Plymouth boss Muslic celebrates Liverpool miracle with 'nachos and Fanta'

Ryan Hardie's second-half penalty gave the Championship's bottom club an astonishing 1-0 victory over the Premier League leaders at Home Park on Sunday. Liverpool boss Arne Slot named a reserve team for the fourth-round tie, resting stars including Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk. Plymouth took full advantage to end Liverpool's quadruple bid with one of the FA Cup's more memorable giant-killings. But the low-key Muslic opted against celebrating with alcohol.

"Normally I'm very good in my words and eloquent, but I'm a little bit speechless," said Muslic, who succeeded the sacked Wayne Rooney as Pilgrims manager in January. "It's a day for Argyle, a day for Plymouth, a day for the 'Green Army'. They deserve it and I want them to give it celebrations their all. I will go home and re-watch the game, eat some Nachos and drink a Fanta. It's very boring for me."

Masterminding a famous victory over Liverpool while fighting to haul Plymouth off the bottom of the Championship was no hardship for Muslic, who was a refugee from war-torn Bosnia as a child. Muslic was forced to move to Austria aged nine, escaping his home town of Bihac after it fell under siege by Serbian forces in 1992.

"I'm very emotional because I realised the task and the opponent. It's the biggest moment so far in my coaching career, no doubt, because it's the FA Cup and Liverpool," he said. "But the biggest moment will be staying up in the Championship. This is my goal, this is what I have in my mind and my soul." Plymouth had already beaten Premier League side Brentford in the third round, but their victory against West Brom last weekend was their first in the league since November.

They subdued Liverpool's understudies with a gritty display before snatching the lead when Hardie converted from the spot after Harvey Elliott handled Darko Gyabi's overhead kick.  Plymouth had to withstand nine minutes of stoppage-time during which Conor Hazard made superb saves to deny Diogo Jota and Darwin Nunez.

"We knew we would have a lot of moments to defend and it was a huge task to keep them away from the goal," Muslic said. "I watched them a couple of nights ago against Tottenham and the wave of Liverpool was unstoppable. Liverpool made changes but I said to the players there was nothing to be afraid of, nothing to lose and everything to win. We played like this and we have added another part in the history of Argyle that nobody can take away from us."

 

February 9, 2025