Didi Hamann has urged Liverpool to ‘take it one game at a time’ as they remain in contention to complete a historic quadruple but believes Jurgen Klopp won’t have singled any one trophy out as a ‘priority’.
The Reds are in the process of navigating their way through a tricky April schedule which has already seen them defeat Watford and Benfica, but with the return leg against the Portuguese side still to come as well as two games against Manchester City and league clashes with Manchester United and Everton on the horizon, Klopp’s side need to remain focused.
Hamann also highlighted two players that need to stay fit for the Anfield outfit if they are to taste as much success as they are hoping for this season.
“I’m not sure if there is a priority. Obviously, Jurgen Klopp has never won the FA Cup,” Hamann told the Liverpool ECHO.
“At the same time, if you can be a multiple Premier League and Champions League winner, he’ll probably go down in history more than if he won the FA Cup.
“You just have to take it one game at a time. If you hadn’t won the Premier League or Champions League then you can prioritise one of them – which will be the case for Manchester City, they will want to win the Champions League.
“In Liverpool’s case, they’ve won everything. They’d have to beat City in the league and FA Cup to win them and possibly in the Champions League as well.
“I don’t think there have been too many clubs in recent history who had a chance in April to do it. Obviously, they have to do it the hard way. They’re still behind in the league.
“In the Champions League, they’ve got a reasonable draw. For the moment I would favour Liverpool. To do it, it’s a hectic schedule, there’s a lot of games, you have to keep your players fit.
“Salah is coming back from disappointment with not qualifying for the World Cup, so you need to see if that’s going to impact him and then you could lose one or two players through injury, which would change a lot. If you get an injury to Fabinho or Van Dijk then things would look different.”
Hamann is right, we do need some luck with injuries in the coming weeks to ensure that we can field our strongest XI, but that’s the case for every team.
We now have more squad depth than ever under Klopp meaning that we won’t feel the impact of injuries as heavily as we would’ve done previously.
Of course, the FA Cup is the one trophy that our German boss is yet to win at the club tasting success in that competition would be great, but he’s made his feelings towards the cup competitions clear in the past.
Premier League and/or Champions League success is rated much higher than the domestic cup competitions, but with us being in contention for three more trophies this season, another two should be the minimum.
Winning the league back in 2020 was special, but it was obviously behind closed doors due to the pandemic.
It would mean so much to both the players and the fans to celebrate winning the title properly this time around.
We are in a great position to write yet more history this season but we need to take it one game at a time as Hamann has rightly pointed out.