Klopp Talk: Reds “Lacking Decisiveness in Right Moments”

After a frankly disastrous run of games, Liverpool are well out of the running for the title and are presumably entirely focused on making sure they can qualify for the Champions League next season. There’s very little left to say about what exactly has gone wrong, and there’s plenty of analysis on what exactly needs to change for the Reds. For Jurgen Klopp, the thing that’s lacking is the ability to convert and score in the decisive moments of a game.

“We had some problems, you know them, and again if you saw an attitude problem today on the pitch, for example, then you have to write it. If you didn’t see that then you cannot write it,” Klopp said after the 2-0 defeat against Everton. “We have to play but we have to force it as well, that’s how it is.”

“In the decisive moments, we have to be calmer, that’s how it is – like in the finishing situations and I don’t mean now the headers from Sadio, which were really tricky with circumstances we had tonight, or the chance from Mo where it was super play with Shaq and Trent when Mo is alone and that’s then really difficult because Pickford is in front of him, short distance.”

“But we had other situations where we had really finishing opportunities and we didn’t finish the situations off. So, the only way I know is to try it again and again and again, and I don’t see any relation to the last three years. That we were champions last year, that was already a month after we were champions, it didn’t feel like it was a month ago – that has nothing to do with that. The boys are still full of desire, I see that. But to change a football game, a result, to get the result you have to be decisive in the right moments defensively and offensively – and that’s what we are lacking.”

Hopefully the team can convert that desire into results when they take on Sheffield United next Sunday.