Klopp on Payet threat, West Ham and young players
Jürgen Klopp previewed Liverpool's FA Cup fourth-round replay against West Ham United with a press conference at Melwood on Monday - read on for a summary of some of the manager's key points...
On how to stop Dimitri Payet...
We [the coaching staff] played against Payet when he was at Marseille, so I knew him before. How I understand football in these times, [we] should not try to find a solution only for Payet, the solution is to avoid the passes to Payet. If he doesn't have the ball too often then it's not possible to have the biggest influence on the game, that's how football should work I think. We have no player we can say, 'come on, follow him, if necessary to the restroom'. We play our football. He can decide games, for sure, but only if we give him the opportunity.
On making things difficult for West Ham...
I saw the Sunderland game and a lot of things I think people could see were really good but in the end it was not enough. But you can see a lot of things get better and better and we have to bring this consistently on the pitch in different formations - that's the challenge. Of course, we will have a different formation to Saturday, but if we can do it similar, then it's not too easy to play against us. I can't say anything about the first [league] game against West Ham when I was not in charge but the second game we were really bad and that's the reason why they could win. If we are better, it's more difficult, and that should be the first step.
On developing young players...
I think [game time] is very important. Young players are similar in one thing: big dreams. That's good and if you then see that it's not only a dream, that it could become realistic, then that's a very important sign in a career. I think for this, it was very important [to blood youngsters in the FA Cup] but now we will see. We give them time and if they feel the same patience then a lot of things can happen in the future and that's what we all want. It's about development in general and that's what we are working for.