Liverpool Justify Benayoun's Faith

Liverpool FC winger Yossi Benayoun praised his team's competitive edge after they advanced to the UEFA Champions League knockout stages with a clinical 4-0 triumph at Olympique de Marseille.

The winner-takes-all affair at the Stade Vélodrome had looked poised to be a tense encounter until Steven Gerrard and Fernando Torres struck a goal each inside the first eleven minutes. Dirk Kuyt and substitute Ryan Babel then pounced after the break to wrap up a qualification that had seemed highly unlikely when the five times European champions found themselves with a solitary point from their opening three matches.

"Honestly, I always believed we could do it," Benayoun told uefa.com. "Even at the time, I said that if there's one team that can win three games in a row, it's Liverpool. This is a club that's proved over the last few years that it can deal with big games in this competition. We knew every game would be like a final and we won three finals."

The Reds progress as the second-placed team in Group A, behind FC Porto, and they could well go far after a textbook example of how to tackle a tricky European tie in a hostile stadium. "We knew all about Marseille's great fans so it was important to get an early goal," Benayoun said. "That gave us confidence and our second came soon after. It killed the game and after that their supporters weren't so noisy anymore."

The Israeli international insisted that the match was anything but easy despite inflicting Marseille's heaviest home defeat in UEFA competition. "When you look at the scoreline it seems easy, but I can assure you it wasn't," he said. "They have a lot of good players and even when it was 2-0 we needed to be careful. They only needed half a chance to get a goal and start a comeback but we were very strong defensively."

The Merseysiders were also particularly strong on the flanks, where Benayoun and Harry Kewell looked fresh after being rested at the weekend. They both caused plenty of damage, but the 27-year-old Benayoun felt the whole team should share the acclaim. "Everyone put in a great performance, all over the pitch," he said. "We played the way we know we can, we deserved to win and we deserve to be in the next round."