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Revenge helped Ancelotti get wins vs. Liverpool. What will their Champions League clashes bring?
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Revenge helped Ancelotti get wins vs. Liverpool. What will their Champions League clashes bring?
Ogden: Liverpool are favourites to finish 4th in the Premier League (0:45)
Mark Ogden believes Liverpool will secure a Champions League finish after their 2-0 win over Newcastle. (0:45)
For a man who never played against them and didnt coach a team against them until he was fully 15 years into his managerial career, it might seem strange how absolutely obsessed Carlo Ancelotti once was with Liverpool FC.
WhenReal Madrids Italian manager takes his Spanish, European and World champions to Anfield this Tuesday, he can either reflect fondly on that first visit to the home of the Kop -- a 2-0 win in charge ofChelseain 2010 -- or onViniciuswinner in last seasonsChampions Leaguefinal against Jurgen Klopps team. What hewontspend time recalling, but you may not know about, is him and his Milan squad chanting the Anfield anthem Youll Never Walk Alone to the television while willing and prayingLiverpoolto win a Champions League semifinal, and doing it as fervently as any Red Scouser.
Real Madrids manager missed his only opportunity to play Liverpool thanks to a knee injury when his then-team, Roma, faced them in the 1984 European Cup (Champions League) final. That night, in Romes Olympic Stadium, Liverpool keeper Bruce Grobbelaar produced his infamous spaghetti legs antics until Ancelottis teammates missed sufficient penalties in the shootout for the Reds to lift the cup.
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Ancelotti described the Liverpool keeper as the hysterical dancer and then, 21 years later, AncelottisAC Milanhad played what he called perfect football to lead Liverpool 3-0 at half-time of the 2005 Champions League final in Istanbul. You know what happened next: Milan kissed their dominant lead goodbye within six wild second-half minutes and then watched Jerzy Dudek produce Grobbelaar-style antics during the penalty shootout until Liverpool, again, lifted the very trophy the Italian coach had craved.
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In his book Preferisco La Coppa (in English, I prefer the Cup), Ancelotti wrote: Six minutes of blackout. The impossible that became possible. Our worst nightmare. I didnt believe it, I was paralysed and didnt have time to react. In 360 seconds, Liverpool had reversed the final by 360 degrees. The light had gone out and there hadnt even been time to change the bulb.
All of which explains the way a rematch with Liverpool -- meaning the Reds had to excel and reach the Champions League final again in 2007 -- became an outright obsession for this normally ultra-laid-back Italian.
Ancelotti has a short history of run-ins with Liverpool as a manager, but all of them have ended up being cathartic in some form or fashion as he got revenge for past losses to the Reds. Will revenge motivate Liverpool in their Champions League clashes?
Diego Souto/Quality Sport Images/Getty Images
In his autobiography he writes: At that time [2007], I was coaching two teams! Officially Milan, but with my heart, Liverpool! I supported us and them. By now, it was an obsession: I thought about it perpetually. One eye on Milan and another on Liverpool.
It came to a head when Rafa Benitezs Reds reached the 2007 semifinal against Chelsea, with Milan beatingManchester Unitedto be sure they, at least, were in position for a revenge scenario. Said Ancelotti: Our training centre practically no longer existed: it had been replaced by the goal-end of a stadium. The legendary Kop of Anfield was now in Varese near Milan, the absolute heart of the Rossoneri empire.
Thirty maniacs, we were, in front of the television as Liverpool played their semi final second leg while we all chanted Liverpool...youll never walk alone! and cursed Chelsea to hell. There was no beer and burping, but there was everything else and it went as we prayed it would. Liverpool reached the final at which point we looked at each other and all thought the same thing: Weve already won!
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Just stop for a second, will you, and picture that scene. Dida, Alessandro Nesta, Clarence Seedorf, Filippo Inzaghi, Cafu and Ancelotti -- all of them were victims of Liverpools Istanbul miracle, yet there they were, roaring and celebrating in front of the TV, as Daniel Aggers goal levelled the tie and the Kop witnessed yet another penalty shootout win.
Ancelotti (and Milan) would get their revenge a couple of weeks later in the Athens final, but his obsession didnt stop there. Oh no. After Ancelotti left Madrid the first time, in 2015, he took a sabbatical to help cure a neck problem that was bothering him, but when an opportunity came up at Anfield, he was in the running.
I knew there would be pressure at different stages of my sabbatical for me to start at a new club. I was linked with Liverpool, a great honour, and I was definitely interested, but not disappointed, when I wasnt appointed.
In fact, when Carletto finally did move to Merseyside in 2019, it was as manager of strugglingEverton, and he duly became the first manager of the club in 10 years to defeat Liverpool and the first to lead the Blues to a win at Anfield since 1999!
However, the climax of his Champions League adventures against Liverpool, starting with watching helplessly and miserably in Rome 39 years ago, came last May in Paris whenThibaut Courtois, by a mile, was named Man of the Match in last seasons final, his accolade indicating how close Liverpool came to winning. Then that rangy, inexhaustible power run fromFederico Valverde, the raking back-post cross and Vinicius side-footing home the winning goal.
However, theres noCasemiroforLos Blancosthis time. Madrid are juggling a players who are clutching at fitness, fighting back from illness, suffering from lack of game time or simply seeking form.Dani Carvajalhas been a fleeting presence this season,Antonio Rudigeris error-prone andDavid Alabahas been slow and lacking sharpness, whileAurelien TchouameniandToni Krooshave been victims of a nauseous flu bug these past few days.
And then theresKarim Benzema: hes still brilliant, but staying fully fit less often. He has scored in all three of their finals this season (UEFA and Spanish Supercups, plus the FIFA World Club Cup) and in the majority of Madrids defeats this season, he has been absent.
The likelihood, however, is that the European champions dig up a characterful performance Tuesday. Its what they do, yes, but Ancelotti is an enormous factor in that.
Former Chelsea captain John Terry says about Ancelotti in the book Quiet Leadership that being able to pick a whole group of players up, to run through brick walls, to play through injuries... its testament to Carlo. Ive seen teammates play through injuries, taking injections to get them through it when they shouldnt really have been out there at all, because they wanted to perform for Carlo.
So lets turn back to the actual game and the state the two teams are in.
Ancelotti, left, won the 2007 Champions League with Milan against Liverpool, which helped him get over the pain of losing to the Reds in the infamous Miracle of Istanbul in 2005.
FILIPPO MONTEFORTE/AFP via Getty Images
When Jurgen Klopp pipped Ancelotti to the Anfield job in 2015, the Italian wasnt only pleased for his rival; he even predicted success under the German. Correctly. But subsequently, he had these perspicacious things to say about Liverpools heavy-metal football.
As Ancelotti argued, If you play at high intensity, like Jurgen Klopps teams at Dortmund and now Liverpool do, data about physical performance will be very important. Here, the question is not is the system right? but rather is it sustainable over a whole season ... or two ... or three? Will the players be able to sustain such energy output and the strain on their bodies?
What Ancelotti will know, inescapably, is that Klopps team is suddenly posting good data again, a shift reinforced by the return to fitness ofVirgil van Dijk,Diogo JotaandRoberto Firmino. Plus, theres the emergence of the remarkable 18-year-old Spaniard,Stefan Bajcetic, in midfield.
The scene is set, giving Liverpool a knockout-round opportunity for revenge after defeats against Madrid in the Champions League finals of 1981, 2018 and 2022.
Were Klopp and his players roaring and punching the air when the UEFA draw pitched them andLos Blancostogether again? Perhaps not, but Ancelotti will go into this tie deeply aware of the motivational power that revenge can inspire. After all, it temporarily made him a Liverpool fan.
