INTO THE LION’S DEN
Liverpool haven’t exactly roared this season but Ancelotti isn’t fooled... he still has fear for the Kop King of the Beasts
LIVERPOOL may have produced more of a miaow than a roar in the Premier League in recent months but Carlo Ancelotti is not fooled.
He believes they will be like lions with a tweaked tail in the Merseyside derby today, the two clubs going head to head in what is a surprising shoot out for a top four place
And Everton boss Ancelotti is adamant his side must treat their opponents as the king of beasts, ready to inflict a mauling, if they are to end a depressing record of more than 21 years without a win at Anfield.
After managing in some of the most passionate derbies in world football, the Italian is confident he knows what he is talking about.
“I had derbies in Milan, Madrid, everywhere,” he said. “A derby is a special game, and special games bring more pressure, more fear sometimes.
“But fear isn’t a bad thing because if you don’t have fear then you are going in front of the lion thinking it is a cat.
“But it is not a cat, it is a lion, so fear is important to have. It can help you to be more focused.
“This is the point. You can be worried, you can have fear but you need to have motivation, concentration. You have to show your quality. You don’t have to be scared.”
Ancelotti’s opposite number Jurgen Klopp has never lost a Merseyside derby and
Liverpool have to go back to 2010 for their last defeat to the Toffees.
Yet the Reds go into the showdown with an almost unimaginable run of three consecutive defeats on home turf.
It is a spell that seemed not just impossible, but laughable for the champions only three Anfield fixtures ago, when they
had boasted an astonishing record of 68 Premier League games unbeaten in their stadium.
Home defeats are not like buses, though, but personal wounds, which is why Ancelotti thinks the lion will fight this evening. He believes Everton’s dismal record there could just help them, as daft as that sounds.
“It is not a normal game – if you think it is a normal game you are wrong. But no, for this game we don’t have pressure because the worst has happened a lot of times in the past,” he said.
“We are better compared to the past and think we can have more opportunities to get a result.”
Klopp thinks so too. He has so many good memories of the derby, he admitted he could not list them all.
“A lot of favourite moments in derbies,” he said. “I don’t want to mention them all now.
“Sadio was involved. Divock was involved. Curtis was involved. There were a few.”
Yet he knows past results are not a guarantee of future success, as the last three home league matches have painfully proved.
And he believes Everton have a roar in them now, perhaps more than in all the time he has faced them – because of their manager.
“They had good teams over the years and in specific games it was close,” said Klopp.
“But a manager like Carlo helps each team in the world, that is clear.”