 Liverpool either got away with it on Saturday afternoon, or showed the mark of a top team by winning the game with a late goal after not playing particularly well.
Only time will tell, but what’s certain is that Jurgen Klopp wasn’t happy with his team after their first-half display against Swansea City.
Liverpool were trailing following Leroy Fer’s goal after eight minutes, and hadn’t shown any of the intensity from recent wins over Leicester City, Chelsea and Hull City.
Our chief football writer @TonyBarrett on Jurgen Klopp's biggest problem #LFC https://t.co/1qZuXkgBjy
— FootballJOE (@FootballJOE) October 1, 2016
Klopp was asked following the game how angry he was with his team’s first-half performance.
“Very. I said to the boys: ‘I am 49, so I have a lost a lot of football games and unfortunately I will lose a few [more].’ But today makes no sense, because it’s not a day where we should lose a football game, because we could have done so much better in the first half.”
Liverpool won the game thanks to Roberto Firmino’s header and a penalty from James Milner, but Klopp still didn’t sound too happy with his afternoon in Wales.
“We were not ready for this game,” the German coach said.
“It’s my responsibility that we’re ready for games and today I saw that we weren’t. The body language was not good, the build-up was too static. Swansea did well, that’s important to say, but we were too static. We had no movement. We knew what they wanted to do, so we knew where the spaces are, but there was a misunderstanding. We were never compact enough for counter-pressing situations, that makes no sense.”
Next up for Liverpool is Manchester United at Anfield after the international break.
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