RANGERS continue their UEFA Champions League group stage campaign with a trip to Anfield Stadium to face Liverpool.
HISTORY
Liverpool are one of the most decorated club sides in the history of football, racking up six European Cup crowns with their most recent coming back in 2019.
The Reds have won 19 league titles, eight FA Cups and nine League Cups, winning both domestic knockout trophies last season after defeating Chelsea in both finals.
Jurgen Klopp’s side have reached the final of the Champions League three times in the last five seasons, losing out narrowly to Real Madrid in the final in Paris last time out.
CURRENT FORM
Liverpool currently sit ninth in the Premier League table, with their most recent 3-3 draw with Brighton making it four draws from their opening seven games.
However, the Reds got off the mark in Group A in their last European outing, with a late Joel Matip header lifting Liverpool to a 2-1 victory over Ajax at Anfield.
MANAGER
Jurgen Klopp was appointed Liverpool manager in October 2015 and has transformed the club’s fortunes, ending their absence from the Champions League before finally pipping Manchester City to the Premier League title in 2019/20.
The German cut his teeth in management at Mainz 05 in the Bundesliga, before earning a move to Borussia Dortmund in 2008. Klopp lifted the league title with the club in back-to-back seasons between 2010 and 2012 while also leading them to the Champions League final at Wembley in that period, suffering late heartbreak against Bayern Munich.
STYLE OF PLAY
Klopp is a proponent of gegenpressing and his Liverpool side are renowned for their relentless defensive intensity from the front.
The Reds typically line up in a 4-3-3 formation, with emphasis on attacking creation from their full-backs and a heavy responsibility on their attacking trio to deliver the goals.
KEY PLAYER
Mohamed Salah is likely to go down in history as one of Liverpool’s greatest ever players, with the Egyptian coming off the back of a goalscoring campaign in the Premier League where he shared the Golden Boot with Tottenham’s Heung-min Son.
Salah has netted over 100 goals in fewer than 200 appearances for the Reds since arriving from AS Roma in 2017, bewitching defences in England with his blend of speed and trickery.
PREVIOUS MEETINGS
The two teams have never met in UEFA competition, although Rangers did run out 1-0 victors when Liverpool visited Ibrox in a friendly match in 2011.
PLAYER LINKS
Several former Rangers players have donned the red of Liverpool over the years, none more famous than Graeme Souness.
The midfielder won the European Cup on three separate occasions for the Reds, later making the move to Ibrox as a player-manager in 1986 and helping restore the Light Blues to the summit of the Scottish game.
Some other notable links between the two clubs include former Rangers manager Steven Gerrard, as well as Mark Walters, Ryan Kent, Danny Wilson, Ben Davies, Gregory Vignal and Sotirios Kyrgiakos.
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