A must-win against a cellar dweller? For Jürgen Klopp, Liverpool’s 4:1 against Luton was everything but that. He showed that afterwards while celebrating – and at the press conference, where he suddenly summed up a completely different game
The game was won, the pitch was slowly emptying again. But Jürgen Klopp still had some work to do. First, as always after victories, he presented the Kop with his typical jubilant gesture, in which he thrusts his right fist into the air three times like a boxer and taps his heart. But then he turned to his left and repeated it in front of the Kenny Dalglish Stand, then in front of the Main Stand opposite and finally in front of the Anfield Road End.
Liverpool FC had not just become champions or reached the Champions League final, they had “only” underlined their lead in the Premier League on Wednesday evening with a 4-1 win over promoted and basement side Luton Town in the dress rehearsal for the League Cup final against Chelsea on Sunday at Wembley. However, this evening had nothing to do with “just”, not for Klopp.
Before the break, Klopp angrily addressed the Liverpool fans
“Tonight is one of those nights where it’s hard to stop talking about it. It just wants to come out of me,” said the coach at the press conference afterwards. And so it came out of him. After a first half in which the injury-plagued Reds trailed early on and remained hapless offensively, in which the visitors’ fans mocked the Anfield “library” and the hosts’ fans grumbled so much at times that Klopp angrily asked for moderation – after all that, something happened that Klopp called a “thunderstorm”: “Wow. Wow. “
His starting eleven, the youngest for six years at 25 years and 68 days, came back furiously, increasingly spurred on by the stands, and was just as unstoppable as Klopp afterwards, even without Mo Salah and Darwin, who were unavailable at short notice. “We” – and by that he also meant the fans – “had to ensure a fresh start. And the second half … not that I needed proof, but what this place can do together with a bunch of fantastic footballers is so special. Oh my God. “
“If you don’t limit yourself with negative thoughts, you can fly “
His team successfully “ignored” the fact that so many important players were missing before the game and that so many things didn’t work out in the first half. “If you don’t set yourself limits with negative thoughts, you can fly. And that’s what the boys did today.” Klopp had obviously contributed to the right thoughts himself in the run-up to the game.
“A few months ago, I promised my team that I would never mention or use the Barcelona game again – today I did and broke my promise.” The personnel situation was similar back then, as was the result afterwards. “This is your Barcelona now,” said Klopp blissfully, after hilariously recounting the entire Barcelona game. “I’ll be mentioning this game,” i.e. a supposedly disdainful 4:1 against Luton, “quite often from now on. “
