The Ballon d’Or winner was the difference.
Ousmane Dembele scored twice as Champions League holders Paris Saint-Germain progressed to the semi-finals and condemned Liverpool to a trophy-less season with a 2-0 win at Anfield.
PSG held a 2-0 advantage from a quarter-final first leg they dominated and, though they had to soak up pressure for much of the second half in the return leg, Luis Enrique’s men got the job done to set up a last-four clash with either Real Madrid or Bayern Munich.
Liverpool lost Hugo Ekitike to what looked to be a serious injury in the first half and, after his France colleague Desire Doue was forced off for PSG in the second, there was huge frustration for the hosts as they saw the award of a penalty overturned after a VAR review.
And Arne Slot’s men ultimately paid the price for failing to make their spell of second-half pressure tell, Dembele creating space for himself on the edge of the area and beating Giorgi Mamardashvil with a left-footed strike into the bottom-left corner.
That strike left Liverpool with too much to do, and Dembele applied the gloss to the aggregate scoreline with a stoppage-time second that made the gap between the two teams as emphatic as it should have been after the first leg in Paris.
Liverpool suffer Ekitike blow
Mamardashvili had to show his improvisational skills to prevent Dembele from breaking the deadlock much earlier than the 72nd minute, the Georgian denying the Ballon d’Or winner while running back to his own goal after cutting out a throughball to Warren Zaire-Emery. Dembele then hooked over the crossbar from close range following great work from Joao Neves.
Ekitike was carried off on a stretcher in considerable distress on the half-hour mark after going down off the ball, leading to the introduction of Mohamed Salah, who was surprisingly left out of the side with Alexander Isak starting his first game since his December injury.
Immediately after Ekitike’s departure, Liverpool went agonisingly close to taking the lead on the night as Matvey Safonov thwarted Milos Kerkez with a superb save, before an outstanding piece of defending from Marquinhos stopped Virgil van Dijk from tapping in the rebound.
PSG punish hosts’ profligacy
Isak was replaced by Cody Gakpo at half-time, and Safonov was required to keep out an ambitious drive from the Dutchman.
PSG’s hopes of killing off the tie suffered a setback when Doue limped off after a challenge from Szoboszlai, and that preceded Liverpool’s best spell of the match, Ryan Gravenberch lashing wide after a surprise foray forward and Kerkez failing to make the most of a superb cross from Salah.
The hosts looked to have a lifeline after Alexis Mac Allister went down under the challenge of Willian Pacho and referee Maurizio Mariani promptly pointed to the spot, only to overturn his decision after a trip to the pitchside monitor.
Mac Allister then headed wide from close range and substitute Rio Ngumoha drew a fine save from Safonov after cutting in from the left, and Dembele showed the cutting edge Liverpool lacked when he put the tie to bed.
PSG were in cruise control thereafter, and the icing on the cake came as Dembele made no mistake with a simple finish after being teed up by Bradley Barcola.
