Spirit of Istanbul rouses Arbeloa

Álvaro Arbeloa invoked the spirit of Istanbul as he insisted Liverpool FC can emulate their famous UEFA Champions League final comeback against AC Milan in 2005 by overhauling a 3-1 quarter-final first-leg deficit against Chelsea FC.

Belief remains
The Spain full-back was not yet a Liverpool player when they recovered from three goals down at half-time to beat Milan on penalties to lift the trophy in Istanbul, but he knows the task facing his side is just as daunting. Two headers by Branislav Ivanović and a tidy finish by Didier Drogba gave Chelsea three away goals after Fernando Torres had guided Liverpool in front after only six minutes. Arbeloa, though, feels the second leg on Tuesday is by no means mission impossible. "We believe we can do it. Why not? We just have to go there and fight, try to score and after that get another," the 26-year-old said. "This team won a Champions League final by scoring three goals in five minutes, so we can score three in 90. We have to remember that and believe in ourselves."

Shock collapse
Arbeloa was at a loss to explain Liverpool's capitulation against Chelsea. In four previous UEFA Champions League visits to Anfield, the London team had only managed to find the net courtesy of John Arne Riise's headed own goal in added time during last year's semi-final first leg. A mystified Arbeloa said: "I don't know what went wrong. After the first goal maybe we were defending too deep. We gave the ball away to them and after we conceded the first one from a corner, everything was painful. They scored again in the second half and that changed the game."

Title quest
With Chelsea clear favourites to reach the last four, Arbeloa turned his attention to keeping second-placed Liverpool in the hunt for the English Premier League title when they face Blackburn Rovers FC at the weekend, not that he is giving up his European ambitions just yet. "We know it will be really difficult to beat Chelsea at Stamford Bridge but I think it's not over. Now it's really important that we think of playing Blackburn on Saturday because we have to fight for the title and we know we have a good chance, but we have just two days to prepare for that game. We have to recover," he said.