Klopp on 'patient' Reds and Coutinho fitness

Read on for a full transcript of the Reds boss' post-match press conference.

On his assessment of the game…

Not bad first half, much better second half. It was a really good performance against a difficult-to-play side – Southampton are one of the best organised teams in the league. I think they adapted their style a little bit to our strength. We had enough chances to win the game, especially in the second half. The reaction in the second half was really good; the body language was better. First half, you could see we thought, ‘It’s really difficult’. We were prepared for a difficult game but then in the game it feels differently, obviously. I’m fine with the performance, absolutely. We could have scored and maybe we should have scored – but that’s how football is. And very often in my life, I lost games like these, when we were so much better and had many more chances. We didn’t because we stayed concentrated and that’s very important, maybe the most important thing for us. Everybody could see already this season that on a very good day, we are able to score fantastic goals. But today it was much more difficult because of different reasons. Even then, to stay in the game is the best news we can get. I’m not ‘happy’, but I’m fine.

On going for the win in the closing stages…

Obviously, we wanted to win. I thought we protected our offensive movements pretty well. Joel and Dejan did really well in these situations. We took a little bit more risk with the changes we made. We felt a little bit like it’s a final – it’s not a final. But it was intense, it was intense for all of us. So we tried it, that’s what you do always, try to help the team. Daniel could have with a brilliant situation and a cross, unfortunately for Clyney! He was the most surprised person maybe in the stadium. This could have been a goal. Roberto could have scored, Phil could have scored, Sadio in the first half – we had these moments, that’s really good. How I have said a few times, two things are very important when you play football – the result and the performance. The result is not perfect but the performance was much better actually than we could have expected when we think about our preparation for the game, when Phil and Roberto came back. For all teams it’s nearly the same but with players from South America it’s a little bit more difficult, because they have long flights and all that stuff. So, I’m absolutely OK.

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On Southampton’s approach…

As I said before the game, this club has all my biggest respect for all they did. They are a good team. I don’t know what Claude Puel said after the game, but maybe it was one of the more difficult games for them to play. I said to my boys at half-time, we have already played more the game we wanted to play than they could - usually they play differently, they have the ball much more, they leave two or three players up for counter-attacks. That was not often [they did that] today because we did what we did. We were patient enough, but not clear enough in the first half. In the second half, we did better and when you play out a draw it’s better that you should have won than should have lost because of the performance, so I am fine.

On players returning from international duty on long-haul flights…

[Coutinho and Firmino were back on] Thursday at Melwood, that was the earliest moment we could [get them back]. But then, of course, they cannot train after a long flight. Sadio came back pretty early, he was back on Monday, so it was all good. Because of the flight, Phil had a little bit [of a problem] but obviously no big problem as everybody could see today. We would have taken no risk – 100 per cent not. Three things are important for me – what the doc says, what the scan says when you have one and what the player says, and all were thumbs up so we let him run.