Wolves boss ready to turn ugly in Liverpool cup clash

Paul Lambert: Ready for Anfield trip

Paul Lambert: Ready for Anfield trip

Wolves boss Paul Lambert is ready to make things ugly for Liverpool in their FA Cup clash at Anfield.

Lambert takes his team to Merseyside for Saturday’s lunchtime kick-off looking to emulate last month’s 2-0 win at Premier League Stoke in the third round.

Liverpool’s hopes of getting to Wembley in the EFL Cup ended on Wednesday night when Southampton secured a 1-0 win with a late goal from Shane Long in the second leg of their semi-final.

Lambert knows he will have to take the Reds “out of their comfort zone” again if the Sky Bet Championship side are to pull off another upset.

“We have earned the right to play at Anfield because we beat Stoke. We were fantastic in the Stoke game when nobody gave us a chance,” the Scot told Wolves Player.

“We will go there and enjoy occasion and the game, but the only way you can enjoy the game is if you get a foothold in it.

“We have to be prepared to be professional and ready for it, try to upset Liverpool and try to do the ugly side of things to win the game.

“I don’t think we can get caught up into playing Liverpool’s way, so I have to find a way of upsetting them and making it ugly and probably take them out of their comfort zone, and that is what I will try to do.”

Wolves will be without goalkeeper Carl Ikeme, who is starting a suspension following his red card in last weekend’s 3-1 Championship defeat at Norwich.

Lambert believes the players can again rise to the challenge in front of some 8,300 travelling supporters, as he looks to get one over on Jurgen Klopp.

The pair were on the same Pro Licence course in 2004 and have since kept in touch, with Lambert spending some time back at Borussia Dormund, one of his former clubs, when Klopp was head coach of the German Bundesliga outfit.

“We have got nothing to lose and everything to gain,” Lambert added on www.wolves.co.uk.

“We go up against a great team and a great club, with the history and everything attached to it, but in one given game, you can win.

“The way Jurgen Klopp’s got them going, he has got the place bouncing. It’s vibrant, all the usual stuff that Jurgen does.

“It’s a game I can’t wait for.”

Wolves midfielder Conor Coady started his career at Anfield, before leaving to join Huddersfield in August 2014.

The 23-year-old is hoping to be able to get the chance to put one over his boyhood club.

He said on the Wolves website: “I want to be involved and I want to play and enjoy it, but more than anything I want us to win.

“We want to play as we have been doing recently and then see if we can get a result.”

Coady – who made two appearances for the Liverpool first team, but both in away games – says there will be no sense of split loyalties.

“I am not the type of player who thinks he has to prove anything to people on Saturday,” he added.

“I just go out and try and enjoy my game and help the team as much as I can.

“I love being at Wolves now. If I did score – and it doesn’t happen every often – I would go ballistic.

“I’m not one of these who wouldn’t celebrate, I’d be going mad.”