Press conference'Let's be the team nobody wants to play against again'

The Reds host the Cherries at Anfield on Saturday seeking their maiden victory in the Premier League this season, following draws with Fulham and Crystal Palace and defeat at Manchester United.

Speaking to the media at the AXA Training Centre, the manager reflected on the campaign so far and outlined how the responsibility to turn things around is collective.

Read a summary of the briefing – in addition to Klopp’s update on injuries and the transfer window – below…

On what he can do as part of responding to difficult periods on the pitch…

Yeah, it’s my job actually. I’m a supporter of this team as well but it’s not my main job – my main job is to put things right. I could learn a lot in my life when things didn’t go well. It’s not my favourite situation but I like it as well, it’s a part of the job as well. I have to be careful with the language but to ‘regroup’ – not that we are not a group, but it’s like to find the perfect way together again, to fight the outside world, to fight all the circumstances, not to suffer. The news are not great, the games are the games.

I think in the past we played much worse games at United and this day the really disappointing part about it from our point of view in this game is nothing to do with injuries, nothing to do with anything else – I know how it sounds but we should have won this game. We should. With all the things, doing here a little bit better, here a little bit better. Now it’s my job to figure out why we didn’t do better in these moments, what’s wrong.

In a situation like this maybe there’s a moment when you just realise, oh, something changed, it’s difficult, injuries hitting. But injuries were not at all the problem at United because the team we could line up was absolutely more than good enough to play a top game. With 70 per cent possession against a counter-attacking team, it’s good and shows the problem as well in the same moment. So I’m completely ready for that now. That’s maybe not the most important thing but maybe a little bit helpful as well.

I want to fight through this. Players come back, stuff like this, and we will get better results, building on that and go from there. All the things we achieved in the past are not important in the moment, really not. We don’t feel it, we don’t rely on it, nothing at all. But it’s always new; the new season is different, for different reasons. In one out of four games we didn’t perform at all, that was Fulham, and in other games we did good stuff as well. Not good enough, or maybe not often enough in the games, but that’s it. Now our next chance is Bournemouth and that’s the one I’m really looking forward to. With all the respect I have for Scott [Parker] and what Bournemouth are doing. I don’t take anything for granted, not at all. But I want to be the one team really nobody wants to play against again – immediately. That’s the plan for tomorrow.

On his assessment of Bournemouth…

Played a super season last year, what an achievement that is to get immediately promoted again. Absolutely class. Scott coming in new and doing the job he did, really cool. Had some injuries as well, key players now at the start, but anyway got results. Tough programme for the beginning, I would say, the last two games especially. I only read a little bit, so obviously they worked on system changes, playing with five at the back, might go back to four at the back, I don’t know. Obviously that’s nothing we can really influence, we just have to use it in the moment when the game starts. That’s it.

On his reaction to the tragic death of Olivia Pratt-Korbel in Liverpool this week…

Nothing that I can say now could really help. Of course, our thoughts and prayers are with the family and I cannot even imagine how it must feel, it’s absolutely horrible only to think about it. It’s such a tragedy. How I said, from our point of view whatever I say would not help really, but if we can help in any kind [of way] we will. That’s clear. That must be clear. This is our city; usually we like to say LFC city or Everton city but in these moments we really have to realise it’s our city and so whatever we can do together there, we have to do. I don’t like the moments when it happens but I like the fact we are then united and support with all we have. Whatever we do it will not help for the moment but anyway you have to try to ease the situation slightly. If we can do something we will do it.

On the players’ response to recent results…

We played the season we played last year and it ends like it ends. For me then, on a high, even when we lost the Champions League final. But in the future when you look back it’s not the season people will talk about because we won ‘only’ two trophies from a possible four. But from our point of view when we will look back it will be a special season because of playing all the possible finals, stuff like this. You don’t do that often in your career, if ever. That makes it a special season. But it’s long ago, so nobody has anything that keeps him back or holds him back and doesn’t let him fly.

Then it gets even a bit stranger, if you want; we played this outstanding game against City really early and then we have this low at Fulham a week later. The rest is normal, we can lose at United – we don’t want [to] but it’s possible. You don’t have to do like it’s a catastrophe to go there and not win with a crazy result. And of course with the Crystal Palace game, how it went with 10 men, it’s possible as well. That’s normal. What we make of it is our decision, that’s true. Do we feel in the moment we did everything perfect and it just happened? No. So, we have to improve, definitely.

So what you can improve immediately is effort. Immediately. Not that we were not. I’m not sure, let me say was it 95 per cent maybe, but in the world of football we are living in you need 100 – if not a little bit more – per cent. And passion. Putting all these kind of things. Don’t wait for the perfect pass, pass as often as one of them will be perfect. All these kind of things. It’s football and it’s highest-level football, the opponents try to cause us problems obviously in these kind of things. It’s all fine, it’s all football things and you have the football solutions for it and you have to get through this. That’s how it always was.

The things we achieved in the last few years were never easy. People said, ‘You win so many games’ – none of them was easy. So nobody should expect it should be now easy. No. It will be difficult tomorrow, it will be really difficult. But anyway let’s go for it together. That’s all I can say. It’s not too much we now have to take from the first three games and mention it constantly. You are more right than me when you mention that we go 1-0 down, stuff like this, then we find somehow back in the game. But it was always different, but it’s a fact as well. Now we have to make sure we give Ali the chance again to have a clean sheet because he alone cannot do it, so we have to defend with literally all we have and then when we attack we have to attack with all we have. One of the main rules we always had is: everybody is responsible for everything. There is nobody out of responsibility when we defend and nobody is out of responsibility when we attack. Getting there was always difficult and now this year with the start it looks like a bit more difficult but not impossible, and that’s the only thing I need. From here we go.

On whether it is ‘too early to worry’ about Liverpool’s points tally so far this season...

You can worry [about points] if you want; it doesn’t make too much sense, obviously, but it’s fine. It’s not that we think, ‘Only three games in…’ I hear that. If you start worrying because other teams have nine points already then that’s obviously not helpful. I think this team delivered in the last four or five years on an incredibly high level – a consistently high level. A little drop again [with] injuries two years ago, but apart from that they were always so often on the winning side. Sometimes people – [and] I don’t speak now about the close group or the real supporters – take things like that for granted. ‘Liverpool against whoever, in the end Liverpool will win’ – that’s not the case.

We had to – and we have to – work incredibly hard for it and that’s what we will do. It’s about own expectations from the boys, so how should it look? Should it look easy immediately again? If you expect an easy game, it will never happen. If you never expect an easy game, you will have three or four in your entire career. The boys are not guilty of that, that they expected to slide easily into the season. But it’s, of course, too early to close the season, definitely, and say that’s it for us. Nobody knows what we can achieve at the end of the season, but between now and then there are a lot of points to get. We should start collecting them.

On Fulham and Bournemouth proving they are proper Premier League teams...

Definitely. If you qualify for the Premier League you’re a Premier League team. The third newly promoted team are Nottingham Forest and I am not sure how many players are still in the team from the team they were promoted with. There are different ways to do it as well. I think early [in my time at Liverpool] we played Bournemouth in a League Cup game and [I] met Eddie Howe for the first time and stuff like this, and really heard for the first time about the club, to be 100 per cent honest. Since then, I know the club pretty well and I like a lot what they are doing, I like the little stadium there, which is nice from an atmosphere point of view and maybe not-so-nice from a money point of view for the club, I think. It’s a special place, it’s a special club. I respect a lot what they are doing. They got promoted and they are a proper Premier League team, of course.