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Jurgen Klopp’s pre-season visit to Anfield in 2014 has been well documented, with Brendan Rodgers’ Reds emerging as 4-0 winners over his Borussia Dortmund side.

It was a trip which Klopp himself admits allowed him to think just a little bit about one day managing the Reds.

But the new Liverpool manager had a very different experience on his only other clash with his new team, back in pre-season in 2006.

Klopp was manager of Mainz, the team he had devoted his entire playing career to, and who he had guided to 11th in the Bundesliga the year before.

Rafa Benitez’s Reds had won the FA Cup – in that famous Gerrard final in Cardiff – and would end the season in Athens in the European Cup final.

After losses to Kaiserslautern and Grasshoppers Zurich, Benitez selected “his strongest pre-season line-up” which included Gerrard, Carragher, Hyypia, Alonso, Crouch and Bellamy.

But there was only one team in it as an error-strewn Liverpool performance saw them lose 5-0 to Klopp’s team.

Admittedly several of those big names had been replaced by the time the final three goals were scored in the last five minutes, when the likes of Salif Diou, Gabriel Paletta, Lee Peltier and Paul Anderson finishing the game.

Klopp’s team made sure the Liverpool team and the travelling supporters among the 20,000 felt at home though, as the ECHO’s Reds’ writer at the time, Chris Bascombe, mentioned in his match report.

“Perhaps Liverpool had been lured into a false sense of security by the rapturous reception they received before the match by appreciative locals, with most of the Beatles back catalogue played over the public address system before the travelling fans were serenaded by a young girl singing ‘Ring of Fire’. Honestly.”

Here’s that match report in full from August 2006:

FOLLOWING a pre-season with largely intermittent chinks of light, Liverpool had a complete Mainz blackout last night.

A third successive defeat was not the way Rafael Benitez would have envisaged his players wrapping up their preparations ahead of a campaign in which they have genuine Premiership and European aspirations.

But it is a continuing lack of cohesion in almost every department of his team that will be of greater concern to the Spaniard with the first leg of their crucial Champions League qualifier with Maccabi Haifa only five days away.

Those earlier losses to Kaiserslautern and Grasshoppers Zurich might have persuaded Benitez to select Liverpool’s strongest line-up of pre-season in Germany last night. But it made no difference as the Anfield team once again appeared leaden-footed, lacking spark, energy and creativity.

Even more worrying is the defence. The five goals conceded to Mainz - three in a calamitous collapse in the final five minutes - mean Liverpool have now shipped 10 goals inside a week.

Once more, Liverpool were undone by individual mistakes, Gabriel Paletta caught unawares again for the second goal, John Arne Riise gifting Mainz their third with an unwise backpass while Djimi Traore and Jack Hobbs also erred in those dismal final moments.

The week’s training camp in Switzerland had been constructed primarily to improve fitness levels but, on the evidence of the three friendlies played during that time, it has come at the expense of performance.

Sure, pre-season has never been a true barometer of future success, but there have been precious few signs of encouragement in the past week for Benitez.

Positives from last night? Other than the fact this was only a friendly, there are none.

GALLERY: Klopp's Mianz beat Rafa's Liverpool 5-0

Five goals scored in five warm-up games is another less than inspiring statistic, and will serve only to hasten Benitez’s need for a new striker. The pairing of Peter Crouch and Craig Bellamy is passing through a painfully embryonic stage, but they weren’t helped by the malaise behind them.

Last night’s opponents Mainz finished in 11th place in the German Bundesliga last season and, in theory, they would offer Liverpool their toughest test of a truncated pre-season programme. But tough enough for Benitez’s side to be thumped 5-0 after being goalless at the break?

Perhaps Liverpool had been lured into a false sense of security by the rapturous reception they received before the match by appreciative locals, with most of the Beatles back catalogue played over the public address system before the travelling fans were serenaded by a young girl singing ‘Ring of Fire’. Honestly.

Liverpool weren’t here to sample German hospitality, however. With Champions League football resuming next week, Benitez’s starting line-up consisted chiefly of those who will be expected to play in midweek.

That the team that finished the game bore not even a passing resemblance to the one that will turn out at Anfield on Wednesday will no doubt be cited by some optimists as a reason for the margin of this defeat.

Inevitably Gerrard posed Liverpool's goal threat

But it should not detract from the fact that, during a first half when they were close to full strength, Liverpool were almost just as poor.

Benitez’s side failed to muster a single shot on target in that period and when, on the rare occasions Liverpool made it as far as the Mainz penalty area, inevitably it was Steven Gerrard who posed the goal threat.

The skipper curled a free-kick over, dragged one shot wide after dabbing his way beyond two Mainz defenders on the edge of the area and, in the final minute of the half, was denied by a timely challenge from centre-back Manuel Friedrich from applying the finishing touch to a low Pennant cross from the right after interplay between Crouch and Bellamy.

Otherwise, the action was mainly directed at an unhappy Scott Carson, who suffered a miserable evening.

It was Carson’s misguided foray out of his area that almost gifted Mainz the lead in the 15th minute, the goalkeeper fluffing his clearance to Markus Feulner and fortunate to see the midfielder’s effort strike his body before Fabian Gerber floated the rebound harmlessly wide from range.

Another Carson misjudgement in racing out to meet a throughball gave Tobias Damm the opportunity to dance around the goalkeeper, Jamie Carragher blocking the striker’s goalbound effort and the Liverpool defender then hounding out Bakary Diakite during a resultant scramble inside the area.

After Feulner had cut in off the left flank and whistled a right-footed shot just wide from 20 yards, Carson did better in clutching Mimoun Azaouagh’s speculative effort but could only watch and hope as a swerving 25-yarder from the same player flew narrowly beyond the far post.

Paul Anderson and Gabriel Paletta were introduced at the interval, but they were barely into their stride when Mainz forged deservedly into the lead inside the first minute of the second half.

Diakite’s cross from the right could possibly have been cut out by Jan Kromkamp, but instead arrived to Feulner who controlled the ball before striking confidently past Carson. Liverpool responded with their first shot on target all night, Dimo Wache punching away Boudewijn Zenden’s snapshot, before a raft of substitutions included the introduction of the lesser-seen Salif Diao.

The Senegalese fired an acrobatic overhead kick wide moments later before fellow substitute Paletta made his second mistake inside four days to help Mainz double their advantage on 65 minutes.

The Argentine, who had replaced Sami Hyypia, went to ground inside his own area looking for a free-kick that was not forthcoming, gifting Tobias Damm the opening to slot home past the exposed Carson.

Liverpool made some belated inroads during the final 20 minutes, Anderson forcing Wache into a resourceful parry at the near post while the goalkeeper held Crouch’s effort after the striker had neatly brought down Riise’s cross.

But they completely fell apart in the last five minutes to concede three goals. A silly backpass from Riise allowed Fatmir Pupalovic, Traore unwisely failed to intercept and Chadli Amri struck home, and then Hobbs was found wanting and Fatmir Pupalovic cut in off the left wing to score.

So, the rehearsal did not go to plan. Liverpool must hope they can step out of the darkness when the real stuff begins on Wednesday.

FC MAINZ (4-4-2): Wache (Ischdonat 87); Demirtas (Cha 68), Noveski (Gunesch 30), Friedrich (Banouas 87), Rose (Weigelt 82); Gerber (M Vrancic 68), Azaouagh (Pupalovic 82), Pekovic (D Vrancic 87), Feulner (Babarz 82); Diakite (Jovanovic 82), Damm (Amri 68).

LIVERPOOL (4-4-2): Carson; Kromkamp (Peltier 62), Carragher (Hobbs 81), Hyypia (Paletta 46), Traore; Pennant (Anderson 46), Alonso (Sissoko 62), Gerrard (Garcia 73), Zenden (Riise 62); Crouch, Bellamy (Diao 62). Subs: Dudek.

REFEREE: Jochen Drees

ATT: 20,300