[Centraal] FC Liverpool deel 4

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Gerrard hints at Liverpool future

Steven Gerrard has indicated that he sees his future at Liverpool.
The Reds captain has been repeatedly linked with a move to Chelsea, who were beaten by Liverpool in the Champions League semi-finals on Tuesday.

But Gerrard told the Liverpool Echo: "After the Champions League final I'll be sitting down with Rick Parry and the gaffer and discussing the future.

"Obviously a result like this helps everyone at the club and we'll have a lot of positive things to talk about."

Earlier in the season, Gerrard publicly doubted whether Liverpool could win the Champions League.

But on Wednesday, he maintained: "I've said all along all I wanted was to see the club going in the right direction and this shows we are."

Gerrard was the last Liverpool player to leave the pitch after the triumph over Chelsea, and he later paid tribute to the club's fans.

"The ground was shaking 50 minutes before the game during the warm-up. I have never known anything like it," he told Liverpool's website.

"At the end I felt like jumping in and celebrating with the fans.

"They are the best in the country by miles and I just hope they enjoy the final as much."

iverpool will play AC Milan or PSV Eindhoven in the 25 May final, with Gerrard adding: "It will be the proudest moment of my career when I lead these incredible men out in Istanbul.

"We have beaten the Premiership champions for the first time in five attempts this season, but it was well worth the wait."

Liverpool's fans set a world record of 131 decibels for the loudest crowd noise at the Carling Cup final in February.

When Luis Garcia scored in the fourth minute against Chelsea, fans in the Kop end reached 119.8 decibels.

Manager Rafael Benitez also hailed the fans' contribution.

"To work hard and have our supporters behind us and believing until the end, you run a little bit more," he said.

"Before, I said that they were maybe the best supporters in England. Now maybe they are the best supporters in Europe."

Defender Djimi Traore added: "The atmosphere was extraordinary, we warned our fans we would give our best.

"When you score a goal after four minutes against a team like Chelsea it is very difficult to hold, but we did it.

"I have been here for six years and it is one of my greatest nights, I hope at Istanbul it will be better."

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Op woensdag 4 mei 2005 18:21 schreef the_legend_killer het volgende:
Inter wou Carragher in de winterstop nog hebben.

En in de zomerperiode zullen er wel meer clubs voor hem zijn

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Op woensdag 4 mei 2005 18:28 schreef the_legend_killer het volgende:
Als ze de CL winnen dan denk ik het ook.

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 12:29 schreef stevengerrard het volgende:
Cisse is mijn held! volgend seizoen is hij weer helemaal de oude en kunnen we het telraam meenemen

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Op woensdag 4 mei 2005 21:37 schreef the_legend_killer het volgende:
Cisse heeft wel coole en stoere tattoo's

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 14:17 schreef CherrymoonTraxx het volgende:

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Hij loopt er bij als een schooier in een achterbuurt. In de krottenwijken van Lima heb ik figuren gezien die je eerder als schoonzoon zou binnenlaten.

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 14:32 schreef Doc het volgende:

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Het schijnt juist in werkelijkheid de ideale schoonzoon te zijn die leeft voor z'n vak

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 14:33 schreef DutchGooner het volgende:
Doc,loop je nog steeds met een stijve rond?

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 14:36 schreef Doc het volgende:

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Ik heb voor het gemak maar baggy trousers aangedaan

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 14:37 schreef DutchGooner het volgende:

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Wel zo verstandig,loop je niet zo voor lul

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MAMA WE'RE ALL FAMOUS NOW
Paul Rogers 05 May 2005
Liverpool's players might have beaten Chelsea on the pitch, but newspapers across the world have been quick to pay tribute to the greatest set of supporters the world has ever seen. To misquote that old Slade classic, we're all famous now...
The Liverpool crowd had done an astonishing thing. They made Chelsea play worse than they can, they made Liverpool play better than they can, they made the referee turn a crucial decision their way. That's 23 people all behaving in the way that the Liverpool crowd wished. It was, in the most literal sense, a triumph of hope over expectation.There's a lot of guff written about football crowds, particularly Liverpool's. But the fact is, the tradition of a club is not in the hands or even the feet of players, or managers, hirelings all, who will be off the minute a better offer comes along. No one in football has loyalty to anyone, or is expected to. Only supporters have loyalty. They are not loyal to persons or institutions so much as loyal to loyalty itself. And with Liverpool, the loyalty passed the test of time, the years of comparative failure.
Simon Barnes, The Times

The best team may or may not have won, but the best supporters definitely did. Just ask them. Like Jose Mourinho himself, Liverpool fans are good and they know it. A walk down Anfield Road late on Tuesday night was a walk down memory lane. The locals celebrated reaching another European Cup final as if their last one had been months rather than decades ago. Once a champion of Europe, always a champion of Europe. I thought Jamie Carragher captured the Merseyside mood when he said that Liverpool fans had come to take success for granted 20 years ago, and that it would never happen again. Well, not until the next time. The current generation of supporters may have tired of listening to their fathers' fireside stories about the Paisley years, but they never lost the taste for world domination or shed their superiority complex. Even Torben Piechnik and Jimmy Carter couldn't shake their faith altogether. Carragher's eloquent eve-of-battle cry empowered the Kopites again. Like voters in a marginal seat, they were told they could influence the big result. They all volunteered noisily for selection as Liverpool's 12th man. But while Juventus may have suffered stagefright in the quarter-final, it wasn't the decibel level that beat Chelsea but the spirit level. Liverpool's togetherness more than matched the champions' own. The heady atmosphere inside the stadium provided the oxygen for their tireless resistance but the players won the game. They just did it with the pride and passion that their supporters demand of them. Liverpool United are quite a team.
Clive Tyldesley, Daily Telegraph

When 40,000 supporters stood as one and held their scaves up and belted out the most rousing rendition of 'You'll Never Walk Alone' some of us have ever heard, it felt humbling to feel such passion. One of the great sights in world football right there in front of you. People stared at each other in awe.
Oliver Holt, Daily Mirror

For Liverpool the end justified the means. To be precise, the noise at the end justified the means. When the Slovakian referee Lubos Michel finally blew the whistle after his extraordinary decision to award six minutes of injury-time - what a sound. Anfield has exploded down the years but surely this was volume to rival anything heard before. Part joy, part tension, part release, the stadium erupted. As Jose Mourinho said afterwards: "The power of Anfield Road, I felt it. Anfield was as manic as everyone said it would be and their Liverpool team, the Liverpool of Rafael Ben??tez, have reached a first Champions League final.
Michael Walker, The Guardian

The occasion, with its cyclonic passion and raw desire, ranked alongside the Anfield nights of the 1970s and 1980s when Liverpool won the European Cup an imperious four times.
Jason Burt, The Independent

The Slovakian referee's whistle and triumphant Kop signalled the start of the biggest party at Anfield since the last league title. When Liverpool last prepared for what proved a notorious European Cup Final, who would have predicted the two decades which would follow? Managerial upheaval, wasted millions, decline in status at home and abroad, humiliating cup exits and a 14-year championship drought. For older supporters and explayers, this night revived images of a distant past. For their sons and daughters, these events meant more than those forefathers can ever imagine. Liverpool Football Club has undergone an era of immense change in the last 20 years. Last night proved some things will never change.
Chris Bascombe, Liverpool Echo

A new Anfield era has begun. Fate, fairytale, whatever, Liverpool are in the European Cup final. Anfield had surpassed the noise level of Stamford Bridge half an hour before kick-off and the Kop was only a quarter full. Packed, it proved an awesome 12th man.
Andy Hunter, Daily Post

The people's club, clad in red, have shattered the biggest, blue-blooded ambitionsof the most wealthy power-broker the game has ever known. They did it in an epic, defiant way too. Truly, there has not been a racket like it since, well, since Liverpool last won a European Cup semi-final on one of these white-lit spring nights or since they closed the old, standing-room only Spion Kop end of Anfield in 1994. It was not just a wall of bulging, stretching, moving red shirts upon which Chelsea had to mount a long, fruitless and toothless assault here. It was a wall of noise too.
John Dillon, Daily Express

IT MAY or may not have been his wife, but the man who moped wishfully around Anfield in the hours before kick-off holding aloft a placard bearing a picture of a buxom blonde above the words, "One night with my wife for a ticket", just about summed up what football means to the people of Liverpool.
James Ducker, The Times

Here were the Saints of Etienne, the burgomasters of Moenchengladbach and the Borgias of Rome rolled into a single semi-final for the new ages. Tinnitus night on the Mersey. This was the European Cup revisited in all its old sound and fury. This was Liverpool throwing themselves back through time. This was a journey down memory lane.
Jeff Powell, Daily Mail

It is Liverpool who carry the Premiership standard on to the greatest stage of them all. And nobody can deny them that right. The flame burns bright, their dream, remarkably, lives as it has not for 20 years.
Martin Lipton, Daily Mirror

It is one of the oddities of modern football that it was Liverpool - with, as their supporters never tire of telling us, 18 championships and four European Cups on the shelves - rather than Chelsea - with two and none - who picked up the traditional British support for the underdog. But that's what money does for you. Money and Jose Mourinho.
Jim White, Daily Telegraph

The night - and maybe the football year - belonged to Benitez. As the Kop sang so passionately, it could not have been in better hands.
James Lawton, The Independent

I think for Liverpool supporters Tuesday night's victory is the best because it is happening now. They have tremendous memories of the great days but that was a long time ago. This has given them belief, hope and optimism for the future after a couple of years of under-achievement. They are in dreamland. We saw that at the final whistle. The atmosphere at Anfield on Tuesday night and for the quarter-final against Juventus was sensational - better than anything I experienced in my time as a player. Those people who said the supporters would be a 12th man were spot on. They are a great bunch of supporters, even though at times recently they might have been disenchanted. It is a fitting tribute to them that the team have got to the Champions League final.
Alan Hansen, Daily Telegraph

The Anfield people are back in the final 20 years after Heysel. The people, not only the team, because the magic of this stadium made the team. coached by the genius Rafa Ben??tez, unbeatable. Mourinho is the great loser of this tie but he remains a great figure. It was thanks to him that this game turned into a melodramatic battle between good and bad, rich and poor. Milan will not underestimate the great history and tradition Liverpool seem to take with them wherever they go to the soundtrack You'll Never Walk Alone.
Corriere dello Sport, Italy

Chelsea had 40,000 screaming fans to contend with. The noise level at Stamford Bridge for the first leg would probably have proked Roy Keane into a rant about the prawn sandwich brigade, but here the sandwich brigade, but here the atmosphere boomed into the Merseyside night air and a seething gallery became a sea of red and white.
Paul Joyce, Daily Express

The scenes at the end were incredible. Gerrard was last off the pitch having gone to all four sides in ecstatic celebration. For this particular observer, Anfield will always remain special having been generously clapped off the pitch when Arsenal won the title here in 1989. Not as special, mind, as for the boy from Huyton. How can he say goodbye now to his umbilical cord? Of all Liverpool's momentous results down the years, this one could prove one of the most crucial.
Alan Smith, Daily Telegraph

Liverpool are no longer the half-ignored club that has never won the Premiership and sweats even to finish fourth. This tournament has seen it embrace its former status. It is not sentimentality to declare that clubs can sometimes gain strength by drawing on the store of folk memories. "Respect for your elders gives you character," the message read on a banner in the stands. It could have sounded like a fortune cookie but the four pictures of the European Cup beneath gave it resonance. Considering the pride that Anfield took in the great displays of synchronised passing a generation ago there was a certain irony to the booing when Chelsea composed themselves by holding the ball but this was the moment for any Liverpool fan to be at his most partisan. The spectators were participants.
Kevin McCarra, The Guardian

It was a night that will be remembered by Liverpool on a par with St-Etienne in 1977 and the thrilling defeat of Roma three years ago and it means that in Istanbul on 25 May, they have a chance to win their fifth European Cup. The banner in the Kop that read "Make us Dream" might have been touched with the sentimentality to which Anfield is prone but now the home support have good reason to hope. It had been an affront to Anfield tradition that, winning the toss, John Terry chose to defend the goal in front of the Kop. But no one could have expected them to pay for it so quickly. Liverpool's first goal was not quite as swift as the John Arne Riise strike against Chelsea that took just 45 seconds of the Carling Cup final but it was equally devastating and its effect on the atmosphere in the old stadium was quite electrifying.
Sam Wallace, The Independent

Whatever they go on to achieve under Jos?? Mourinho, Chelsea and their billionaire owner learnt last night that there are some things money cannot buy. Four famous Scousers once sang that it can't buy you love, but add to that the type of passion that was required to propel Liverpool into their first European Cup final since 1985. Mourinho had shaken his head when asked whether the Kop could be the opposition's twelfth man, but instead they proved to be Liverpool's ninth, tenth and eleventh, inspiring players such as Djimi Traor?? and Igor Biscan to play like the immortals that they might now become.
Oliver Kay, The Times

It had been a start from the manual of Anfield dreams, ferocious, cyclonic, and there were, of course, those vast layers of keening noise that had to be anticipated from the moment Liverpool walked out of Stamford Bridge with more than a taste of the old glory.This wasn't the Reebok Stadium and a splash of champagne. This was place practised in grabbing you by the throat and, and if you are not utterly attuned, somewhere in rather lower regions. Chelsea were far from acclimatised.
James Lawton, The Independent

Anfield constructed three layers of defence last night. The first, the conven tional back four, did everything that could have been expected of them, with Jamie Carragher again setting the tone. But those demands had already been reduced by the partnership of Didi Hamann and Igor Biscan in a front screen which gradually eroded the morale of Chelsea's forwards. And the third layer was formed by the 17,000 fans filling the old Kop and creating a steel wall of noise that surely kept out Eidur Gudjohnsen's blazing cross-shot in the sixth and final minute of stoppage time.
Richard Williams, The Guardian

We were promised Anfield's most memorable night in 20 years, and boy, we weren't left wanting. It was difficult not to get caught up in the atmosphere. MEven Roman Abramovich, the Russian who has bankrolled Chelsea all the way to the Premiership title this season, was spotted clapping along enthusiastically to the Kop choir. It's the kind of support that no amount of Abramovich's billions can buy.
Ian Doyle, Daily Post

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 14:15 schreef Doc het volgende:
Sfeer op de KOP http://www.hippychik.co.uk/webstore/kop204.wmv

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 18:24 schreef stevengerrard het volgende:
Tuurlijk weet men van die foto af...Hij had toen nog een leeftijd dat foute maken nog mag...Gelukkig is alles goed gekomen met Steven

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 16:30 schreef Doc het volgende:

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Speciaal voor DG
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http://www.liverpoolfc.tv/news/drilldown/N148747050505-1437.htm

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Op vrijdag 6 mei 2005 03:37 schreef DutchGooner het volgende:

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Ja doei,ga die hele lap tekst niet lezen,vat het maar samen voor me

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Op vrijdag 6 mei 2005 09:50 schreef Doc het volgende:

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Anfield op Europese avonden is ongeëvenaard

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Op vrijdag 6 mei 2005 12:26 schreef DutchGooner het volgende:

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Who gives a shit?

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CL-kwalificatie Liverpool zelfs bij zege onzeker[

De Champions League winnen, maar het jaar erop geen kans krijgen die titel te verdedigen. Voor Liverpool dreigt dat scenario. The Reds moeten hopen op coulance van de UEFA, want steun van de FA krijgen ze niet.

Zelfs als het op woensdag 25 mei de Champions League wint, is Liverpool niet verzekerd van een plaats in het belangrijkste Europese toernooi voor clubs. Als The Reds in de resterende wedstrijden in het Premiership de vierde plaats niet stadsgenoot Everton afhandig maken, moet de ploeg van Rafael Benítez genoegen nemen met een plaats in de UEFA Cup. Dat is uitkomst van een bijeenkomst van Engelse bond (FA).
Door het succes van Liverpool in de Champions League ontstond discussie over de vierde en laatste te vergeven plaats. Moest die sowieso naar de nummer vier in de competitie gaan? Of moest die laatste plaats gaan naar de winnaar van de Champions League die daar gezien de stand op de ranglijst geen recht toe had?

In principe legt de UEFA de toewijzing in handen van de nationale bonden. Zodoende kwam het op het bordje terecht van de FA.

Liverpool betoogde dat een club de titel te allen tijde moet kunnen verdedigen. The Reds dachten daar de reglementen voor aan z'n zijde, die namelijk duidelijk zijn voor het geval deze situatie zich voordoet. De nummer vier van de competitie moet genoegen nemen met een plaats in het UEFA Cup-toernooi. Maar die wisseling vindt alleen plaats op verzoek van de nationale bond.

Everton stelde dat de competitie in eigen land de voorkeur moet krijgen en lijkt daarmee de steun te hebben van de Engelse bond, zo blijkt uit een officiële verklaring van de FA. 'De eerste vier clubs in het Premiership nemen deel aan de Champions League. De uitkomst van de finale in Istanboel zal daar niets aan veranderen. Maar de FA is ook van mening dat als Liverpool in Istanboel wint en niet bij de eerste vier in het Premiership eindigt, het een extra plaats moet worden toegewezen.'

Daarmee lijkt het pleit beslecht in het nadeel van Liverpool. Want de UEFA heeft verschillende keren aangegeven dat voor komend seizoen de reglementen niet kunnen worden veranderd. En dus dat er maximaal vier ploegen uit één land kunnen worden ingeschreven voor de Champions League. De Europese bond wil echter pas uitsluitsel geven ná de finale in Istanboel.

Om aan alle onzekerheid een einde te maken zit er voor Liverpool niet anders op dan de vierde plaats veroveren. De achterstand bedraagt drie punten op Everton, dat een wedstrijd minder heeft gespeeld.

Liverpool kan daarnaast hoop putten uit het verleden. In 2000 vaardigde de Spaanse bond Real Madrid af voor de Champions League, ondanks dat de Madrileense ploeg dat seizoen als zesde was geëindigd. Het ging ten koste van Real Zaragoza.

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Op vrijdag 6 mei 2005 12:41 schreef Cruoninga het volgende:

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The English Football Association stated on Thursday that "...the top four teams in the Premiership at the end of the season will enter next season’s UEFA Champions League." (Statement here: http://www.thefa.com/TheF(...)sLeagueStatement.htm )

This follows the debate that should Liverpool win the Champions League and finish outside of the top four would they qualify for next season's competition. The F.A. have dodged making a decision by stating "This is ultimately a matter for UEFA, but The FA will continue to make representations on this issue at the highest level."

However, last season Chelsea and Arsenal met in the quarter finals of the competition and on March 10th 2004 The FA released an article entitled The Road to Europe which stated:

"Should Arsenal or Chelsea win the Champions League, they will automatically qualify for next season's competition but England will not gain an extra Champions League place, even if they finish outside of the top four in the Premiership.

In that scenario the fourth-placed team in the Premiership will play in next season's UEFA Cup."

The link to this article is here (screenshot: http://www.thisisanfield.com/images/hypocrites.jpg ). Should this page somehow be removed from thefa.com we have uploaded a screen shot of the page just in case, here.

In a new article for this season about European Qualification The FA state "If an English team wins the Champions League and finishes in the top four, we do not gain an extra place". They do not mention whom would get the places should a team ranked outside the top four win the competition.


The FA's Contact Us page can be found here ( http://www.thefa.com/TheFA/ContactUs/Postings/2005/03/Contact_Us )

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Op vrijdag 6 mei 2005 12:38 schreef Doc het volgende:

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Volgen mij vind je het stiekem best klote dat ze op Highbury niet dat soort Europese avonden kennen ...

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Op vrijdag 6 mei 2005 13:36 schreef DutchGooner het volgende:

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Mwah,zeeeeeeeeeeer incidenteel hebben we ze wel hoor

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Op vrijdag 6 mei 2005 17:46 schreef the_legend_killer het volgende:
Als Lpool de CL wint dan zou Everton gewoon zijn CL plaats moeten afstaan ( vind ik )

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Op donderdag 5 mei 2005 14:15 schreef Doc het volgende:
Sfeer op de KOP http://www.hippychik.co.uk/webstore/kop204.wmv

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Op woensdag 25 mei 2005 23:55 schreef rubbereend het volgende:
schop

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Op woensdag 25 mei 2005 23:55 schreef Suijk het volgende:

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Is daar een reden voor dan