[lfc-news] Liverpool start on long road with cautious step - Telegraph

Daily Telegraph, 13 July 2005
Liverpool start on long road with cautious step
By John Ley

Just 49 days after claiming the Champions League trophy as their own,
Liverpool begin their defence against Llansantffraid's villagers at
Anfield tonight. It will be a surreal affair, attracting a capacity
crowd, as Total Network Solutions attempt to succeed where Juventus,
Chelsea and AC Milan failed last season.

Liverpool earned £21.85 million from match bonuses and their share of
UEFA's market pool in winning the trophy; TNS's average crowd is less
than 300 but a village of fewer than 1,000 inhabitants will be bolstered
by 3,000 followers tonight.

Rafael Benitez, the Liverpool manager, was careful in his appraisal of
this game, brought about after the holders were given a back-door entry
into a competition they did not officially qualify for after finishing
fifth in the Premiership.

Those searching for information on TNS via internet search engines are
directed to The Naturist Society, but the bare fact is that the Welsh
club have more players with links to Merseyside than the champions.

Included in their squad is midfielder and lifelong Liverpool fan Steven
Beck, who played alongside Wayne Rooney in the Everton side who lost the
2002 FA Youth Cup final. In addition, Tommy Rooney, Wayne's cousin, is
in the squad.

"I don't like to use the phrase 'David and Goliath' - because David
won," Benitez said. "These kind of games are always difficult. We have
been in training for two weeks, but some players were playing
internationals in the summer and they have been back one week.

"We know we are favourites," Benitez added. "We don't have the pace yet,
but we have the quality. I have lots of memories of Istanbul, but we
cannot think about the past. You have to work for the future and we must
prepare properly for every game - like this one - because if we are
caught sleeping and dreaming about the past we will be punished.

"For TNS this will be a final, it will be their most important game of
the season, that is why we cannot think about anything else but this game."

Preparations against a team from just 62 miles away have not been easy.
"We have been talking with the scouts since we knew the draw," Benitez
said. "I have four videos of their matches in my office and we have seen
two games and we have enough information.

"It is not easy to find the videos and they are not the same quality as
say the videos we had for AC Milan. It depends on how we manage the
squad as to whether this game causes us problems later in the season.
You need to use different players in different games. If you play games
then you cannot train and the physical condition of the player decreases."

Teams have suffered from playing early competitive games, such as Fulham
and West Ham, who ended up fatigued after beginning InterToto Cup
campaigns in early July. Benitez is aware of the potential of a knock-on
problem from such early participation.

This double header may not cause too many problems, but if Liverpool
overcome TNS, their next task is more difficult, with two second
qualifying round ties against either HB Torshavn, of the Faroe Islands,
or Lithuania's FBK Kaunas, followed by a third qualifying round tie
before the group stages begin in mid-September. And if they are to
retain the trophy, their journey will take in 19 games over a period of
more than nine months, concluding in Paris.

"Their manager has said it is the biggest mismatch in history," said
Benitez. "After the game I would like to say the same - but not now. In
football you don't know. We will be playing against 11 players who are
really motivated and they will have been preparing for the last two weeks."

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