Jürgen Klopp, the boss of Liverpool, has a plan to deal with Mohamed Salah’s absence. He believes Darwin Núñez and Diogo Jota have got their scoring touch back just in time as Salah leaves for AFCON.
Klopp is pleased that Núñez broke his 12-game goal drought at Burnley on Boxing Day, where Jota also scored within seven minutes of returning from injury. He thinks Núñez and Jota, along with Luis Díaz and Cody Gakpo, can fill the big gap left by top scorer Salah.
Klopp said: “Yes, absolutely, it’s great timing,” and added, “And it’s good as well that we played the West Ham game without Mo starting, seeing that we can do something without him.”
He continued: “You want to have Mo Salah, he plays all the time, on the pitch, but he’s not available. You always have to find solutions and usually we find some.”
Klopp concluded: “It’s not the first time, it’s a really very average situation that you lose your goal-scorer, but we had it even worse in the past when both Sadio [Mané] and Mo left and traditionally at least one of them went far in the tournament. We know the Africa Cup of Nations appears and Mo has to go, and so we have to deal with it.”
Klopp is really happy that Jota and Núñez are scoring goals for Liverpool again. He thinks Jota is super smart at football and Núñez scored an amazing goal against Burnley.
“Diogo has a football brain, he’s a very smart footballer, he understands the game really well,” said Klopp. “The game is blessed with some of these players, who understand the game on a different level, and he’s one of them.”
“It gives him the chance to understand the game a little earlier. On top of that, he’s a great finisher. I love the Diogo story, he’s back and I hope he’s back for the next 10 years.”
He continued: “You want to have Mo Salah, he plays all the time, on the pitch, but he’s not available. You always have to find solutions and usually we find some.”
Klopp concluded: “It’s not the first time, it’s a really very average situation that you lose your goal-scorer, but we had it even worse in the past when both Sadio [Mané] and Mo left and traditionally at least one of them went far in the tournament. We know the Africa Cup of Nations appears and Mo has to go, and so we have to deal with it.”
Klopp is really happy that Jota and Núñez are scoring goals for Liverpool again. He thinks Jota is super smart at football and Núñez scored an amazing goal against Burnley.
“Diogo has a football brain, he’s a very smart footballer, he understands the game really well,” said Klopp. “The game is blessed with some of these players, who understand the game on a different level, and he’s one of them.”
“It gives him the chance to understand the game a little earlier. On top of that, he’s a great finisher. I love the Diogo story, he’s back and I hope he’s back for the next 10 years.”
“The goal from Darwin is an exceptional goal. It was a first touch from outside the box and into the far corner. Diogo closed the game and we need these boys.”
Klopp also talked about how Liverpool won a tough game at Newcastle in August. He said it showed how important it is to defend well and work as a team.
“It was an important day,” he said. “We got the red card against Bournemouth the week before and then the second red card and we realized pretty quick what we can do if we really stick together. It’s obvious we have a lot of offensive players in the team, but in that moment when we played with 10 men, no-one thinks ‘what is my actual position?’.”
“Everybody buys really 100 per cent into defending against Newcastle. I said after the game, if we can defend with 10 like this, who has a problem to do it with 11? So if we do that, it makes it even more difficult for the opponent. For sure, it was a special day and a very important one.”
