Cody Gakpo left his native Netherlands for Liverpool in the winter after a stellar season with PSV Eindhoven.
Cody Gakpo, a talented striker from the Netherlands, will make his UEFA Champions League debut for the team in the round of 16 opener against Real Madrid on Tuesday night at Anfield.
Gakpo was very impressive for Luis Van Gaal’s team at the World Cup before being eliminated by Argentina in the quarterfinal stage in Qatar, so he was delighted to join Jürgen Klopp’s team at Merseyside.
The Liverpool player who cost £40 million in the January transfer window is on track to make his first Champions League start after scoring twice in his last two matches to guarantee Anfield’s success.
Cody Gakpo scored his first Premier League goal for Liverpool in the Merseyside derby against Everton on February 13, 2023, and his second goal of the season last weekend against Newcastle United at St. James Park.
Gakpo started the 2022-2023 football season for PSV Eindhoven in the Eredivisie. He scored nine goals in 14 appearances before signing a contract to play for Liverpool after scoring three goals at the World Cup.
The 23-year-old spoke to UEFA.com about settling in at Anfield and the prospect of facing the European champions for the tenth time in the competition, with their first meeting taking place on June 27th, 1981.
In the Champions League, Cody Gakpo told UEFA.com that it is preferable to open a home game with as many goals as possible when there are opportunities.
Gakpo told UEFA.com, “The opening match is a very important one. As they say in the Netherlands, the first blow is half the battle. If you can get off to a good start at home and win by as many goals as possible, your starting position for the second leg will be so much better.”
The striker admitted that playing against the competition’s all-time champions, Real Madrid is a difficult task in the knockout stage.
“Of course, it’s never that easy, especially against Real Madrid, but that’s our aim, of course. They have a very experienced, mature team and lots of individual quality, especially up front with [Karim] Benzema and Vinicius [Júnior] and in midfield with [Luka] Modrić and [Toni] Kroos. All of them are very good players. They’ve got lots of individual quality, but so have we. I think it could be a great game,” Gakpo revealed.
