Liverpool enter elite 16

By J Wade
January 9 2005

Liverpool new this would be a hard game and before half time finished the task seemed impossible when compared to the Reds stats in the Champions League.

At the start of the game the table stood like this:

..Team............P..W..D..L..F..A..Pts
1.Olympiacos..5..3..1..1..6..2..10
2.Monaco........5..3..0..2..6..4..9
3.Liverpool.....5..2..1..2..3..3..7
4.Deportivo....5..0..2..3..0..5..2

From this table you can see that Liverpool had to beat Olympiakos to get into the last 16 of the competition. If Liverpool were to win 1-0 this would be enough to send them through, however if Olympiakos were to get a goal the Reds would have to win by 2 clear goals. Liverpool made the task hard for themselves by having most possession in matches but not having the end product in games such as Deportivo at home. At this point Deportivo were down and out but had the chance to help Liverpool by beating Monaco. However they were thrashed by the French team 4-0. Liverpool could no longer rely on other games and in the second half had the task of scoring as many goals in 45 minutes as they had so far in the whole tournament.

The Liverpool players didn’t want to exit from the competition so early, especially the captain Steven Gerrard who said “ I don’t want to wake up on a Thursday morning knowing I would have to play in the UEFA Cup.” Gerrard has been linked with a move away from Anfield over the past week. Teams such as Chelsea and Real Madrid have been linked to sign the Anfield Hero. Gerrard rejected Chelsea in the summer to see how things pan out over the season, however he recently said that although he loves Liverpool and always will he wants to win Trophies and win the best cups. Gerrard would love to achieve this at Liverpool but is considering his options.

Liverpool started the game with a very high tempo and won 4 corners in the opening few minutes. Olympiacos were pinned into their own half for a majority of the first half. This was Baros’ first appearance after being out with injury for three weeks and was not yet up to pace. 27 minutes into the first half Liverpool were on the attack, Baros picked up the ball on the edge of the area and tried to run across the box, however he was again tackled and Olympiacos were on the break. Rivaldo had the ball midway into his own half, by this time Liverpool had 4 defenders back however none of them could stop him and Hyypia stuck out a blatant foot to concede a free kick about 22 yards from goal. Nunez stepped out of the way, which gave Rivaldo a gap to hit the ball through. At this point the Liverpool fans were absolutely gutted. Benitez needed to say something at half time.

Traore was substituted at half time and Pongolle took his place. 2 minutes of him coming on and he drew Liverpool level after some great work from Kewell on the left hand side. The next substitute to come on was Mellor who took the place of the not up to scratch Baros. It was this inspired substitution that put Liverpool ahead on the 80th minute from a brilliant cross by Sinama Pongolle. At this point all Liverpool fans were biting their nails in hope of another goal. There is a saying, which says ‘special players do special things at special times’. This player was Steven Gerrard with a beautiful strike hit so cleanly, which put Liverpool 3-1 up on the 86th minute to send them through to the next round. Gerrard described the goal as the most important goal of his Liverpool career and certainly one of the best.

There are some teams who can produce this sort of game and this sort of come back and during the history of Liverpool, they have certainly produced many of these occasions.