Liverpool 1, PSV Eindhoven 0 (D,Post)

Apr 12 2007 by Ian Doyle at Anfield

Liverpool win 4-0 on aggregate

EARLIER this week, Rafael Benitez had told his players to remember Istanbul. This morning, it’ll be difficult for anyone connected with Liverpool to think of anything else.

The Anfield outfit kept their side of the bargain last night to set up a re-run of their 2005 Champions League semi-final against Chelsea.

And with AC Milan having also progressed to face Manchester United in the last four’s other tie, the echoes of two years ago in this competition are becoming impossible to ignore.

Liverpool, of course, memorably recovered from 3-0 down to beat Milan in the final that season, and such experience meant Benitez was keen to guard against complacency when his team sought to defend a similar lead last night after their thumping of PSV Eindhoven in Holland last week.

He needn’t have bothered. PSV coach Ronald Koeman conceded within minutes of the final whistle in Eindhoven that the tie was effectively already over, and his team did little to suggest they were even contemplating a comeback on an evening of happy anti-climax for Liverpool.

Before any thoughts of an Athens final can be entertained, there’s the trifling matter of the embittered Jose Mourinho and his Chelsea team to contend with.

The Portuguese was only last week again rambling on about the ‘ghost goal’ from Luis Garcia that dumped the Londoners out at the semi-final stage of the Champions League two years ago.

Mourinho will no doubt have much more to say between now and the first leg at Stamford Bridge on Wednesday week, the return taking place at Anfield six days later.

Indeed, the Chelsea manager started the mind games straight after his team’s win in Valencia on Tuesday, craftily attempting to shift the weight of expectation on to Liverpool shoulders. Benitez responded in kind last night.

It’s obvious the Spaniard has crept under the skin of Mourinho, not just with that Champions League win, but the FA Cup semi-final success last year, again sealed courtesy of a Garcia strike.

Mourinho can console himself that the Spanish playmaker has long since been ruled out for the remainder of the season. But those cup defeats have placed the seed of doubt in Chelsea minds, a potentially decisive advantage in a match-up where margins are sure to be slim.

However matters transpire in the semi-final, they are certain to be more intriguing and entertaining than last night’s fare at Anfield.

This was merely a case of dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s for Liverpool as PSV, employing just one striker up front throughout, showed a depressing lack of ambition. Quite how Arsenal were eliminated by the Dutch side in the previous round is baffling.