RECORD-BREAKING REDS CLINCH FINAL PLACE

Record-breaking Liverpool are just 90 minutes away from being confirmed as the best football team in the world after easily overcoming CONCACAF champions Deportivo Saprissa 3-0 in the FIFA Club World Championship semi-final.

LIVERPOOL shrugged off jet-lag and doubts about their motivation to beat Deportivo Saprissa and reach the final of the Club World Championship.

They were in incisive form against the Costa Ricans, who looked a long way out of their depth against the class of the European Champions.

And the clean sheet meant the Reds set a new club record of 11 games without conceding a goal, breaking the previous best set by the last vintage Liverpool side of 1987-88.

Peter Crouch started the romp in the third minute, Steven Gerrard doubled the advantage just past the half hour with a thunderous volley.

And Crouch stole in for his second on 57 minutes to set up a meeting with Sao Paulo in Sunday?s final.

The game was meant to pit the technique of the Central Americans against the power of the Reds but Liverpool?s greater nous repeatedly exposed their opponents? weaknesses at the back.

In the first half in particular, they were vulnerable to the quick

counter-attack and Rafael Benitez used the strength and pace of John Arne Riise down the left flank to great effect.

Despite fears that Liverpool would not have acclimatised to the nine-hour time difference having only arrived in Japan on Monday, they raced out of the blocks.

Crouch took Mohamed Sissoko?s knockdown from a Riise cross with a sweetly struck volley into the corner after three minutes.

The first glimpse of goal for Saprissa was 27 minutes in coming when Alvaro Saborio was freed through the middle but faced with the on-rushing Jose Reina he dragged his shot past the post.

Almost immediately they were made to pay for the glaring miss when another quick breakaway saw Riise pick out Gerrard on the 18-yard box and he thundered the ball under Porras to double Liverpool?s advantage 13 minutes before the interval.

Cisse headed a Gerrard free-kick from the right wide of Porras? goal two minutes into the second half and then drilled a cross behind three unmarked team-mates in the six-yard box, much to their exasperation.

But the third goal was not long in coming as Crouch capitalised on uncertainty in the heart of the Saprissa defence to collect a loose ball and calmly finish on 57 minutes.

Crouch was unlucky not to get his third of the night after cleverly working his way into space in the box, before Benitez sent Luis Garcia on for Sami Hyypia in the 71st minute.

Cristian Bolanos, the only Saprissa player to worry the Liverpool defence all night, had two half-chances late on as Liverpool got a touch complacent, but the Reds saw out time.

STAR MAN

PETER CROUCH (Liverpool). Big man is on cloud nine ? and he does not even have to jump!

Captain Steven Gerrard summed up the whole mood in the Liverpool camp at the moment when he claimed the Reds feel unbeatable after another impressive display from Rafael Benitez's side in the 3-0 win over Deportivo Saprissa in Japan.

It's now 11 games without conceding a goal for the Reds and they have set a new club record following the victory over the Costa Rican Champions in Liverpool's first game in the FIFA Club World Championship.

Gerrard said: "We feel unbeatable at the moment. The whole team is proud to have broken a record. The whole back four and the goalkeeper have been superb and everyone has worked hard all over the pitch.

"It's always nice to break records but the most important thing is to win and keep on improving. We don't want to break records, we want to win trophies and we really believe we can beat Sao Paolo in the final on Sunday.

"We have come here to win it and we know it will be a tough match but we have done Europe proud scoring a few goals and keeping clean sheets."

All of a sudden, simply winning is not good enough for this Liverpool team and the supporters who follow them all over the globe. Now - or at least today - it had to be a perfect, unblemished win. A clean, unsoiled victory.

It a cliché to say a year is a long time in football but how else can you describe how dramatically times have changed at Anfield since last December. Back then we were already playing for fourth place in the Premiership, couldn't buy a draw never mind a clean sheet on our travels in the league and were desperately trying to work out precisely what score we'd need to qualify for the knock-out stages of the Champions League once Olympiacos scored against us.

Fast forward 12 months and the team that were within four minutes of being knocked out of the Europe's premier club competition at the first hurdle go into Friday's draw as the reigning champions. Not just the reigning champions though. The reigning champions who haven't conceded a goal in 11 matches; have won their last seven Premiership games; are being tipped by some to mount a serious challenge to Chelsea's title aspirations this season and now, after today's 3-nil defeat of the Central American champions, stand just 90 minutes away from being officially recognised as the greatest team on the planet.

If a Japanese bellboy walked into Rafa's hotel room in Yokohama tonight, he'd be forgiven for asking the Liverpool boss where it all went so right?

It says a lot about Benitez and the miracle he's pulled off since touching down at John Lennon Airport for the first time last summer that he'd probably tell the bellboy that he hasn't even got started yet. Even in victory against Saprissa today, with friends and journalists patting him on the back and congratulating him on his side's record-breaking achievement in not conceding a goal since October, he turned to liverpoolfc.tv and revealed we'd have to play a lot better on Sunday if we want to have something big and shiny to declare when our plane touches down in England on Monday afternoon. Always looking for improvement, always looking to the next game.

It's this search for perfection that drives this current team on match after match. Benitez would put Liverpool's ascent down to pure hard work on the training pitch coupled with a practically fully fit squad to choose from. He'd be right of course but you also get the feeling that the players are finally getting very close to understanding exactly what he expects of them. Not just when he sends them out at the start, having given them a last-minute team talk, but also as the match unfolds. The Liverpool boss claimed recently that it took him three years before Valencia were playing exactly how he wanted. If what we're seeing now ? 18 months into his reign ? is only 50% of the side Rafa aims to produce, then we could be in for a treat.

And if any fans leaving the stadium today or watching the game at home had to pinch themselves to reassure themselves just how far we've come in 12 months, they probably weren't the only ones. A year ago the two players who led Liverpool's attack against Saprissa today couldn't have dreamed they'd be in Japan on the verge of being crowned World Champions. Back in December 2004, Djibril Cisse was laid up in bed with his leg in plaster while his strike partner was on the road to certain relegation.

What a difference a year makes indeed.

Zammo the Premiership isnt going anywhere, well finish at least 2nd if not win it.

Worry about your own team acheiving something. As we pride ourselves of ours.

Nice going Liverpool :-)

liverpool have worked their way into the hearts of bangkok football fans apparently, if the number of liverpool-themed pickup trucks is any indication...

i dont think this helps their premiership chances though. they'll finish in a high position but i doubt they'll win it. however, their chances are considerably better than ajax' chances of winning holland...