Arne Slot’s side were desperate to stop the rot in Germany, but it was Frankfurt who took the lead at the end of a devastating move.
Rasmus Kristensen was expertly picked out by Mario Götze and unleashed a right-footed strike from a tight angle that clipped in off the post.
It was the Dane’s first UCL goal to add more encouragement to an already vociferous home crowd, but they were soon silenced thanks to a former hero of theirs.
Andrew Robertson brilliantly played Hugo Ekitike through on goal with the Frankfurt defence horribly exposed, and the latter unleashed a clinical finish against the club he left for £69million three months ago.
The turnaround was complete when Virgil van Dijk headed home from Cody Gakpo’s corner, before Liverpool added a third via another corner before half time.
On this occasion, Dominik Szoboszlai was the provider for Ibrahima Konaté to provide a bullet header of his own and leave Frankfurt shell-shocked.
Isak made way for Federico Chiesa after the break, and the Italian almost made an immediate impact when his acrobatic effort flew wide. Florian Wirtz was next to try his luck in pursuit of his first Liverpool goal, but Michael Zetterer parried his free-kick over the bar.
Frankfurt’s rampant start felt like a long time ago, with Zetterer called into action again to deny Ekitike before parrying Conor Bradley’s stinging effort onto the post.
A fourth goal seemed inevitable, and it came courtesy of Gakpo, who had the simplest of tasks to tap the ball home from Wirtz’s cut-back.
The floodgates had well and truly opened when Szoboszlai drilled home a fifth, with Wirtz the provider once again to round off a job very well done.
This result was the perfect cure for Liverpool's recent slump that had lingered long enough to be classed as a mini crisis. Slot will hope his side can turn a corner now, as they aim to reignite their challenge for domestic and European glory.
They are now unbeaten in 15 matches against German teams (W12, D3) in a run dating back to a 4-2 UCL quarter-final second-leg defeat to Bayer Leverkusen in April 2002.
Meanwhile, this result means Frankfurt’s first three UCL league phase matches have all ended in 5-1 scorelines, ending up on the losing side in two of them. They are now without a win in five games against Premier League clubs (D2, L3) after a sobering night for Dino Toppmöller’s team.
Flashscore Man of the Match: Dominik Szoboszlai (Liverpool)
