Jürgen Klopp was delighted with the maturity Liverpool displayed in their 2-0 victory away at Sheffield United in the Premier League on Wednesday night.
Virgil van Dijk opened the scoring at Bramall Lane with his well-taken volley from Trent Alexander-Arnold’s corner in the 37th minute.
Dominik Szoboszlai then wrapped up the points for the Reds by finishing past Wes Foderingham in the fourth minute of second-half stoppage time.
Read on for a summary of Klopp’s post-match press conference…
I’m really pleased with the result, it’s obviously the perfect result, I’m really pleased with a lot of aspects of the game. I would call it kind of a mature performance – besides a few moments when we gave the ball away in areas where we just should not do it and that’s when the crowd got a bit excited, I would say. Besides that, if you didn’t see the game, you could have heard it because we calmed an atmosphere which was probably ready to go down and didn’t really let it happen, which is really super-important. I don’t want to be overly critical, I know we can play better football, but this time of the year you play, hopefully win, recover and play again. That’s it.
On the maturity of Liverpool’s display…
Look, it would be extremely cool if we could have scored the second goal earlier! It was possible, I think Mo had after a corner where it was an incredible save from the goalie, I have no clue how he kept that out of the goal, and other moments where we could have played better. That would have been great. Besides that, we just tried to create without opening up too much. We had flexible movements. The first half I liked a lot, I liked a lot of things, to be honest, but we didn’t create the clear-cut chances but it’s sometimes like that. Then you have to use your set-pieces, defend their set-pieces as well – [their] throw-ins are exceptional, wow, and really difficult to defend on top. Yeah, we gave the balls away for the counter-attacks and the set-pieces – these were the tricky moments. But there is no game without tricky moments if you don’t put it to bed early and we didn’t do that, so that’s our fault obviously. But in the end when you win 2-0, it’s all fine.
On the importance of scoring the first goal…
Super-important. Goals decide football games and it was today the same thing. Look, if you look at the game, and in football a lot of things can happen, but if you really look at it and you think, ‘Who deserves to win that game?’ It was one team and it was us, however we got there. These boys played an extreme number of football games during that first part of the season already and we will play [more]. We go home and play on Saturday again, so it’s all tricky. We have to get through this. If I sit there and go into each point and say, ‘You have to do that better, you have to do that better and do that better.’ We have to get through this, we have to fight through this, like everybody else, and that’s what we will do. When we get kind of a good feeling, where results really help, then you don’t feel the intensity that much, that’s how it is – what’s most important about this result tonight. So we drive home now by bus and then wake up, recover, wake up, recover and play. That’s it.
On defenders and midfielders scoring goals…
All offensive players are invited to score goals, all of them. Virg scored, I heard, his first goal [of the season]. I was a bit surprised, I thought he scored already but maybe it was a different competition or last year, I don’t know. But set-pieces are a massive help in tight games. They were really good today. On the other side, we defend their set-pieces really, really good and that’s the most important thing. And then you have to go for the moments, games are decided in moments. You don’t need to have like 80 per cent possession to win a football game, 10 per cent [is] enough sometimes. You just have to do the right stuff.
Obviously we had much more than 10 per cent but that gives you more chances to make mistakes and you could see Ibou played a fantastic game, I don’t know how many headers he had to do today – I was close to asking Chris [Wilder] if they could shoot the ball for once on the other side and then Virg can go in these challenges. And then obviously all of a sudden he felt the intensity, he gave two balls away and was a bit tricky in these moments. But you have to get through this and tonight we came through and we will try to do it again on Saturday.
On whether the title race will ‘go down to the wire’…
I have no clue! If we win it, I hope not. I have no clue. We will see that. I don’t know if they lose or whatever, if somebody would write City off, that would be the biggest joke in the history of football, that really makes no sense. Arsenal is obviously fighting, had a similar experience as we had a few days before – it feels really good; anyway you have to play the next game from the start again and it’s 0-0 and not 4-3 already and you don’t score a late goal and can take that into the next game. Aston Villa is incredible. United is there, don’t play yet maybe exactly the football whoever wants it, I’m not sure, the media or whatever, some arguments – but they have points like crazy, so they are around. Chelsea, I’m not sure if they’re coming still. All these kind of things and you have to play them anyway. Who cares where they are? We have to play them and they are incredibly strong, the league is incredibly strong. You need to be lucky to get through difficult moments – with injuries especially. So I have no clue where this will end up.
On whether the list of potential title winners is longer this season…
Probably. In the last few years it was always two maybe. I’m really not interested in that, to be honest. As long as we are around there, I’m fine with that. But it’s all so difficult and so intense and [with] all the games coming up now, so let’s get through this and then ask me again in April.
