Gomez injury overshadows winning start for Iraola

Image source, Getty Images Image caption, Both Dominik Szoboszlai and Federico Chiesa scored for Liverpool in Nashville By Aadam Patel Football reporter , At Nashville Published 6 minutes ago Liverpool started life under Andoni Iraola with a 4-2 win over Sunderland thanks to goals from Kieran Morrison, Dominik Szoboszlai, Federico Chiesa and Lewis Koumas. But the Iraola era had initially got off to the worst possible start when Joe Gomez, who started the game as centre-back and captain, went down injured and was taken off in the eighth minute. "Probably the worst news has been straight away the injury of Joe. We were happy because we were going through training without losing any players and unluckily for us we've lost Joe straight away," said Iraola, who was also without new signing Jeremy Jacquet - who plays centre-half - for the opening friendly of Liverpool 's tour of the USA. "With Jeremy we decided to take it easy with him. He's had a lot of months without playing and he's been training very well but we're going to take it easy with him," Iraola added. "He will play probably in the last game of this tour and he will have time to have minutes." With Virgil van Dijk given extra time off following the Netherlands' World Cup campaign, it meant that two teenage centre-backs held the line until the 68th minute. Mor Talla N'diaye, 18, and Ifeanyi Ndukwe, 18, made their debuts and both performed admirably given the situation but neither can be expected to feature regularly yet. Meanwhile, Giovanni Leoni, 19, is still undergoing individual training as he works his way back from a severe ACL tear. Iraola said earlier in the week that his squad was "very thin" defensively. Liverpool 's sporting director, Richard Hughes, was in Nashville for the game and if he wasn't aware already, seeing Gomez trudge off must have underlined how they are desperately short when it comes to experience in the centre-back department. Image source, Getty Images Image caption, Kieran Morrison gave Liverpool the lead in the first half Goals galore in Music City as Liverpool entertain On Friday evening, some of the Liverpool squad took the short walk from their hotel in downtown Nashville to Broadway - the famous entertainment district here in the state of Tennessee. Szoboszlai, who was among that group, certainly took some inspiration. Wearing the armband after coming on at half-time and picking up from exactly where he left off last season, the Hungarian scored a belter from outside the box to level the game at 2-2 after Sunderland had gone ahead through Timur Tutierov, having initially levelled through Enzo le Fee. Seeing Harvey Elliott make a surging run on his first game back at the club, after his spell at Aston Villa , to assist Morrison for Liverpool 's opener was another positive. Morrison showed his quality with a lovely left-footed finish after cutting in from the right. The 19-year-old Northern Ireland international was brilliant all evening and asked plenty of q