The Liverpool manager on the eve of the round of 16 against the Spanish: “Ancelotti is the most relaxed manager, the best for a big team. Madrid are so strong that they don’t need to be at the top to win, we’ll need two super games to go through”
February 20 – Liverpool
Jurgen Klopp’s smile is that of every fan in love with football. “This is Liverpool-Real Madrid, it’s a great match between two great teams” even if this time it’s the first leg of the Champions League round of 16 and not the final like last June, the match that the Reds coach confesses he hasn’t seen again until last weekend (“And I immediately understood why: we played well and we could have won, so it was a real torture to see her again”). In the Anfield press room, which welcomes him full of journalists (“Sold out? We should start selling tickets” he jokes with his press officer), Klopp shows that enthusiasm for a great match, and anticipates the difficulties of a challenge against a team full of champions for his Reds who after a very difficult season are finally giving some signs of awakening.
REAL
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Klopp’s praise goes first and foremost to Carlo Ancelotti: “He’s the most relaxed manager I’ve ever faced – he says -. One of the best people you could ever meet, awesome and humble at the same time, super smart and nice. His player management is on a completely different level than the rest of us. I respect and admire him very much. He is the perfect coach for a team full of champions, who have added very strong young players. In La Liga they are a few points behind Barcelona, but they are always super competitive and hard to beat. But we have to try anyway.”
AWAKEN
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Klopp doesn’t just want to try: he wants to succeed. “We know we have to play two super games to have a chance to progress. The difference is that Madrid may not be playing at their best and will still have a chance. Some of their players have won this competition 5 times: normal they think they are the masters, and they are probably right, but I still want to try to beat them.” To do that, Klopp will need the best Liverpool of him. It may not have Darwin Nunez, in doubt until the end, but it starts again from the last two victories with Everton and Newcastle, those in which the Reds showed flashes of true Liverpool, just the ones needed to look at this super challenge with more courage. “Four weeks ago it would have been more difficult, but in life timing is everything and maybe we got back into shape in time – says Klopp -. We’ve won the last two games and we need to build on that, but we still need to prove we are ourselves. We too have perceived that something has changed in the last two games, it helps morale a lot but we mustn’t stop there. Against Real, however, I would have expected the real Liverpool anyway, because this is the Champions League you always work hard to reach us, and now that you’re here, you have to enjoy it to the fullest. Especially when you play Liverpool-Real Madrid, which is always a special game.”
GAKPO
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Before Klopp it was Cody Gakpo who sat on the table in the Anfield press room. The Dutchman who arrived in January will play against Real in the second Champions League game of his career, on the strength of his first two goals for the Reds in the victories over Everton and Newcastle which put Liverpool back on track towards fourth place. “Those successes serve us to demonstrate that we are returning, that we are ready to put the difficult moment behind us – he says confidently -. We are ready for Real Madrid, we want to win especially at home and we want to go through.” It will not be possible to scare Real, as Klopp said, but Liverpool are convinced they can at least try.
February 20 – 3.32pm
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