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| Liverpool 2 Bournemouth 1 |
Jürgen Klopp relished the reaction of his players as Liverpool produced a comeback to beat Bournemouth 2-1 after two successive defeats.
The Reds responded to reversals at Watford and Chelsea – and an early concession to Callum Wilson at Anfield on Saturday – with goals from Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane to go 25 points clear at the Premier League summit.
In his post-match press conference, Klopp explained why the manner of this victory – and its meaning – merited celebration after the final whistle.
Read a summary of the manager’s assessment below…
On his emotions after the final whistle…
I was in good spirits, let me say it like this. I was absolutely happy about the result, the three points and the performance because I knew it would be tricky for different reasons. I think the decisions of the ref around the goals made it even more tricky for us, obviously. We wanted to fight back before the game and after that we had to fight back. How we played after being 1-0 down was exceptional, to be honest. I don’t want to make it too big but in a moment when you have to fight back for the momentum and then you get a decision like that and a goal like this, there are other teams in the history of football which would then slip. The boys’ reaction today, I loved – I really loved.
We fought hard, played super football, the strikers played really good together and were connected. We had good passing behind, we had two super situations [with a] pass from half-space; one for Mo from Millie, I think, and one probably Ox for Trent where we could have scored more goals. We had other situations. We didn’t score then, that’s OK. Second half, we controlled the game. But the biggest chance in the second half was obviously Fraser’s chance. Millie saved our life, that helped massively, I really think we deserved that today. We had moments but didn’t finish it off. But the attitude again, the reaction to the different knocks, I liked a lot. So after the final whistle I was really happy.
On requiring nine points to win the title and not getting carried away…
We will not get carried away. There’s nothing good in losing football games but it makes you aware of how special it is to win football games. That’s what we had in the last 10 days or two weeks when we lost games. So you appreciate it much more. Imagine we would have won against Watford, won in the FA Cup, won against Atletico and in the end you become champion whenever it would happen, and everybody would have said, ‘Yeah, champion.’ If it will happen, it will feel really special – if it will happen. But today was obviously very important to make it happen, that’s how it is, nothing else. Now we have three or four days to prepare for another very difficult game in a wonderful stadium with a sensational crowd. I think that was the best 12.30 performance of our crowd since I was here, I loved it. So, let’s make sure we are ready for that.
On James Milner’s performance at left-back…
Having Millie not available and Hendo in the same time, pretty much not in the dressing room, is really not cool because the job they do is on the pitch mainly, but not only. So I’m more than happy for Millie that he had that situation; I didn’t like the situation obviously but then when Millie saved it I was really happy about it. Super game. He told the whole world and their dogs that he doesn’t like the position two years ago, but now from time to time he obviously likes it. He was really good and very important for us, so all good.
On whether Liverpool have been doing anything differently in the last two seasons to make them consistent…
That’s funny because we didn’t feel consistency in the last two weeks, to be honest. We consistently lost football games and that’s not nice. No, no secrets; hardest work. That’s what I love about the boys, that they were really ready to work really hard today and play football. Not only play football, I liked a lot how we really were in the challenges and stuff like this. Pressed balls were on our side, all these little things make it really important. We said a lot of times, we want to be as successful as is possible for us. Nobody knows exactly where that will end. Especially for us, it’s not always possible to play our best football but to give everybody a proper fight should always be possible. That’s what the boys did very often and that’s why we won a specific amount of games. We didn’t feel the consistency in the last two weeks, we just had to work on things which we didn’t like. The second goal, for example, was a good example – where the last line was, where we won the challenges, where we had the challenges, that we can win the ball and then now we play a counter-attack in a situation like that and not the opponent. That was a massive difference.
Source:liverpoolfc.com
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