Jurgen Klopp: We Were Completely Open, Too Passive

Jurgen Klopp was at loss for words about exactly why Liverpool fell to Manchester City yesterday losing 1-4 in a game that has seen both sides equally matched on many occasions before.

“The first half was OK, not just because of the result but because of the performance as well. Of course, City had more possession and these kind of things, but that always happens when we play here. We scored a wonderful goal, could have scored a second one in a really good counter-attack”, he said.

“Then, I would say the situation was rather unlucky when Kevin De Bruyne gets a touch on the ball and rolls through Robbo’s legs. From there, of course City was doing really well.”

Defending City in the crucial moments is necessary so that they don’t start dominating the game, according to Klopp.

“If you are too deep, too passive or whatever, then they use that immediately”, he said.

“We were not there anymore; we were completely open, we were too passive, too deep, too far away from everything.”

Getting out of a situation where City are in the lead is particularly hard when all the players are not performing to their best ability.

“If you look at the game, I think we had around about four performances which were OK: the two midfielders with Hendo and Fab worked a lot, tried to close gaps, Cody especially in possession and Ali, of course, and then that’s obviously very difficult. If you want to get something from here, then you have to play 11 players, 14, 15 players have to be on the top of their game and that was not the case again. So after being 3-1 down, it is anyway difficult to come back here”, said Klopp.

“I told the boys now there is nothing from my side to say for tonight. Everything is obvious and everyone needs to think about it and then tomorrow we have to talk about it, but that was nothing for now. It is not a lot of time, but it is time – we don’t play tomorrow, we play Tuesday. We should play better, especially more consistently”, he added.