Roman rally for Klopp’s Reds
Liverpool revisit scene of past triumphs amid tight security
Liverpool look to star player Mohammad Salah to guide them into the Champions League final when they take on Roma
Liverpool return to the scene of two of their most famous European triumphs amid tight security ahead of today’s Champions League semi-final, second leg clash in Rome.
Jurgen Klopp’s side are on the brink of reaching the final of Europe’s elite club competition for the first time since 2007 as they look to defend a three-goal advantage against Roma in the Italian capital.
But off-pitch tensions are high as Liverpool supporter Sean Cox lies in a coma after being attacked before last week’s first leg in Anfield.
Two Roma supporters were arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and club legend Francesco Totti has appealed for “fair play, hospitality and respect for our opponents”.
Roma manager Eusebio Di Francesco, when asked about the incident, said: “There are bad apples among all fans. I stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Sean Cox and his family and I’m against all forms of violence.
“I can assure you there are really great fans in Rome — real fans — who mean well. But a very small part of them — and generally all around the world — can ruin a beautiful sport like ours. So I want to issue an appeal: I hope it’s really joyful and fun to come to the stadium.”
Former Roma striker Mohammad Salah — who won English Football Writers’ Association Player of the Year award yesterday — scored two brilliant goals and set up two more as Liverpool went five up at Anfield before two late goals gave Roma hope of a potential fightback.
Klopp’s side are bidding for a sixth European title having won two, in 1977 and 1984, at the Stadio Olimpico — the latter against Roma. But they have suffered disruption in the build-up after Klopp’s right-hand man, Zeljko Buvac stepped aside for personal reasons this week.
Added to the distractions is star striker Salah’s image-rights dispute with the Egyptian Football Association.
The Roma game also comes days before Liverpool clash with Chelsea in the Premier League.
It’s a clash between two sides who have not won the domestic title in years. Liverpool won the last of their 18 Premier League titles 28 years ago.
Since then the Reds lifted the Champions League trophy in 2005. “Nothing is won so far,” warned Brazilian forward Roberto Firmino, who this week agreed a new “long-term contract” with Liverpool. “There is a possibility of winning the Champions League — but we have a semifinal to finish first.”
Firmino’s example
Klopp is confident that many of his top players will follow the example of Firmino and extend their stays at the Premier League club.
British media reported that new deals are in the pipeline for Liverpool forwards Sadio Mane and Salah along with defenders Ragnar Klavan and Alberto Moreno.
Klopp will be without midfielder Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, out for the season with a knee injury, with Georginio Wijnaldum likely to be the only change from the first leg.
Roma boss Di Francesco is putting the emphasis on attacking while instructing his squad to be more aware of Salah’s darting movements.
“We can’t move a chunk of the squad around just for one player — even if he was decisive in the first leg — or try to put the entire squad’s focus on Salah,” Di Francesco said. “All I can say is this player is unbelievably skilled when he moves vertically and we need to be a bit better at reading certain situations. Salah has scored 43 goals in 48 appearances in all competitions this season.
Roma have not conceded a goal in their five Champions League home matches this season, and it’s clear that the Giallorossi want to duplicate their surprising 3-0 win over Barcelona from the quarter-finals.
The game is a rematch of the 1984 European Cup final that Liverpool won over Roma in a penalty shoot-out at the Stadio Olimpico.
There are bad apples among all fans. I stand shoulder to shoulder with Sean Cox and his family and I’m against all forms of violence.” Eusebio Di Francesco » AS Roma coach
Roma supporters may harbour only slim hopes their team can once again overturn a three-goal Champions League deficit, but Bosnian fans of Edin Dzeko are convinced their hero will once again rise to the challenge.
In Bosnia, Roma striker Dzeko is known as the “Dijamant” — diamond.
“People love him because he has proved that it is possible to succeed even from this country as it is,” his friend Jasmin Ligata, 32, said. “Because he always stayed there with his heart and with his soul.”
Dzeko is one of Sarajevo’s
‘war children’.
The day after scoring what would prove to be a crucial away goal at Barcelona in the quarterfinals, Dzeko posted on Facebook, not about the match but about the anniversary of the start of the siege of his hometown, which began on April 5, 1992, when he had just turned six.
The siege lasted almost four years.
“In a city where you didn’t know if you were going to see your best friend tomorrow, whether you’d hug your father or your mother again, whether you’d open your eyes or even go out to play with your friends, I spent every one of those 1,425 days under siege,” Dzeko wrote.
Bombs rained down, Serbian snipers spared no one. Of the estimated 11,000 deaths, between 1,500 and 1,600 were children.
Playing on
“I was lucky and I survived, while many of my peers were wounded or are no longer with us,” he added. “To them in remembrance, I dedicate my goal against Barcelona in the Champions League.”
Dzeko’s parents still live in Sarajevo, a city even now dealing with the shadow of the siege.
The Sarajevo Memorial for Children Killed during Siege opened in a city park in 2010 carrying the engraved names of victims that relatives come and touch. The War Childhood Museum opened in the town last year.
Even amid the violence, the young Dzeko went out to play in their neighbourhood of Otoka.
“When he went out to play football,” his mother Belma recalled in 2010, “I was very scared. I did not forbid him to go out to play, even if it was crazy. He was playing all the time, the war meant nothing to him.” One day, she did say no. “He was crying, it hurt me.” But, she said, “a shell fell exactly where Edin played with other children, there were dead, wounded”.
Although he’s gone on to play in some of Europe’s biggest football league’s, Dzeko has never forgotten his humble beginnings.
“Edin was often there when we needed him the most,” said Ligata, a Bosnian sports press adviser who ran through a list of the times when Dzeko showed an uncanny ability to make unlikely triumphs possible.
Great moments
There was the 92nd minute equaliser against Queens Park Rangers in 2012 that made possible the 3-2 victory that won Manchester City’s first English title since 1968. There were the 26 goals in 2008/09 that propelled Wolfsburg to their only Bundesliga title.
Even though Sergio Aguero and Grafite might have caught the eye in those teams, Ligata says Dzeko “is somehow predestined for great moments”.
Few moments have been greater than Roma’s quarterfinal comeback against Lionel Messi’s Barcelona at the start of April, when the Italians kicked off at the Stadio Olimpico trailing by three goals on aggregate, as they will against Liverpool today.
Dzeko had given his team hope by scoring an 80th minute away goal at the Camp Nou before fanning the flames of an unlikely comeback with a sixthminute opener in the second leg.
He won a penalty converted by Danielo De Rossi on 58 minutes before Kostas Manolas completed the remarkable turnaround eight minutes from time.
Dzeko also started Roma’s fightback from five goals down at Anfield last week with an 81st minute strike.
At Zeljeznicar, the Sarajevo club where Dzeko started, his signature is on a wall and his name on a seat plaque, recognitions of donations to the renovation of a stadium which, during the war, was on the front line.
These days, though, when Dzeko flies back to his hometown, he returns as a star.