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1st May 2018
10:28pm BST
“Our future will be as bright as this,” Liverpool’s manager says with a smile dipped in complete conviction. “And I know football is all about success, but it’s also worth having a situation in 20 years when you can look back and think over the great times you had together during your development.”
That was at the end of July 2016, with the German having overseen his first pre-season at the club, and as Liverpool finalise preparations for the second leg of the Champions League semi-final against Roma, those words are underlined and in block letters.
The Merseysiders, courtesy of the 5-2 scoreline at Anfield last week, have a three-goal advantage at Stadio Olimpico and are 90-odd minutes away from the opportunity of landing the trophy every elite team covets.
Walk around that. This is a tournament they had to qualify for in August. A tournament they have only featured in twice over the past eight seasons. A tournament they could not navigate beyond the group stage in 2014-15, finishing 13 points adrift of Real Madrid, two behind Basel and one ahead of Ludogrets, while scoring only five times and conceding four more than that.
Liverpool are odds-on to be lining up in Kiev despite sanctioning the £142 million sale of their two-time Player of the Season, Philippe Coutinho, to Barcelona in January.
Stir in the fact they were unable to turn to right-back Nathaniel Clyne until April 10, have been without Emre Can since March 17, while Adam Lallana has not made an appearance since the end of that month having only started three games this season due to injury, with Joel Matip unavailable all through April and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain the latest name on the treatment list, and that the Reds are here - in the final four, in such a commanding position - should be magnified as the exceptional success it is.
“If this team goes to the final it would be an outstanding – outstanding – achievement already,” Klopp said on the eve of the encounter in Rome. “It is not the prize we want then, because if you go to a final then of course you have to think a little bit bigger, but it would be something we could not have expected at the start of the season.
“We were not even qualified for the Champions League, we had to play a qualifier, and I don't know who else reached the semis having been in a qualifier at the start!
“The boys really stepped up. They constantly saw the competition as an opportunity. Losing a player like Phil in the winter is big on the outside, and I can say what I think and that we tried to do something to sort it, but the decisive thing is what the boys think in that moment.
“They obviously missed him and they miss him still because he is a fantastic boy, but they stepped up and played football.
“I even liked the way we struggled a bit after Ox came off [picking up knee ligament damage in the 18th minute last Tuesday] and not because of Gini [Wijnaldum], who replaced him. It was because it was a shock for the boys. It was because they care. We needed a few minutes. And then we started again.
“The group is outstanding. Outstanding. With how they deal with all the things that happened over the year, I could not ask for one per-cent more.
“There have been so many big, big developments this year and it is really good but still there is nothing in our hands – not the Champions League final or even Champions League qualification.
“Nothing we have done so far has put us in a position where we can relax and take a deep breath, it is just at the highest intensity constantly and the boys did fantastic.”
In truth, they have done more than just step up. They have been more than fantastic. Liverpool are the highest scorers in the competition, 10 clear of Real Madrid in second. One more goal in Rome, inclusive of the six struck past Hoffenheim during qualification, will see them equal the all-time record in a single Champions League season, matching Barcelona’s haul of 45 in 1999-2000. If done, they will have managed the feat in two less games than La Liga’s giants.
Liverpool are the only unbeaten team remaining and have conceded the least of the semi-finalists. Detractors are quick to point out that Maribor was one of their group opponents as though Atletico Madrid didn’t twice struggle against Qarabag and APOEL didn’t stifle Borussia Dortmund home and away. Meanwhile Sevilla, who were in the same mini-pool as Liverpool and were Manchester United’s conquerers in the Last 16, could only draw at Maribor and were spanked 5-1 at Spartak Moscow.
Anyone attempting to diminish what Klopp’s side have done so far should study the statistics and remember the calibre of clubs that are no longer in the equation.
It has not just been about the staggering numbers accompanying Liverpool’s return to the top table, but the manner of their performances too.
They have maimed opponents with mists of attacking might so swift and surgical, primarily through their punishing front three of Roberto Firmino, Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane. There were five goals in 40 minutes in the first leg against Roma, a spell in which the Serie A club’s manager, Eusebio Di Francesco, said they “got totally disbanded.”
Pep Guardiola, meanwhile, explained that Liverpool’s 19-minute blitz that produced three goals in the quarter-final at Anfield, made it “complicated mentally” for Manchester City to recover.
In the reverse fixture, the Premier League champions clawed a goal back within two minutes and dizzied their opponents in the opening half. Liverpool, though, nullified their weaponry and delivered their own bullets through Salah and Firmino, registering a 5-1 aggregate.
So with Di Francesco declaring: “I would like to make something clear, we are about to play a Champions League semi-final in front of 70,000 people, do you expect us to sit back?,” will that experience at the Etihad prove useful?
“Things like this always help, but it’s not the help,” Klopp said. “You can’t constantly remind yourself ‘okay, against Man City this happened.’ I don’t want Roma to score after two minutes! It’s all clear that anything can happen, and whatever happens early in the game, you can still use the rest of the time to reach your target.
“We have other European experiences. We conceded a late goal to Villarreal and it didn’t feel great in that moment to be honest. And then you saw them celebrating and I felt immediately ‘what are you celebrating? You still have to come to Anfield!’
“There’s always a reason for one team or the other to believe a little bit more but the journey we’ve had so far has been outstanding. So let’s do it again and not hope something will happen or someone will help us. We can help ourselves and that’s the best way to sort problems.
“Of course, the boys are growing in these situations – that’s what you need as a player. You use experience. You don’t take something out of the toolbox and say, ‘that’s the Champions League tool,’ or whatever.
“It’s only, we are more convinced about ourselves than we were before the season, that’s 100 per-cent. That’s why we are here. I don’t think there’s many teams in the semi-finals at the moment that have the problems like we have.
“If you see the line-up for Roma in the last game and the game before the first leg, they made plenty of changes and still you say, ‘Wow, what’s that…’
“Our midfielders are quite busy at the moment and the offensive players as well. We have good options in defence and rhythm in the offensive but in midfield, we don’t have [because of injuries].
“So, we did it our way, we came here with really good exciting football and I’m really happy about that. And now we want to continue that journey, of course.
“Everybody talks about the Anfield nights: outstanding. But the away performances…we have been spot on [in terms of attitude] all of the time. And it can happen again.”
It would be gutting, given the way Liverpool have swaggered to this point despite all their setbacks - the latest being the absence of assistant coach Zjelko Buvac that the club have put down to ‘personal reasons’ and which Klopp has declined to comment on - if they do not crown their path with a sixth European Cup.
“I don’t think that people are interested in semi final losers, same as final losers,” Klopp admitted. “I could write a book about that - we all know that. But the only way to win something is to go the whole way.
“Football, as in life, if you are not ready to lose you cannot win. You try everything to win - there are no guarantees that you get it - but it is the only chance that you try so I don’t feel like we are in the final, I only care about these 90-plus minutes or longer.”
And football, as in life, is more than solely about what happens - it is the how of it, and what - even at the lowest points - you can learn from it.
It’s about “having a situation in 20 years when you can look back and think over the great times you had together.”
When they are offered the chance to breathe, to reflect, Liverpool can rewind on what they have already done on the continent this season with pride before working to ensure their future continues to be luminous.
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