Liverpool edges into Europa League's final 16 courtesy of early Milner spot-kick

An early James Milner penalty was enough for Liverpool to edge past FC Augsburg by a 1-0 aggregate scoreline at Anfield on Thursday.

Caiuby and Dominik Kohr both rose to head a cross away from danger but got in each other's way, culminating in the latter unintentionally batting the ball away with his flailing hand. The steely Yorkshireman made no mistake from the spot after just five minutes.

The rest of the match followed a similar script to the 0-0 first leg of their Europa League Round of 32 meeting in Bavaria last week, with the Reds displaying some neat fluidity and incisiveness with the ball at times, but with an unerring yet unwanted habit of squandering the final opportunity.

As the tie reached its conclusion, Augsburg sensed an upset with an away goal capable of upsetting the illustrious English host and sending the Germans into last-16 in their maiden European campaign.

And it looked like the telling blow was dealt on 89 minutes, when Konstantinos Stafylidis superbly bent a free-kick over the wall only to see it pass Simon Mignolet's post by a matter of millimetres.

Liverpool enters the Round of 16 for the first time since it was dumped out the same stage by Braga in 2011. Jurgen Klopp's side will learn of its opponent in the next stage on Friday.