KENNY DALGLISH admits Liverpool must be “more aggressive” if they are to earn a place in the last 16 of the Europa League this evening.

The Anfield outfit entertain Sparta Prague in the second leg of their round of 32 encounter with the tie delicately balanced following a goalless draw a week ago.

Liverpool adopted a cautious approach in the Czech Republic, leading to a game of few chances and precious little incident.

And with no away goal to defend, Dalglish has underlined the importance of scoring first tonight while calling on his players to be more adventurous going forward.

“We know what we are up against, it’s not rocket science is it?” said the Liverpool manager. “We know where we start, we know what we have to do, we know the responsibilities we have to get a positive result.

“We have to score first – that’s the first challenge. It is up to us to break them down and at the same time keep our back door shut. We will be up for it.

“Sparta have got a way of playing and it suits them – they have been on a good run this season. It’s up to us to try to break them down if they want to come and put a barrier up.

“Maybe we’ll concentrate on our own game and get ourselves focused. We know what we have got to do, we know where we have got to improve on last week. We know we have to be more aggressive than last week.”

Although unbeaten in 11 Europa League games this season, Liverpool have not scored in four of their last six matches in the competition.

On the nine previous occasions they have returned home with a goalless draw from the first leg of a European tie, the Anfield outfit have failed to progress only once when beaten 1-0 by Brondby in the UEFA Cup in 1995.