Jürgen Klopp explains plans to lead Liverpool response
Jürgen Klopp plans to provide his players with the information and support they need as Liverpool strive to emerge from a below-par run of results.
The Reds visit Manchester United for an FA Cup fourth-round tie this weekend, with the boss holding his pre-match press conference ahead of the trip to Old Trafford on Friday.
Read on for a summary of the topics Klopp discussed…
On whether Thursday’s defeat by Burnley can provide a ‘spark’…
Of course we go again, there’s no doubt about that, but yesterday directly after the game I said what I thought - like most of the time, actually. I said it as when the things don’t work out on the pitch as we want them to work out, there’s an issue. And how I understand it, the issue is then that the things I tell the boys I didn’t tell them clear enough, that’s how I understand it. So I have to change the way I tell the boys, and then we have to change the way we play.
On whether there are other ways to restore confidence other than results and goals…
Confidence is nothing naturally given, to normal people at least. So some things have to work out so that you can build confidence, that’s how it is, and it didn’t work out - at least in the final third - for us in the last few games. That’s why we had to mention the word ‘confidence’ but it didn’t disappear [so] we cannot find it anymore. But we have to work and that’s what we do. There is no other chance. I don’t have five million different words for the same issue, that’s why I only can use that one. Maybe there are other words which would describe it better. But we didn’t get the results now for a few weeks that we wanted. Parts of the game were absolutely good enough [and] parts of the game were not so we have to keep going with the things that were good enough and we have to improve the others. That’s the way.
On whether chasing at the top of the table provides less pressure when compared to being chased…
That would be a good way to do it, to be honest. Yes, that’s right, in a situation when you don’t like the situation you have to change the right things - not everything, the right things - and that’s what we try to do, of course. I like to say and I like to see that in each bad situation there is a chance for something and I see it that way. But honestly I will not do that here now. I need to speak, and I will speak, to my players. I spoke to them last night, I will speak to them today. It’s nothing for a press conference what I will say to them. But that we want to change the situation you can imagine and that’s what we do now. So there’s nothing to say really about how we do it and so on, in the end what we do is for the outside world not too important - for them it is only important that we change it. But we have to work on the details, let me say it like this. In the end we have to play football, we have to create, we have to defend, we have to score: 100 per cent we know that and that’s what we try to do again on Sunday.
On whether the ending of the long unbeaten league run at Anfield removes a ‘burden’ on his team…
Honestly we didn’t feel that pressure, it was just an opportunity. In this specific case we never spoke about the number or stuff like this. Yes, it’s an incredible number, 68, great. But it’s gone now and we can start a new series, 100 per cent.
On whether ‘form goes out of the window’ in a cup tie against United…
Yeah, it’s a different competition. Again, we want to go through and for that we have to play really well because United is obviously in a good moment and they get all the results they wanted so far. That’s why we have to be ready, 100 per cent.