Jürgen Klopp: The good stuff was exceptional and we have to do it again

The Reds will be aiming to extend their six-match unbeaten run – which includes four victories on the bounce – when the Cottagers visit Anfield on Wednesday.

Ahead of the game, the manager held a briefing with reporters at the AXA Training Centre. Read on for a summary of what he had to say.

On the yellow card he received against Tottenham Hotspur…

The whole situation is off, it shouldn’t have happened at all, that’s how it is. It was out of emotion. It was out of anger in that moment, never a good leader for the things you do. That’s why I celebrated the way I celebrated, there was a situation with a foul on Mo; no foul, but a foul in my view, and a foul was whistled directly in front of my eyes. I saw it was no foul. But he whistled it anyway, free kick, another free kick, then the goal and a minute later we score. So, that’s usually a moment where you should just be happy that you could score a goal.

But, unfortunately, I was still kind of angry, that led to the way I celebrated. I didn’t say anything wrong. I was shouting: ‘Without you, without you!’. It doesn’t even make a lot of sense. That was all. I couldn’t get really close to the fourth official… the direction was already not really right and I didn’t want to get close at all, because then I felt my muscle, that’s it pretty much. Then we scored, how I said, then Paul Tierney came over to me, I didn’t expect at all a red card to be honest. I know I had a red card not too long ago, I didn’t expect for a second a red card because I didn’t feel that was right, I expected a yellow card in that moment and he said to me: ‘For me it’s a red card, but because of him…’ That’s what I understood, it’s loud in the stadium, but… ‘… because of him, it’s yellow.’ Show me yellow card, smiles in my face. That’s it. ‘Red card, for what?’ That’s how I left. Stood there, game goes on, final whistle, we go inside, tried to calm down, didn’t work out properly, go into all the interviews, then in the interview I said what I said. The things which were made of what Paul Tierney said to me I didn’t say. I think everybody knows what I said, probably, because you can find it out.

I said what he said to me was not OK. And actually I thought it was not OK because it was not a red card in my view. That’s it. And then the things happen, I understand, I opened the box with that. It was not intentionally, but obviously I opened it and your colleague stepped into it and wanted me to carry on and said all these words like it was inappropriate, or whatever. I don’t know what kind of words he used, but I maybe I should’ve said in that moment he said to me it was a red card and stuff like this, but then from that moment on I realised I opened a box which I didn’t want to open and stop talking there. That’s one of the things that happened. The rest was the things I said how feel about how I felt in that moment about Paul Tierney whistling our games.

I know he’s not doing it intentionally, but we have a history and I cannot deny that. I’m not a resentful person, not at all; not at all. I think it’s a waste of time, I had to get over so many things in my life and I get over them. But obviously these kinds of things what happen in the past in decisive games for us, if you were involved or not, they happened. Of course they didn’t happen intentionally, but they are still there. That’s a feeling, nothing else, that’s what I said. I know that obviously the refs are really angry about what I said and go now for it. I heard I was lying and stuff like this… I did a lot of things that day, but I didn’t lie. I shouldn’t have said a couple of things, but lying was not involved in that. That’s pretty much the situation.

On the level his players are at as they put pressure on teams above in the Premier League…

We don’t know really because they win their games as well. So, nothing changed there. It’s important, I think the last game showed pretty much everything, showed our situation, we are capable of doing really good stuff, liked it a lot, started the game, stuff like this. Misunderstood the scoresheet slightly, put the foot off the gas, wrong thing against Tottenham obviously, game opened up a lot, we had still much more possession, but they had now real chances; crossbar, post, all these kind of things, scored their goals.

That we let that happen, we were guilty for that, that we could turn it around again all credit to the boys that they did that. Diogo had that nous to realise what will happen and be in the best possible position to finish the situation off. So, that’s football games. In short turnarounds between the games, it’s clear that we want to build on stuff, that was really good, like really good and to sort the things we didn’t do well and in football two yards change the world. These two yards we were too far away from pretty much everybody in these moments and that’s why the whole game changed. That’s it, pretty much.

On Fulham’s form and their season so far…

Great season, unbelievable football what Marco is doing there. Last year we were in London when he became Manager of the Year from the Championship, [we] congratulated each other. He is a super colleague, a really smart guy, what he did there [is] unbelievable. Now, still performing but the results are not there anymore, as much as before maybe. Injuries now, but  the way he sets up the team, the way they play, the players they brought in, super interesting. They’ve build a really, really, really good side, so we are aware of how good they are, especially if we let them be. We have to make sure they cannot be at their best, that’s the first job to do.

On the challenge on selecting a front three from his current available forwards…

I never saw it as a real challenge, to be honest. If you only have three players and you want to play with three strikers, it is pretty easy to line them up. Of course, if you have a fourth one then you have to make a decision; if you have a fifth one, you have to make a decision. That’s what we do and I would not say it is a challenge, it’s just the job to do. It’s a normal situation, you need more players than you have positions and the boys always have the possibility to show they should start, or could start, and I have to make decisions about how it would fit the best for the specific opponent.

On Liverpool ‘taking their foot off the gas’ after going three goals up against Spurs…

I think actually we more often didn’t do it – take the foot off the gas – than the other way around, but yes from time to time it happens. I think the main problem was that we were that good in the first past of the game it just put us on the wrong pathway, that’s it. We thought that’s how it would go on and forgot what we had to do that we did to get into these good positions. The way we played was absolutely exceptional in the beginning, how we controlled it. Everybody saw the set up of Tottenham, pretty defensive, going for counter-attacks and in these 15 or 20 minutes they were not counter-attacking anything because if we lost the ball we won it back immediately and kept playing again. I would like to let the positives outweigh the negatives, to be honest. It is more important, the negatives were obvious as well – what we didn’t do right and what we have to do it clear – but the good stuff I wouldn’t take for granted because it was exceptional. That’s what we have to do again. As I said, this is the start for something new and that start will not stop at the last matchday of the season, it will have to continue next season and that’s why I take what I get and work with it. The first part was that good that I was really pleased with it.