'It's exciting' - Klopp discusses LFC team to face Spartak
Jürgen Klopp is excited by the prospect of Philippe Coutinho, Roberto Firmino, Sadio Mane and Mohamed Salah joining forces against Spartak Moscow tonight.
The quartet start a competitive match together for the first time this season in Russia as the Reds play their second fixture in Champions League Group E.
“It is [exciting],” said Klopp.
“It was actually the most positively difficult day I’ve had so far with the line-up, because pretty much no player gave me a reason not to bring him today.
“But, at the end, this is the first XI and a strong bench – that’s what you need when you have a lot of competition and you have a difficult game ahead.
“We have to mix up the quality with tactical discipline and big heart and desire, greed, aggressiveness and all that stuff… let’s play football.”
Asked if there will be extra onus on Emre Can and Jordan Henderson to shield the back four as the attackers seek goals, Klopp insisted that responsibility lies with the whole team.
“To be honest, that’s the job of all six in front of the four,” continued the manager.
“That we play pretty flexibly offensively means you need to go the short way back in defence. That’s not about the position, it’s about the space.
“It’s not only these two. Phil is also good in this, really good in tactical things and defence tactics.
“It’s about doing the right thing in the right moment, it’s not about the name and ‘that’s your job, you are only responsible for scoring, you are only for defending’. It’s football so they are responsible for everything.”