Press conference'We expect a massive fight' - Jürgen Klopp's Wolves preview

The Reds restart their 2023-24 campaign by travelling to Molineux, having strung together three successive wins and totalled 10 points before the international break.

Ahead of this weekend’s clash with Gary O’Neil’s Wolves, the Liverpool manager spoke to the media during a press conference at the AXA Training Centre.

Read a summary of Klopp’s pre-match comments below…

On the midfield options he now has…

Yeah, I’m happy. I was happy with our midfield we had over the years: fantastic players, super characters, real men grew into fantastic [players] from younger players and more experienced players, grew into each different role. Were the most successful players we had here at the club at least since I’m here. And it was a big task, and it is a big task, to replace these guys. But I’m happy with what we’ve got, that’s true. I really think we brought in good players and we had already good players here; we had Curtis, Harvey, Thiago obviously, we had already Stefan. We had really good players here and we brought a few on top of that. That’s necessary but not easy.

So far I think it looks alright. We would have loved to carry on obviously after the Aston Villa game, which was a really good game. We couldn’t do that. I think 30-odd hours ago Macca played in Bolivia, landed yesterday morning at four o’clock. Lucho at 9am yesterday. So, let’s see where we can pick up from there. I didn’t see them yet, I will see them today and we will make decisions about the game tomorrow. But with the quality of the players I’m really, really happy. The potential they have is really good and I love working with them because they are open. It’s nice for a coach obviously as well, for a manager, that you know they didn’t hear it already 500 times before, some messages are new. So it’s really exciting.

On the difficulty of facing Wolves away from home…

It’s the Premier League, if you asked me now, ‘Is there any away ground where you like to go and think oh my God, we have the points already’, there is none. Wolves for sure not as well. 100 per cent sure the manager didn’t want to lose Matheus Nunes late in the window, they lost a few key players. And then you look at the line-up and think, ‘Wow, that’s real quality.’ Players like Hwang and Kalajdzic don’t even start, they still have Neto and other guys, so it’s a really, really good football team and that’s the team we prepare for. Were unlucky obviously now early in the season already with decisions, which happens to all of us but not all these decisions lead directly to a bad result – in their case I think it was like that. We expect a massive fight and that’s what we have to be ready for.

On the qualities he saw in new signing Ryan Gravenberch to bring him to the club…

I wouldn’t want to choose one, to be honest. The package is really interesting. He’s good in small spaces and that’s now really special, good in big spaces as well. He can accelerate with the ball, he can really drive the ball, he has a really good overview, he is a good passer, a good shooter. The full week training now. Everybody said before and he knows that, he’s a really skilled boy, always was. When he moved to Bayern he had already more than 100 games at Ajax, that’s not a usual career until then. But everybody would have said defensively he can make the next step 100 per cent, but I see that he wants that, he got that 100 per cent. He’s really in that, he’s working extremely hard.

It’s obviously really nice for him – OK, Cody only arrived yesterday I think, but having Virg and Cody around. He’s the same age group like most of the boys now. And it’s really cool having him. He is a good guy and a player with massive potential. I don’t know where he will end up, he has to fit in what we are doing but he will. How long it will take, I don’t know, we will see, to reach closer to his peak but we will work on that. He is here for a long time and I’m really happy that he’s here and we can start that.

On his comments about his team’s lack of confidence after this fixture last season and the change he has seen now...

I didn’t remember that. I thought I said that after Brighton, but maybe I said it after Brighton as well and after other games. So, I’m not sure we improved already, that we made a change or whatever. I think we showed a few really nice signs, I liked it as well. I really liked the Aston Villa game. I know how difficult this game usually is and that day we were really good and that’s cool. Early in the season, pretty much three days or two days after the transfer window closed... then this team plays that kind [of game]. It was a really good one. But are we stable already? I don’t know. Let’s see. We miss players for the game tomorrow, key players for us that we have to prove that we can replace, that we can still play football.

We build a team, it’s not that we have built a team, or did it now during the pre-season, or whenever we started with a slightly different system. We are in that process. Yes, we had key moments going our direction, we love key moments going our direction. Unfortunately, probably not, but winning with 10 men helps to create a spirit and mentality, but only if you use it because these opportunities you can let slip through your fingers and then you think, ‘How was it again? I forgot what we had to do.’

It’s still early days and we have to build a team and I’m really happy with the basis we can work from. I said before the Aston Villa game when I stand in the dressing room and look at the team I really, really love this team. It’s early days and I really think it’s easy for people to love this team as well. It’s all what we need because we cannot, and Liverpool never could, they cannot start loving a team when we won something, we have to do it before, because that’s the only chance we can win something. So, let’s go for it and then we will see.

What we did is we changed a few things, we brought in new players and maybe for me a big difference is, and I said it to the players, obviously, that this is not year eight, I think in October I’m here eight years, [but] this is year one of the new team and that’s exactly how we approach everything. We changed a lot of things, brought in a few guys to give an interesting insight in their lives and we want to become a new team and not the replica of the other team. That’s what we are working on. I’m fully in, this is year one of whatever, and not year eight of the good old past.

On replacing the injured Trent Alexander-Arnold and how his absence impacts the team...

[The] dynamic, not so much. We have to be there flexible even with Trent, if you watch the game against Villa in detail, you will see he was not fixed in any midfield role; inside role, we have to be flexible there and that’s exactly how we will do it. But if you know another passer like Trent tell me, who can play this position, that would be really cool. It must be fine; it will be fine. We have to adapt to the different skillset of the player, but the most important thing in this game again is defensive stability. That’s [what it’s] all about, then we can play.

If you are not stable you don’t have to think about that and that’s why the last game against Aston Villa, I think a lot of people were maybe not convinced about our last line. Then you saw Joe Gomez and Joel Matip performing on that level, they have that quality and that’s really cool. So, that was the key for the game, plus Alexis in front of them did really well. We need defensively stability and then we can play football from there.