It’s no good being world class against Man City and then blowing it against the teams at the bottom
KLOPP GETS SHIRTY WITH MISFIRING REDS AND FORCE-FEEDS THEM A VIDEO OF THEIR FAILINGS
JURGEN KLOPP ripped into his inconsistent Liverpool players and told them: You’re only world-class if you do it every week.
The Liverpool manager is furious after devastating backto-back defeats against the Premier League’s bottom two clubs, Swansea and West Brom, which he suspects could have been down to over-confidence.
The Reds had shown their quality to end Manchester City’s season-long unbeaten run before that pair of embarrassing setbacks, and now the manager has warned every single member of his team that they cannot sit back and admire their work.
Klopp faces another harrowing test when he visits old mate David Wagner at Huddersfield tonight and, in a rare broadside at his squad, said the Reds have to do much better than they did against West Brom in the FA Cup at the weekend.
“These boys are potentially world-class but real world-class is to bring it onto the pitch again and again and again,” the German coach said.
Asked if Liverpool were complacent following the praise heaped on them after that City game, Klopp said: “I don’t think so. But if it was, that needs to be finished.”
After Roberto Firmino (right) put Liverpool one up against the Baggies, Klopp was furious with his side’s feeble defending, with every department from front to back responsible for abandoning basic duties.
And he revealed he called his entire squad in on Sunday for a dressing-down and a ‘video nasty’ which he forced them to watch...even though their instinct was to hide from the damning evidence.
“You need to defend in a compact formation and we were not compact. That was the problem,” he explained. “When they played a pass for the first goal, we lost two challenges. We could have defended it better. The second one is just, as a group, bad defending.
“In the video room I showed the boys where we could have reacted much better. If we get back to showing responsibily when defending then we’ll get back to defending better.
“That’s why we showed the boys the game again. It wasn’t about blaming a player. It was about showing what really happened because players probably won’t look back at a game and think ‘oh, that was it.’ They will try to ignore it, and this time I didn’t want to give them the opportunity to ignore it.”
Klopp visits Huddersfield tonight aware of growing criticism that his side lack creativity against the smaller clubs following the sale to Barcelona earlier this month of Philippe Coutinho.
But he hit back at claims he should have signed a replacement by arguing: “Phil Coutinho could not be replaced in this transfer window. We can stop thinking about it. It is not about replacing anyone, it is about using our own opportunities, our own tools, players, tactics and formations.
“No, we didn’t play well at Swansea or against West Brom, but I don’t think Phil would have helped a lot in these situations.
“The solution is not out there in the transfer market in this moment. In the long term we will do a lot, in the short term I don’t think a lot will happen.”