Champions League: English teams shine brightly in game week 3

Liverpool crush Frankfurt 5-1, Chelsea thrash Ajax 5-1 in Champions League. English teams dominate, eyes on Forest's new coach Dyche in Europa league.

Virgil Van Dijk celebrates after heading Liverpool in front on Wednesday as the Premier League champions won 5-1 away at Frankfurt. (Photo credit: Photo credit: Opta)

Liverpool emphatically dismissed any talk of a crisis by decisively defeating Frankfurt in Germany, a game in which Florian Wirtz finally found his mojo.

Going into the game, Liverpool had lost four straight games, including the one away at Galatasaray, which has impacted their position on the Champions League log, but their performance against Frankfurt restored confidence to their fan base.

Liverpool didn't start the game well; they even conceded first, but Hugo Ekitike and the duo of Liverpool centre-backs headed home impressively to hand Liverpool a 3-1 first-half lead, one which they built on in the second half.

Cody Gakpo and Dominik Szoboszlai added the third and fifth goals, setting Liverpool up for an important fixture in the Premier League on Sunday away at Brentford. The only negative of the night, however, was the injury to Jeremy Frimpong.

Elsewhere on the night, Chelsea hammered Ajax at Stamford Bridge Stadium. Is it time for the Dutch side to hit the panic button? It keeps going from bad to worse for them, and a 5-1 embarrassment in England is the latest in their run of losses.

Young Brazilian Estevao got on the score sheet as well as Tyrick George, with Enzo Fernandes, Moises Caicedo and Marc Guiu all also scoring. The win has taken Chelsea up to 11th on the log, while Liverpool sits one better in 10th.

Thursday is the turn of Aston Villa and Nottingham in the Europa League and Crystal Palace in the Europa Conference League. So far, all English teams have won all their respective games so far in Europe this week. Will the Thursday trio do the same?

All eyes will particularly be on Nottingham Forest as Sean Dyche takes to the dugout for the first time as the new head coach following the sacking of Ange Postecoglou. Will Evangelos Marinakis finally find joy this season?