NewsLiverpool's Greatest - No.29: Sami Hyypia
Years: 1999-2009
Appearances: 464
Goals: 35
Trophies: League Cup (2001, 2003), FA Cup (2001, 2006), UEFA Cup (2001), UEFA Super Cup (2001, 2005), Champions League (2005)
Pound for pound, Sami Hyypia undoubtedly features within Liverpool Football Club’s smartest acquisitions in history.
Scouted by a totemic predecessor in his centre-back position – Ron Yeats – the Finn, who supported the Reds as a boy, was brought to Anfield for £2.5 million just before the new millennium.
Comfortable on the ball, an adept reader of the game and a dominant figure in the air, Hyypia’s integration and impact for Gerard Houllier’s side was such that he was named captain in a game within three months.
He was involved in 58 of Liverpool’s 63 fixtures during the marathon treble-winning campaign of 2000-01 as the League Cup, FA Cup and UEFA Cup were lifted alongside Champions League qualification.
Though his own subsequent permanent spell as skipper was cut short with the decision to move the armband to Steven Gerrard in late 2003, Hyypia’s importance to the club was by no means diminished.
Indeed, he straddled the managerial eras of Houllier and Rafael Benitez, delivering a string of heroic performances under the latter when the Reds produced their sensational run to European Cup glory in Istanbul in 2005.
“I still don’t understand how we won it, how we came back,” he said 20 years after the comeback from 3-0 down at half-time to defeat AC Milan on penalties.
Another FA Cup medal was added to his collection a year later, and his experience was vital to Benitez’s squad as they continued to compete on the continental stage and launched a Premier League title bid in 2008-09.
By then, Hyypia had joined a rarefied group of players to pass 450 appearances for the Reds and weighed in with a total of 35 goals from the back.
His confirmed legendary status was reflected in the powerful send-off he received from supporters when he bid farewell to Anfield in May 2009, the Kop forming a mosaic in his honour.
“It’s still emotional when I think of that day and when I see some scenes from that day,” he said. “Still, the tears are coming to my eyes.
“When I signed my deal, if somebody came to tell me, ‘You’ll spend the next 10 years here and you’ll win this and this and this and you’ll play this many games’, I wouldn’t have believed that.
“It was like living in a dream for 10 years.”
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