Milner: Late goals can make Anfield a horrible place to visit
James Milner believes Liverpool can ensure Anfield is 'a horrible place to play' for visiting teams if they keep up their useful recent habit of scoring late goals.
The Reds secured a deserved point from their final Barclays Premier League fixture at home in 2015-16, as Christian Benteke's injury-time header denied Chelsea victory on Wednesday evening.
Jürgen Klopp's team have struck decisively at the sharp end of a number of games this year, including wins over Borussia Dortmund, Norwich City and Crystal Palace.
That run was kickstarted by Divock Origi's 97th-minute equaliser against West Bromwich Albion in December, and Milner believes such late shows are all the more significant at home, given that they are often inspired by the Anfield crowd.
The No.7 now hopes to see more points claimed in L4 thanks to the fans' belief that anything is possible in the final moments of games.
He told Liverpoolfc.com: "The manager said it earlier on in the season, [it's about] giving the fans performances to believe in and, when we are losing late in games, making them believe that we'll get a goal and get back in the game.
"We can make this a fortress and our performances will ultimately do that, and if we're doing the business on the field [the fans] will get right behind us and create an amazing atmosphere.
"If we can make this a horrible place to play, ourselves and the fans, it's a massive plus to [help] win our games at home."
LFCTV GO subscribers can watch Milner's interview in full
Reflecting on the stalemate with Chelsea specifically, Milner expressed disappointment that Liverpool could not sign off at Anfield for the season with a victory.
But he was pleased with the show of character that resulted in Benteke turning in late on.
"We're disappointed not to win, we wanted to win the game," he added.
"They're obviously a good team [but] we know we can play better than we did. We showed in patches what we can do but I think we were maybe a yard or two off it tonight for whatever reason.
"It's disappointing but we've shown that character again to keep going to the end to get a point."
The captain on the night also rejected any suggestions that the hosts' inability to claim three points was down to he his teammates already looking ahead to the Europa League final clash with Sevilla on May 18.
"You want to finish with a win and if you can't do that then make sure you don't lose the game, so that was important," he continued.
"Many people might've thought we had one eye on next week but we were 100 per cent [focused] on tonight and we were desperate to win.
"I think you could see that from the way we kept playing even though things weren't quite going for us.
"We showed nice touches at times but maybe didn't put together a complete performance like we'd like - but we kept going and managed to get a point against a good team."