Saturday, April 24, 2010

Jamie Carragher Confident Of Another Liverpool FC Comeback In Europa League


Liverpool FC defender Jamie Carragher admits the Reds have not made their Europa League campaign easy for themselves but has faith their experience will see them through to next month’s final in Hamburg.

A 1-0 deficit to Atletico Madrid is far from insurmountable next week at Anfield, where they have staged second-leg comebacks in the previous two rounds against Lille and Benfica.

It promises to be another rousing night on Merseyside and Carragher is confident Liverpool FC will get the result they need.

"We expected to play a bit better in Madrid but even though we lost 1-0 I think we’d take that," said the centre-back. "We limited the damage and it is all still to play for.

"We’ve definitely made it difficult for ourselves in the Europa League as we’ve always been behind going to Anfield but somehow we’ve always seemed to come through it.

"It is not something we’ve planned on doing but after our last two trips it’s something we’ve had to do and we know exactly what we need to do.

"It will be a long 90 minutes and we have to be patient. The job is to put them under pressure, play at a high tempo and hopefully it will be enough.

"It will be another great European night."

Liverpool FC, who have become the first English club to play in 16 European semi-finals, are now just 90 minutes away from their third European final in the last six years.

But even though they are so close to booking a place in Hamburg on May 12, Carragher said the players did not feel any additional pressure.

"Not to get the away goal is disappointing but we are always confident with second legs at Anfield," the 32-year-old said.

"I don’t think it makes any difference it’s the second leg of a semi-final.

"Atletico will be pleased with the score and be thinking if they get an away goal we’ll need three, but it’s up to us to stop that.

"We’ve been in lots of different situations. We were in the (2007 Champions League) semi-final with Chelsea and we lost the first leg 1-0 and eventually went through on penalties, so it is something we are aware of."

Liverpool FC manager Rafa Benitez is also targeting a clean sheet in the second leg to make his side’s task much easier.

"We have confidence. We have to score and a clean sheet would be fantastic because that would mean we just have to score two goals," said the Spaniard.

"It is really important for us to play the second leg at Anfield, where we’ve scored three goals against Lille and four goals against Benfica.

"We couldn’t give the fans the away goal they wanted but hopefully at Anfield we can give the fans a lot of goals.

"I’ve said 20 times before we can reach the final and I still say yes."

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