European glory will put Liverpool's Salah on top of the world

Jurgen Klopp’s side face Real Madrid in Kiev on Saturday night looking to win a sixth European Cup in the club’s history.

And Lovren believes success would put Salah, winner of the Premier League’s Golden Boot and scorer of 44 goals in all competitions, in contention for the Ballon D’Or, which has been the exclusive reserve of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo since 2008.

“I spoke to Mo about that. It is still quite an early stage, but if we win definitely he is one of the contenders,” said the Croatia international.

“When you score 44 in all competitions, definitely. When you look at Messi and Ronaldo, Mo deserves to be in the top three.

“He has the quality, the world-class experience already.

“He is so calm, down to earth and he deserves every credit for every goal he scored for now and definitely we will help him achieve this dream.

“It (winning the Champions League) is a dream come true for everyone.

“I always dreamed to be in the Champions League and I dreamed one day to lift the trophy.

“We have the biggest chance of our lives. For some of us maybe it’s the only chance, for some of us many more hopefully, but we need to be proud of ourselves.”

One of the keys to winning in Ukraine will be stopping Ronaldo, who is the competition’s all-time leading scorer with 121 goals and leads this season’s charts with 15.

This will be the job of Lovren and January signing Virgil van Dijk, who since becoming the world’s most expensive defender following his £75m move from Southampton has had nothing but a positive effect on the team and his centre-back partner.

“It is always good to receive quality and Virgil definitely has the quality as he helped the team to improve defensively and he bring a calmness into the team,” said Lovren.

“I feel also personally much more confident when you know you have a really good partner next to you and he showed already at Southampton that he is one of the best defenders in the Premier League.

“It is great we didn’t take too much time to connect with each other in the games.

“Usually it takes more, but when you have the quality you show the quality straight away. You feel it in the team. We had quite good games this season.”

Lovren’s confidence extends to being able to keep Ronaldo quiet for 90 minutes.

“Ronaldo, Salah, Messi: you need to respect these players a lot and he (Ronaldo) has already been in this kind of game for 12 to 15 years,” said the centre-back.

“Every year he scores more than 30 goals, even if he has a bad season he scores 30 goals, but we play in the Premier League against the best strikers in the world and we know how to defend like a team.

“When you want to stop Ronaldo we will stop him together. In some parts of the game it will be one against one and it will be tough, but it is a challenge that I am ready for.

“I have been working so hard to come to the final of the Champions League and I am ready for everything.”

Klopp refused to answer a question about whether Salah is more important to Liverpool than Ronaldo is to Real, the Portuguese forward out to claim a fourth Champions League crown in five years.

“I can already read the headlines... which is why I won’t answer that question,” he said.

Klopp was a lot more at home fielding questions last night about whether Liverpool are ready to make the final step of their “very exciting journey” by beating Real Madrid.

The Reds knocked out Premier League champions Manchester City and then Roma to secure a place in the showpiece European final at the Olimpiyskiy Stadium.

In Real Madrid, however, Klopp’s men face a club looking to become the first to win the European Cup for three seasons in a row since Bayern Munich in 1976.

Victory in Kiev would, though, lift Liverpool above Bayern and Barcelona into third place on their own in the list of European Cup wins with a sixth crown – and Klopp is relishing the challenge.

“We feel really good. It has been a very exciting journey so far. Now we want to bring it to the best possible end,” the German coach said.

“They are more experienced – that is a fact. Experience is important in life, but it is not the only thing. You can level it with desire, attitude and work-rate – and that is why I love football.”