Jürgen Klopp on title race, Henderson, Fabinho and Burnley
The Premier League title race, Fabinho and Jordan Henderson’s defensive partnership and Burnley’s form were among the topics covered during Jürgen Klopp’s pre-match press conference.
Liverpool’s boss previewed his team’s clash with the Clarets by fielding journalists’ questions from the AXA Training Centre on Wednesday afternoon.
Read on for a summary…
On the regular changes of leadership at the top of the Premier League…
Yes, it changed all the time and that’s because it’s so close. We’ve known that since a few weeks [ago] and that makes it a slightly different title race or race in general this year. We have to be ready 100 per cent and that’s what we try to do constantly. I know that in this business only results count, I’m long enough in to know that. But before you have the result you need to have performances and the last performance was really good… we said it how it was, how we saw it. But we didn’t win, we know that, and now we have another chance to change that and that’s exactly what we try.
On what winning this season’s title will require and whether ‘close to perfection’ remains the case following the last few campaigns…
Again, close to perfection but ‘perfection’ depends on the situation. There is no perfect season with 114 points, there is just dealing with circumstances, dealing with the situation and dealing with the amount of games and these kind of things. We have to be as perfect as possible and that’s what we all try. Pretty much all the teams had meanwhile kind of a dip here and there and some sorted it already [while] some are on the way to sorting it. That’s the situation. I understand 100 per cent the need to talk all the time about it but we cannot change it just in a minute… you can imagine the day is 24 hours, we think about a lot of stuff and most of the things the public thinks about we think about as well, but not all of them. And for sure somebody has to be calm in this kind of situation, it’s not a catastrophe or whatever, our situation. It’s not perfect but that’s not important because it’s just really to be as good as you can be and I saw a lot of good signs in the Man United game and if we would have won that game everybody would have seen them. Because we didn’t win, then nobody was interested in it. That cannot change my view.
On whether Liverpool are still striving to ‘attack the title, not defend it’…
Believe it or not, we still chase it. Nothing changed. ‘Chasing’ doesn’t mean that you are always in the best possible position, ‘chasing’ is more a general mood. So we go for it and if you don’t see that, I cannot change it. If you think we don’t score goals because we don’t want it enough, I cannot change that. If you think we don’t score goals or have enough results because we are not good enough, I cannot change that, not here. The only thing I can do is work with the boys on the right stuff and that you all see it again in the football games we play.
On the thought process behind partnering Fabinho and Henderson at centre-back against Manchester United…
We played with a six and an eight in the centre-half position. If you go back, Hendo is an eight, a box-to-box player, and I think Fabinho would describe himself as a six. Defensively they did outstandingly well and offensively you can make a positive difference with these kind of players in the build-up and against United you have to build. We did that really well and so that was the thought process behind it. I was never in doubt that they can defend. Now the next game is a different game because some things are similar, the areas they defend and stuff like this, but the way Burnley counter-attacks is different to how United counter-attacks. There are differences and we have to make sure we find a solution for that again. How I said, defensively the boys did really well, all of the boys did defensively well since we started the season. But we cannot change the situation and asking me if I ‘miss’ somebody in midfield: if I would think it was better to play them in midfield than in the last line then we would do it. But we thought for that game it’s better this way around.
On Burnley’s form and whether they have improved since Ben Mee’s return…
When you look at the goal difference, I think it’s nine-22, that means obviously they didn’t score a lot of goals but they don’t concede a lot as well. So that just shows us how tough the game will be, but it was always like this against Burnley: a proper fight, second-ball fight, defending the channel balls, defending the intensity - Burnley puts in a specific intensity - and all these kind of things. Ben Mee is a very, very important player for Burnley, I knew that before, that’s clear. They have a really settled line-up, not only with Tarkowski and Mee, but these two and Pope, these three players I think are the heart of the team. Then they have the strikers up front who work their socks off and good footballers in midfield. That’s the situation. They play a specific way and I really respect that. They do it for years and Sean is always able to squeeze really good performances out of the squad, even when it’s not the biggest squad in the world and of course if they have injuries that hurts them maybe even more than other teams. But that’s the situation, they know that [and] they deal with it very well and we have to face it.