![\"Ian](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Ian-Doyle.jpg\")
<\/p>\nIan Doyle with the Liverpool player ratings and scores from the opening pre-season friendly against Athletic Bilbao at Anfield on Monday<\/p>\n
Ian Doyle has covered Liverpool for more than 20 years, following them across Europe in multiple Champions League and Europa League finals and as far afield as Thailand, Singapore, the United States, Hong Kong and Qatar, and has reported on the Reds winning every major honour. He previously also covered Everton for 18 years and followed England, reporting on the European Championships and World Cup final. Once had to tell Jude Law he does not drive a Mini.<\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/0_GettyImages-2227827930.jpg\")
Rio Ngumoha of Liverpool during the pre-season friendly match between Liverpool v Athletic Club Bilbao at Anfield on August 4, 2025(Image: Robbie Jay Barratt – AMA\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Liverpool opened their friendly double-header against Athletic Bilbao with an entertaining 4-1 victory at Anfield. Teenage winger Rio Ngumoha, Darwin Nunez, Ben Doak and Harvey Elliott all found the target as the Reds romped against the Spanish visitors.<\/a><\/p>\n Arne Slot<\/a> fielded a largely second-string side with his selection influenced by the absence on Monday evening of the ill Virgil van Dijk and Conor Bradley, who is nursing a minor injury.<\/p>\n The ECHO was among those at Anfield – once they were allowed in after the Main Stand had been evacuated around an hour before kick-off<\/a>, that is – and here we run the rule over Slot’s side.<\/p>\n READ MORE: Anfield Main Stand evacuated ahead of Liverpool vs Athletic Bilbao<\/a>READ MORE: Play stopped at Anfield as Liverpool pay emotional tribute to Diogo Jota<\/a><\/p>\n Freddie Woodman 6<\/strong><\/p>\n Watched a shot hit the bar but otherwise untroubled during a composed display.<\/p>\n Luca Stephenson 6<\/strong><\/p>\n Couple of canny defensive moments were very much those of a player with a season of senior experience under their belt. At fault for Bilbao consolation due to wayward header, however.<\/p>\n Trey Nyoni 7<\/strong><\/p>\n Emergency centre-back but, two unwise passes aside out of defence, the 18-year-old embraced the challenge. Switched back to midfield shortly after half-time.<\/p>\n Andy Robertson 7<\/strong><\/p>\n Kept things simple at the heart of defence and a couple of good blocks before break. Tidied up a few times second half but centre-back isn\u2019t his position.<\/p>\n Kostas Tsimikas 7<\/strong><\/p>\n Nipped in at the right time defensively on occasion and had one shot blocked. Willingness to push forward led to major part in fourth goal.<\/p>\n Curtis Jones 7<\/strong><\/p>\n Forceful in midfield and took a few knocks as a consequence. Looked to get Liverpool moving forward and good in possession.<\/p>\n Alexis Mac Allister 6<\/strong><\/p>\n Very much playing within himself as he continues to gain minutes having missed a few months through injury.<\/p>\n Ben Doak 7<\/strong><\/p>\n Caused his marker problems down the right with his direct running and had one piledriver saved before notching the third.<\/p>\n Harvey Elliott 7<\/strong><\/p>\n Playing in the number 10 role, looked to link play but wasn\u2019t involved as much as he would have wanted first half. Better after break and nice finish for fourth.<\/p>\n Rio Ngumoha 8<\/strong><\/p>\n Brilliant run and finish inside 90 seconds for the opener, assisted the second and roused the crowd whenever on the ball. Another very encouraging showing from the 16-year-old.<\/p>\n Darwin Nunez 7<\/strong><\/p>\n Played on the fringes at times but plenty of effort and took his goal very well. Good awareness to assist the fourth for Elliott.<\/p>\n Armin Pecsi (for Woodman 46) 7<\/strong><\/p>\n Good save when left one-on-one with Guruzeta shortly after coming on. Good distance on clearances.<\/p>\n Wellity Lucky (for Mac Allister 56) 6<\/strong><\/p>\n Academy centre-back teenager made one good clearing header.<\/p>\n Jayden Danns (for Doak 56) 6<\/strong><\/p>\n Started on the right, moved to the left and another for whom minutes were the main objective.<\/p>\n Trent Kone-Doherty (for Ngumoha 67) 6<\/strong><\/p>\n Not much chance to show his pace and trickery out wide.<\/p>\n Tommy Pilling (for Nyoni 67) 6<\/strong><\/p>\n Massive moment for the Academy midfielder who was determined to enjoy it.<\/p>\n Lewis Koumas (for Nunez 80)<\/strong><\/p>\n Enough time to see a low shot well saved.<\/p>\n Michael Laffey (for Jones 85)<\/strong><\/p>\n Another youngster for whom this was their first real exposure around senior players.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ian Doyle with the Liverpool player ratings and scores from the opening pre-season friendly against Athletic Bilbao at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":317798,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8815],"tags":[748,393,4884,179,763,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-317797","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-liverpool","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-england","10":"tag-great-britain","11":"tag-liverpool","12":"tag-liverpool-fc","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=317797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317797\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/317798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=317797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=317797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=317797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}