Champions League: Hyypia Finnish gives Liverpool win

Liverpool 1, Leverkusen 0 (full-time)

Sami Hyypia made the breakthrough for Liverpool at Anfield tonight in the Champions League quarter-final first leg against Bayer Leverkusen.

The Anfield skipper put them ahead a minute before the break after being set up by Michael Owen from a John Arne Riise corner.

Lucio of Leverkusen earned up the first yellow card of the game for dissent after being upset at a challenge from Gerrard.

Liverpool were struggling to find their rhythm and John Arne Riise hoisted a long ball forward.

Ramelow only half cleared the ball and it left Gerrard time to weigh up his options but his finish was wasteful.

There was a scare for Liverpool when Ze Roberto played in Dimitar Berbatov. However his return ball was poor and Sami Hyypia was able to clear easily.

A hanging cross from Gerrard from the left lifted the home supporters. Vladimir Smicer got on the end of it, only to direct his header wide.

Liverpool suddenly stepped up the pace and made the breakthrough a minute before half-time.

Riise swung in a corner from the left, which evaded the Leverkusen defence and reached Owen. He cleverly pulled the back for Hyypia to steer his close range shot beyond goalkeeper Jorg Butt.

Ramelow was then booked for a rash challenge of Smicer which will rule him out of the return leg next Tuesday.

In the second-half Liverpool were growing in confidence and Riise was continually finding space down the left.

He got himself into a good position just outside the penalty area only for Butt to block his shot.

Perhaps Riise should have done better but there was no disguising the upbeat mood now of the Liverpool supporters now.

Leverkusen, however, were looking a much tighter unit than that which conceded four goals to Arsenal at Highbury in the group stage.

They switched things around in the 65th minute bringing on Boris Zivkovic for Berbatov.

Michael Ballack should have pulled them level in the 67th minute only to steer the ball wide in front of the posts from Ze Roberto’s cross.

For the final 10 minutes Leverkusen threw everything they had at the Merseysiders but the Liverpool defence and Jerzy Dudek held them.