Jürgen Klopp was pleased with Liverpool's improved showing against Real Madrid on Wednesday night but rued the first-leg display after his side were eliminated from the Champions League.

The Reds exit the competition at the quarter-final stage following a 3-1 aggregate defeat by Zinedine Zidane's team in their last-eight tie. 

Tasked with overcoming a two-goal deficit at Anfield, Klopp's men applied heavy pressure on the Real backline throughout the second leg but, ultimately, were unable to find a breakthrough on the night and drew 0-0. 

Read on for a summary of the boss' post-match press conference...

On how close he was to getting the performance that would have got Liverpool through...

We started the game extremely well and could have obviously scored there early, but we didn't. So, we were good in the game, we played much better. We didn't lose the tie tonight, we lost the game obviously in Madrid, that's clear, with the performance we put out there, which was not good enough. Today it was good enough to go 1-0 up for sure and then it would've been a different game. So, with the experience of Real Madrid and the situation like you have to chase a game, that you have to score and stuff like this, it got more and more difficult obviously. So they controlled the game from a specific moment on, had then their counter-attacking chances themselves. But obviously what we saw tonight, with two good performances we would've had a better chance to go through. One good performance without scoring then anyway was not enough.

On ensuring the elimination acts as motivation rather than impacts negatively...

That will not happen that it impacts us negatively. We are not silly. We want what we earn. If we don't earn it 100 per cent, then we respect the situation that we don't get it. How I said, tonight if we scored an early goal this game would've been a different one – I think everybody knows that but it's hypothetical, we didn't. But it has now no impact on the Premier League, apart from that we don't play midweeks at least internationally – I'm pretty sure Premier League plays midweeks if I'm right. So we can concentrate and focus on the Premier League – what we will and what we have to. But it's tough just because we are still not in the hot seat, I would say, and we face Leeds on Monday, so that's a tough one. What can I say? They are the leader in all physical stats in the Premier League pretty much, so you better run a lot yourself. We have a few days until then, we will use that and then we make sure we are ready for that.

On whether tonight's performance gives him confidence Liverpool can secure a return to the Champions League next season…

That has nothing to do with confidence, I would say I am naturally confident, but that doesn't mean we will end up there. We just can read the table, we know the points, we know the situation and stuff like this. We know who we play and we don't have to talk too much about it. I said now what we think about it and, yes, we want and we have to – and if we want that we should play really good football, what we did tonight. But if we want to go through then we should finish those situations off on top of that because that is very helpful as well. I think we are not in a bad moment at the moment; we played pretty well even when it was a late winner against Aston Villa. We played a good game against them, we played really good against Arsenal and not too good against Real Madrid in the first leg, but in the other games we were not bad. Tonight, a good game, so we just have to keep going. We really have to keep going, we have to keep fighting, we want to be in the Champions League next year but in the moment we still have to pick up more points than a lot of other teams.

On who he believes will win the Champions League and his thoughts on Thibaut Courtois, Luka Modric and Toni Kroos...

Who wins the Champions League I honestly could not care less. Who will win the final I think they will deserve it. There are four incredibly strong teams in, so congratulations already to whoever will do that. Courtois is a really good goalie and that's it. I think we controlled the three midfielders tonight much better than in the first leg. That means when you let them play then they are pretty much unplayable but if you defend them well, like we did tonight, then they have their problems as well because they are human beings. We learned a lot from the first game, how to do it differently, we used that tonight and it could have been enough but it wasn't because we didn't score.