Liverpool vs Villarreal LIVE: Champions League latest score and goal updates from Anfield as Luis Diaz starts

‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ rings out around Anfield. The anticipation is building nicely inside the stadium. Here come the players.

The stage is set.

It is scarcely difficult to find signs of the transformation of Liverpool in the Jurgen Klopp years. There is the gleaming new training ground and Anfield’s giant Main Stand, visible across much of the Liverpool skyline, in which the German is talking. There is the team which Pep Guardiola has described as one of the best in history.

But another eluded even Klopp, the architect of their success. Now Liverpool’s season could be judged in the context of a possible, and unprecedented, quadruple. Rewind a few years and a top-four finish represented a triumphant campaign in itself. And yet when Liverpool booked their spot in next season’s Champions League, Klopp did not realise.

“We did it two games ago after the Manchester United game and it slipped through my fingers, which has never happened before in my life,” he reflected. “Usually we really celebrate that.”

Just over 15 minutes to go until kick off. How will Liverpool fare tonight?

Unai Emery led the Yellow Submarine to Europa League glory last season which was Villarreal’s first major honour, and the fourth time he himself had got his hands on the famous trophy, after lifting it in three successive campaigns with Sevilla.

Can he add a UEFA Champions League winners’ medal to his burgeoning collection?

As Jurgen Klopp talks about “needing the atmosphere” of Liverpool’s last Champions League semi-final, that famous night against Barcelona in 2019, the opposition are enjoying an excitement unique to Villarreal.

It is that rare thrill that can only come with rare appearances in a fixture like this. There’s nothing like it. It’s what the Champions League should really be about, that sense of something really special rather than routine.

And then the game will start. The strong likelihood is that, if Liverpool don’t blow Villarreal away, they will be drawn into a methodical tactical matrix. It could well be a tedious game, far removed from the rampaging drama of recent Champions League semi-finals. This is what Unai Emery does, and does so well, to the frustration of so many European opponents. Klopp knows it well from the 2016 Europa League final against Seville.

Victory for Jurgen Klopp’s side will see them equal the club record of 43 wins in a season, set in 2019-20 (including penalty shootout victories).

Villarreal have won four of their last five away matches in European competition. They have met English teams on 21 previous occasions, winning six times, with seven draws and eight defeats.

Alisson Becker has played every minute of Liverpool’s European campaign so far this season.

Ibrahima Konate could become the first Liverpool defender in history to score in three successive European games. In the home leg against Benfica earlier this month, he became only the fourth Red ever to net his opening two goals for the club in European competition.

Few expected the seventh-placed LaLiga side to get past Juventus and Bayern Munich in the knockout stages to reach the last four.

Emery admits the chances of Liverpool not taking them seriously are slim but he hopes to “surf the wave” of success which started when they won the Europa League last season.