Jurgen Klopp insists Liverpool have to respect Porto after they were drawn against the Portuguese side in the quarter-finals of the Champions League – but revealed he has a secret weapon to call upon.
The Reds avoided the biggest sides left in the draw, such as Barcelona, Juventus and Manchester City, and landed the team that many consider to be the weakest left in the last eight of the competition.
But Klopp will not be taking Porto lightly after they came from behind to beat Roma in the last 16 and says assistant Pep Lijnders will play a big role in preparing for the game.
‘What can I say? It’s Porto and we’ve played there already and we know how good we had to be last year,’ Klopp told Liverpool’s official website, having won easily against Porto en route to the final last year. ‘The result in the end was a strange one; it was very good for us, of course, but it was a strange one. In the second leg, we saw the character of Porto and the quality they have.
‘I could not be further away from thinking it’s the best draw because it isn’t – it is just the draw, it’s the opponent we have to prepare for and that’s all we will be thinking about from when we start preparing for the game. ‘We have a specialist for Porto in our own team in Pep Lijnders being there in the past – and he always speaks with so much respect for that club.
‘We will have plenty of information and that’s what you need before a game, but you still have to play it. Now we know it, let’s prepare.’ Lijnders – who was academy coach at Porto between 2007 and 2014 – missed Liverpool’s meeting with his old club last season, having taken over at NEC in January 2018, though he returned to Anfield over the summer after failing to gain promotion to the Eredivisie.