ReactionAlisson Becker: We take the good things but there's lots to improve on

The Reds were prevented from winning at Anfield for the first time in 2023-24, with the Premier League showdown ending in stalemate.

Post-match, Alisson spoke to Liverpoolfc.com and gave his assessment of the encounter and what Jürgen Klopp’s men must carry forward from it.

Read the interview with the goalkeeper below…

On the frustration of the game…

Yeah, unfortunately it’s a draw for us today, not what we were hoping for. But we have to take the good things that we did on the pitch. I think we dominated all the game, created a lot of chances, but still big areas to improve. We take the good things from here this afternoon: the clean sheet I think was really good, really solid defensively, the way we defended, aggressive in the moments we needed to be, stopping counters, giving them [just] one or two chances. This is really important for a team that wants to win something, that wants to do great things. [It] starts with a solid defence and we did that today.

Maybe we could improve in the creation phase in the last third of the pitch, creating better chances for ourselves, being more calm on the ball and making better choices. Sometimes we rushed a little bit, shooting balls that we could have passed to a player in a better position. But this is part of the game, we have to learn from that as quick as possible, as the season doesn’t give you too much time to improve.

On matches this like happening from time to time…

Yeah, but we know that in reality football is not always happening the big scores, scoring a lot of goals, scoring every chance that you create. But we have to do better, the quality that our players have, we can do better and we have to because we are Liverpool, we want to win big things. Of course, everybody is speaking about the title race. We don’t want to talk about that but our target is to win the league, that is clear. But we know that is a long way and we know we have to do everything as close to perfect as you can.

On his vital save from Rasmus Hojlund during the second half and keeping a clean sheet…

That’s the positive of this afternoon. We can take a lot of things from the performance but I think the best thing today was the clean sheet – not only because I’m a goalkeeper and I love them, but because of the way the team defended. The manager said that the counter-press was a really important thing for us today. I think the team did a good answer in counter-presses, when we lost the ball everybody tried to get the ball immediately. It was mainly in the first half, in the beginning of the game with one minute we had chances already, a corner. It was really important today to see how good it feels when you can do these things in the right way. So we have to take that forward for the next games.

On it being the first time in 35 games Liverpool have failed to score, and having faith the goals will come again soon…

It will, they are massive for us, the strikers. They are always scoring. I think it’s a moment as well sometimes for the other players to try to score from set-pieces. The front three and the others who are coming in are doing the difference every game, one game after the other. Today, unfortunately, I think because of the things I spoke [about] before, I think we didn’t give as well too many good chances for them. I think only Lucho had a really clear chance and even that chance wasn’t clear. We have as well to see the good things that the opponents did on the pitch, they made our work really hard today at the last third, the way they defended; they sat back and they worked hard. All the shots that we had [were] always with pressure so it was not easy. We take that, we take the point, we take the clean sheet and take the things we can improve and the things we did well.

On more big games coming up at Anfield and its importance to the players…

Everybody knows the power of Anfield, the atmosphere the supporters can create here for us. In the good times they were always there – in the bad times as well. This is a time that everybody knows, we cannot forget, we are rebuilding a team. As the manager says, Liverpool 2.0, and I think it’s really important to remember that they play a really big role in the achievements of the club. The supporters are massive, they always make the difference.

I said before already one of the reasons that I came here was because of that, because the atmosphere here at Anfield when I played against Liverpool was amazing. We are going to need them for the rest of the season and we need them for the next two games we have at home. We have to make this our fortress and the place that nobody can beat us. We players play a big, big part on this to give a good feeling for the supporters: playing well, playing in a consistent way so they will follow us.