Looks favourable for Liverpool this week, doesn't it? Rather than Manchester City or Real Madrid they play Villarreal, a city whose population would not fill Anfield.
But I've watched quite a lot of Villarreal this year and witnessed masterclasses by Unai Emery in knocking out Bayern Munich and Juventus before them. The knockout king Emery, a man derided in England.
Owen Hargreaves and I researched the statistics recently and there is only one person, Zinedine Zidane, who boasts a better record in European knockout games. Emery stands ahead of Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola.