Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp says Champions League semi-final rivals Villarreal absolutely deserve their place in the last four and their coach Unai Emery is the "King of the Cup".
Liverpool drew 3-3 with Benfica in the second leg of the quarterfinals on Wednesday and advanced to the semi-finals with a 6-4 aggregate score.
The win sets up a meeting with Villarreal, who scored a surprise victory over Bayern Munich in their quarterfinal encounter.
"I saw the results, the game was very impressive. I just picked up the pieces but they deserve to beat Juventus and Bayern Munich to reach the Champions League semi-finals," Klopp said.
"Unai Emery is the king of cups, it's unbelievable what he's doing. But give me a little time to prepare this properly."
Emery won the Europa League three times with Sevilla and won the same competition with Villarreal last season, while also winning four domestic cups with Paris Saint-Germain.
While the Spaniard's time at Arsenal was disappointing, he still managed to take the London club to the Europa League final in 2019.
Klopp was in an apologetic mood about his team's poor performance against Benfica at Anfield where, along with conceding three goals, he also saw two attempts from the visitors that went offside.
"The day we qualify for the Champions League semi-finals and I'm not happy, please come and kick me out," he said. "We made seven changes. The situation was that the last line was never played together and it was all about the details, staying 100% focused.
"It wasn't exactly what we wanted it to be, but it's not at all important because if we played the best game of the season tonight it wouldn't have much of a chance to make it to the final. We've been through it and that's all that matters and I am very happy."
Liverpool's defence, which included Ibrahima Konate scoring a goal, and Joel Matip at full-back with Joe Gomez and Costas Simicas in the middle, opened with some ease by the Portuguese side. Klopp said that was understandable.
"One thing we knew is that it would be tough because the last line was never played together," Klopp said. "You lose guys like Virgil [Van Dijk] and these things are normal. It's not a problem. Benfica kept believing and just kept going.
"It was important that we could make a change and still be successful. That's okay."