Press conferenceJürgen Klopp: We are fully focused on Bournemouth and nothing more

The Reds would move into the top four on goal difference, temporarily at least, with a victory in the 12.30pm GMT kick-off against the Cherries at Vitality Stadium.

Liverpool are aiming to follow up last weekend's impressive 7-0 triumph over Manchester United at Anfield by claiming a sixth clean sheet in a row in the top flight.

The manager previewed the contest during a press conference at the AXA Training Centre on Friday afternoon – read on for a summary from the media briefing below…

On the possibility of moving into the top four and whether his players can feed on chasing other teams...

Again, two different things. There's a general feeling that we have to chase and we have to challenge pretty much everybody, but that's only a little side story because the main thing is going to Bournemouth and playing a game there and not calling the points before you have them. I'm much too long in the business, so the last few days [I have watched] a lot of Bournemouth football. The way they play, stuff like this, can be really uncomfortable for each team and only in the last one against Arsenal, [who are] in a really good moment, everybody saw how much they had to fight and stretch luck, if you want – a late winner is always a bit lucky as well, even when they deserved it.

Then you know exactly what is going on and you have a look at the fight for the relegation. We might fight for the Champions League spots – we will see how the results will be in the next few weeks – but the fight to stay in the league is as exciting, if you want, and [it] means each point can make a massive difference. And I am 100 per cent sure Bournemouth will fight like crazy, and that's something we have to expect. There's nothing else to think about, it's a general thing that we want – and I said it before – we want to squeeze everything out of this season and that means, obviously, if it is somehow possible, we want to go into the top four clear but nobody knows that in the moment. [It] must be our aim anyway but it has nothing to do with the game and not thinking about whatever, other stuff. It's just being fully focused about Bournemouth.

On earning three clean sheets in a row...

In the league it's more, but fine. I know in between there was another game. That's the basis for everything. The way you defend gives you stability to create and to attack, and that [Real Madrid] wasn't very helpful. I said it now before, and I understand 100 per cent that for a few days at least it [the 7-0 versus United] was a massive story, for us not so much because, again, [I’m] long enough in the business knowing the performance is super-important to us because that's really something we have to build on and use. The result is just not important. We won 7-0, which is quite strange. It's nice when we are all coming back in 10, 15 years watching a game [and] maybe get tickets for another derby and I sit there and people will remember that once we did that – but that might be important that day, it's not important today. It was a good game and we have to keep going.

On how easy or difficult it is to draw a line under the Manchester United victory...

It's a bit more complicated with the first game against Bournemouth obviously a similar result. I knew after 9-0 it will be no fun when we go there because that's now the easiest motivation of all time. Now with this result before, of course, it's just one of the informations you have. Not more. Bournemouth plays a different system, we don't play at home, which obviously in this season if you look at this season our points tally, I think with home games in the home table we are in the top four. In the away table we are far away from that. So, we have to show consistency there as well. We have to step up, we have to make sure we create the atmosphere on the pitch we need and then use it. But it's a football game, like all the others, and we have to make sure we are ready for that.

On what last weekend's result has done to the squad's confidence...

There's no better mood-booster than a good game before. Yes, of course you see that. We had consistency, if you want, in the league now in the last five games but we spoke a lot about it, confidence is like a fragile little flower and we have to make sure that we keep that, and we have to understand in the right way. I loved the goals we scored because it's not likely that you always finish the situations off. You can have seven, eight chances in a football game, even against United, but that you finish them all off and score, that's really unlikely. But the way [we scored the goals], there was everything involved – there was good play, super counter-attacking and what always was there was really, really good defending before, so winning balls back if it was high up the pitch in a counter-press situation. And these kind of things, they bring you consistency.

You should not expect to score now from all situations again but we have to create in this manner and we have to use all the little situations. So we had counter-attacks, if you want, out of open play, we had it after set-pieces – all things we really need and didn't have it that often this year, to be honest. I think for all goals there were plenty of options in the box, like the bodies in the box were three, four, five – and that's always something that you need as well. So that's what we take and that's what we try to recreate and to get consistency in. There's so many games to play and, what we said before, we have to chase pretty much everybody, and that means tomorrow [at] Bournemouth and that's what we'll try to do.

On how Cody Gakpo and Darwin Nunez have handled the 'pressure' since arriving at Liverpool...

They deal very well with it. I think we deal very well with it all together, because you don't put extra pressure on the players – never did, will never do. But that doesn't mean there is no [pressure] because we know the world can be quite [an] intense place, especially when you cost a lot of money, stuff like this. A lot of things are said, a lot of things are written and all these things you have to deal with. For Cody, it went obviously really quickly – we were hoping for that, you never know 100 per cent but we were hoping for it. I really liked the game he played, the contribution now is really obvious. Same for Darwin, like it was for Luis, it's super-important, like it was for Diogo when he came in. Obviously scouting can never be perfect because you only know a person really when he's then around you. But obviously we were really spot on in these moments, so we signed the player but the boy behind as well. Both worked really well, so I'm really happy with the development.