Jürgen Klopp: We were absolutely spot-on against Arsenal

The Reds were back to their energetic and creative best against the Gunners at Anfield, returning to the Premier League top four courtesy of goals from Roberto Firmino, Sadio Mane and Georginio Wijnaldum.

Klopp was pleased with the way his side rose to the intensity of a hard-fought contest, particularly given the need to show a response following their defeat at Leicester City earlier in the week.

Read on for a summary of the manager’s post-match press conference…

On another victory against a top-six rival…

First of all, we were absolutely spot-on from the first second in the game. We played a wonderful first half. It was clear it would be a very intense game, you could see it already with the line-up of Arsenal; OK, Mesut Ozil was not in, [Alexis] Sanchez was not in, but pretty much the rest… It was clear we needed to have an eye on the counter attacks and all that stuff. Both teams tried to play high pressure – that was the reason for a lot of long balls, which made sense. But after winning the second ball, both teams tried to play football. Especially in the first half, we did better. We played really good, created wonderful chances and scored only two times, and could have scored more in the first half.

It was clear a response would come from Arsenal and especially when Alexis Sanchez is then on the pitch. On one side, he is a world-class player, no doubt about this. On the other side, he is completely different to [Danny] Welbeck for example; not better or worse, only different. It took five minutes, but they felt actually like 50, to adapt to the situation. They already had two big chances at the beginning of the second half. We needed Simon [Mignolet] and a little bit of luck in this moment, but controlled the game then again and it was clear if no coincidence happens, we will have a chance for a counter attack. It was really intense. They scored the goal after Roberto Firmino goes down in their box, and we blocked the ball from Sanchez before we scored the third one. It was a long way to go for all the goals – it was very intense between these two boxes. It was good again.

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On the psychological impact of returning to the top four…

We had a really hard week. Directly after the [Leicester] game, I found a few words and it was not asking for friendships. It was pretty clear. Next day, we made the analysis, which was nothing to enjoy for me when I did it and not for the boys when they saw it. But there was a point in the week when we actually had to finish the Leicester game. It was absolutely exceptional; we have played and lost games, and not played well in all the games, but in this game [there were] so many bad individual performances and it’s really difficult to win a football game. It was frustrating. We are kind of the rollercoaster of the league – a lot of ups and, meanwhile, too many downs.

But only if you are really silly then you let the bad things have more influence on you than the good things. We have to remind ourselves of the good things and we are ready to go again, if you want. How you can imagine, when you make an analysis like this and watch training or have training and you see the training, you think ‘OK, that didn’t help obviously in getting confidence back.’ That’s not the nicest moment. The weather was not too cool, it was rainy in training and then it was not clear that we will perform like we performed tonight. The boys showed again what they are capable of. I’ve said a few times now, I don’t like the fact that inconsistency is part of the deal in development. Usually, you win games and you lose against the big teams because at the beginning, when they are at a higher level, they are smarter and more experienced and you lose the games. We’ve chosen another way but it’s still part of the deal and we know that we have to keep on going – and we will.

On whether he was surprised by Alexis Sanchez being on the bench…

I’m 17 years a manager and I’m really not surprised about any line-ups in my life… only if somebody broke their leg last week and then he starts. Then I’d think I’d want to meet the doctor! We always make the analysis without knowing who is playing. You can imagine, we did it with Alexis Sanchez in the line-up, but then when [Olivier] Giroud is on the pitch, it’s a different game because they cross more often. For us, it was not a big advantage; as I said, Alexis had a big impact on the game, but because we had to adapt to it. If he starts, then we could have already a better solution from the beginning.

On when he became confident he’d get a reaction from his players after the Leicester defeat…

In 17 years as a manager, I’ve seen the worst training weeks in my life and the best performance at the weekend – and the other way around, unfortunately. It’s not a law. I didn’t, but if I would have thought after Wednesday if we could win against Arsenal, the answer would have been ‘no’. If you would have asked me on Thursday, I would have said ‘not sure’. And then if you asked me on Friday, [I would have said] ‘yes we can’. Reactions, especially for football teams, are not always the same, but even then it was not clear it would happen. The performance tonight should not be a surprise because the boys have played already a few times like this.

Watch the best of the action from the 3-1 victory

On Adam Lallana’s performance…

When we are compact, it is really nice to have Adam because he jumps out of compact formations and triggers the pressure or sets the tone. The problem is, in a few games when we have not been compact and Adam does the same, he opens a gap for the opponent, then it’s a one-on-one in a big area. We cannot win all of these things. Today, we were as a group really compact. Stability is the base for everything and we wanted to be stable. We worked really well in these parts together and Adam, it is nice to have him in this row.