Jürgen Klopp on Bologna wins, pressing, Anfield return and more
Jürgen Klopp declared himself 'really happy' after Liverpool's victories over Bologna in two 60-minute friendlies in Evian on Thursday.
The first game saw the Reds claim a well-deserved 2-0 win over their Serie A opposition thanks to goals from Diogo Jota and Sadio Mane inside the opening quarter of an hour.
That was then followed up by Takumi Minamino's match-winning volley from a Xherdan Shaqiri cross in the second contest.
Highlights: The best of both games v Bologna
Read on for the boss' verdict on both performances and more from his post-match interview with Liverpoolfc.com…
On the performances...
Good. I liked obviously the way we scored the goals because they [the opponents] lost the ball easy – I don't think it was easy, it was just we forced them. From that we played really good football against a defensive-orientated team but I liked a lot of things. Always when we kept the ball, when we had the right speed for our passing and kept them running, it looks really good. In the second game especially as well, it was really good. I liked the rhythm we played. You come to chances, you have to use them. We had more chances than we scored but obviously Taki scored after Shaq's pass was a nice one. How I said, [we] could have scored more with the penalty and all that stuff but it's all fine. As long as nobody is injured, how it looks in the moment, then it was 60 minutes for a lot, 45 minutes for some and 15 minutes for some, so that's exactly what we wanted to have today. I'm really happy.
On his team's pressing in the games...
You can imagine that we work a lot on that. We spoke after the last game, it doesn't work out always. It's not likely that you win the balls in that area but it's still the right thing to do. You force them there to make a mistake, they don't make it – you should keep pushing them in different areas, to the sideline or wherever and then you win the ball there, that's fine as well. Maybe it's not only one pass until you score but two, three [are] fine as well. And you put pressure on the opponent, you can do what you want and the other team cannot do what they want. That's a massive thing in a football game – that you feel insecure or you feel really confident. That's what we try and for today it was absolutely fine. I can't say nothing bad about it, to be honest. I saw a lot of good performances, liked a lot of performances today and that's good.
On the performances of Kostas Tsimikas and Minamino…
Kostas was really, really good today, I have to say. That's true. It was just 45 minutes, that's fine, Owen Beck 15 minutes and that's good as well. Taki has played a good pre-season, that's true – that's really, really true. Seeing the quality of Shaqiri and all those things, that's good. Having the centre-halves back, playing football, you can see Joey with new long balls from left to right to left, a nice little asset. It's good, we can switch the game quicker maybe. Even after a long time, not with all of the guys who came late, we have to get used to each other quickly and then we have to make sure we are ready for the season. We don't prepare for Norwich, we prepare for the whole season so we have to see – who is in which situation for next week. We have two more games to go, I cannot wait for them actually – I heard now they are nearly fully sold out. We only sold 75 per cent [of capacity] if I am right. It will be the biggest atmosphere and crowd I have played in front of for 18 months or so, I'm not sure exactly. Can't wait to get there, to do that and I hope the people are looking forward to it as well. That's good, let's play these two games. We are where we are, judge it, use it and then go for it.
On Jordan Henderson's return to training and team selections for the Anfield friendlies…
Hendo trained today in Liverpool. We have a meeting on Saturday, it's all fine and we will see if he plays a few minutes or not. I didn't think about it yet and probably more likely in the second game, but if anybody is worried they choose the wrong game, I couldn't say which is Team A and which is Team B, to be honest. Today it was the same, we have only good players here and that's good. Both line-ups will go for everything, so all fine.