Liverpool 1, Chelsea 0 (after extra-time, Liverpool won 4-1 on penalties).
Liverpool reached the Champions League final for the seventh time after a dramatic penalty shoot-out decided a night of unrelenting tension in the second leg of the all-English semifinal.
Pepe Reina saved from Arjen Robben and then from Geremi, allowing striker Dirk Kuyt to fire home the winning penalty and send Liverpool to Athens, leaving Chelsea's ambitions in tatters.
The build-up had been ferocious. Rafa Benitez and Jose Mourinho spent the week exchanging verbal blows with growing acidity and ever-decreasing decorum. Bragging rights and a date with AC Milan or Manchester United were at stake and only one could emerge with pride in tact.
Predictably, a frenetic pace ensued and both teams were for a time lost to the intensity of the occasion. Anfield's red and white cauldron, lauded as the team's 12th man by Benitez, burned brightly and the Mersey hoards urged their team forward with every breath.
After 20 minutes, Liverpool created the first meaningful chance of the game and Daniel Agger sent the masses into delirium with a crisp drive from the edge of the box to level the tie on aggregate. The breakthrough came after Joe Cole crudely bought Steven Gerrard's progress to an abrupt halt on the left flank.
Gerrard's cleverly taken free-kick, passing the ball square with Chelsea expecting a whipped cross, provided the ammunition for Agger's first goal in European football. Unlike Luis Garcia's disputed strike when the teams met at the same stage in 2005, it seemed there would no protest this time. Replays showed a subtle push from Dirk Kuyt in the build-up, however. Mourinho, no doubt, took note.
Advantage Liverpool. Great sides are measure by their resolve, however, and Mourinho's found theirs quickly. On the half hour mark, Didier Drogba came close to realigning the balance in Chelsea's favor, bursting down the inside right channel before blasting his shot into the body of Pepe Reina.
Ten minutes later, the Ivorian again came to the fore, this time sending a towering header into the path of Essien, who failed to make meaningful contact. Drogba, as ever, carried his team's attacking ambitions upon his muscular shoulders with verve, invention and tenacity.
With the game sumptuously poised, the second half began with Liverpool in the ascendancy and Peter Crouch drew a sharp save from Peter Cech with his first aerial contribution of the game after 55 minutes,
Five minutes later, the impressive Jermaine Pennant found Kuyt, whose header crashed against the crossbar with Cech rooted to the floor.
This was footballing theatre of the highest order and a sense of looming crescendo built with every interception, near-miss, and desperate tackle. With a quarter of an hour left, Ashley Cole burst forward and, timing his run to perfection, Drogba came within inches of an equalizer that would have left Liverpool chasing two goals.
With just five minutes remaining, and the drama of extra-time and penalties on the horizon, Reina was called upon to make a swift inception from Drogba. Shortly after, Boudewijn Zenden cut inside and struck a fierce drive that Cech could but parry to safety. The tension mounted. With one mistake the game could be decided.
Chelsea entered the final minutes with the knowledge that they had scored 26 times in the last 10 minutes of matches this season. Liverpool held firm and the final whistle bought "Chelsea time" to a close.
With extra-time came a moment of high controversy. Kuyt raced through and slotted passed the onrushing Cech, only for the goal to be over-ruled for the tightest of offside decisions. Echoes of 2005 resonated once more. This time Benitez, and not Mourinho, was left aggrieved.
As lottery by penalty shoot-out loomed large, Kuyt had one final chance to win it for Liverpool. Substitute Robbie Fowler played provider, but the big Dane could find only Cech's imposing frame.
Chelsea were without the suspended Ricardo Carvalho, and Michael Essien was duly asked to slide one square back in Mourinho's chess set and sit alongside John Terry at the heart of their defense. Carvalho had missed his team's last visit to Anfield when Chelsea lost 2-0; their last defeat and the only time in the past year they had lost by two goals.
Also absent through injury were Andrij Shevchenko and Michael Ballack, players of the highest European pedigree who have failed this season to meet the quality their monikers evoke. It was Shevchenko's priceless goal that had decided the quarterfinal, however.
The Liverpool team news came with more than a hint of irony. Having baited Mourinho by suggesting his tinkering had cost Chelsea the Premiership title, Benitez himself made 10 changes to the Liverpool team who lost at Portsmouth on Saturday. Only Zenden survived the cull.
Surprisingly, there was no place for Xabi Alonso, one of the heroes of Liverpool's 2005 Champions league triumph, in the starting lineup. The Spanish international missed the semifinal second leg between the two teams in 2005 through suspension. This time, despite being fully fit and available, Jermaine Pennant was preferred.
Liverpool will play the winners of tonight's semifinal second leg in AC Milan's San Siro stadium. Manchester lead 3-2 from the first leg at Old Trafford last week.
Liverpool
Reina, Finnan, Carragher, Agger, Riise, Pennant (Alonso), Gerrard, Mascherano (Fowler), Zenden, Crouch (Bellamy), Kuyt
Chelsea
Cech, Ferreira, Essien, Terry, Cole (Robben), Makelele (Geremi), Lampard, Mikel, Cole, Kalou (Wright-Phillips), Drogba
Referee — Manuel Enrique Mejuto Gonzalez (Spain)
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