Goals from Sadio Mane and Andy Robertson turned the deficit caused by Alexandre Lacazette’s 25th-minute opener into a half-time lead for the champions.
A pair of superb Alisson Becker saves preserved the Reds’ advantage after the break, before Diogo Jota came off the bench and volleyed in a late Kop-end clincher on the occasion of his home debut for the club to seal all three points.
Read on for a transcript of Klopp’s post-match press conference…
On the result and the performance of his team…
It was good. It was a really good game, I loved pretty much each second. I didn’t like the goal we conceded but the reaction afterwards immediately, I liked a lot. Against a top team in form playing like we did tonight is something, to be honest. It doesn’t help us for Thursday or help us for Sunday, but for tonight it was quite good, I have to say. I really liked it: we were dominant, we played football, we were difficult to defend, the counter-press was top, attitude was great and played some really good stuff. Arsenal had not too many, but some, chances because they have real quality. I think most of the moments they had were offside, so good defending, but Ali made a save anyway. It was all good, a really good performance.
On Jota’s appearance and first goal for the club…
Mo played an absolutely exceptional game tonight; I would have wished for him that he could have scored. I don’t think Robbo’s goal was the reaction from the situation before [the Lacazette goal], the performance was the reaction and it was really good. The goal we scored was a cross from the right full-back and the left full-back finished it off, which is absolutely amazing. I love it. Diogo came on, played naturally his football, tried to defend the way we defend. He is on 20 per cent of information on what we do exactly; we had meetings to talk about it and that will all take time. Today he had 60 or 70 minutes to watch how Sadio is doing and then he came on the pitch and did incredibly well. He scored a super goal, a nice first game at Anfield. He will never forget it, I will never forget it. A cool start.
On whether he was concerned by the early chances not being taken…
No, I was not worried. That’s the situation, that’s life as a manager. I would wish we would score the first chance, take the second one as well, the third one and the fourth and fifth, but it never happens! The direction of the game, I liked a lot; the way we played, I liked a lot. We looked pretty ruthless in these situations. We kept them like 25 metres in front of their goal, we were there with our centre-halves. We looked really, really good, to be honest. It is so difficult because Arsenal defends in these moments with 10 men – or 11 with the goalie – but each ball you lose is a potential counter-attack and everybody knows the speed they have, so that makes it really tricky. It must be a proper mix between being brave, being flexible, being direct and being perfectly protected because otherwise you run into one counter after another. No, I was not worried [about missed chances]. As I said, I wish it would be different, but it is pretty much my life waiting for goals.
On whether he saw any ‘sloppiness’ in the Reds’ display…
I didn’t see us really being sloppy in defending. I saw us in one or two passing situations when we gave the ball too easy away, which is just then a problem because to outplay Arsenal you need a quite expansive formation. Losing the ball without any pressure on yourself, that doesn’t make too much sense, that can really hurt you. So in these moments yes, but our defending was really good, really good, because you cannot defend Arsenal for 90 minutes with the quality they have. It’s completely normal that they have chances [and] you need a goalie for that, you need a block for that, you need all these kind of things. But in all other moments you need to be really creative because they defend well. They defend in a 5-4-1 until it develops and then in a 5-5 and that makes it really difficult. And you know, one ball at their feet and Aubameyang is on his bike and that’s then really difficult.
On whether his side’s impressive start to the season is a ‘statement’…
We don’t make statements, to be honest. In a press conference from time to time I have to do it because you ask me questions, but apart from that we just play football and want to win the games. Look, as I said, I liked the game tonight and I said as well that it doesn’t help a lot for Thursday because we have to play again like this, or better, so that’s how a season works. Tonight I am really happy about what we did but now we have three days and then we play again and then we have two days and we play again so that’s quite intense. So it’s about consistency obviously, but when I saw the schedule before the season I thought as well, ‘Oh, that’s pretty tricky’. It was always clear, for ages clear, that Chelsea would be really strong, Arsenal won the FA Cup, so won the last English competition after lockdown and are flying since then, pretty much. They beat us in the Community Shield. Leeds, I said it before the game, is of all the [other] 19 teams, they would not have been in the top 10 what I want to play in the first game. It was difficult but we did it. So we have to improve, we have to become consistent. So far we played quite well but that’s all.