds and once for Bilbao. Here are the four things Liverpool.com spotted as the second game of the day unfolded at Anfield.
New signings settle in
For Mamardashvili, Milos Kerkez, Florian Wirtz and Ekitike, this was their first experience of playing at Anfield. And each had moments that they will look back on with pride.
Wirtz and Ekitike, the $260 million (£195 million) additions in attack, caught the eye the most, as you would expect from the more attacking players in the team, but the others were solid enough too. Wirtz, for his part, looks so skillful in possession. More on Ekitike shortly.
Given there has been so much churn in the Liverpool roster this summer (and there might be some more changes yet), the players would be forgiven for taking some time to gel. They seemed pretty on the same page here, though, which can only be a good thing at this stage of the summer. This was a glimpse, and clearly, there is much more yet to come.
Hugo Ekitike stars
Ekitike is less of a known quantity than Wirtz and Kerkez. But the 23-year-old showed exactly what Arne Slot would have wanted from him here, knitting everything together up top.
This was a really good home debut. Ekitike pressed well, passed well, moved well, and made sensible decisions. His touch is excellent and he combined really well with Wirtz and Salah, in particular, which can only be a good thing.
The comparisons to Darwin Nunez will be inevitable — he too was an expensive number nine — but Ekitike showed lots of things that the Uruguayan has been unable to at Anfield. This was a very promising start.
Center-backs solid
Virgil van Dijk was missing through illness and so this was a chance for Ibrahima Konate to step up and show what he can do as the more senior of the center-back partners. With Joe Gomez not yet having returned, Liverpool is light in that department.
Konate played well here. He was good on the ball and solid enough at the back. Against a decent Athletic Club, who finished fourth in La Liga last season, he put in a composed showing.
Wataru Endo was the man to slot in at center-back in the more senior of the two starting XIs, suggesting he is the favored option if required during the season. Signing a defender before the window closes on September 1, though, is surely still high on the to-do list.
Dominik Szoboszlai's new role
Dominik Szoboszlai is unlikely to win the battle to play number 10 this season given that Liverpool has spent so big on Wirtz. But if anyone thought that he wouldn't be getting plenty of minutes, pre-season has categorically proven them wrong.
Szoboszlai has dropped deeper in midfield but is still very effective (indeed, if you asked him, he would probably admit that he prefers to be there). As a number eight, he still injects almost limitless energy.
Dropping into the backline when Liverpool was building up the play, the Hungarian was dictating things from there as well. In possession, he has a great range of passing, while he was pointing and cajoling Kerkez into the correct spots time and time again.
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