Liverpool FC Thread #155 :- Kyiv here we come!!!

[NI KI]

[NI KI]

Mohamed Salah has won the PFA Fans' Player of the Year award after claiming 89 per cent of the votes in an online poll of supporters across the country.

The Liverpool forward set a new Premier League record with his 32 goals in the division during 2017-18, and has scored 44 times in all competitions for the Reds this term.

Salah scooped the monthly prize on four occasions in his debut campaign at Anfield.

He saw off competition from David de Gea (Manchester United), Kevin de Bruyne (Manchester City), Eden Hazard (Chelsea), Harry Kane (Tottenham Hotspur) and Raheem Sterling (Manchester City) to take the accolade.

[NI KI]

Emre Can is making steady progress in his recovery from a back injury and may be available for Saturday's Champions League final.

The midfielder has not played for Liverpool since mid-March, but trained with his teammates at Anfield on Monday having also travelled to Marbella for last week’s pre-final preparation camp ahead of the meeting with Real Madrid.

And, while stopping short of confirming Can will be able feature in Kiev, Jürgen Klopp is pleased with the No.23’s recent development in terms of his fitness.

“It depends,” the boss replied, when asked whether Can will be in his matchday squad at the NSC Olimpiyskiy Stadium.

“With Emre or players in the situation of Emre it depends on the reaction on things [but] let me say it like this: 10 days ago, I didn’t think it was possible that he could do what he did today, and that he could do what he did in Marbella already.

“That looked good and my impression of him is really positive, but we have to wait again until tomorrow. But the door, of course, is open. It’s really nice to have him back in the group and he is really desperate to be part of [the final] and we will see.”

Klopp was also quizzed on Can’s contract situation.

“No clue. [That’s] not important in the moment, to be honest,” he said.

“In this moment, he is 100 per cent here and that is the only thing I’m interested in. Anything else, I really have no idea but that’s not important to me at the moment.”

[NI KI]

Mo Salah has been named PFA Fans’ Player of the Season with 89% of the votes

[NI KI]

[NI KI]

Jurgen Klopp's Liverpool is better than Champions League 2005 winners - according to Rafael Benitez

Rafa Benitez was the manager who oversaw the Miracle of Istanbul.

He does not have a conversation with a Liverpool fan without the events of that incredible evening of May 25, 2005 being mentioned at least once.

But he has a stirring message for the manager looking to pull off another modern miracle in Kiev on Saturday night and deny Real Madrid a third successive European Cup.

Asked how Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool team compares to his 2005 heroes he is definitive.

“I think this one is better,” he said.

“We achieved what we achieved. They talk about the miracle of Istanbul but this team is better.

“So, if we talk about the money spent my budget was £20m - £20 millions.

“The value of this team is so much higher and they have had so many more years when they have been spending a lot of money.”

And while Benitez had a living Liverpool legend to call on, Klopp has Salah, Mane and Firmino.



It was Steven Gerrard who inspired that Istanbul fightback, just as he helped Liverpool reach the knockout stages with a dramatic rescue act against Olympiakos.

But the current Reds do not rely on Salah anything like as much as Benitez needed Gerrard.

“No I don’t think so,” he said. “They have a good balance. Everyone was talking about their defence but they spent some money on defenders.

“They are strong in the middle and they have three players up front who can score goals.

“To be fair Mo Salah has done really well but all Liverpool’s forward line, Mane and Firmino can score goals against any team.”

Benitez could claim to have a foot in both camp on Saturday night - having managed Real and the Reds.

But while he refused to give a prediction, his heart will clearly be rose-tinted on Saturday night - and while the final is finely balanced Benitez believes Liverpool can win.

“The difference between the Premier League and the other leagues is the intensity of the games,” added Rafa.

“Liverpool and their offensive players, their midfielders, their defence have the intensity to hurt you if they do it well.

“On the other side, Real Madrid have experience and they have some good players.

“It will be interesting. On one side you will see a Liverpool team with lots of passion and intensity and a lot of pressing and crossing and fast counter-attacking against a team with a lot of the qualities needed to manage this kind of situation.

“I’ve said before, Real Madrid has the experience and the quality to match them but Liverpool can do it.

“They have the intensity and the quality, the passion, the desire. But sometimes these kinds of games it’s just one mistake and then you pay for that. And it’s how do you manage this pressure.

“Real Madrid have been managing this kind of pressure for a while and Liverpool are in a new situation but, at the same time, they have the energy, the passion, the desire.

“Tell me the difference? The timing of when you can score. Can they maintain the intensity? Yes.

“Can the other side mange the intensity of Liverpool? Yes. So I think it’s a fine balance.”

Like this weekend, Liverpool were underdogs in Istanbul.

“AC Milan was the best team in Europe,” Rafa added. “They had Pirlo, they had Kaka and nobody could be better than them.

[NI KI]

“But we were better than them. We beat them.”

Already popular, that victory enshrined Benitez in Anfield folklore.

He remains one of only three Liverpool managers to claim the European Cup and despite having managed at Inter Milan, Chelsea, Napoli, Real Madrid and now Newcastle since, he is still adored by large sections of the Reds fanbase.

“It changed my life in England,” he admits. “To win the League with Valencia in Spain after 31 years changed my life. To win the UEFA Cup with Valencia changed my life, it changed everything.

“But to come to England and win the Champions League with a different team was massive. It changed everything.”

It meant that Benitez, despite still having a family home on the Wirral and despite being a familiar figure in the region, still cannot venture out publicly without someone talking about Istanbul.

“You find Liverpool fans everywhere and they will always want to talk about Istanbul,” he smiled, that familiar twinkle in his eye.

“At my home I must have watched hundreds of programmes on Istanbul. When I come here (to Newcastle) from Liverpool on the train, you have Liverpool fans talking about Istanbul at one end and Newcastle fans at the other!

“I always say Istanbul will be the most emotional final ever because of the way we won, the way we came back.

“Everything was going wrong, massively wrong and then after half time you see the Liverpool fans singing even though we were 3-0 down. It was massive.



“People say we were lucky in the final but were we lucky in the earlier rounds when we beat Chelsea and Juventus and Bayer Leverkusen” The players did a great job and they had a great belief that we could do this. We were a little bit lucky against the best team in Europe at that time but we had also done well.

“People still think it was just lucky. No. The penalties, four or five of them we knew where they were taking the penalties because we had done a lot of work on that.

“We were actually unlucky at the start of the game because we lost Harry Kewell early (to injury) and we had to change everything.

“We were lucky because we scored the goals in a few minutes but we were much better than them in extra time. When we changed to three at the back that changed everything. We matched them, we had control of the game.

“And we had Stevie of course.



“We also had some players with experience and quality, Alonso and Hamann, we had players who worked very hard. We had a good balance.

“I think this team also has good balance but the three players up front can make a difference on their own.

“We had one player who could maybe make a difference on his own (Gerrard) and here they have three.

“The team spirit, the intensity could be more or less the same because it’s the Liverpool way.

“But what they have today is more quality, especially up front.”

[NI KI]

Benitez has been back to Anfield several times in the away team dugout and is always warmly received.

Despite having also lifted an FA Cup in 2006 and reached another Champions League Final in 2007, that is entirely down to the miracle of Istanbul.

Straight after the final it saw him deified!

He tells the anecdote: “We had a party after the match and security would not let some friends in.

“I went out but security said ‘it’s a private party, you cannot go in.’



“A friend I was with turned to him (security) and said ‘Do you know this man? Do you know this man is? He is God. He is God!”

Benitez shrugs as if he could not understand his sudden elevation to Godlike status - and he believes Jurgen Klopp does not need victory on Saturday night to achieve the same status.

“Maybe it will change everything for him in Liverpool,” said Benitez. “But he’s fine. He’s an idol now but he will be more.

“He was winning with Dortmund but it would be massive for him here because it has been some time since he was winning at this level.”

And then it’s back to that magical night on the banks of the Bosphorus.

“When we conceded the second goal, I was thinking what I had to say, I was making my notes and then we conceded a third,” he explained.

“I had to give a speech in English and you know my English now ... but then, 10 years ago, it was not so good.

“I was thinking about what I would say in English to motivate players because it’s not the same as saying something in Spanish. Speaking English you lose something.

“The main thing was to run through the system and make sure we had everybody ready. That was the main thing, that Didi Hamann would control the middle and give some freedom to Gerrard, so we had more control because Kaka was playing between the lines and we needed to control the space better.



“I remember Stevie talking to my assistant and he said ‘Now you have to make me the best midfielder in the world’ so he had the clear belief he could improve and we could improve them.

“I have been in some (other) situations like that and I was really proud of what they’d achieved, but you do not realise at this time what it means.

“That happens after. So two or three days after you went to the city (Liverpool) and saw the fans ...”

Rafa will be watching on Saturday night - and despite his diplomacy, he will be a fan.

He will always be the man who oversaw the miracle of Istanbul.

Victory in Kiev on Saturday night could see him have a rival ... and he would be thrilled.

[NI KI]

Toni Kroos has faced Klopp’s Gegenpress ‘animals' before 👀

[NI KI]

Sadio Mané this season